I used cannabis long before I became a medicinal cannabis patient. I didn’t have a treatment plan. I wasn’t thinking about cannabinoids. I certainly wasn’t describing cultivars in terms of their therapeutic potential. I liked cannabis. More specifically, I liked it instead of alcohol.

Over time, my relationship with the plant changed. I became more interested in what I was consuming and why. Cannabis became more intentional. It was therapeutic and, eventually, it became medicine.

There wasn’t a clean moment where one relationship ended and another began. I didn’t suddenly become a different kind of cannabis consumer because a doctor wrote me a prescription. But the way the world viewed me certainly changed, and that distinction has been bothering me for a while.

Australia’s medicinal cannabis system has done something incredibly important by giving hundreds of thousands of people legitimate access to a plant they previously risked being criminalised for using. It has brought cannabis into clinics, pharmacies and healthcare conversations. But somewhere along the way, we’ve started acting as though cannabis only became worthy of respect once medicine got involved.

I don’t think that’s true.

The respectable cannabis user

Medicinal cannabis has given us a new category of cannabis consumer: the patient. The patient has symptoms that require treatment. We are familiar and comfortable with the white-coat approach of Western medicine and, ta-da, we have a framework for medicinal cannabis in Australia. But you must join this very specific club.

That club has created a line in the sand for many of the people who helped normalise cannabis long before prescriptions were a thing. Creating the respectable cannabis user can reinforce the idea that everyone outside that category is somehow less legitimate. The recreational user. The stoner. The person who simply enjoys it.

I’ve occupied more than one of those categories myself. I’ve also been somebody insistent on using “adult-use” instead of “recreational”, but I’ve realised I’m putting a hat on a hat to impress people whose minds probably won’t ever be changed anyway.

Before cannabis was medicine for me, it was something I enjoyed. It was social and relaxing. I preferred it to drinking. Becoming a patient didn’t suddenly make those experiences meaningless. If anything, they helped me understand the plant. So did the two years I spent living in Canada, working entirely within its “adult-use”, aka recreational, market.

That’s why I struggle with the increasingly neat line we draw between medicinal and recreational cannabis. Legally, the distinction is obviously important. It matters to the TGA. But human beings are messier, and cannabis is messy too. It should be allowed to be.

Someone might discover cannabis socially and later realise it helps them sleep.

Someone might use it for chronic pain and also enjoy how it makes them feel.

Someone might consume cannabis medicinally during the week and socially on the weekend.

If you think medicinal cannabis is undermined by acknowledging any of this, you’re probably being too sensitive.

Cannabis knowledge didn’t begin in a clinic

There is another problem with pretending cannabis became legitimate when medicine arrived. Cannabis knowledge didn’t begin when Australian doctors started prescribing it. People had been growing the plant, developing genetics, comparing cultivars and learning how cannabis affected them for generations.

Some of that knowledge was anecdotal. Some of it was folklore. Some of it was probably wrong. That’s what happens when knowledge develops in a community that has largely been pushed underground. But the answer isn’t to pretend none of it existed.

The legal cannabis industry inherited decades of knowledge from people who were never allowed to call themselves industry professionals. It inherited genetics from growers, language from consumers, knowledge from patients and political momentum from activists. It also inherited an enormous amount of cultural capital from people who continued talking about cannabis when doing so carried considerably more risk than it does today.

We don’t have to romanticise the underground to acknowledge that. We just need to remember it existed.

Medicine changed the vocabulary

I’ve watched the language around cannabis change enormously. We talk about cannabinoid profiles, terpene content, formulations and therapeutic outcomes. There are good reasons for that. Medicine requires precision, patients deserve products they can trust and doctors need reliable information when making clinical decisions.

But sometimes I wonder whether we’re using clinical language to explain cannabis or to sanitise it. Because cannabis already had a language: strain names, growers, breeders, genetics, flower, weed, joints...

Some of those words don’t fit comfortably inside a doctor’s office. I understand that. If you’re a doctor who has spent your career prescribing conventional pharmaceuticals, discussing something called Cheetah Piss probably feels ridiculous.

But perhaps that discomfort tells us something too. Those names didn’t appear because somebody in a pharmaceutical marketing department thought they sounded credible. They came from the history and culture of the medicine we’re now prescribing. Also, maybe medicine isn’t the only framework for cannabis?

Patients are allowed to enjoy cannabis

There’s another thing medicinal cannabis patients sometimes seem reluctant to say, some doctors despise and an entire industry that profits from cannabis occasionally puts its head in the sand about: cannabis can feel good.

Years of prohibition have made us incredibly nervous about pleasure. Patients are expected to talk about symptom reduction, sleep quality and therapeutic outcomes.

I use cannabis medicinally. I also like cannabis. Those statements don’t contradict each other.

We don’t generally demand that medicines be unpleasant before we consider them legitimate, and we certainly don’t apply that standard to many other substances. Someone can appreciate wine while understanding the risks of alcohol. They can enjoy coffee while using caffeine for a functional purpose. Human relationships with substances are complicated, yet cannabis is forced to be the exception. The black sheep.

We don’t need to choose

I don’t want to return to an unregulated cannabis market. Patients deserve better than mystery products. Consumers deserve accurate information. Doctors deserve evidence. Cannabis products should be tested and standards should exist.

But none of those things require us to pretend the legal industry invented cannabis.

We can have medicine and culture, doctors and growers. We can talk about cannabinoids and strain names. We can respect medicinal patients without disrespecting recreational consumers. And we can acknowledge that someone enjoying cannabis doesn’t automatically make their relationship with it irresponsible.

Medicinal cannabis has helped Australia reconsider a plant we spent decades misunderstanding. That’s worth celebrating, but I don’t want cannabis to become acceptable only because we’ve found a way to make it look less like cannabis.

The prescription gave me legal access to something that had already become an important part of my life. It only legitimised my relationship with the plant in the eyes of others.

