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Marc Emery Gets His Money Back
By Ted | April 6, 2002
By Ted Smith
Founder,
Cannabis Buyers’ Clubs Of Canada
Recently I hosted the 3rd Annual Cannabis Convention in Victoria, an event
which may have been the best of it’s kind in Canadian history. However, there
was one awkward moment which should be further explained to everyone who might
not have witnessed it, especially because the video is not yet available. This
moment occured when I gave Marc Emery $100 to begin repaying him money that he
had originally given the Cannabis Buyers Clubs of Canada after the raid of Jan
3, 2002.
Despite all of his contributions to the movement and his seemingly generous
donations, there are several legal and political reasons why the CBC of C
cannot accept handouts from Mr. Emery and/or the B.C. Marijuana Party. This
is in part because it appears as though Mr. Emery is using the B.C. Marijuana
Party to forward a political agenda which I have been on record as being
opposed to. Despite calling him a liar and an opportunist last summer in the
public e-mail battle we had, Marc came through with first a $1000 donation to
the club and later a $2000 cheque for my lawyer after the police raided the
club. While the money seemed to come from Marc personally at first, with no
strings attached, soon after I invited Marc to attend to Cannabis Convention
it became clear that Mr. Emery and the B.C. Marijuana Party were prepared to
railroad over me in the name of the movement.
The final straw broke when we saw the Monday Magazine advertisement which
claimed the B.C. Marijuana Party was sponsoring the convention, with no mention
of Hempology 101 or the CBC of C. While I was given credit for being the host,
the only pleasure I received from seeing the ad was knowing that they had just
glorified their biggest and most dangerous critic. Over the phone Marc told me
I should be extremely grateful for his assistance, that he has helped or
started every medical marijuana club in the country now (which is not true) and
that I should stop causing problems in the movement.
While I recognize that Mr. Emery has probaly done more to help the cannabis
movement that just about anyone in history, he has, at the same time, done a
number of things which I believe have caused unnecessary harm to individuals
and the cannabis movement in general. While we seem to agree that the laws
prohibiting the use of cannabis are wrong, we don’t really agree on a wide
variety of other political and economic issues. He perceives me to be a
left-wing, communist, pain-in-the-ass, which means he considers himself a
right-wing, capitalist, pain-in-the-neck, a seperation I am more than happy to
live with. He has acted like a tyrant ever since he became involved in the
cause, but after the B.C. Marijuana Party formed he went off the deep end.
Unfortunately the prince of pot has become the prince of potaganda, and his
dangerous rhetoric is undermining the credibility of all middle-class pot
smokers.
So while it may take a while to repay Marc, especially if the cops keep robbing
the store, the fact is that the second payment is soon on the way and the rest
will come as soon as possible because I don’t want this hanging over my head
any longer than it has to. It is not like he really needs the money but we do
need to maintain our crediblity, something we will not do if it appears that we
are in the back pocket of Mr. Emery. We will keep our business seperate from
his politics as much as possible. While some may consider this debating
within the movement to be counter-productive, it should be recognized that
about 60% of the population of Canada agrees cannabis should be legal and that
these people represent a wide diversity of cultures. The idea that the entire
cannabis community will totally agree with each other and work together all of
the time is not only unreasonable but would mean that humans are shallow and
conforming towards one way of life. I believe that our diversity, as a species
and within the cannabis activist communities, is our biggest strength. While I
wish Mr. Emery the best in his endeavors, I truly believe that I am better off
going my own direction.
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