EDMONTON—The last time I saw you was soon after we graduated high school — and two weeks before you were killed.

We ran into each other by chance at a bus stop. I remembered you as a ball of energy on the basketball court, so you seemed calm by comparison. You told me how you planned to go to NAIT and eventually work in the oilpatch. I told you that I was in my first year of university, and I was finding it difficult to adjust. I gave you my number and got on the bus. I never saw you again.

Two weeks later, you went out with some friends to buy weed — normal for kids our age. There was a disagreement over the price, and in what the media later described as a “drug deal gone bad,” you were stabbed four times.

On Oct. 17, cannabis was legalized in Canada. This move is being celebrated as a solution to the problems prohibition created. But for people like us, the legacy of illegal weed won’t be so easy to forget.

In 1971, Richard Nixon declared a “war on drugs.” For the American president, the war entailed harsh punishment of drug users. It’s a war that intentionally targeted minority communities and the most vulnerable. It’s a war that every subsequent president has supported.

And, like any war, the toll it takes on victims is immense.

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Make no mistake, the war has been waged here in Canada, too: through aggressive policing of marginalized neighbourhoods and disproportionate incarceration of Black Canadians. Mohamed, you knew the effect these policies had on the neighbourhood — our neighbourhood — where you tried to buy cannabis that night. Police officers heavily patrolled these spaces, cracking down on anyone suspected of intending to buy or sell. While in other more well-off areas, police presence was light and transactions tended to happen in the tranquillity of suburban basements and grassy parks. These conditions are what made a 16-year-old believe that he needed a knife and that he needed to use it on you.

Mohamed, I remember the fear we had of the police. Whose presence in our community was felt day in and day out as they put our friends in cuffs. I don’t know if the police hated us. But I know that Black people were three to four times more likely to be charged for possession in Edmonton than white people, despite similar rates of cannabis use. Whether or not they like or agree with our country’s drug laws, police are soldiers in the war and are complicit in the damage it’s caused.

On the day weed becomes legal from coast to coast, I’ll think about you, Mohamed, my friend who could make anyone feel welcome.

I will also remember the pain. The pain my mom felt when she found the innocuous green pipe belonging to my sister. I was young and did not understand why she cared so much about a bong.

I understand now. My mom was afraid of legal consequences and of the dangerous underground market — afraid my sister would join the rising Black prison population, which has increased 70 per cent in the last 10 years.

Mohamed, I’ve seen both sides of the war. At university, my white friends would openly smoke without fear of police. During my first summer placement at the Law Courts, I ran into a childhood friend facing charges for possession; meanwhile, some of my co-workers were stoners. It was tough seeing these two worlds. People from my world who smoked were pathologized and called “thugs,” while those in the other world were seen as fun-loving, laid-back or quirky.

Mohamed, you should be here. I am 23 now and think each day about how unfair it is for me to be where I am now, a civil servant who has a predictable salaried job, while so many in our community are weighed down by the scars of this war.

And yet I also carry those scars. I grew up in an environment where it was the norm to see friends arrested, families fall apart and people die. Everyone who grew up with us knows a victim in this war. We all bear the scars.

You’re not here to tell your story, but I want to make sure you’re not forgotten. I know you would have done the same.

Cannabis is legal, but the drug war is still officially on. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau — a man who admitted that his father helped his brother out of possession charges — re-signed onto the U.S.-led war on drugs. Instead of focusing on harm reduction and creating safe spaces for people who use drugs, we have committed to targeting those who use substances other than cannabis with heavy-handed enforcement. A war that, according to criminologists, has failed.

In addition, Edmonton city council passed restrictive cannabis regulations that will effectively only allow those with their own homes or land to smoke up. Everyone else is at the whim of their landlords and will be subject to increased enforcement. Based on the history of the war, who do you think will be the primary targets of this enforcement? It’s clear that this policy will lead to more victims like you.

It doesn’t have to be this way.

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The government has already taken the first step by signalling that it will pardon those convicted of cannabis possession — an estimated 500,000 people. However, it’s unclear if these pardons will be extended to all 500,000 people since the move is reported as only targeting “simple” possession.”

We also need to change the legislation so privileged homeowners are not the only ones able to safely smoke. And finally, we should remember the current and future victims of this war, who will continue to carry these scars long after Oct. 17.

It’s important that we celebrate legalization: it’s a major milestone and a first step toward justice. But, as we celebrate, we should remember those who are unable to join us and those who feel pain when they think about their scars. Remembrance is important; without it, we’ll lose sight of why today matters. And so, Mohamed, I promise I will remember you long after the euphoria of Oct. 17 subsides.

Bashir Mohamed is an Edmonton-based writer.

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