T<\/span>abloid newspapers are still thriving in the United Kingdom. A full-fledged \u201cnewspaper war,\u201d begun when the members of Monty Python were still in university, is raging on\u00a0well into the digital century.\u00a0This is not a good thing \u2014 especially because the two largest papers appear to be biased against cannabis.<\/p>\n A quick glance at the top two in the competition reveals the direction the race is headed. The top-selling paper in the country is the Rupert Murdoch-owned\u00a0The Sun,\u00a0a certifiable rumor-mill<\/a>\u00a0that owes its profile to its cheerful willingness to print whatever will gain attention, and is most notable today for\u00a0its abject shamelessness<\/a>. Right behind The\u00a0Sun\u00a0is the\u00a0Daily Mail.\u00a0<\/em>Its owner is a member of the country\u2019s landed gentry, who inherited both its title and the paper.<\/p>\n As befits two similar products vying for a similar share of the market, the papers share another quality in common besides format, editorial slant and disinterest in serious, in-depth, meaningful news coverage. They both reliably print anti-marijuana fearmongering \u2014 and they are so committed to stamping out the spectre of weed from their noble island that they are more than willing to break journalism\u2019s fourth wall, and become part of the story themselves.<\/p>\n An example:\u00a0Facebook has a new product called \u201cWatch.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0It\u2019s a streaming-video service, sort of like Netflix \u2014 but without the high-quality, movie-studio or self-produced content.\u00a0One of these\u00a0 reality shows<\/a>, watchable by users as young as 13, is called \u201cEdibles Will,\u201d and, The Sun\u00a0intoned<\/a>, is \u201cdedicated to teaching people how to use suspicious herbs in their cooking.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s unclear how exposure to a cooking show involving a psychoactive plant is any different from a young child stumbling onto a show extolling the virtues of wine or\u00a0a digital copy of psychedelic bible \u201cThe Teachings of Don Juan.\u201d\u00a0<\/a>The average Anthony Bourdain broadcast has more scandalous content \u2014 and more appeal. But there \u201cEdibles Will\u201d was, and The\u00a0Sun\u00a0dutifully shone upon it. Facebook the took the content down, apologized and swore it would never happen again.<\/p>\n The anti-marijuana bias in the tabloid media, British legalization advocates say, in turn plays a key role in shaping public opinion \u2014 and reversing what gains have been made on marijuana policy.\u00a0Cannabis was briefly a\u00a0Class C drug in the UK<\/a>, the least-serious of the country\u2019s three categories,\u00a0before it was returned to Class B in 2009,<\/a> in a move critics called\u00a0an \u201cillogical\u201d \u201cfarce.\u201d<\/p>\n And so, the UK has some of the toughest drug laws<\/a> of any of the Western European democracies, places most Americans associate with free healthcare, good schools and generally liberal policies.<\/p>\n Though Labour leader and left-wing hero Jeremy Corbyn has said he wants to decriminalize cannabis, neither of the UK\u2019s two major political parties appear much interested in spending much political capital in changing this state of affairs. Labour has other things to worry about \u2014 and the in-power Tory government is just fine with the status quo.<\/p>\n United Patients Association organizer Jon Liebling told me that one of the goals of the \u201cCannabis Tea Party\u201d outside Westminster<\/a>, the seat of the UK\u2019s government, was to get the media \u2014 aka the Daily Mail \u2014 to get up and take notice.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Daily Mail seems very keen\u201d to perpetuate \u201cany stigma at all,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Liebling predicted the newspaper\u2019s reaction correctly.\u00a0The\u00a0<\/em>Evening Standard<\/a> \u2014 owned as it is by a sacked member of government who has his own political vendettas \u2014 did a write-up of the protest. The Sun and the Mail were nowhere to be found.<\/p>\n TELL US,<\/strong> do you think newspapers should police social media for marijuana-related content?<\/p>\n The post UK Papers Are Policing Social Media for Marijuana References<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Cannabis legalization advocates in the UK say that constant negative stories on cannabis from The Sun and the Daily Mail are inhibiting the drug\u2019s legalization. Tabloid newspapers are still thriving in the United Kingdom. A full-fledged \u201cnewspaper war,\u201d begun when the members of Monty Python were still in university, isContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[50,80,574,119,2190],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20695"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20695"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20696,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20695\/revisions\/20696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\nRead More: UK Papers Are Policing Social Media for Marijuana References<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"