Marijuana in the balcony

Ten cannabis plants grow in a balcony in Botafogo neighborhood under the gaze of Christ the Redeemer, in Rio de Janeiro’s affluent zona sul area. A few blocks away, amid busy Copacabana streets, still in zona sul, a small cannabis growing room has been established discreetly in an unused bathroom, softly lit by sodium lamps. Across the other side of Guanabara bay, in small patio hidden away in Niterói, Rio’s neighboring city, six female plants offer their flowers to a third user.

The cannabis gardeners could buy the drug in many “bocas de fumo” (illegal venues) in town, but they prefer to grow cannabis for themselves. The activity is rooted in two arguments: the cultivation of cannabis for personal use avoids financing organized crime and allows for greater control over the quality of the weed.

Pedro owns one of the plants in Niterói. He is a lawyer and has for the past 16 of his 32 years of age, smoked cannabis. “I did my undergrad studies normally, smoking every day, never once did I feel unmotivated due to cannabis. I think the prohibition is an affront to my individuality and I plant it without any qualms: I don’t sell it, nor do I pass on what I produce, I know that at most what can happen to me is to face criminal proceedings as a user, there is no risk of a prison sentencing,” said Pedro.

The man who owns the plant in the Copacabana bathroom, Bas, works as a graphic designer, he is 34 and is the founder of Growroom, a website committed to championing user rights. Growroom stated in 2002 in Brazil initially to exchange information on cannabis growing and after 8 years it became active in championing legalization and user protection.

Growroom has approximately 30 thousand registered users, and discussions do not limite themselves to 3 or 4 illegal plants sitting in a bathroom. Site members discuss cannabis and health, cannabis and spirituality, cannabis and society, among other issues. The website also monitors cases of users persecuted by the police.

Brazil’s 2006 Drug Law did away with prison sentencing for illegal drug users and it does not expressly prohibit cultivation for personal use. But it failed to regulate illegal drug use, leaving open a legal gap that often leads to the detention of users and growers (self cultivators) even if for a few hours or days.

NGrowroom is active in precisely that limbo. “At a certain point, the site grew so much that it began to take on the role of helping and guiding people. We took up activism through a number of small initiatives and in 2007 a group of cannabis users in Rio launched the Cannabis March (Marcha da Maconha) that made it significant in defending the use of cannabis. We then kept track of those users who had a few cannabis plants at home and who were unjustly arrested,” said Bas.

Medication in green

But the case to have the widest repercussion in the past few months was a recovering cancer patient, Alexandre Thomas, a 40 year old publicist professional in advertizing, who did away with cancer through chemotherapy. Thomaz used cannabis he grew himself to help him through chemotherapy sessions, after losing a great deal of weight and feeling fatigue. Thomaz found the drug helped him restore his appetite, acted as a painkiller and generally lessened his suffering. “Medication is not only what is sold in drug stores or produced in labs. There are natural medications, like Cannabis, a plant,” said Thomaz.

But his life in a newspaper in the state of Rio Grande do Sul was interrupted abruptly one day, and he was thrown in jail under the accusation of drug trafficking. The police broke into his farm in the municipality of Santa Rita, where, along with basil, chives, parsley and laurel, he had 10 plants of cannabis.
“As part of my treatment I began to cultivate the land in this small farm I have. Only 5% of the area cultivated was used for cannabis. But I was arrested and shown on tv as a a drug trafficker. This practically ended my social and professional life. I had 10 plants, enough only for a single user…” said Alexandre, who is currently taking legal action to the full extent of the law.

His lawyer Lucio Scaroparo explained that it is hoped that his client’s case will be used to establish legal precedence for the rights of cannabis users. “We want Alexandre’s case to be the leading case in the topic. The most likely result is that he is offered a lighter sentence, such as taking a course on the effects of cannabis. We will also request a license for him to cultivate his medication. We understand that to bar him from cultivating good quality cannabis for the benefit of his health is a breach of his fundamental rights,” said Scarparo.

The medical value of cannabis use has been shown in a number of studies, as explained by Medical Doctor Elisaldo Carlini – one of the few doctors bold enough to speak on the topic in Brazil – the cannabis plant has components with very significant therapeutic effects in a number of diseases, and cancer is one of them.

Scarparo adds that in countries such as Israel, Canada, and the United States, the state not only does not punish medicinal cannabis use, but also prescribes it and offers it to patients in treatment. “The Brazilian constitution is based on the respect for human dignity. What we ask is: is it in keeping with human dignity that an adult and responsible person, who pays taxes and who was diagnosed with cancer is stopped from using a medicinal plant that he or she can grow in their own home?” said Scaroparo.