Simpson eventually questioned that story. At 27, curiosity won out. What followed was a relationship with cannabis that opened parts of his life he had not expected. He found creativity, introspection and a renewed sense of wonder. Ordinary experiences could feel interesting again. Films could be revisited from another perspective. An afternoon could become an adventure. It challenged much of what he had been taught. Then something went badly wrong.

About a year after first trying cannabis, Simpson was feeling confident in his relationship with it. Perhaps too confident. “I think I felt a little invincible,” he says. He had reached a point where cannabis seemed to be contributing positively to his life. That success created its own assumption. “You take more cannabis, life will get better.”

One night, already heavily affected by cannabis, Simpson consumed roughly the same amount again and settled in to watch an intense film with a friend. A particularly disturbing scene triggered something he had never experienced before. “My mind started just like it kind of got away from me.” The rapid connections he had previously enjoyed became frightening. His thoughts moved faster than he could control them. “That was happening in the wrong direction.”

The experience did not end when the film stopped. It did not disappear when the cannabis wore off. Simpson struggled to sleep. He repeatedly pictured people he loved in horrific situations. He sought medical help. The effects stayed with him for months. “I stopped functioning as a human being. I could no longer function as a working, thinking adult.”

It would be easy to make this a cautionary tale about cannabis. It would also be easy for cannabis advocates to dismiss it as an unfortunate outlier. Neither response is particularly useful.

We need somewhere between harmless and harmful

Cannabis has spent the better part of a century surrounded by exaggerated claims of danger. People have been arrested and imprisoned. Patients have been denied access. Consumers have been portrayed as lazy, irresponsible or criminal. Governments have often relied on fear rather than honest drug education. Challenging those ideas remains important.

But correcting decades of exaggeration does not require pretending cannabis is incapable of causing harm. In fact, doing so risks recreating the same problem from the opposite direction. Simpson’s experience is useful precisely because it refuses to fit neatly into either story.

He does not believe cannabis destroyed his life. Nor does he pretend nothing happened. “I in no way blame the cannabis,” he says. Instead, he looks at the circumstances around his experience. He had consumed a large amount. He was feeling unusually confident. He deliberately chose an intense environment. He had limited education about where his own limits might be. “That choice that I made to do that, that’s on me.”

Acknowledging personal responsibility does not make cannabis harmless. Nor does acknowledging cannabis as a contributing factor make prohibition sensible. Both things can be true. Cannabis can produce meaningful experiences for some people and difficult ones for others. The same person can experience both.

That is a much less convenient message than either side has traditionally offered. It is also probably closer to reality.

Good cannabis education cannot only contain good news

Simpson eventually stepped away from cannabis. For around six months, his priority was getting himself back. Therapy became central to that process. So did yoga, meditation and examining other parts of his life that had surfaced during the experience. “Without it, I don’t know where I’d be.”

Eventually, he began to miss cannabis. Not simply getting high, but the things he associated with it. Creativity. Exploration. Wonder. That created an uncomfortable question. Could cannabis still have a place in his life after what had happened?

He eventually decided to try it again. This time, the relationship needed different rules. “We have to be much smarter now. We have to treat this with the respect it deserves.” That idea deserves more attention within cannabis culture.

Respect for cannabis is often expressed through appreciation of the plant. Its history. Its cultivation. Its medicinal applications. Its cultural significance. Respect should also mean recognising its limits.

A mature cannabis culture should be able to tell someone that more is not necessarily better. That potency matters. That context matters. That individual responses differ. That an experience which feels profound or helpful one day may feel very different under other circumstances. That information should not be considered anti-cannabis, it is simply cannabis education.

Simpson later had another uncomfortable experience after unknowingly using a cannabis concentrate and consuming considerably more THC than he expected. Again, the lesson was not that cannabis was inherently dangerous. It was that understanding what you are consuming matters.

Education built entirely around benefits leaves people poorly equipped for the moments when things do not go according to plan.

Advocacy should be strong enough for uncomfortable stories

There is an understandable reason cannabis advocates sometimes become defensive when discussing harm. For decades, almost every potential risk has been used to justify prohibition.

A difficult experience becomes evidence that cannabis is dangerous. A case involving mental health becomes an argument against access. A road incident becomes justification for laws that treat presence as impairment.

When harms are routinely exaggerated, people learn to push back. But there is a cost when that instinct becomes automatic. People with complicated cannabis experiences can become reluctant to talk about them. That leaves the public conversation with two extremes. Cannabis is dangerous. Or cannabis is wonderful. Most relationships with substances, medicines and human behaviour are more complicated than that.

Simpson’s story offers something more useful because he remains openly supportive of cannabis while refusing to rewrite the difficult parts of his own experience. He went on to write Drenched in Wonder, a book about his relationship with cannabis.

Cannabis advocacy does not need to prove that cannabis is harmless. It needs to argue that adults deserve accurate information, sensible laws and the ability to make informed choices. Those arguments are not weakened by acknowledging risk. They depend on it.

Respect is more useful than fear

Simpson grew up with cannabis education based largely on fear. Don’t touch it. It’s bad news. It might lead somewhere worse. That approach did not prepare him for cannabis. It simply delayed the point at which he had to educate himself.

Years later, his own experience pushed him towards almost the opposite conclusion. Not fear. Respect. “The question of whether cannabis is harmless or harmful is obviously a very complicated one,” he says. “And it’s different for everybody.” That may be the more useful starting point.

Cannabis does not need another generation raised on exaggerated warnings. But the alternative should not be a generation raised on exaggerated reassurance either. People deserve to know what cannabis can offer. They also deserve honest conversations about what can happen when things go wrong.

A culture confident enough to hold both ideas at once will ultimately be better equipped to advocate for legalisation, education and responsible use. Simpson puts it more simply: “Respect the plant.”

