OC NORML to protest U.S. Open of Surfing

News: Marijuana advocates to protest U.S. Open of Surfing | marijuana, leitz, year, norml, booth – OCRegister.com
HUNTINGTON BEACH – Marijuana advocates plan to protest the U.S. Open of Surfing after they said they were denied a booth at the world-renowned competition.

Officials with the Orange County chapter of the National Organization to Reform Marijuana Laws (NORML) said they were refused a booth after being told by an organizer that the city and event sponsors did not support the group’s message. The group advocates the repeal of marijuana prohibition and the use of medical marijuana.

U.S. Open officials deny the accusation, stating that the refusal was purely a business decision. City officials said they have nothing to do with the granting of booths and denied having any kind of say.

About a hundred people from NORML and supporters plan to picket the event on July 26 and 27.

James Leitz, executive producer of the U.S. Open of Surfing, said the group was denied a booth this year because he said they had misrepresented themselves last year, applying under the guise of another organization.

Steve Lawrence who put in the application for Steve’s List said that he spoke to an organizer last year and let her know that his Web site www.steveslist.info was dedicated to the cannibas patient community. The Web site is now defunct.

Lawrence, a member of NORML, said he filled out the application truthfully and didn’t think he had to include cannibas or marijuana on the document.

Instead, [OC NORML president Kandace] Hawes said a female organizer told her on several occasions that “they called Huntington Beach and that they didn’t want us there and didn’t support our kind of organization and said that the sponsors didn’t want us there anyway.”

Leitz denies the accusations, stating that he stands by the decision to exclude the group.

“I myself personally have to worry about the 8-year-old kid… I have to worry about the message we’re sending,” Leitz said. “I have to worry about the family-friendly atmosphere. I think OC NORML’s message … or what have you is vague. We just don’t’ think it’s appropriate for the family-friendly nature of the event.”

This is not the first time a NORML booth or NORML people have been excluded from public events.  My own chapter and members here in Portland have been discriminated against, too.  Members who wanted to volunteer for NARAL (abortion rights) were turned away and Oregon NORML was denied when it tried to volunteer and sponsor the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure (breast cancer).  Shockingly, even our efforts to organize canned food drives at our meetings and then donate that food to the Portland Food Bank were refused – I guess they’d rather have poor starving kids go hungry another night than to accept free meals from “potheads”.

Mr. Leitz wants to use the old “what about the children” excuse?  Well, certainly, we can’t have kids exposed to a group that tells them citizens can organize to change ineffective prohibition laws, even if that challenge isn’t socially popular.  Nope, better that we keep the “family-friendly” atmosphere provided by such kid-friendly US Open of Surfing sponsors as Corona Extra Beer.