Who Knew That Insisting All Cannabis is Medical Would Confuse So Many?
A cannabis law blog doubles down on the claim that real weed can get you arrested in Thailand. I show where they go wrong, and how easy it is to misunderstand Thailand's innovations.
These two posts are worth reading because they represent how difficult Thai legal cannabis is to comprehend for minds possessed by the legalistic distinction between medical and recreational use:
Last month we weighed in on Thailand becoming the first country in Southeast Asia to decriminalize cannabis. We’ve seen some bad reporting on this since then, along the lines of “weed is legal in Thailand!” The new Thai regime is not that progressive, but we still feel that Thailand has taken a step in the right direction.
Thus begins this week’s blog post from the Canna Law Blog, one of the more serious resources of its genre.
The post is a warning to would-be cannabis tourists that the only cannabis that is legal in Thailand is that which has a THC content of .02 percent, that is, essentially, hemp, not the dried flowers with a natural THC content that is legal in countries like Canada, Mexico and South Africa.
The link in the opening sentence is to an earlier blog post by another attorney from the same firm (Harris-Bricken) who, the week before wrote:
…the recreational use of cannabis remains illegal, even in the case of low-THC cannabis. The Thai authorities have issued clear warnings in this regard, with the country’s health minister telling tourists to stay away if they are looking “to smoke joints freely.”
In Thailand, as of the 9th of June 2022, possession of cannabis flowers is legal. Why is that so hard to understand?
Carrying a bag of weed with natural amounts of THC is as legal as walking down the street with a bag of basil leaves. So, to say “weed is legal in Thailand!” is not bad reporting. It is a simple truth. Sitting on the street corner and smoking a pipe of weed is not legal, just as emptying a sack of basil leaves into a heap on the street corner and lighting it ablaze is illegal. In both of these latter cases, the crime committed would be stupidity.
Two Thai women smoking real weed in a discreet area, not bothering a soul
Listen to what the health minister says to foreigners “looking to smoke joints freely”. He says to “stay away”. He does not say that they would be locked away.
And this is what so few analysts, especially those whose thinking is framed in western law, have gotten their heads around. Medical weed is, among other things, a question of etiquette and good judgment. Weed as medicine is consumed with a certain mindset. You do not smoke medical weed on the street corner. This is the point the Thai minister of health wants you to understand.
The health minister also said this on the day cannabis was legalized:
We have taken away the stigma of Ganja so it can be used once again for health, don’t sit at home smoking Ganja and smiling, getting nothing done.
He did not threaten arrest. He emphasized rather that anyone can grow Ganja at home after registering on the Thai Ganja app (which takes about 4 minutes). If you are getting way too high for no good reason and sitting stoned like a fork on a shelf, you are abusing Ganja. Don’t do that.
The only threat is that you will be arrested if you smoke Ganja in crowded public places, where you are likely to bother people, in which case you run the risk of getting arrested for bothering people.
It is true, as the latest post in the Canna Law Blog says, that government “is only just now drafting regulations to dictate the use, production, and sale of the plant.”
The most important aspects of these coming regulations will be the policies for cultivators and suppliers who require guidance for importing and exporting. It is highly unlikely however, that they will stamp out pure dried cannabis flowers. In doing so, they would be writing the death sentence for cannabis in Thailand.
Were they to do so, the private dispensaries that are popping up across Thailand, along with the nearly 1000 state-sponsored ones, would be forced to close, or be doomed to close for lack of business, because of the prohibition of the one product that the public finds most attractive, i.e., dried cannabis flowers with nature’s mix of CBD and THC.
Right now you can pack your weed in your luggage when you fly anywhere in the country — or just keep it in your pocket. No, you cannot smoke weed at the airport, but who in their right mind would attempt to?
I invite the lawyers who write the posts on Canna Law Blog to come to Thailand and see for themselves how legalized weed with Thai characteristics works. It is more progressive than they think. Given their advocacy of and for legal cannabis, they would surely be happily surprised.