cannabisnews.com: Berlin Rolls A Hemp Parade!





Berlin Rolls A Hemp Parade!
Posted by FoM on August 28, 1999 at 14:13:29 PT
By Steve Kettman
Source: Wired News
BERLIN -- Protests in favor of legalizing marijuana take on a whole different feel in a country where the foreign minister most definitely did inhale, and jokes about it, and the coffee shops of Amsterdam are only a train ride away. 
Berlin's third annual Hemp Parade kicks off Saturday afternoon with a gathering in Alexanderplatz. It will first and foremost be a great party, a scaled-down version of the legendary Love Parade. Organizers expect more than 50,000 people to show up, making it the largest of pro-marijuana gatherings. "I think it is just a question of time before it is legalized," said Martin Muencheberg, an event organizer. "It started as just a German event but now since we have some sponsors from Holland and Switzerland -- and now people come from Rotterdam and San Francisco to see the Hemp Parade -- we hope to become more and more of a part of the international effort to legalize." This is a country, after all, where the two political parties that make up the governing coalition, the Social Democrats and the Greens, at one time or another have favored legalization. Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, easily the most dynamic political leader in Germany, is said to have done plenty of toking up in his wild days. The press has never pressed him to comment on this, however (Sprechen Sie Deutsch, George W.?). Fischer, leader of the Greens, has toned down his style since the days when he was bounced from parliament for telling the president of parliament, "I'm sorry, Herr President, but you are an asshole." Nevertheless, avid pot smokers still support him. "Officially he said he has never inhaled, just like Clinton, but he meant that as a joke," Muencheberg said. "He said he would not participate in the parade, because he is a nonmilitaristic person. But we saw in the last war that he is a liar." The appearance of German combat troops in Kosovo, the first such deployment since World War II, was startling, maybe more so since it happened under the direction of the newly formed left-wing government. Another surprise was the quick shuffle-step away from the left's previous support of legalizing pot. Saturday's parade will end in a party at the Brandenburg Gate. Events on 13 stages will run for hours and include music and videos on the cultivation of hemp. Political parties that support legalization will hand out materials. Chancellor Gerhardt Schroeder's Social Democrats were part of the effort last year, but since the elections brought the SPD-Green coalition to power, that has changed. "The SPD had some old plans that said we have to legalize cannabis, but since they became powerful, now they don t remember that," said Muencheberg. "Last year they were at the Hemp Parade and said 'Yes, we should legalize it.'" This year, only low-level representatives of the Greens (Fischer's party, for the time being) will be present. This is disappointing to the organizers, but not to many others. "It is organized as a political demonstration," said freelance journalist Volker Wartmann. "But the party aspect is the main thing." Wartmann has covered the last two Hemp Parades. "Three to 8 million people in Germany smoke cannabis more or less regularly. Everybody gets it. They get it on the black market or wherever. If you have two or three grams or so for your own use, you don't go to jail. It's kind of half-legal." The parade is taken in a spirit of good fun. Even the Berlin city government, which at first resisted it as merely an excuse to party, relented eventually. Hashish remains the more typical THC vehicle, though that is changing, and the fun of rediscovering green bud feeds the event's popularity. "More and more marijuana is coming from Holland, and this grass has much THC, so I think more people are going to smoke this Netherland grass," said Wartmann. "But people compare this to Netherland tomatoes. It's not genetically manipulated, but it's almost too strong for some people. "Myself, I don t like smoking hash. When I was younger, [smoking] hash and grass was kind of a rarity. If someone got grass, it was like 'Ooooooh, you're my friend.' Now things are changing." 3:00 a.m. 28.Aug.99.PDTWired Newshttp://www.wired.com/news/news/culture/story/21470.html
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