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The Mexican hypothesis debunked: How marijuana really came to the US

The idea that marijuana use was introduced and spread across the US by immigrants from Mexico is widely accepted, but the evidence actually supporting this is dubious

By Chelsea Whyte

22 September 2023

A newspaper article from 1915 asks whether Mexico is

Popular media amplified concerns about the dangers of marijuana and linked the drug to Mexican immigrants, as seen in this article from The Ogden Standard from September 1915

University of Utah/Marriott Library

The true tale of marijuana’s arrival in the US may have been obscured by a useful fiction that was devised and spread during the fight to legalise the drug during the 1960s and 1970s. Many reputable sources still repeat the story that Mexican immigrants introduced the recreational use of cannabis to the US after the Mexican Revolution began in 1910. They will also repeat that the…

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