Legalization of Marijuana and Effect on Future Generations

The environment and sustainability have become increasingly important topics in today’s society, meaning that their consideration is necessary in most ethical debates. The ethical issue regarding sustainability is whether it is ethical to legalize marijuana in order to preserve the environment. The current illegality of marijuana leads to many covert, unregulated grow-operations. Many of these operations are done indoors for secrecy purposes; this has the adverse effect of exhaustion of energy. In 2012 it was estimated that “1% of U.S. electricity consumption [was due] to indoor cannabis grow-ops” ("The Environmental Benefits of a Legal Marijuana Industry"). Also, these indoor grow operations were “associated with producing 15 million metric tons of CO2” pollution (Green). The outdoor operations are not any better as “they destroy the forests” in which they grow through exhaustion in the form of deforestation, as well as degradation in the form of soil erosion (Green). The shift to legal production by distributors results in forcing “producers toward sun growing” and will ultimately result in “a corresponding reduction in electrical use and a significant reduction in carbon dioxide emissions” (Green). Along with remedying the faults of illegal growing, legalization would result in grow-operations of a vastly larger scale, which means that more plant life will be added to the environment. “The nature of the [marijuana] plant enables it to absorb incredible amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere” ("Using Hemp to Halt Climate Change"). In addition, the plant does “not only absorb carbon dioxide, but it puts much of it into the soil,” which “enhances the soil” ("Using Hemp to Halt Climate Change"). However, the one n...

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...e generations. This was done by analyzing the ethical issues regarding risk, gender, and sustainability. From the perspective of distributors, the more ethical choice of the two extremes would be legalization of marijuana on a federal level. However, this choice does not result in the best possible outcome; instead the best solution would be decriminalization of marijuana and legalization of medical marijuana. The changes we will see in the future regarding this issue will “be shaped be whether the various experiments with legalization, decriminalization, and medical marijuana are deemed successes or failures” (Dionne and Galston). The ethical cycle clearly shows that there is never a definite course of action that should be taken, but through deliberation and analysis using the ethical theories, one is able to produce the best solution given the circumstances.