Yet Salvia divinorum, like marijuana before it, is on the table with Michigan legislators to eventually make its sale, use and possession illegal. Although the plant is a very potent hallucinogen, salvia’s strongest effects are very short, lasting about five to 10 minutes, and it has not shown to be a long- or short-term health risk. The closest link one can find is the suicide of an already-depressed 15-year-old who smoked salvia occasionally with friends, but not at the time of his death. The report was posted on the Web site of the local TV news station, KVBC/DT in Las Vegas, in an article that amounted to baseless fear mongering and propaganda. To draw a causal link between the two is not only illogical, it’s absolutely irresponsible.

Reasons for the ban from lawmakers are equally ridiculous. Rep. Michael Sak, D-Grand Rapids, who introduced a bill earlier this month to classify the drug as a narcotic, said that “It has such negative impact on individuals, and we don’t want them to purchase this across the state.” What those negative effects are, or why they are defined as such, is never mentioned. Dangerous, presumably, means something that makes the drug more worthy of being illegal than tobacco and alcohol.

James McCurtis, a spokesman for the Michigan Department of Community Health, said that salvia is “hallucinogenic and it’s a dangerous drug that’s out there.” Once again, no reason is given for why the drug is dangerous, except for the implication that being hallucinogenic makes the drug dangerous. Given the incredibly lopsided statistics demonstrating a good barometer for danger (fatalities causally linked to the drug), how this language is justified is anybody’s guess.

“If medical people and scientists are still researching this, then it’s probably not a good idea for individuals to try,” said DEA special agent Rich Isaacson. What Isaacson doesn’t mention is that salvia has been used for centuries by the Mazatec in Oaxaca, Mexico. Furthermore, the unknown does not make a substance dangerous, and dangerous should not merit a substance as illegal.

The gold medal, however, goes to Rep. Charles Anderson of Waco, Texas, for these two gems: First, Anderson stated the drug should be banned because its legal status could lead people to think it’s benign. He also said he’s really worried about “youngsters doing this and then getting in a vehicle or getting on a motorcycle or jumping in a pool somewhere.”

Based on the above statements, lawmakers classify a drug as “dangerous” when it doesn’t have a corporate lobby.

This is of course not to mention salvia’s potential, again like marijuana, for medical purposes. A Sept. 9 New York Times article cited the drug’s capacity to treat addiction and depression, and scientists expressed concern that a ban would impede research.

The underlying truth is the United States, and especially those most in favor of banning drugs like salvia, are not in favor of a drug-free state. They are in favor of a state that lets corporate power decide which drugs are legal. Our country is full of drugs, but the dealers are companies like Anheuser-Busch Cos. Inc., Pfizer Inc. and Starbucks. Living in a chemically induced state is what it means to be American — just as long as you pay the right pushers.

Safe, responsible, legal drug use is a common principle that runs throughout many developing and developed nations, including the United States. But what makes drugs like salvia and marijuana grounds for criminal action has nothing to do with their effects on society. The bottom line is that salvia poses no threat, and any efforts to ban it are rooted in self-interested power spreading illegitimate fear.

Drew Robert Winter is a State News columnist and an English and journalism senior. He is also president of Students Promoting Animal Rights, or SPAR. Reach him at winterdr@msu.edu.