By promoting the use of soft drugs in any context, encourages young people down a slippery slope toward harder drugs  Part of the attraction of cannabis, especially among younger users is its appeal as a ‘forbidden fruit’. Removing that would mean that other, harder drugs would be sought out to fulfill the same need to rebel.  A government sanction on a drug with a proven tendency to effect memory and other neurological functions would still hold open the door to other, more dangerous, drugs as a form of rebellion. In this regard the continued ban on cannabis – and the relative tolerance of the breach of that ban – sends out a clear message of ‘this far and no further’.  Any signal that this narcotic is acceptable simply increases the stakes.