Amazon backs marijuana legalization, drops weed testing for some jobs

> The e-commerce company

Can you sell it? If so - Amazon is related to it or would like to be.

Consumers need to know what they are buying and this is not possible under decriminalized frameworks, only recreationally legalized frameworks

That would be a massive public health win.

My guess is this comes about because insurance companies will dodge claims due to a positive drug test, but an injured worker could still sue the company. So, companies don't want workers that would test positive for drugs in the event of a work related injury.

Warehouse workers are relatively likely to get injured at work. SDEs are not.

Edit: At Amazon that may be true, but OP's statement seemed much wider than that.

http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/hemp/urine-saga.html

Conclusion

At both urine tests I've taken (the practice test at the University of Maryland Health Center, and the real drug screening test for Xerox at Bethesda Roche Labs), the person in charge didn't want to let me submit to the test. Both times, I had to ask their supervisors to override their decisions, appealing for special permission to piss in a bottle. I was always forthright about my belief that urine testing is a violation of my privacy, even though I was compromising my principles and submitting to the test anyway.

The way I've been treated in both cases confirms my belief that urine tests are intended to discourage people like me from even applying in the first place. Unfortunatly Xerox didn't notify me of their drug testing policy until after I had applied for the job, been accepted, and chosen a project. Had I known about their drug testing policy in advance, I would have acted on what I believe, by never applying to Xerox for employment.

The people who administer my drug tests treated me as if they didn't expect people like me to ever submit to them, unless we're crazed criminals trying to cheat our way into urine sensative positions. Anyone with the integrity to refuse a urine is in the same class as unqualified applicants and drug abusers: unfit to work at Xerox. The only drug abusers Xerox will employ are those unscrupulous enough to cheat on the test (which is certainly possible despite the chain of custody procedure followed by Roche Labs).

If you don't want you or your children to be treated this way, please help end the drug war!

http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/hemp/xerox-letter.html

Dear Mr. Allaire:

In February of 1990, I applied for a summer internship at Xerox PARC by sending in my resume along with recommendations from Ben Shneiderman (faculty and supervisor), P. S. Krishnaprasad (faculty), Mitch Bradley (supervisor), Gudrun Polak (supervisor), and Mark Weiser (faculty, supervisor, and CSL lab director).

I was accepted and invited to join PARC for the summer, and given a list of three projects proposed by groups that wanted to sponsor me. I was excited by all three, and Christian Jacobi's proposal meshed perfectly with my interests and experience. However, when I discussed the position with Eric Bier, I learned that to qualify for the job, I would have to consent to having my urine collected and tested for evidence of drug use.

I object to not being notified of the drug test until after I had applied for the job, been accepted, and chosen a project. The announcement of summer internships at PARC broadcast to the Internet should have mentioned the drug testing requirement, along with the resume and reference requirements, so that I would have known not to apply to Xerox in the first place.

Because I wanted to work at PARC, and I had already gone through much effort to qualify for the job, I took the drug test, against my principles, and passed. I regret taking the test, compromising myself, and selling out to a company that does not respect the privacy of its employees.

I went to Roche Labs in Bethesda, Maryland to submit to the test, where I was treated rudely by the lab technician. She refused to administer the test, but after two hours her supervisor finally intervened and I was permitted to drain my bladder into a specimen jar. I related the details of my experience to Bill Skinner, and he requested that Bethesda Roche Labs be removed from Xerox's list of approved urine collection agencies. But, unfortunately, he could do nothing to address the real problem that most troubles me: Xerox's ill-conceived urine testing policy.

Screening for drug use before employment is an ineffective method of providing a drug free work place. It also invades my privacy, casts doubt on my integrity, and violates my dignity. The policy makes it harder for Xerox to hire good honest people, because it discourages them from even applying for the job. Had I known that Xerox had such a policy, before I had otherwise qualified for and been accepted to the job, I would have been sorry, but would not have wasted my time.

Even though I passed the drug test, and am completely qualified for the summer internship at Xerox PARC, I must turn it down because of the drug testing policy. I couldn't feel good about working for Xerox after the violation of my privacy, the ordeal I've been through, and the lack of respect I've been shown. The decision was a painful one: regardless of the cloud of urine testing hanging over it, Xerox PARC is a most prestigious place, where I could have been exposed to many great ideas, and met some of the best people in the profession.

I wish I could have spent the summer at Xerox PARC, but instead I have taken a full time job at Sun Microsystems, a company that respects its employees enough to provide a drug free work place without invading their privacy. I won't be looking for other employment in the forseeable future, but I would be delighted to hear when Xerox has changed its drug testing policy. Until such a time, I hope that potential job applicants learn about the policy before they decide to apply.

