Episode 06: A Social Reformer
Intro - 00:15
Ads - 05:23 - Please visit our sponsors Awakened Vapes, Genesis Pharms, and the Caramel Corn Company and help support this podcast!
Interview - 08:57
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Welcome back to Awakened Exchanges! I’m your host Jay Rich and we’ve got our first Thanksgiving episode for you today! This whole month, I plan to focus on people who care for others. People that can show us how to be grateful all year round.
I’m recording this on Election night, so I suppose I can stop telling people to get out and vote. That said, I don’t think we’re going to have an answer about who our next president is until after this episode airs, and maybe not until a while after. I hope they prove me wrong, but the white house has installed “non-scalable fencing,” which is making me worry that Trump’s new wall is now just protecting him from the masses in case he decides to try to steal the election somehow. Maybe he’ll declare himself the victor early and refuse to concede? Or perhaps he’ll just keep the mail-in ballots from being counted via lawsuits? I could be totally wrong, but I am still worried about it all. That said, my hope is that after this election is finally over, we can start thinking about the fact that we’re all Americans and it’s time to do our best to salvage what is left of this American Dream. Our constitution was an inspired document, but it wasn’t meant to last forever. The founders knew that times changed and it was meant to be updated. The last meaningful amendment was 1971, nearly 50 years ago, and that was to allow 18 year-olds the right to vote so that we could keep drafting them to fight in Vietnam! Is this the legacy our founding fathers would want? I don’t believe so. As Thomas Jefferson said, “I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions, but laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.” Has our society not progressed since 1971? Have there been no new discoveries or progress that’s worth noting in our constitution? No rights that need updated? Jefferson once said that “Every constitution then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19 years. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force, and not of right" That’s right, 19 years! Maybe it’s time we rework the entire document and build into it the equality that we wish actually existed in today’s society.
That’s probably enough of that rant for today, but before we quickly get into the sponsors, I wanted to thank David Benedicktus for joining me for our first remote interview. He’s the cofounder of Cannabis Patients PNW, as well as a retired mental health professional. Before Covid, he was teaching a class at Clark College called Cannabis and Your Health, which is where we first crossed paths again in my adulthood. As well as talking about that class, we talk a lot about mental health, criminal justice reform, and the decline of our natural endocannabinoid system. He is a very knowledgeable individual with a fascinating story to tell. I’m glad to be introducing him to a lot of you and I hope you’ll find the information as fascinating and helpful as I did.