For Yuki Stanborough, Director of Kaizen Supply Chain Solutions, the future of medicinal cannabis isn’t just about producing more cannabis or producing it faster. It’s about changing the relationship between people, the plant and the land itself.

As a proud Aboriginal man, patient and industry operator, Stanborough believes Indigenous perspectives have something unique to offer a rapidly commercialising sector. Not because they’re novel, but because they’ve been refined over tens of thousands of years.

“Land is not a commodity… it’s something that’s living and breathing. You don’t own it. It’s actually something that you’re a part of.”

That idea challenges much of the thinking that drives modern agriculture where success is often measured through yield, efficiency and output. Bigger harvests. Faster crop cycles. Lower production costs. Those goals aren’t inherently wrong, but they can become the only goals that matter. Stanborough argues that stewardship asks different questions. Instead of asking how much can be taken from the land, it asks what the land needs in return.

“Soil health, microbial activity, biodiversity, working with the natural cycles of sun, water, and seasons, rather than forcing outcomes through heavy intervention. You’re actually trying to work in balance with it.”

For Stanborough, cannabis grown with intention, healthy soil and respect for Country produces more than a compliant product. It reflects a process built around care rather than extraction. If cultivation becomes focused primarily on speed, density and commercial returns, the plant risks becoming disconnected from its purpose as medicine.

Throughout our conversation, Stanborough returns to the traditional Ngari approach to health. One where healing isn’t separated into physical symptoms alone. Mental wellbeing, spiritual wellbeing, connection to community matters and connection to Country matters. Cannabis, viewed through that lens, becomes one part of a much larger picture.

“It’s more about connection to self, which will then implore connection to Country and connection to community. Cannabis then becomes the catalyst of a bigger healing system.”

That perspective feels remarkably relevant today while medicinal cannabis occupies an unusual place within healthcare. It sits somewhere between conventional medicine and holistic care. Patients regularly speak about improvements in sleep, anxiety or pain alongside broader changes in quality of life. Indigenous models of health have long recognised that these things are connected so perhaps that shouldn’t feel so radical.

Stanborough is careful not to suggest Indigenous knowledge should replace modern medicine but he sees an opportunity for the two to complement one another. An opportunity for Australia to maintain rigorous pharmaceutical standards while also embracing a deeper understanding of stewardship, sustainability and responsibility.

That thinking is already influencing the work Kaizen is doing through its partnership with the Australian Indigenous Research Foundation (AIRF) and Wangara Cultivation Co. Their ambition isn’t simply to create another cannabis supply chain. It’s to demonstrate what Indigenous-led cultivation, testing and distribution can look like when guided by shared values rather than commercial convenience.

Cannabis is often described as a new frontier in Australian healthcare. In reality, the principles Stanborough speaks about are anything but new. Stewardship. Reciprocity. Responsibility. Thinking beyond the next harvest. Ideas that have shaped First Nations relationships with Country for more than 65,000 years.

The medicinal cannabis industry spends a lot of time asking how to grow better plants but Yuki Stanborough is asking a different question. How do we become better custodians? As Australia continues building its medicinal cannabis sector, that may prove to be the more important conversation.

To hear the full conversation with Yuki Stanborough, listen to the latest episode of the Give & Toke podcast.

As medicinal cannabis has become increasingly integrated into healthcare, we’ve come to rely on a handful of familiar metrics. THC percentage. Cannabinoid content. Basic Certificates of Analysis (COAs). They provide consistency and reassurance in a system that depends on both. But what if those numbers only tell part of the story?

That question was at the centre of a recent discussion on the Give & Toke podcast with chemist Dr Colin P. Nuckolls, cultivation expert Alec Koudijs and global cultivator, Tom Forrest. Together, they explored the uncomfortable idea that we’ve become remarkably good at quantifying cannabis, while still struggling to explain why one flower can produce a completely different experience from another.

For Dr Nuckolls, that question has shaped years of research into cannabis chemistry beyond the handful of compounds that typically appear on a laboratory report. His work isn’t about dismissing testing. It’s about recognising its limitations.

“We test for a handful of cannabinoids and maybe a couple dozen terpenes,” he explains. “The plant produces far more than that.”

Two flowers can return remarkably similar laboratory results while producing noticeably different experiences for patients. Anyone who has spent time with the plant already knows this intuitively. The challenge is that our testing frameworks often can’t explain why.

It leaves us with a system that sometimes places more confidence in measurement than experience. That’s an interesting contradiction within medicinal cannabis as patients are routinely encouraged to find the product that works best for them. At the same time, they’re often directed towards products using the same simplified indicators that have repeatedly failed to predict how those products will actually feel.

THC percentage is perhaps the clearest example. It has become the industry’s shorthand for quality, strength and value. Higher numbers attract attention (and buyers) and lower numbers are often overlooked.

Dr Nuckolls argues that “THC percentage does not correlate with the most positive experience. It doesn’t even correlate with the most intense experience.”

That’s a difficult idea to accept in a market that has organised itself around potency but the chemistry is more complicated than we’ve allowed it to be. That complexity extends well beyond the laboratory. But chemistry is only one part of the story.

Tom Forrest argues that cannabis has also been separated from its agricultural roots. For most of human history, cannabis was simply another crop. It grew in the sun, responded to its environment and varied from season to season. Modern prohibition changed that relationship, encouraging a view of cannabis as something to be hidden, controlled and eventually standardised. That can help explain why consistency has become such a dominant goal within medicinal cannabis.

Alec Koudijs expands on that idea through cultivation. Indoor growing has become synonymous with quality. Controlled lighting, temperature and nutrition produce reliable outcomes. Those are genuine advantages. But reliability shouldn’t be mistaken for completeness and we should consider looking far beyond the metrics we’re settling on today.

Perhaps the most memorable analogy comes from Dr Nuckolls. He compares modern cannabis research to looking for lost keys beneath a lamppost. Not because that’s where the keys were dropped, but because that’s where the light is.

