Legal & Ethical Concerns of Marijuana Advertising on Social Media
Introduction
In 2017, there were a reported 2.8 billion people who used social media, which makes up about 40% of the world’s population. These statistics can be broken down further by individual social media sites: Facebook had a reported 1.9 billion users, Youtube had 1 billion, and Instagram had 600 million. The numbers are sure to rise in the next few years as both the world’s population grows and digital marketing becomes even more prominent. Among the billions of social media users, there is a percentage dedicated to businesses who use social media as part of their marketing strategy. The sheer number of people who use services like Facebook and Instagram on a daily
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However, this has not come without its own set of unique challenges for both marijuana businesses and the attorneys representing them. Although marijuana has been legalized at the state level in several places, it is still federally illegal, which raises some concerns regarding both the legality and the ethicality of advertising marijuana products on social media.
Facebook Algorithms & Monitors: Tracking Illegal Content Facebook in particular has stringent rules regarding what can and can’t be posted on the site. According to their Advertising Policies, businesses cannot promote illegal products; additionally, their Community Standards state that posts may be removed if they do not adhere to community guidelines. How does Facebook track down illegal content? The social media platform relies on both artificial intelligence and people to monitor content that is posted on the site. For example, an algorithm might be programmed to flag posts with the words “pot” or “weed” in them. Human monitors would then review the flagged posts and determine if the content is
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Given Facebook’s inconsistency in monitoring and removing content, there is the potential for misleading or false information on marijuana to be made available, which could have dangerous implications, especially for users that are under 21 years old.
To avoid these issues, some marijuana businesses might choose to share information that is purely educational in tone, carefully avoiding the use of slang terms and making sure all information is accurate.
However, as many in the cannabis industry can attest to, “educational” content does not necessarily mean one’s social media page is safe from being shut down.
State Advertisement Guidelines & Social Media Use For those in the marijuana industry, advertising in any form is a tight rope to walk. It is important for businesses to be aware of the risks involved in advertising on social media, especially advertising that involves a federally illegal
Mekdlawit Demissie IGED 130-06 Informative Speech Outline Topic: Marijuana Speech Goal: To inform the audience about the long and short term effects of marijuana usage. Central Idea: Marijuana is the most commonly used drug amongst young people in the United States. Introduction: I. Attention getter:
Cannabis usage for medical purposes has grown in popularity amongst society, patients, and doctors alike. The marijuana industry is an industry that is relatively new and lots of opportunities to grow within. The company I am creating for an online non-profit venture is called Herbal Remedies Home Delivery. This company is an online site that medical marijuana patients can virtually order medicinal products via web chats to have delivered to their home address from a protected company van. The company will get their products from outside growers and producers and act as a distributer. The company can deliver only to patients within states that have legalized the medical consumption of marijuana products who have proved who they are and that they have valid prescriptions for these products. Herbal Remedies Home Delivery is a nonprofit company that promotes the research and development of cannabis medicinal applications. The company donates excess funds to foundations to keep the industry moving forward. The company strives in educating the public about the medicinal properties of marijuana and how products are used for the benefit of the patients just as any other medicine is prescribed by doctors. Herbal Remedies Home Delivery will supply educational articles on their site to keep society educated in the industry.
...own Facebook account and be “friends” with their students to keep them safe like Boyd recommends. Instead, I believe by talking to students and children about how their posts directly impact their reality is a more effective approach in teaching how to prevent and remedy any inflictions that will be caused by adolescent lapses in judgment. Just as my brother has never posted another indecent photo and learned to limit his online profile content, people do learn from their mistakes. Educators should have an open door policy fortified by trust between themselves and their children in order to guide them in making appropriate decisions.
