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Dr Lester Grinspoon Pases Away
Thursday 25 Jun 2020 https://www.worldofcannabis.museum/post/lester-grinspoon-obituary Dr. Lester Grinspoon, Associate Professor Emeritus at Harvard University and the godfather of the medical marijuana movement, has died. He passed away peacefully this morning, at his home in the suburbs of Boston with his wife of 66 years Betsy at his side, after just having celebrated his 92nd birthday yesterday. Born June 24, 1928, in Newton, Massachusetts, Grinspoon attended nearby Harvard Medical School, where he received his doctorate in Psychiatry and went on to teach for decades before retiring in 2000 as an associate professor. Dr. Grinspoon is the author of over 150 articles in various scientific journals, as well as twelve books, including two on cannabis: Marijuana, The Forbidden Medicine in 1993, and the classic Marihuana Reconsidered in 1971, which to this day is hailed as a landmark in medical marijuana research and advocacy. “He’s one of the most important people in the history of marijuana reform,” notes former associate publisher of High Times and World of Cannabis advisory board member Rick Cusick. “His book started the movement.” When he began work on Marihuana Reconsidered in 1967, his original intention was to study marijuana’s harmful effects and caution people of its dangers. But after thorough research—and with the counsel of his dear friend (and closeted cannabis enthusiast) Carl Sagan—Dr. Grinspoon eventually determined that "there was little empirical evidence to support my beliefs about the dangers of marijuana," and instead became one of the plant’s most respected and outspoken advocates. “I have concluded,” he later wrote, “that marijuana is a relatively safe intoxicant which is not addicting, does not in and of itself lead to the use of harder drugs, is not criminogenic, and does not lead to sexual excess,” also noting that the only real harm associated with cannabis was, in his opinion, “the way we as a society were dealing with people who use it.” Interestingly, Dr. Grinspoon had never actually tried cannabis until two years after the book’s publishing, around the time he began using it to help his young son Danny, who was dying of leukemia and suffering the ill effects of chemotherapy. Marihuana Reconsidered was never embraced by Harvard, whose faculty disdained it as “too controversial.” In fact, it is widely believed that the administration’s bias towards cannabis and Dr. Grinspoon’s embrace of it was the reason he was twice denied promotion to full professorship status there. He was, however, enthusiastically embraced by the cannabis community. He served on the board of National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws since its early days and is credited with helping to rescue it after a scandal associated with the Carter Administration led to executive director Keith Stroup having to step down in 1979, and again in 1994 when the board became too divided to function effectively. Dr. Grinspoon also appeared as an expert witness in a number of legal proceedings and congressional committees to testify on behalf of legalization, including the deportation hearings of rock icon John Lennon. In 1990, Dr. Grinspoon received the Alfred R. Lindesmith Award for Achievement in the Field of Scholarship and Writing from the Drug Policy Foundation. He’s also had two awards named after him—NORML’s Lester Grinspoon Award (their highest honor), and High Times’ Lester Grinspoon Award for Lifetime Achievement. He’s even had a cannabis strain named after him—“Dr. Grinspoon,” a pure sativa heirloom strain released in 2010 by Barney’s Farm in Amsterdam. “We have lost an intellectual giant, the individual who defined our mission of legalizing marijuana,” commented Stroup. We at World of Cannabis would like to extend our deepest sympathies to Dr. Grinspoon’s family. He left the world on pretty much the same day he came into it—an extraordinary end to a truly extraordinary life. His legacy and memory will never be forgotten. Marijuana Heroes- Dr Lester Grinspoon https://steemit.com/marijuana/@spellmaker/marijuana-heroes-1-dr-lester-grinspoon Every year millions of people are put into jail for using a natural healing plant that could be grown in every backyard. Imagine if the government banned the peppermint tea and replaced it with synthetic tea with a peppermint taste. It's just the same. We have been given a plant with so many usages that it's absurd to put a ban on it. While the government is still hiding the truth about this plant making millions of dollars from the cancer industry (I call it as an industry because if we were all knowing about the way our bodies work and what is it that we need, cancer wouldn't be an issue) we are waking up as humans and truth seekers. We no longer believe what they say on TV. Most of us don't even watch TV anymore. We are basing our views from a personal experience without believing some government tale. We are the change that we want to see in the world. Compassionate and understanding human beings. But that's not what I wanted to talk about today. I want to talk about a person. A father. A professor. A psychiatrist and a truth seeker. A