It’s an elegant description of how scientific progress can become constrained by the tools available to measure it. Researchers focus heavily on the compounds they can reliably detect. Regulators write standards around those compounds. Producers optimise cultivation to satisfy those standards while the biology of the plant extends well beyond what we’re currently measuring.

None of this suggests laboratory testing should disappear. Certificates of Analysis remain essential for confirming safety, identifying contaminants and verifying consistency. Patients deserve that protection but are we beginning to mistake compliance for understanding?

As medicinal cannabis matures, that’s becoming increasingly important. Healthcare understandably wants products that are predictable. Patients want products that work. Those goals usually overlap, but they aren’t identical.

If a patient repeatedly tells their doctor that one cultivar helps while another with virtually identical laboratory results doesn’t, lived experience deserves to be part of the evidence rather than treated as an exception to it.

Cannabis has always challenged simple classification. Perhaps the future of medicinal cannabis isn’t about abandoning science, but allowing science to ask better questions.

The numbers will always matter. They just shouldn’t be mistaken for the whole story.

To hear the full discussion with Dr Colin P. Nuckolls, Alec Koudijs and Tom Forrest, listen to the latest episode of the Give & Toke podcast.

It kinda makes sense at the surface. For medicine to work, patients need reliability. If a product helps with sleep, pain, or anxiety, it should do the same thing next month. But as cannabis moves deeper into pharmaceutical systems, something else becomes harder to measure. Care.

Care in the agricultural sense. Attention to the plant, time spent understanding genetics, knowing how it responds to stress or recognising when something is off before it reaches the jar. That kind of knowledge does not always survive scale.

To Remi-Dean Ryan, whose career has moved across cultivation, pharmacy, genetics, and post-harvest that range matters. Few people understand cannabis from both ends of the system. Fewer still understand what gets lost between them.

Ryan’s relationship with cannabis did not begin in a clinic. Like many people, it started recreational, social and unstructured. But with time, the meaning changed. “I found weed in my teens,” he said. “I found cannabis in my twenties.”

For Ryan, that shift came through reflection. Looking back on early use through the lens of undiagnosed attention, anxiety, and sleep issues. What looked chaotic at the time started to look more functional. Then came his mother.

Watching her navigate severe mental health struggles and heavy pharmaceutical intervention changed the way he saw the plant entirely. He described seeing her personality disappear under medication. Out of options, she pursued cannabis.

The results were not instant, but they were meaningful. Better sleep. Less medication. More of herself returning. It was the first time he saw cannabis not as a legitimate support rather than just an escape. That kind of lived experience still sits underneath much of the legal cannabis industry, even if it is rarely centred.

When asked what the medical system often forgets about cannabis, Ryan’s answer was immediate. “It’s a plant.” It sounds obvious. But in practice, it’s a reminder that plants are variable, and genetics express differently. Growing conditions, harvest timing, drying, storage all influence the final product. That distinction is where craft lives. And for Ryan, craft is not nostalgia. It is quality control.

When people talk about quality in cannabis, the conversation often drifts toward flavour, bag appeal, or terpene profiles. Ryan’s benchmark is simpler. Consistency. If a patient relies on a flower to sleep, it needs to perform predictably. That is harder than it sounds. Too often, Ryan argues, businesses chase volume before they understand the genetics they are growing. The result is a product that looks compliant, but lacks integrity and patients notice.

That matters because medicinal cannabis still relies heavily on trust. Trust that the product will work, trust that the person prescribing it understands it and trust that the system respects the complexity of the plant. This is where the old world still has something to teach the new one.

Before legalisation, clinics and barcodes, cannabis knowledge moved through growers, patients, and communities. It was practical, informal and often dismissed. But it was knowledge.

Ryan sees value in preserving that. Not as rebellion against medicine, but as an extension of it. Because the best outcomes won’t come from reducing cannabis to a single metric.

As Australia’s medicinal market grows, these questions will become harder to ignore.

Can the system protect consistency without sacrificing craft?

Can cannabis scale without flattening the knowledge that built it?

Can medicine make space for growers, not just manufacturers?

There are no clean answers yet. But if the future of cannabis is going to be credible, it cannot afford to forget its past. Because long before cannabis was scanned, packaged, and prescribed, it was studied in a different way by people close enough to the plant to listen.

The full conversation with Remi-Dean Ryan is available now on Give & Toke.

These are practical questions. They sit in the gap between access and understanding. It is a gap the system still struggles to fill. It is also where people like Kyla de Clifford have found their place. Through Canna Curious and Ruby Mary Botanicals, de Clifford has built something different.

For many people, especially women, cannabis still comes with hesitation. Not because they are against it, but because they have rarely been invited into the conversation in a way that feels clear, safe or relatable. De Clifford knows that feeling.

Her own relationship with cannabis started long before legal access. Like many Australians, it began without much guidance. As her understanding grew, so did her frustration with how hard it was to find practical, trustworthy education.

Even after medicinal cannabis became legal, that problem remained. A lot of what de Clifford found came from women overseas already building communities around cannabis literacy. That shaped what Canna Curious would become. Curiosity first. Certainty later.

It is a simple shift, but an important one. For many patients, especially those managing health issues and hormonal changes, cannabis can feel overwhelming at first. Not because it is complex, but because the language around it often is.

THC percentages. Strain names. Delivery methods. Dosing. For a new patient, it can feel like learning a new dialect. That confusion often continues inside the medical system with short consults, locked prescriptions, and limited instructions. This is not always a reflection of poor care. More often it is time pressure, limited education and a system still finding its feet.

De Clifford has become a bridge between the clinical and the practical. Helping people understand not just what they are taking, but why. That also means challenging some of the assumptions that have shaped the medicinal market. The biggest is potency.

Higher THC has become shorthand for better. But patient outcomes rarely work that neatly. For many, lower doses or more balanced cannabinoid profiles can be just as effective, sometimes more so.

Cannabis is tightly regulated as medicine, yet much of the knowledge patients rely on still comes from lived experience, community and trial and error. The formal system exists. But the practical knowledge often sits outside it.

De Clifford speaks about the ways stigma still follows patients, even when their use is legal. Women worried about being judged at work. Others concerned about how medicinal cannabis might be viewed in family court or custody discussions.

Legal does not always mean accepted and accepted does not always mean understood, which is especially true in women’s health. Many women have spent years navigating symptoms that were minimised, misunderstood or pushed aside.

Cannabis has opened a new path for many of those women. But it also raises an important question. Who gets to shape the conversation?

That idea now sits behind one of her most important projects to date. Through Canna Curious, she has launched a national survey asking women how they want to be spoken to about cannabis. It looks at trust, stigma, communication and lived experience, with the goal of gathering more than 300 responses over five weeks.

The findings are aimed at improving how patients, practitioners and the wider industry communicate. Women interested in contributing can find the survey right here.

To hear our full conversation with Kyla de Clifford, listen to Give & Toke on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all good podcast platforms.

For decades, cultivars have carried names that range from descriptive to ridiculous. Northern Lights. Blue Dream. White Widow. Sour Diesel. Pineapple Express, Alaskan Thunderf—k. For many patients, these names are simply part of cannabis. For some healthcare professionals, they can feel awkward, unprofessional or difficult to reconcile with a medical framework.

As medicinal cannabis becomes more established, there is increasing pressure to replace strain names with something that feels more clinical. Product codes, THC percentages and brand names designed to fit neatly within healthcare. The intention is understandable as it is often seen as an “easy win” to legitimise our industry, especially with the pressure created by the recent TGA consultation.

Healthcare values consistency, professionalism and clear communication. A doctor may feel more comfortable prescribing a product called T25 Flower than one called Cheetah Piss. The question is whether something important gets lost in the process.

More Than Marketing

Strain names did not emerge from corporate branding departments. They were created by growers, breeders and communities long before legal markets existed.

Some reflected a plant’s appearance. Others referenced aroma, flavour or effects. Many acknowledged genetics, geography or the people responsible for developing them. In an unregulated market, strain names became a form of shared language.

They helped consumers identify products, helped growers track genetics and allowed knowledge to move between communities. The names were not always scientific, but they carried information and they carried history.

Modern cannabis did not appear overnight. It is the product of decades of breeding, experimentation and cultivation. Behind every well-known cultivar sits a network of growers whose work helped shape the genetics patients access today.

When strain names disappear, some of that history disappears with them.

The Push Towards Uniformity

The medical cannabis industry has spent years working towards legitimacy and that work matters. Patients deserve access to safe products. Healthcare professionals deserve reliable information and regulators have a responsibility to ensure appropriate standards are met.

None of this requires cannabis to abandon its identity yet there can sometimes be an assumption that legitimacy and culture are incompatible. The more medical cannabis becomes accepted, the more pressure there is to present it in a way that resembles traditional pharmaceuticals.

Cannabis is not a traditional pharmaceutical. It is a plant with a rich agricultural history. Its genetics matter. Its cultivation methods matter. Its cultural origins matter. Patients often learn about products through the language of cultivars long before they learn company names.

Understanding the Counter Argument

There are legitimate criticisms of strain names. Some are childish. Some create awkward conversations between patients and healthcare professionals. Some names can make it difficult for people outside cannabis culture to take the industry seriously. These concerns should not be dismissed.

A patient discussing chronic pain, PTSD or cancer treatment may not want to explain to friends or family that a product called Booty Clapper has become part of their healthcare plan.

Healthcare also relies on precision. A strain name alone tells us very little about cannabinoid content, terpene profile or clinical suitability. These are reasonable concerns but they are arguments for better education, not cultural erasure.

Learning the Language

Every field develops terminology that appears strange to outsiders. Wine has varietals. Craft beer has styles. Medicine itself contains countless terms that sound unusual until people become familiar with them. Cannabis is no different and the solution is not necessarily to remove strain names from the conversation but to improve understanding of what those names represent.

A cultivar name is not a clinical recommendation. It is not a guarantee of outcome. It is a reference point. A way of understanding genetics, lineage and history. For patients, that information can be valuable. For healthcare professionals, it provides another layer of context when discussing products and patient experiences.

The goal should not be choosing between culture and legitimacy. The goal should be recognising that legitimacy does not require culture to disappear.

Preserving the Story

The irony is that many of the names now considered unprofessional are part of what made cannabis culture accessible in the first place. They reflected creativity, humour. and community, and helped build a shared language around a plant that spent decades pushed to the margins.

As cannabis continues its transition into mainstream healthcare, there is value in remembering where that language came from. Not every strain name deserves preservation and not every cultivar needs a colourful backstory. But reducing cannabis to product codes and percentages risks stripping away part of what makes the plant unique.

Cannabis can be legitimate without becoming sterile. It can be medical without becoming disconnected from its own history and perhaps that is the real lesson of Pineapple Express.

The fact that a major Hollywood film was named after a cultivar speaks to the cultural significance strain names once held. They were not simply labels. They were stories. As the industry evolves, those stories remain worth preserving even if they require us to think a little differently.

By the late 1990s, public trust in anti-drug messaging had already started to erode. Younger audiences were growing up in a world where cannabis use was increasingly visible within music, comedy and everyday social life, yet official education still relied on exaggerated warnings and moral panic. Into that environment came Half Baked.

Recently revisited on Helping or Hurting?, the podcast series from Give & Toke and Exotican exploring cannabis in film, the 1998 comedy marked a significant shift in how cannabis users were portrayed on screen. Earlier films often treated cannabis as a symbol of decline or deviance while Half Baked approached it as part of ordinary social behaviour.

Co-written by Dave Chappelle and Neal Brennan, the film follows a group of friends trying to bail their mate out of jail after he accidentally kills a police horse while on a munchies run. The premise is purposefully absurd and juvenile, but the film’s broader cultural impact came from the characters feeling familiar.

Nobody was spiralling into violence, or delivering dramatic anti-drug speeches. The cannabis users in Half Baked were messy, immature and directionless at times, but they were still recognisably human. They had friendships, routines and ordinary social interactions. For many viewers, that alone made the film feel more believable than the education campaigns surrounding cannabis at the time.

Comedy became a kind of unofficial public education, not because it was entirely accurate or particularly educational, but because it reflected something audiences recognised from real life.

That shift was important because fear-based messaging tends to collapse once people encounter contradictions in their own experience. When someone grows up hearing that cannabis users are dangerous or incapable of functioning, then meets ordinary people who clearly do not fit that description, credibility starts to break down.

Half Baked did not argue for legalisation or medicinal access. It did not attempt to educate audiences about policy or healthcare. What it did do was remove some of the fear surrounding cannabis by presenting users as fun and recognisable, instead of threatening.

At the same time, the film also reinforced stereotypes that continue to shape the cannabis conversation today. The central characters drift through unstable jobs, avoid responsibility and treat adulthood as something to be escaped. Cannabis becomes closely tied to laziness and emotional stagnation, even if the film never directly blames the plant itself. Many folks are still informed by these ideas.

Patients regularly describe feeling judged before discussing cannabis with a doctor. Clinicians remain cautious about speaking publicly, particularly as scrutiny around prescribing standards continues to increase in Australia. Much of the public conversation still swings between two extremes. Cannabis users are either framed as reckless “stoners” or repackaged through highly sanitised corporate language designed to make the industry appear respectable.

Many medicinal patients are not looking for rebellion or identity. They are looking for symptom relief, improved sleep, reduced pain or a better quality of life. Yet many still navigate cultural assumptions that were shaped long before medicinal frameworks existed.

Part of the difficulty is that meaningful cannabis education was absent for so long. Schools focused on abstinence, governments focused on deterrence and healthcare often avoided the subject altogether. In the absence of honest discussion, culture became one of the primary ways people formed opinions about cannabis.

Modern medicinal cannabis now exists in the shadow of both propaganda and comedy. Earlier anti-drug campaigns exaggerated danger to the point of losing credibility while cannabis comedies pushed back against that fear. Somewhere in the middle sits the reality most people are now trying to navigate.

That complexity is part of what makes films like Half Baked worth revisiting. Not because they offer a perfect representation of cannabis, but because they capture a moment where entertainment felt more believable than official education. The humour was exaggerated, but the humanity underneath it resonated with audiences in a way many institutional messages never did. The result was imperfect, but influential.

In Australia, prescribing has dropped significantly in recent months. Not because the legislation has shifted, but because the environment has. Heightened scrutiny from the TGA, combined with sustained pressure from groups like the AMA and Pharmacy Guild, has created a climate where disproportionate caution becomes the default. As practitioners pull back, patients feel it quickly.

For a patient, that can look like a treatment that was working suddenly becoming harder to access, with no clear explanation. In trying to legitimise cannabis, there is a risk of overcorrecting.

Dazed and Confused is a film that presents cannabis without explanation, justification, or consequence. The characters are not using it to solve anything. It is part of the environment, not the focus of it.

In clinical settings, cannabis is framed through outcomes like pain reduction, sleep improvement, anxiety management and other measurable outcomes. Products are categorised with rigour in our system. This film sits entirely outside of our new world.

Earlier film portrayals like Reefer Madness relied on exaggeration to shape behaviour. The goal was deterrence but hyperbole failed to win hearts and now, modern fear looks different. It is quieter and far more calculated and sits in regulatory language, professional risk, pearl-clutching, outdated drug driving or workplace testing laws, and public scrutiny.

When prescribing drops without a corresponding legal change, it is rarely the result of new evidence. It is about perception. Practitioners respond to risk, and systems tighten without instruction. Though not a return to prohibition, it’s a stern reminder that progress is not fixed and access is neither linear or logical.

The push for legitimacy has brought clear benefits. Patients who need cannabis for specific conditions have a pathway. Products are more consistent and prescribing is more accountable. But legitimacy comes with boundaries.

When cannabis is framed only as a clinical tool, its broader role becomes harder to acknowledge. That can narrow conversations rather than expand them.

For many people, the value of cannabis is not easily reduced to a single outcome. It may sit somewhere between relief, routine, and quality of life. That nuance is difficult to capture in strictly clinical terms.

Dazed and Confused is not instructive. It does not attempt to guide behaviour or present a model for use. It shows a version of cannabis that is unburdened by justification, highlighting something that is easy to lose in regulated environments.

Patients can require structured, evidence-informed care. They can also have a broader relationship with cannabis that sits outside strict clinical endpoints. A system that only recognises one of these will struggle to meet people where they are.

The current moment is defined by caution as regulatory attention is high. Public narratives are shifting and prescribing behaviour reflects that.

Dazed and Confused is a reminder that cannabis existed before it was formalised. It will continue to exist beyond the boundaries placed around it. The challenge is not choosing between clinical legitimacy and cultural reality. It is recognising both, knowing that neither has the right to erase the other.

That tension sits underneath the broader conversation explored in the Helping or Hurting? podcast. Check it out here or at giveandtoke.com.au

Long before clinical frameworks or regulated access, public understanding of cannabis was shaped by culture. In many cases, that culture was not neutral.

One of the most enduring examples is Reefer Madness.

A Film That Still Matters

Released in 1936, Reefer Madness was presented as a cautionary tale. It was aimed at parents, educators, and community groups. Its purpose was simple. To warn the public about the perceived dangers of cannabis. Instead, it portrayed something else entirely.