I sympathize with my colleagues who work in positions they would no longer be willing to accept on moral grounds, and who have been forced to compromise their principles because of other responsibilities.

"What are politicians going to tell people when the Constitution is gone and we still have a drug problem?"

-- William Simpson, A.C.L.U.

Sincerely and regretfully,

Don Hopkins

Also:

> Amazon was hit with a proposed class action suit, which claimed that the company was violating a New York City law by testing applicants for jobs at local facilities for marijuana, according to a Westlaw report.

So it seems like their hand was forced by the dissonance between federal and state law. This is not leadership or some kind of principled stand, it's liability minimization.

The thing that frustrates me about all this is that none of it has anything to do with safety or well being.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justin_Hall

http://www.links.net/

Instead of selling out to Budweiser for peanuts, he stashed it away safely in a cool dry place for later. Now he runs Bud.com as a California benefit corporation delivering recreational cannabis!

https://bud.com

>What is bud.com?

>bud.com helps you find legal, lab-tested, quality cannabis for delivery in your area.

>Order from your smartphone, tablet or computer. Pick from curated products across all categories and price ranges, then proceed to checkout. You'll need to indicate a delivery address, provide a valid ID (21+) for upload, then choose your payment method.

>Our customer service team is here to help you have a positive order experience. We look forward to bringing you quality products from local dispensaries.

History of bud.com:

https://bud.com/history-of-bud-com/

>I was 19 years old, working as an intern at Wired Magazine in San Francisco. We were launching arguably the first commercial publication on the web; we ran the first banner ads. I learned how to register domains in that office, and I didn’t register very many. I was depressed that justin.com was taken; instead I got justin.org & links.net – both pointed to my personal web site.

>A whois lookup shows I registered bud.com on 2 December 1994. It was free to claim; no one had used it before. I had to write a letter explaining what I was going to use it for. I can’t remember what I said I was going to use it for, but I liked pot and I liked the internet so it was fun to have this great, short domain name. I immediately made my email address justin at buddotcom which I’ve used since then. [...]

>In 1999 I was contacted by a lawyer Steven M. Weinberg, representing Anheuser-Busch, makers of Bud beer. We chatted by phone: “So, you’re a college student!” Actually I graduated the year before.

>He continued: “Well, how does $50,000 sound for bud.com?”

>I replied that $50k should be the interest generated by the money someone pays for bud.com. This is a three letter, actual word, dot com domain, and if I’m going to see it on every beer can you make forever, I should at least be well compensated. I remember reading that the marketing budget for Budweiser beer that quarter was $16.1 million. BUD was the company’s stock symbol.

>I wasn’t going to sell lightly, and they weren’t going to bid against themselves, so we didn’t get anywhere.

First recorded content on bud.com (check that 1996 archive link to Cyborganic's "spacebar" if you love retro web design):

https://web.archive.org/web/19961219041227/http://www.bud.co...

A story of bud.com:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2v9gzfYF6aY&ab_channel=Justi...

>I've owned the web domain bud.com since 1994. Here's a story of what I've done with it so far, and what we might do with it together going forward!

It just doesn't seem like an especially relevant analysis of this event.

That’s just false.

There are also vapes, which don't have any of the smell, and coincidentally are much more convenient to smoke in public, likely for that very reason.

I live in a large apartment building. Every once in a while, I'll walk outside my door into the shared indoor hallway and get a whiff of something. This is rare, though if I was a betting man, I would bet that of everyone on my floor, someone is likely smoking every day. Some days it's stronger, other days it's faint. I can't smell it in my apartment at all, and it doesn't seem to linger as long as the area is well ventilated.

Would I prefer it didn't smell? Yes. But, it's not much different than when some other neighbor decides to smoke a brisket on their balcony. It's just a different smell. And for the record, I also don't like the smell of weed.

Okay. How do you feel about ciggies, cigars and pipe? That also smells horrendous? Or car exhaust fumes?

The thing here is: you can be against something because it will be "yet another annoying thing"... But that ignores the freedom aspect: if behavior X is less-than-or-equally annoying (unhealthy, addictive, etc.) compared to Y, and Y is legal, then that is a good argument that X should be legal too. If not we get into "unfair discrimination against behavior X" territory.

Also, isn't vaping more popular than smoking these days? When vaping, the smell is greatly reduced, and dissipates in seconds.

Cannabis can also be processed so that the smell is minimal (some medical varieties get such treatment)

Unbelievable.