NEW YORK — Citing a recent drop in pretentious cultural pieces, the New York Times called for the national legalization of marijuana in an editorial Sunday, in order that the newspaper can document the drug in a series of stiflingly elitist and obnoxious columns in its Lifestyle section.
“The federal government should repeal the ban on marijuana,” said the paper’s editorial board. “We reached that conclusion after a great deal of discussion…inspired by a rapidly growing movement among the states to reform marijuana laws, as well as this paper’s increasingly-scarce ostentatious cultural profiles. Legalization will increase tax revenue, free up law enforcement resources, and allow the Times to continue to write boring fashion summaries.”
The Times is the most prominent U.S. newspaper to endorse the end of marijuana criminalization, which it compared to alcohol prohibition in the 1920s and ‘30s.
“For too long, the nation’s leading newspaper has been unable to pompously catalogue Kush, Cali, or Purp,” the editorial continued, emphasizing that the newspaper’s Wine Club “has covered every ostentatious angle of alcohol. In the future, we hope to pedantically drone on about an eighth of Blue Dream in the same way we would about a bottle of Napa Valley Chardonnay.”
Speaking to reporters Sunday night, Times wine and food critic Eric Asimov enthused over the paper’s decision, and said he looked forward to lending his condescending voice to marijuana consumption and culture.
“The Upper West Side has been at a loss for which strain of bud to break out early in the evening or what size bong is appropriate to hit during dessert,” Asimov noted. “We wouldn’t want our loyal subscribers to make a major faux pas like rolling their spliffs with TOP instead of Zig Zag, or, heaven forbid, bringing a multi-colored bowl to a black-tie event. Rest assured, your faithful correspondents will answer all questions regarding marijuana usage and décor, in an eye-rolling weekly column that all but the most unapologetically odious will decline to even consider reading.”
“Creating systems for regulating manufacture, sale and marketing will be complex,” the paper admitted in its conclusion. “An equally-daunting task will be how we will turn the herb into another tedious accessory of the glitterati lifestyle. But this publication has yet to find the topic it can’t make insufferably patronizing, and we have no doubt we will succeed where others have failed.
“But none of this can happen until federal prohibition of marijuana has come to an end,” the Times concluded. “President Obama, do not let us down.”
