Pubdate: Sun, 15 Jun 2014 Source: Toronto Star (CN ON) Copyright: 2014 The Toronto Star Contact: http://www.thestar.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/456 Author: Jacob Serebrin Page: E8 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?196 (Emery, Marc) PRINCESS OF POT COMES TO TORONTO Marijuana Activist and Media Owner Jodie Emery Sees 'Tipping Point' For Legalization On a Thursday in early June, Jodie Emery has an episode of her web series to film, potential employees to interview and blog posts to edit. The next day, there's a flight to Texas, where she's speaking at a conference organized by the U.S. non-profit National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. The following week, she'll visit the United States federal prison in Mississippi for about the 80th time in four years, where her husband, Marc Emery, widely known as the Prince of Pot, is currently incarcerated for selling marijuana seeds. As the owner of Cannabis Culture, an online magazine, Pot TV, a Vancouver head shop and a lounge where customers can consume their own marijuana, Emery oversees a mini marijuana-themed empire. She's also become one of the best known marijuana legalization activists in Canada. Previously an editor at Cannabis Culture, Emery came to the helm of the myriad of businesses founded by her husband when he went to prison in 2010. "People were looking to me because Marc was gone," says Emery, who will be speaking in Toronto next week as part of the ideacity conference. Now, just as the Emerys prepare for Marc's expected release next month, momentum for their cause celebre is building on both sides of the border. "We're at a tipping point where even former prohibitionists are admitting they were wrong," Emery says. The former U.S. district attorney who prosecuted her husband, John McKay, has called the prohibition of marijuana a "complete failure." Authorities in British Columbia won't be able to ignore it when marijuana stores begin opening just across the border in Washington State on July 1, she says (Colorado has also legalized marijuana, and more states are considering the move). But she acknowledges that similar changes in Canada's marijuana laws - - which are set at the federal level - are a long way off, despite new rules that allow anyone to apply for a licence to grow and sell medical marijuana. "If we were able to sell marijuana legally we would definitely do it," she says. But right now, "we don't sell seeds, we don't sell medical marijuana, we don't do anything illegal." Cannabis Culture and Pot TV, which received two million unique visitors and close to 10 million individual page views in May, are Emery's highest profile businesses, but the small amount of advertising on the sites isn't enough to make them profitable in their own right. The store and lounge are "the biggest in terms of staff and money," she says. "Mostly, the business supports our activism." That's all set to change soon, with Marc's scheduled release July 9. On a personal level, it's exciting. "I do miss Marc terribly," she says. Professionally, it will mean little for her job as head of a group of organizations that stands to capitalize on the dramatic changes to marijuana laws south of the border. The couple have more activism planned for when Marc returns, in the form of a cross-country homecoming tour to endorse the federal Liberal party because of its pro-legalization stance. It's an endorsement she's not entirely comfortable with - Emery has twice run as a Green party candidate in B.C., and twice as a B.C. Marijuana party candidate - but she says the issue is important enough that compromises have to be made. "I know that change only happens through policy-makers and government," she says. Emery is disappointed with the federal government's recent ban on medical marijuana patients growing their own plants, and requiring them to buy from licensed distributors - which have multiplied with the allowance of more businesses to grow marijuana. "As a capitalist myself, it's great to see companies get in the game," she says. But she disagrees with profiting from the sale of marijuana while it remains illegal, and she's a strong believer in consumer choice. Emery envisions a future where marijuana is sold openly in a variety of settings, or grown by users at home. It's a question of freedom, she says. It's also a question of tax dollars - governments are wasting "billions" in a failed drug war, she argues, adding that as much money could be generated through taxes. That's the part of the message she likes to play up when she appears on the conservative Sun News Network or speaks to the Canadian Investor Conference. "I reach a different audience than most pot activists," she says. "I change people's minds." Emery knows that even if marijuana is legalized, it will likely be regulated similarly to alcohol. But she says that would still be better than the status quo, where people like her husband are going to jail, and prohibitionists continue to fight against loosening laws. "The war continues," she says. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom