What is in a Name? That which we call…

What is in a Name? That which we call…


Shakespeare posed a famous question that seems fitting in the medical cannabis community in Los Angeles right now. What is in a name?

Cannabis goes by many names such as marijuana, pot, weed, grass, lawn, reefer, dope, Mary Jane, 420, 215, ganja, giggleweed, wacky tobacky, assassin of youth, bamba, bud, herb, burnie, cheeba, chronic, dank, green, hooch, kaya, killer green bud, mota, etc.

But the crazy naming thing does not stop with just what the herb is called but how many different types it comes in, such as: hemp, indica, sativa, kief, hash, highbred, purples, etc.

And there are just as many naming variations on ways of consuming cannabis such as joints, bongs, blunts, spliffs, vaporizers, tinctures, topicals, glass pipes, etc.

And there are a plethora of names for the weights in which cannabis is packaged in grams, eighths, quarters, halves, ounces, pounds, lids, zips, Z’s, etc.

And the nomenclature for the specific strains is overwhelming with names such Sour Diesel, Blue Dream, Casey Jones, Kush, O.G., Purple, Maui Wowie, Life Saver, Pineapple Thai, Mr. Nice, White Widow, Goo, L.A. Confidential, headband, Ingrid, Blueberry, Cheese, Chemdog, Haze, Jack Herer, Kali Myst, etc.

And in Los Angeles, Ca, medical cannabis patients can get most of the above from any number of collectives which go by their own set of very interesting names, such as: Sunset Herbal Corner, California Patients Alliance, Pure Life Alternative, Farmacy, Strain Balboa Caregivers, Patients Against Pain, LA Wonderland Caregivers, Ironworks Collective, Mother Nature’s Remedy, etc.

As you can see the medical cannabis community has no shortage of names and they are very creative when naming almost everything they do. So, as Shakespeare put it so elegantly, What’s in a name? And (this part I added to the question) does all cannabis and cannabis organizations smell the same?

To twist yet another phrase from Shakespeare (because I was an English Lit Major at UCLA), Something’s rotten in Los Angeles. And I would like to clear up any confusion there may be regarding the names of organizations that sound or look very similar to others.

Dan Lutz, a Los Angeles marijuana provider, has named his last two organizations after well-established organizations that have been around for years before he was ever known to this community. Dan's collective has won an injunction against the city of LA which challenged the moritorium.  And Dan organized a new group of post-ICO (moritorium) collectives.

First he named his organization, Los Angeles Caregivers Alliance (LACA) which was oddly similar to an organization that had been organized in LA for years called Greater Los Angeles Caregivers Alliance (GLACA). GLACA with a "G" is a group of pre-ICO collectives meaning they had complied with the City of LA's request to fill out paper work and register with the city before a moritorium went into place. Post-ICO collectives violated city rules and opened without proper permits, licenses or permission.

Now, Dan has decided to name his organization Safe Access (SA) but for the last 10 years AMERICANS for Safe Access (ASA) has been the nation’s largest medical cannabis organization. Americans for Safe Access has been fighting to protect patient's rights on all levels of government including cities, counties, states, and federal. They have won vital cases that set precident for all patients. They have chapters around the country.  Dan's organizaton has yet to accomplish anything but clever naming.

Either Dan has no idea what’s going on in the medical cannabis community and keeps accidently naming his organizations after pre-existing groups or he lacks the creativity to come up with more original names by himself. Regardless of Dan’s reasoning, it’s clear the average person cannot tell the difference between LACA and GLACA or Safe Access and Americans for Safe Access and that’s cause for a lawsuit. He may want to reconsider his naming process before it becomes a legal issue.

P.S.

All cannabis smells like freedom until you get caught with it by law enforcement, then it smells like Denmark (As Shakespeare might say). And maybe Dan should change his last name to start with the letter "P", it seems more fitting.