A PhD researcher analyzed over 3 million Reddit comments from 2009-2019 to understand how conversations about cannabis legalization evolved and influenced policy changes. The study found that "character judgements" of prohibitionists, which framed them in a negative light, were more influential in shifting views than personal anecdotes about cannabis use. Additionally, discussions about how to regulate cannabis were less important than simply advocating for legalization. The researcher concludes that character judgements may have convinced those on the fence about legalization by simplifying the complex issue into a matter of personal principles regarding prohibitionists.

1. 12/28/21, 11:35 AM What Two Themes Help Get Cannabis Legalized in So Many States So Quickly? - A PhD Paper Looks at How It Happened
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THEMES TO MARIJUANA LEGALIZATION
What Two Themes Help Get Cannabis
Legalized in So Many States So Quickly? -
A PhD Paper Looks at How It Happened
How did weed go from illegal to legal in so many states in such a short time historically speaking.
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2. 12/28/21, 11:35 AM What Two Themes Help Get Cannabis Legalized in So Many States So Quickly? - A PhD Paper Looks at How It Happened
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https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/rnotwy/a_brown_university_researcher_used_machine/
(https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/rnotwy/a_brown_university_researcher_used_machine/)
The history of cannabis re-legalization is documented online and now a researcher used machine learning to discover
what kinds of posts actually influenced legalization. As someone who has written their fair share of cannabis posts over
the years, I was interested in seeing which of my posts actually had some influence in the grand scheme of things.
The research comes from Babak Hemmation, a researcher from Brown University who was working on his Ph.D.
dissertation and analyzed over 3 million Reddit Comments from 2009 – 2019 to analyze how the conversations on social
media platforms evolved alongside legalization efforts.
The paper entitled, “Taking the High Road: A Big Data Investigation of Natural Discourse in the Emerging U.S. Consensus
about Marijuana Legalization” shed some interesting insights on what type of posts had the most impact on legalization
and how these posts changed once the plant was legalized.
“Marijuana legalization is a highly unusual topic in how a bipartisan consensus was reached in a matter of years while the
American society was otherwise becoming more polarized,” Hemmatian told Marijuana Moment.
(https://www.marijuanamoment.net/researcher-uses-reddit-to-learn-what-kinds-of-marijuana-posts-influenced-
legalization-attitudes/) “I wanted to know if the way the public discusses marijuana facilitated this unusual shift, and how the
societal change in attitudes in turn affected how we talk about cannabis.”
It turns out that “Character Judgements” were major precursors to legalization. Essentially, posts that framed
Prohibitionists in a negative light helped more in shaping people’s views on cannabis legalization than personal
anecdotes. Personal anecdotes talked about how cannabis helped them cope with whatever ails them.
Therefore, it seems that “shaming the opposition” actually had a more significant impact. Nonetheless, anecdotes were
used to beef up character judgements. For example, “Prohibitionists are cold hearted bastards (character judgement)
because they want to prohibit people’s access to medicine. I use cannabis for my migraines and it really works better
than any pharmaceuticals (personal anecdote).
Interestingly enough, actual topics about reform seems to be non-essential to legalization, despite the fact that how we
would regulate cannabis would be assumed to be a top influencer. However, it turns out that most people weren’t as
interested in “how to regulate” as simply “Legalize!” Additionally, health impacts did see a slight increase in prevalence
post legalization – however, only in a casual manner.
“Both topics are highly relevant to whether and how the substance should be de-regulated, but were ignored in decision-
making and at best attended to once the societal decision was already made,” the study author said.
Furthermore, the author continued;

3. 12/28/21, 11:35 AM What Two Themes Help Get Cannabis Legalized in So Many States So Quickly? - A PhD Paper Looks at How It Happened
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“While not the most persuasive approach according to previous research, character judgments may have still pushed people
who were on the fence but not diametrically opposed to legalization over to the pro-legalization camp…This is because they
highly simplify decision-making: One no longer needs to know the complicated effects of cannabis on health, the economy and
the society to make up their mind; they just need to think through their personal moral principles. This may have been
comforting during a transition period when the uncertainty surrounding marijuana’s status would have been anxiety-inducing
for many folks.”
According to the data, character judgements were the number one motivator for changing people’s mind. It reminds
me of how Darwinism took root in mainstream science. There was a point prior to the popularity of Darwin’s theories
where people predominantly believed the “creation story” of our origins. When Darwin proposed his theory, academia
and “free thinkers” would label those who believed in the creation story as “backwards”, unevolved, and dumb.
As a result, people who did not want to be seen as such were more likely to accept the theory as truth and since then
has become a bedrock of biological sciences – despite there being several potholes in the theory.
A New Dawn of Research
This trend of social media studying is something that many other institutions like NIDA and the FDA want to start
implementing to get a feel for what the public thinks about their policies. Social media gives everyone who has a
smartphone access to voice their opinion and as such, it is a goldmine for research. Of course, it’s a difficult thing to
quantify since most of the opinions on social media are just that – opinions.
However, it is definitely a good tool in uncovering how people “feel” about a particular topic and if utilized correctly can
give a lot of insight to people who are making policy. Often times, there are also very important information hidden
within the comments and while they might not be ideal for convincing people – they do help researchers and writers
like myself come up with interesting topics to relay to the masses.
Having an accurate depiction of the attitudes of users can help lawmakers make more informed decisions when
creating policies. Also, it bridges the apparent disconnect we have with these individuals. People like Nancy Pelosi –
who’s rich beyond the wildest dreams of the average Joe – have no idea how average people live. The political class only
panders to their supporters – who tend to be large corporations these days. Therefore, having data that accurately
reflect the sentiment of the people can help them make more informed decisions.
Of course, ideally we would want to remove these millionaire politicians as quickly as possible – but that’s a topic for
another day.
The bottom line to this study is that when it comes to convincing people of anything – it’s far better to focus on creating
character judgements on the opposition. Of course, in 2021, this has gone out of control. With a significant divide
between “left” and “right” politics – everybody is trying to assassinate the character of the opposition and as a result are
creating echo chambers.
While character judgement might have helped legalize weed – it shouldn’t be our standard for convincing people. We
should embrace reason and logic as our main vehicles of convincing others. This study revealed to us not only what
worked, but what’s wrong with modern discourse.
Can you convince people without assassinating the character of the opposition?
FEDERAL MARIJUANA LEGALIZATION, READ MORE...

4. 12/28/21, 11:35 AM What Two Themes Help Get Cannabis Legalized in So Many States So Quickly? - A PhD Paper Looks at How It Happened
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(https://cannabis.net/blog/opinion/the-marijuana-industry-just-had-a-
trainwreck-godawful-horrendous-end-to-2021-is-there-hope-in-2)
THE MARIJUANA INDUSTRY HAD A HORRIBLE END TO 2021, READ THIS! (https://cannabis.net/blog/opinion/the-
marijuana-industry-just-had-a-trainwreck-godawful-horrendous-end-to-2021-is-there-hope-in-2)
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