> The grandparent commenter was trying to blame current societal ills on the legality of marijuana and the legal availability to children

I'm blaming marijuana legalization for young people smoking marijuana, when they wouldn't smoke cigarettes. The fact that marijuana isn't legal in all states, or is illegal at the federal level, is immaterial to my point. In the places where my family and I live (D.C. and Oregon), marijuana has been legal for a decade. It was made legal in Oregon in 2015, after being decriminalized in 1973. Dispensaries are all over the place. In D.C. it's been legal to grew, possess, and barter since 2015.

The fact that it's illegal under federal law has no effect on people's use of it, because the feds do not bother to enforce that law on individuals. My neighborhood in downtown D.C. reeked of pot smoke way back in 2016.