Rebuttals to Common Prohibitionist Arguments 5: Legalization is not an "Experiment"!

I often hear people referring to Colorado's new policy of cannabis legalization as an "experiment."

Countless articles, even those written by people who are ostensibly in favor of legalization, purport to analyze the results of Colorado's "legalization experiment."  Prohibitionists try to warn us to wait for the results of this "experiment" before launching legalization campaigns in other states and nationally.

As you can guess from my scare quotes, I disagree with the characterization of legalization as an experiment.  For all of human history, cannabis has been free by default.  No one ever imagined banning this widely-used and boundlessly-useful plant until the 1900's.

So clearly, prohibition is the experiment. Truly a failed, deadly experiment.  Legalization is the ending of that experiment and the restoration of the default.  Banning substances does not work to the benefit of society.  This has been made abundantly clear by the prohibition of alcohol, and the drug war, which only drove usage rates up, as well as adding a host of other problems.

Let's end this failed experiment of prohibition and restore normalcy.