Beer is great, don’t get me wrong. And the addition of local pride makes microbrews taste even better.
But alcohol can cause damage to the brain, the heart, the liver and the pancreas through long-term use or by excessive use on a single occasion. It can also lead to vomiting and blackouts in the short-term and cancers of the mouth, esophagus, liver, throat and more in the long-term. Alcohol is a substance with high addiction potential and a low, easily attainable lethal dose.
When the Wyoming House passed House Bill 82, permitting the state’s microbreweries to triple in size before having to deal with expensive consequences of being relabeled a brewery, they were implicitly saying that Wyoming citizens can be trusted to limit their consumption of this deadly substance.
I applaud them for that. As a Wyoming citizen, I want to be trusted with taking care of my own mind and body.
Which is why I’m so offended the same House that passed this bill killed a bill last month that would have decriminalized marijuana.
House Bill 29 would have ended the decades long practice of wasting law enforcement’s time and wasting space in our jails and prisons by locking up nonviolent individuals for possession of a substance that is legal just a few miles south of here.
The bill’s sponsor Cheyenne Representative James Byrd introduced the bill because he recognizes that Wyoming’s archaic drug laws hurt the state’s younger citizens.
“We fill up our jails with young people,” Byrd said, according to a story in the Casper Star Tribune. “We set all sorts of traps for young people. Look at the arrest rates for young people. Look at the arrests for marijuana. We ruin lives.”
Marijuana, for the curious, does not cause damage to the brain, the heart, the liver or the pancreas of healthy adults. It does not induce vomiting or blackouts. It does not cause cancer of any kind. It has a low addiction potential and no one has ever overdosed on marijuana.
But God forbid the House trust us with such a dangerous substance.
House Bill 82 is not bad because it allows microbreweries to expand and grow. It’s bad because it reflects how, in Wyoming, decisions are made based on ignorance and financial gain. Let’s start making laws based on science and with a mind to public health.
Attack weed and alcohol together, or help both industries grow in our state. But don’t encourage the spread of the toxic while maligning the non-toxic.