Cannabis use was linked to insanity, violence, and moral collapse. The message was clear and absolute. There was no nuance. No context. No distinction between use and harm.

At the time, there were no patient pathways to consider. No clinical data to reference. No regulated systems to balance risk and benefit. What remained was narrative and that proved powerful.

A System Looking for Certainty

The film did not emerge in isolation. It reflected a broader social climate.

The 1930s were marked by economic instability and social tension. In uncertain environments, there is often a push for control. Simple explanations become appealing and cannabis was positioned as a villain.

It painted cannabis as a fast track to insanity, violence, and ruin. Framing which aligned with a system that prioritised order over understanding. It offered a clean story in a complex moment and the cost of that simplicity is still being felt.

From Narrative to Policy

What begins as culture often becomes policy. Reefer Madness contributed to a broader shift in how cannabis was viewed and regulated.

Fear-based messaging does not stay contained to film. It influences legislation. It shapes enforcement. It informs how clinicians, patients, and the public approach a substance.

For patients, this has real consequences as access becomes restricted, conversations become harder and stigma replaces curiosity. In some cases, treatment options are dismissed before they are properly considered.

The issue is not just that the film was inaccurate. It is that it helped establish a framework where inaccuracy persists.

The Gap Between Perception and Experience

Modern cannabis care sits in tension with this legacy.

Patients today are navigating regulated pathways. Clinicians are working within evolving evidence bases. Outcomes are being measured and refined. Yet the shadow of earlier narratives remains.

There are still parts of the system untangling what was set in motion decades ago. For some patients, stigma continues to influence how their care is received. For others, it shapes whether they seek care at all and this is where education becomes critical.

Clear, evidence-based communication helps close the gap between perception and reality. It allows cannabis to be understood as part of a broader healthcare system rather than an outlier.

Between Harm and Humour

Over time, Reefer Madness has taken on a different cultural role. What was once presented as serious has, in many circles, become comedic.

Its exaggerated portrayals are now often viewed as absurd. The film is regularly described as a cult classic rather than a credible warning. This shift is important, but incomplete.

Humour can expose flaws in past thinking. It does not automatically correct them. The underlying narratives can persist even as the surface is ridiculed. This creates a dual reality where the film is both dismissed and influential at the same time.

A More Measured Approach

Today’s cannabis landscape is more complex. It requires balance as there are legitimate risks and there are also legitimate therapeutic uses. Good policy and good care depend on the ability to hold both. This stands in contrast to the binary thinking of earlier eras.

Patients benefit when systems move beyond fear-based messaging. Access improves when discussions are grounded in evidence rather than assumption. Outcomes improve when clinicians and patients can engage openly.

The lesson is not just that Reefer Madness was wrong. It is that systems built on oversimplification tend to create long-term friction.

Looking Forward

Cannabis is still finding its place within modern healthcare. Progress is being made, but it is uneven.

Understanding how past narratives were constructed helps explain current barriers. It also highlights the importance of getting the next phase right.

Education, legitimacy, and patient-centred care are not abstract goals. They are practical tools for improving access and outcomes.

The conversation continues to evolve. This episode of Helping or Hurting? revisits Reefer Madness to explore how far things have come, and how far there is still to go.

As partners in both marriage and entrepreneurial endeavours, Jen and Nick Ravenswood created their Brisbane and Melbourne brand-agnostic dispensaries, alongside Kirk Richards, with a certain aesthetic in mind, but were ultimately propelled by patient experience as the driving force.

Jen and Nick were intentional in avoiding both the usual pharmacy expectations of stark white light and clinical coldness, and the stereotypical ideas of dispensaries seen in legal markets overseas.

They juxtaposed these by building a “caring environment that patients feel comfortable to enter.” They wanted to ensure that Rays is a “very calm, welcoming, warm space that is very community-driven.”

It’s quite the journey when compared to where they began in 2019, when they first received a script for plant medicine at their HealthSave community pharmacy and didn’t even know it was legal at the time.

After a quick call to Queensland Health to verify, they raced to try and get it filled for the patient, learning everything on the fly in a process that ultimately took six weeks due to the infancy of Australian access at the time.

Both Jen and Nick care deeply for their patients. Coming from a place of curiosity rather than judgement, they are closely aligned in how they treat people. They could not accept such a long wait time for a patient who could be suffering, so they went down the rabbit hole.

They sourced education from overseas, as it wasn’t readily available in Australia at the time, and then shared that knowledge with other prescribers and GPs, marking the beginning of their advocacy work in the space. The next step was obtaining a wholesale licence to increase access, and eventually they were able to bring wait times down to just two days (and now, regularly same-day).

After becoming advocates, they launched a compassionate access program, born from noticing issues in the industry such as a lack of pricing transparency and patients paying above RRP.

Education around plant medicine and the system it operates in is a necessity, not an option. Nick believes in meeting patients where they are and taking the time to explain things as the best way to avoid hostility.

“We try to remove that friction between practitioner and patient by talking to them, educating them, and getting to their level, explaining the system. But some healthcare practitioners either don’t want to do that, or they don’t have time. So instead of explaining to the patient why I cannot do this for you, they just give a flat no. And that’s where you get people being upset and feeling like they’re not being heard.”

A major focus for the Ravenswoods is the patient experience, giving empowerment back to individuals when it comes to their healthcare, while also encouraging education around outcomes and how other clinics and doctors can support them.

Their ultimate goal is the legitimisation of plant medicine as a recognised therapeutic alternative, while keeping patients front of mind.

Nick and Jen are also aware that those without medical backgrounds can find it difficult to be taken seriously when advocating for plant medicine as medicine. This led them to lean into their own experience and credentials to help bring credibility to the space.

In discussions with the TGA, they are working to help improve plant medicine’s place within the pharmaceutical framework. Patients can take comfort in hearing that, from Jen and Nick’s perspective, there is no intention to “take away people’s quality of life and access to medicine” that they may rely on.

