Alcoholic beverages are normally being consumed for their taste, marijuana is being consumed to get high ... which in my mind puts it right in league with any other drug.
This is an ignorant, uninformed, inaccurate and offensive statement, in which every single word within is incorrect. So much so in fact, that I feel the need to bring this baby out of retirement.
First off, nobody drinks Budweiser or Coors for the taste. Nobody. When I was in my twenties, I bought the cheapest beer I could to get drunk. I didn't care about the taste. The various rot guts out there are produced for only one purpose, and it is not to titillate the taste buds.
Furthermore, after working for over 3 years in the legal marijuana industry of the state of Washington, I can tell you that there are reasons other than simply "getting high" that people buy marijuana. Not that there's anything wrong with getting high. People will come in and buy joints or flower simply because they want to relax after work, the same reason someone might buy a 12 pack of (ew) Budweiser after work. Many of my customers prefer the THC experience to that of alcohol. Alcohol will leave them with hangovers and result in loss of control, while marijuana only relaxes a person, opens their minds and increases their appetite. I've never seen anybody lose control of their anger or get violent while under the influence of cannabis. The only thing in danger around someone under the influence of cannabis is a bag of doritos.
And the medicinal benefits are real. I get customers who have issues with pain, stress, anxiety and sleeplessness that seek out products heavy in cannabinoids such as CBD, CBN and CBG. I once helped the customer who is on prescription opioids for pain, and she came into the store saying that the opioids had taken over her life and that she had heard about the benefits of cannabis products and asked another budtender and me if we could help her. We introduced her to various edibles and tinctures, wished her the best of luck and sent her on her way. A few weeks later, she came into the store looking and sounding so much happier and said "thank you for giving me my life back". Just as James Doohan once said that helping a suicidal young woman out of her suicidal state was the best thing he had ever done in his life, I consider helping this woman to be one of the best things I've done with my life.
And let us consider the case of Charlotte Figi, a young girl who suffered up to 300 seizures a week until being given doses of CBD oil. Sadly, Charlotte died all too young anyway, but what life she did get to live, she lived free of seizures thanks to the medicinal properties of the cannabis plant.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlotte_Figi
So, kindly and please take your debunked and outdated "Reefer Madness" crapaganda and shove it up your most convenient bodily orifice.