...y lower the IQ of teen users by up to eight points. With marijuana being easier and easier to get on the streets, medical marijuana is now thrown into this, making most teens simple access to marijuana. Others are concerned that heavy marijuana use will lead to marijuana addiction in the user and a lower quality of life as well as health problems, financial issues and more life problems. The flashy marketing attached to marijuana laced drinks and baked goods appear to be marketed towards teens and this is disturbing to many. There is concern that people who don’t need marijuana prescribed to them will lie to doctors to be able to procure a medical marijuana card, allowing them to legally purchase marijuana. These people could be just selling the medical marijuana instead of using it, or they could be giving it to children and sharing it with friends on the streets.
Marijuana is taken very lightly and is the most highly used illegal drug. In fact, 1 out of 7 high school students smoke marijuana more than once a day. For this reason, society should know its short and long term effects on the brain. Marijuana can effect these two areas emotionally or physically. Also in some cases physical damages causes the emotional response. Although most public information on drugs are funded by anti-drug organizations, hopefully we will still learn these true facts of marijuana in spite of that.
Marijuana, or Cannabis, is a plant that has been in use since ancient times. Cannabis has had significant affects on history and societies throughout the years. It is a plant that can grow in any environment, with the exception of the Arctic Circle. Up until recent years the Cannabis plant has never been looked upon negatively. The debate on Cannabis has started again; with some people thinking that it should be legal and others thinking that it should stay illegal. It is time for people to see Cannabis as what it really is and not as what manipulative advertisements have shown it to be.
For nearly one hundred and fifty years marijuana has been illegal in the United States of America. Though marijuana naturally grew in all of our fifty states, it was outlawed due the superior strength and durability of hemp rope. This threatened to replace cotton rope, which would cost wealthy cotton owners a lot of money. To this day marijuana is still outlawed in the U.S., however rope has nothing to do with it. Once slavery and the “cotton boom” were over hemp made a little bit of a comeback in a smoking form. Then, in the early 1940’s the government began releasing anti-marijuana propaganda. In the 1960’s when marijuana became popular amongst pop-culture, a movie by the name of “Reefer Madness” was released depicting marijuana users as fiends and criminals who’s normal everyday lives fell apart, and spun out of control due to the addiction to the drug. Even in the present day organizations, as well as the government, continue to try and sway people from using the substance by portraying users as irresponsible idiots. Some examples of behaviors portrayed in the commercials are: accidental shootings, running over a little girl on a bike, molesting a passed out girl, supporting terror, and impregnating/becoming impregnated. I feel that these advertisements are ridiculously tasteless and misleading. Through personal experience, surveys, an interview, and a case study I intend to prove that marijuana users do not behave in the fashion that the anti-marijuana campaign ads would suggest, and furthermore, I expect to find that the ads so grossly misrepresent the common user, even those who do not use disagree with the negative portrayals. I also challenge you to think about the suggested situations and behaviors from the commercials, I feel that you’ll see every situation and behavior in the advertisements is much more feasible to a person under the influence of alcohol than under the influence of marijuana.
Marijuana has been widely mis-viewed as a bad thing; society classifies marijuana as a drug, parents warn their children to stay away from marijuana because it is bad; but those are all misconceptions. But in reality, it is actually a very beneficial drug to many degrees. Marijuana actually has numerous favorable effects, such as helping people escape the cruel reality for a moment, helping patients who are almost at the end of their lives feel better, and helping the economy recover. In addition, marijuana’s side effects are all due to human abusing it, like the old saying goes, too much of a good thing can be a bad thing. Although marijuana users have a history of not doing so well in life, marijuana should still be made available to anyone above the legal drinking age and be regulated like tobacco and alcohol; due to its assuaging effects to the economy and human’s mental health.
Unlike a person who uses marijuana for medicine or entertainment, some people use marijuana as a means for income. Honestly marijuana sales is a very profitable business but the problem is that there is still a numerous amount of people who sell marijuana illegally. Usually with illegal sales of marijuana also comes other illegal activity. According to the DEA, “marijuana smuggling into the United States has occurred at consistently high levels over the past 10 years, primarily across the US–Mexico border, where more than a million kilograms of marijuana are seized annually.” With the availability of marijuana increasing there has also been an increase in use among young adults. The DEA also reports, “Use of the drug will likely continue to increase over the next decade; recent national-level studies indicate that use is most prevalent among young adults, with adolescent acceptance and illicit use increasing.”