Worldview and legislation

Frequent detentions of both users and self cultivators speaks volumes of the judicial limbo that remains between the law as it is written and how it is enforced by the police. The fact that those detained are frequently freed also shows that, in practice, and little by little, change is approaching.

The hot topic of drug policy, not only in Brazil but around the world, in face of the failure of proibitionism, has posed two main challenges in Brazil: The first and most profoundly, at a cultural level, and secondly, at the level of legislation.
There remains the question of whether Brazilians will decide whether smoking cannabis will continue hidden away in private, and persecuted by the authorities or if it will discussed openly. Brazilians must consider whether medicinal use is to be authorized and if it is to enter the national health system, and finally, if personal grow rooms are to be regulated.

Anthropologist Sergio Vidal is a representative of the National Student Union at Brazil’s National Drug Policy Council (Conad), the entity in charge of discussing the topic and coming up with solutions. “Self cultivation is still a social taboo here in Brazil. No country in the world has regulated the practice, but there are municipal, regional and national legislations that create a climate of tolerance towards growers. Here, when someone is processed for growing cannabis in their own homes it is usually the result of cultural intolerance,” said Vidal. Sergio is one of the most active members of Growroom. He adds that the topic of self cultivation has been supported by the Conad, which is discussing the possibility of regulating it.

Ignorance is not, however, limited to lay people. The police are also known to make mistakes, significant ones, such as weighing entire plants to asses the quantity of the illegal substances, down to the pots. “Just to give you a sense of how little the police know, there was the case of a self cultivator in Brasilia who was arrested for the possession of two kilos of cannabis. When the police apprehended the plants, they weighed everything, even the earth pulled out with them, ignorant of the fact that for preparing the drug you only use the flowers of female plants,” said Bas, who lives in Rio.

Some public statements of the genre helped to take the subject out of obscurity. The most famous statement was issued by Brazil’s former president Fernando Henrique Cardoso along with his colleagues César Gaviria and Ernesto Zedillo, respectively the former presidents of Colombia and Mexico. They signed a joint statement on the need to end global proibitionism, recommending the adoption of more efficient measures against drugs, among them the decriminalization of users.

In a country in which drug offenses are the second offense filling jails, (70 thousand people are behind bars for drug related offenses, according to a joint study by the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and the University of Brazilia) and where organized crime is financed by the sale of illegal drugs, it seems only fitting that the current administration has showed a inclination to adopt changes in drug policy.

Even though it is difficult to approve legislative changes in an election year, congressman Paulo Teixiera is preparing a Bill that proposes the regulation of self-cultivation, medicinal cannabis and other issues hoping for the backing of a multi-party coalition.

'Cara limpa'

On another front, a social movement defending the use of cannabis is active at a more complex and deeper level. “The concept that most people have is that cannabis is bad, and they don’t ask themselves why. In the 20s and 30s the state hired researchers and built a consensus based on scientific fraud, the data was manipulated” said Vidal. Put simply in the words of the anthropologist: “ Our governments lied to us in the past, and we believed them.”

Those who champion self-cultivation have simple and convincing arguments: adult, responsible citizens who wish to use cannabis will grow it for their personal use, and commit themselves not to sell the drug and thus avoid contact with drug traffickers, stop financing them, and guarantee the quality of the product they use.
On the other hand, there is the issue of whether self-cultivation helps us come any closer to solving the wider problem: cannabis remains illegal, its use is persecuted, and the black market is still generating cash. In Vidal’s view, “it is impossible to decriminalize conduct without regulating production.”

In the meanwhile, there are growing numbers of users who are bold enough to use cannabis and come out in public, a group that Lucio Scarparo calls ‘cara limpa’ (clean faced). “People are afraid of exposing themselves, to own up to the fact that they use cannabis, but there are more and more people coming out and publishing photos of themselves along with their plants. When my father found out I used cannabis he was very disappointed in me, he thought I had become a criminal, but, over time,” said Scarparo, “he came to respect my point of view. I realized that the cannabis I bought in the black market was coming back to me through crime”, said Scarparo.
The lawyer says prior to taking up his client Alexandre Thomaz’s case, he had avoided the issue, concerned with protecting his career. “But it came to a point that I realized that things had been put the wrong way around, there was no reason for me to hide: I don’t harm anyone, I grow my own cannabis, I never sold any nor ever will I, nor do or will I ever provide any for anyone else,” said Lucio.

Photos: Growroom