Why New York Needs To Go Back To The Future Written by RYAN LEPORE New York, it's about time...it's time we explore our roots, and at the same time leave the past behind. I mean this in the Marty Mcfly sense, we have been stuck in the past - and we have to go back to the future - to being the future. The future that was once the idea of New York, the idea of America - the idea of worldly change. Ending prohibition is a true testament towards transcending our past - a drug war that centered and amplified at its inception within the Big Apple.
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When we talk about the American Revolution, nearly one-third of all battles were fought on NY land - a war that created our existence as a country. This has been no different in the context of cannabis - which for many years NYC held the worldwide arrest record
and essentially carries the largest law enforcement budget in the world, making it the law enforcement capital of the world. While at the same time, NYC has grown to be the largest cannabis consuming city in the world - even within the midst of criminalization. For the past few years due to its population size and importance nationally, New York is considered the last domino to fall to bring the country towards federal legalization. If we beat back prohibition here - we will alter and influence a future that will be sought after not just in this country but worldwide. We are at the cusp of addressing deeper rooted issues that come from a cultural dynamic set forth from our forefathers. New York City, was originally a Dutch settlement called New Amsterdam before being sold to the English. Before colonization - it was native to the “Lenape” tribe. It has been a centerpiece of financial markets, some of which, a past rooted in slavery and southern sympathetic economics something that came from the Dutch and English who were not only some of the biggest slavers but also bankers of