After Napoleon’s expedition to Egypt at the end of the 1790s, many of the troops brought hash back with them, boosting its popularity.
French is my second language and I’ve also traveled there so I have a soft spot for French authors like Charles Baudelaire and Honoré de Balzac, who were members of the Club des Hashischins, aka The Hash Club.
The thick green paste was typically made of cannabis resin, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, pistachios, sugar, orange juice, butter, honey, fat and cantharides .
They view all cannabis consumers as “stoners.” This stereotype perpetuates the idea that people who consume cannabis are stupid, lazy and a whole lot of other bad things, while alcohol has been put on pedestal and perceived as less destructive to individuals and society than it is.
Alcohol, since it has been legal for hundreds of years , has carved a lofty place for itself in modern American culture.
Although we can’t fix how cannabis has been demonized across prior generations, we can change it for our time.