...ssures to be the best they can be academically. With all these pressures of adolescence on the rise, more and more teens are falling prey to the alluring “high” that allows a temporary leave from their problems and stress. Because teens lack the maturity and knowledge to understand long term consequences, they tend not to think about the down falls that they will face as a result of the drug use. This is especially true when it come to marijuana, as it is seen by so many as the harmless drug. With the increased use of marijuana by youth over the last three decades, it is imperative that better preventative measures, and firmer penalties, be put in place to educate and raise awareness concerning the risks and dangerous side effects that marijuana use can have. Only once society has put these preventative measures in to action, will there be an effective change seen.
Marijuana is the third most common leisure drug in the United States after alcohol and tobacco. Millions of Americans smoke marijuana despite the strict laws against its use. Marijuana is less dangerous compared to tobacco or alcohol. Smoking marijuana can cause breathing problems and coughing just like cigarettes and some people get addicted after using for a while. Regulating and legalizing marijuana will bring Americas greatest cash crop under law, create economic opportunities and jobs in the formal economy as opposed to the underground market. Adopting a legally controlled market for marijuana will ensure that consumers buy the products from a safe and legal source. Marijuana has been approved in some states for medical uses to ease the effects of different health challenges. Colorado and Washington legalized m...
Facebook is traditionally seen as a website which allows for users to upload their own content. Likewise, although it provides space for advertisers, they are responsible for their own content as well. The problem arises that if Facebook allows certain types of content, it is facilitating certain reactions. This is something that Facebook and other websites must consider as they post adverts. Although Facebook is just a portal through which people can post different content, there has to be some accountability with respect to the fact that they are hosting the content on their servers and making it accessible to
Facebook was developed by Mark Zuckerberg who was in college when he created this social media networking website. Zuckerberg’s intentions were much different than what we have expected and grown used to. Facebook has allowed different sites and partner websites in on the user’s private information such as, their interests, location, and age. It has also allowed for many users to cyber bully others and not deal with the consequences after. Many users on Facebook suffer from depression, sadness, anger, jealousy and many other negative feelings. Facebook has caused privacy interferences, behavioral issues, and an overall unsafe environment for its users.
People have been fighting for the legalization of marijuana for a long time. Many people use this drug and find absolutely nothing wrong with it. Others find it disgusting and are opposed to the legalization of it. The earliest use of marijuana was documented in 7000 B.C. The ancient Greeks, Egyptians, and many others used it for medical purposes. Marijuana was first used in the United States during the 1800’s and was banned in 1937 without any reason given by the government except that “it was for our own good” (Block, “Why Marijuana Became Illegal”). Marijuana should be legal everywhere in the world because, although it is highly addictive, marijuana is not as harmful as tobacco and alcohol, having a regulated market for it would reduce the sale and use of it amongst people under the age of eighteen, and the government can save and make money off of it.
As a college student, drugs and alcohol are constantly creating temptations for individuals. In the United States, the problem with marijuana use is increasing. It is “the most used illegal drug in the world, with almost 160 million people, aged fifteen to sixty four, reporting having used marijuana in the last year” (Smith 429). Friends of users and users are constantly surrounded by the drug, but have no idea of the effects. As the years pass, marijuana is being viewed as a “normal” drug and although some disagree, they find no reason to discourage users. Marijuana has serious side effects and with a little knowledge could change the choices of individuals. In order to protect friend, family, and the community, it is necessary to recognize the disadvantages it has on individuals. By the enlarged number of marijuana users in the United States, the negative effects it has on the body, lives of individuals, and legal consequences should cause a realization that marijuana should continue to be illegal and avoided.