For the Culture By The Culture
Every October, the machine cranks up the same show. New slogans, old fear. This year’s “October surprise” is quieter Red Ribbon Week, a vape bust, and a shrinking drug war pretending to roar. Pot Culture Magazine cuts through the noise and exposes how America’s favorite crusade still feeds itself on panic and nostalgia.
A hundred years after the 1925 International Opium Convention first outlawed cannabis, prohibition still stands as one of the biggest policy failures in modern history. From colonial fear and racist propaganda to Nixon’s drug war and global treaties, the cost has been human lives, stolen freedom, and wasted truth. The plant survived. The lies didn’t.
In Part Two of our exclusive interview with former High Times Magazine Editor-in-Chief Chris Simunek, the conversation turns raw. From outlaw growers and underground legends to lost friends and a culture gutted by greed, Simunek reflects on the rise and fall of cannabis journalism. This is not nostalgia. This is what the movement lost when legalization cashed in.
Massachusetts health officials report a surge in pediatric cannabis ER visits, but the real culprit is the unregulated hemp gray market. Candy-lookalike edibles and weak enforcement fuel fear while licensed operators take the blame. Pot Culture Magazine cuts through the panic to expose how prohibitionist loopholes and corporate spin create the danger.
For decades, junk science has fueled cannabis prohibition, from bogus chromosome scares to today’s clickbait about weed causing diabetes. Despite billions in tax revenue and no overdose deaths, scare studies dominate headlines while real-world data proves otherwise. This piece exposes how research funding, media bias, and political agendas keep cannabis criminalized against all evidence.
Hawaii sells itself as paradise, but when it comes to cannabis, the islands are locked in prohibition. Lawmakers have teased legalization for decades, only to betray voters and bow to cops, lobbyists, and fear. With over 70% of Hawaiians supporting legalization, the hypocrisy is glaring. Paradise is freedom, yet a joint in Waikīkī can still mean court.