real marijuana hero. Doctor Lester Grinspoon Lester Grinspoon was born in the year of 1928 in Newton, Massachusetts. He graduated from Tufts University and Harvard Medical School. He is the father of four and a grandfather of five. He is still rocking today and the things he has done to cannabis community are something we should be grateful for. How did it start for him? In 1966 through a shared involvement in anti-Vietnam War activities, I met Carl Sagan and we eventually became close friends. He was the first person I had ever met who used marijuana. As a sometimes arrogant young doctor who believed he knew something of the dangers of cannabis, I warned him of its harmfulness and urged him to stop using it. He took another puff from his joint and then held it toward me and said, “Lester, have a puff, it’s harmless and you will enjoy it.” This was another amazing fact for me. He was close friends with Carl Sagan who was an active cannabis smoker. By the way - here are 7 Quotes Making Carl Sagan A Cannabis Hero Carl Sagan and Lester Grinspoon As I met more of his friends, and they were not unsophisticated people, I discovered that most were also cannabis-users .This began to trouble me; in fact, it compelled me to question the basis for my firmly held belief in its harmfulness. By 1967 I found myself in the Countway library searching for the medical and scientific basis for the marijuana prohibition which was enacted in 1937; now, thirty years later, it had been responsible for many annual arrests, mostly of young people. It was not long before I had my first cannabis epiphany in the Countway library: marijuana was, in fact, remarkable for its lack of toxicity, and the harmfulness surrounding cannabis was not to be found in its psychopharmacology, but rather in the way we as a society were dealing with people who use it. At that time it was responsible for about 300,000 arrests annually; that figure had been rising annually to its apogee of almost 900,000 in 2011; it is now declining and at present is about 700,000, 89% for mere possession. He Wrote "Marijuana Reconsidered" Before Even Trying It For The First Time Well, here’s what happened. I was writing a book on schizophrenia. I finished my part — this is a seven-year study of schizophrenia — my co-writers told me that they were going to be 2-3 months behind the scheduled time. Now that was 1967, which incidentally was the same year that my son was diagnosed with leukemia. I was just concerned all these young people using this terribly dangerous drug marijuana. I went to the Harvard Library and said I was going to put this material together in a scientifically sound, hopefully objective way, which would hopefully be useful to some of these young people. I wanted to get it published in a vehicle that would reach college students and perhaps some of them would pay attention because I would demonstrate why the government is saying this. Well, I was absolutely amazed that despite my training in science and medicine, I discovered that I had been brainwashed like every other citizen in this country. I published a paper in The International Journal of Psychiatry -– it was about 80 pages long — but that was not a vehicle for college students. But Scientific American saw it and approached me and said, “Can you do a short version of that? It was published as the lead article in the December 1969 issue or something like that. Then Harvard University Press asked, “Look, you’ve already done an 80 page paper, expand it by three or four times and we’ll make it look like a book.” So I thought, “Hey, what the heck?” Well, it turns out that while marijuana is not addicting, learning about it is. I spent a couple of years really – you know the important thing to me was to have it ready. They agreed — I wanted to have it for Danny while he was still here. It was the one thing of my work that Danny was interested in. As much as the book was loved by cannabis smokers and others, it was too controversial for Harvard and the scientific community getting his promotion turned down. By 1975 when Jack Ewalt announced that he was going to put me up for early promotion I cheerfully went about revising my curriculum vitae to fit the style demanded by the Promotions Committee and happily anticipated the day when the decision would be made. That day came about a month or so later when his secretary called and asked me to come to his office. As we exchanged greetings there was something in his voice which suggested bad news. "They turned you down" “They did?" (With constrained surprise) “Yes” "Can you tell me why?" "They like your work in general, and they loved the schizophrenia book, but they hated Marihuana Reconsidered." “They hated it? What did they hate about it?" (I was stunned). “They said it is too controversial” “Too controversial! What should that have to do with it? Aren’t we all in the Academy? What did they think of the scholarship?” Jack then held out his hands toward me with his palms up, “Hey, don’t blame me; I’m just the messenger.” Personal Use His son Danny had cancer and it was on of the reasons he was so addicted to researching cannabis all this time. I finally tried it in 1972 or ’73, sometime around when Danny did it for the first