Charlo Greene is a cannabis activist, media and culture expert. She became a leader in cannabis activism in September 2014 when she publicly left her career as a news anchor to dedicate her life to fighting for cannabis reform with the famous “fuck it, I quit” resignation heard around the world.
Since leaving journalism, Charlo successfully launched the Alaska Cannabis Club, Alaska’s first and only legal marijuana resource, acting as CEO. The Club is the only safe access point for patients in Alaska and serves as the example for other prospective businesses in the region and the go-to source of accurate information for area policy makers and law enforcement.
Interview Charlo Greene Expogrow (Irun) 2015
Transcript of interview Charlo Green:
Charlo, thank you very much for sharing your time with us and…how are you doing? Are you enjoying the fair?
This is my first Expogrow, my first time in Europe, let alone Spain and…it’s incredible!
I love what you guys are doing here, I’m surprised how rich the cannabis culture is.
Thank you. It’s been almost one year since you said “Fuck it, I quit”...how did you feel?
Hahahahaha! In that moment?
I felt like I was closing the door on one chapter of my life, like quitting a job but going into my purpose, and beginning exactly what I was supposed to be doing, so a year later I’ve absolutely no regrets, I mean I’m standing here with you, in Spain…that’s crazy!
For sure! And…as owner of an Alaskan cannabis club,
what do you think about the right of people to be able to grow their own marijuana at home?
Well I think that is essential, especially when you’re looking to pass new legislation measure, and has something in there that protects the right of individual citizens especially medical marijuana patients – to grow their own cannabis, to look over what’s going into the plants, they’ll be consuming for recreational or medicinal purposes,
I think that’s of the utmost importance.
I guess we can all imagine but…how did you feel when a police officer pointed at you with a gun?
I think that…what we have to also keep in mind when we recall the raid the 2 raids - that were executed on the Alaskan Cannabis Club,
is the fact that we were one month after the majority of Alaskans voters had decided that we needed to legalize recreational marijuana, so this sort of thing wouldn’t be happening, so one month after the kick’s in, here are a dozen officers with huge machine guns, pointing them in my face, my brother and sisters faces and the faces of the patients that were coming to find a safe access…
it’s disgusting, and it’s disturbing, and its disheartening to know that even when there is a way for citizens to make a change, the powers that be still are able to come in and try to tear you down…
its disheartening but, at the same time it only motivates me to continue fighting that much more because, if they can do this, in a state, in a country where we can choose this isn’t the right way, then imagine what everyone else around the world is going through.
I have to keep fighting, so that’s all it did, give me more gas. We all have to keep on fighting, sure!
Do laws on drugs have something to do with Justice?
Of course! I mean…if we were to look back at where marijuana prohibition began... it doesn’t make any sense.
It didn’t make any sense then, it doesn’t make sense now, especially now that we have Ipads and the Internet to look up the statistics: Is marijuana prohibition working? No it’s not.
Is loking up law abiding citizens for responsibly consuming a substance that is unarguably safer than alcohol, safer than coffee, safer than sugar?
No it doesn’t make sense so, why are we doing this? It’s injustice.
And in the US it’s very clear that one of the driving forces behind marijuana prohibition is the racist root of it, something to keep down blacks and Hispanics which evolved to just include all poor people.
If you’re poor, and we can fine you with this, then this is a way to make sure that you don’t get financially to go to college and become something more than what you are.
This is a way to make sure that when things are going wrong
don’t get government assistance, so you hit rock bottom.
It’s, it’s…it’s sad, it’s sad when you look at all of it but again that’s why we have to keep fighting, because we know these things and while everyone else might not, we have a responsibility to do something about it.
Anything else you would like to say to the cannabis community?
Just keep on fighting, change is happening so quickly, and so many people are being woken up.
Use social media, use the Internet, make sure that the mainstream media isn’t controlling the message put out by the Government any longer… that’s what “Fuck it, I quit” did.
Like while I was a journalist, I saw the dirty tricks the prohibitionists were playing, saying “Well, you should be scared because of this, we can’t do this because of...”
No! None of that was based on science, we have the facts now.
If you look at Uruguay, and you look at Colorado and Washington,
the first two states in the USA to legalize, you see every fear that the prohibitionists throw out, they are to get a reaction from people that are as involved in politics and amusing what’s happening, all of it is...it’s bullshit!
And so it’s our responsibility to hold our journalists responsible,
and to spread the truth ourselves, and continue having conversations with our neighbors, our friends, our family members,
so they know there is an injustice going on, and when you get a chance to change it, everyone steps up to do so.
Charlo, thank you very much for sharing your time and just...keep on fighting!
Absolutely, thank you for having me, thank you!