time. You know I remember the day very well because in testimony at that time, I was very often not always asked, “Have you ever used marijuana?” I was able to say no, but then there was one – in fact it was before this Massachusetts Legislative Committee and this very hostile Senator said to me, “Dr. Grinspoon, do you use marijuana? Have you ever used marijuana?” I said to him finally, “Look Senator, I’d be glad to answer that question, but first would you tell me if I answer affirmatively would that make my testimony more or less credible to you?” He got so pissed. He told me I was being impertinent and he stood up and walked out of the hearing. I came home and I said to Betsy, “You know, the time has come…. Let’s try it.” You know, every time we went to a party the Cambridge people would offer it to us, and people would often say, “You mean to say you wrote a book on marijuana and you’ve never used it?” I’d say, “Well I wrote a book on schizophrenia and I never tried that either.” From the very beginning I was open about my use. Over the course of more than four decades of personal use I have learned much more; for example, before 1973 I believed that there were two large, somewhat conflated, categories of its usefulness; Recreation and Medicine. It’s now been years since I came to believe that there is a third category, one I call Enhancement, the enhancement of a variety of human capacities. I have never hidden my belief that I have profited in all three of these domains. Bright Look On The Future Of Cannabis Since the year 2000, I have continued to write from my home office. Over the ensuing years I heard little from HMS other than perfunctory announcements of meetings and speakers, and appeals for funds. Then, in 2013 I received an invitation to write a short piece on cannabinopathic medicine for Harvard Medicine. For a moment I excitedly thought that, finally, the medical school was catching up with a modern, data-based understanding of cannabis as a medicine and that perhaps I was being rehabilitated. But, alas, the piece was to be published alongside one which would express a counter view (as though I were writing on evolution and that demanded a companion piece on creationism). Shortly thereafter, I was invited to give a talk on marijuana as a medicine at the Talks at Twelve, a program which was held at noon to facilitate attendance by people from the medical school proper and all of the associated teaching hospitals. Again, I was disappointed that I would have only a fraction of the hour because there was to be a presentation of a position to counter mine by Dr. Kevin Hill who also wrote the “counter” piece for Harvard Medicine; He heads up the Drug Rehabilitation Center at the McLean Hospital. Each of us was allowed 20 minutes so that there would be time for questions. The auditorium was overflowing, mostly with younger people and very few people of my generation. However, two of the latter made their presence known during the question period. A senior pediatrician expressed, somewhat angrily, his belief that cannabis was dangerous to young people because brain development continued until the early twenties; for that reason what I was doing was harmful to young people because I was reducing their fear of marijuana. It wasn’t exactly a question but I replied that I had never advocated for its legal availability to people under 21. The other older person who was sitting in the second row and who could barely contain herself in attracting the attention of the chair, just stood up and began a long diatribe about how harmful my position was. Her language was stunningly acerbic. After the first minute or two it became obvious that she was not interested in asking a question and I expected the chair to gently interrupt her and ask her to state her question, but she did not and the speaker went on with her castigation. The substance of her nasty words revealed her to be a true “cannabis creationist”. This was confirmed when I learned that she was Dr. Bertha Madras, Professor of Neurobiology and a former Deputy Director for Demand Reduction in the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, a Presidential appointment in the George W. Bush Administration. The chair terminated the program on the hour but asked us if we could stay to answer questions. There were two people who came forward to ask Dr. Hill questions and he was through in a couple of minutes. There were several dozen enthusiastic young to middle-age people in line who wished to ask me a question, just say hello, autograph a book or ask his neighbor to take an iPhone picture of the two of us. For me, this was the most reassuring 35 minutes of the experience. It gave me hope that with the passing of my generation that the anti-cannabis culture, which permeates Harvard Medical School and allopathic medicine in general, will disappear and medical students and physicians will have the opportunity to learn what this remarkably non-toxic and versatile medicine has to offer. I continue to believe that Harvard Medical School is a great institution, the best; but it disappointed me when it failed itself in violating its obligation to academic freedom.
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