The push for a better patient experience is ongoing. In an industry that is constantly questioned for evidence of plant medicine’s efficacy, Jen is ready to fight for legitimacy:

“This goes back to being action-oriented. So we’re talking about what do we hope for the future? We hope for legitimacy, we hope for a change of minds, and for acknowledgement. How do we do that? Well, as an industry, we could be collecting evidence. We could be presenting evidence proactively and that’s what we can control.”

Jen and Nick Ravenswood continue to share more with Paul O’Donoghue on the Give & Toke podcast. You can listen to Give & Toke with Paul O’Donoghue right now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or simply visit giveandtoke.com.au.

Kathy Stewart taught him that it was not just about getting high, but that it could be used as a powerful tool for healing, wellness, and recovery. Tanner’s mother had immersed herself in making RSO (Rick Simpson Oil, or crude cannabis oil extract, popularised by Simpson with a high-dose methodology for cancer treatment) and edibles for her community, treating cancer symptoms for over 20 years.

For this reason, cannabis has always been medical for Tanner. He also has a strong passion for clean produce, shaped by his time farming lettuce and growing food. These values form the backbone of Stewart Farms, producing “high quality, clean herbal medicine” that supports patients dealing with conditions including endometriosis and PTSD, while also being used as a general wellness tool.

Stewart is a strong believer that cannabinoids can be utilised to replace many pharmaceutical drugs: CBD as one of the most powerful anti-inflammatories with no side effects; CBN helping with sleep; and THC, the heavy hitter in the pain relief category, which could potentially go head to head with opioids, something Tanner hopes will be replaced completely over time. Fortunately, the craft cultivators he works with not only design cultivars for “highly enjoyable recreational purposes” but also develop strains that could rival the strength of opioids and help move patients away from them.

The fact that humans have an endocannabinoid system, reinforced by research showing that cannabinoid receptors are spread throughout the body at a cellular level, is why Stewart Farms focuses on topicals that can be applied locally. These products bind to receptors and send signals to reduce pain and inflammation in targeted areas. Tanner’s view is simple: “we’re wired to receive cannabinoids.” They can also be used in a bath bomb as a fast and effective way to cover the body.

Tanner has also created a space for men to explore self-care and enjoy products generally marketed towards women, like bath bombs. This has led to unexpected outcomes, such as veterans finding they can manage PTSD flare-ups with a Stewart Farms bath. These kinds of testimonials, along with others about relieving endometriosis symptoms or coming off morphine, are, due to regulation, unable to be used to demonstrate the efficacy of cannabis.

While Tanner sees the over-regulation of cannabis as protection for the existing pharmaceutical framework and a culture built around prescribing synthetic and chemical treatments, he can also acknowledge in hindsight that cannabis remaining medical for longer, as it currently is in Australia, may help establish a stronger foundation before recreational markets are introduced. In Canada, the adult-use market has largely moved away from the medical system, and although Stewart Farms can sell muscle creams and bath bombs in recreational dispensaries, they know people are not buying them for recreational use.

Inspired by his mother’s teachings, her charity work, and her generosity, Tanner Stewart’s mission to help as many people as possible before he leaves this earth is “too important to fail.” It is an insightful and personal story shared with Paul on the Give & Toke podcast. You can listen to Give & Toke with Paul O’Donoghue right now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or simply visit giveandtoke.com.au.

Flavour and experience could take priority over THC for consumers choosing cannabis, especially now as it becomes more apparent that young people and those new to cannabis are looking for more than simply getting high and are instead using it as a tool for general wellness. If those consumers care about where and how their food and cannabis is grown, their dollar will most likely land with those offering organic products.

Justin Lee created his brand Ay Papi with regenerative organic farming as the foundation, focusing on feeding and strengthening the earth rather than simply feeding the plants. It is a lifestyle he attributes to legacy cultivators. Lee also had personal reasons for getting involved in cannabis. After dealing with injury in the past, he turned to cannabis and, because he already cared about what he was putting into his body, he naturally developed an interest in how it could be grown organically.

There was also a practical nudge. As he was spending significant money on rosin, his accountant suggested that if he was going to invest that much, perhaps he should start a rosin business instead. And so the craft cannabis brand Ay Papi was born.

To Lee, “craft” is not simply the opposite of commercial. It carries responsibility. Craft operators must innovate, push boundaries and constantly strive to offer something better. They shape consumer expectations, and consumer dollars ultimately dictate the direction of the market. Commercial producers then scale what craft has already proven works.

Craft also allows flexibility. A cultivar that may not boast the highest THC percentage can still be brought to market if it offers something compelling in flavour, aroma or effect. Justin’s “why” in starting Ay Papi was to create his own medicine. The “what” was to show consumers the possibilities of cannabis flavour.

Lee’s brand explores exotic flavours such as tropical fruits, but he is still a fan of classic skunk, gas and chem varieties. The brand uses a solventless process. Ice and water are used to wash fresh frozen flower to separate the trichome heads, which are then dried and pressed into rosin. Freezing the plant at harvest is key, preserving the terpene profile and aroma captured at full bloom.

That rosin is then used in products such as flavourless gummies, where the taste comes directly from the infused extract. It is a way of opening consumers’ eyes to what cannabis can truly offer.

Ay Papi has also participated in cannabis activations designed to lower the barrier to entry. No smokables. Just edibles and gummies offered in microdoses, paired with education about cultivars, expected effects and safe consumption. The aim is not simply to get people high, but to “open your eyes to sensory profiles, flavours and experience.”

Craft brands like Ay Papi play an important role in shaping cannabis culture and educating consumers about terpenes, flavonoids and the plant’s broader complexity. There is still so much being discovered about cannabis. Having people in the industry who care deeply about what they offer is something special.

Hear more from Justin Lee on the Give & Toke podcast. You can listen to Give & Toke with Paul O’Donoghue right now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or simply visit giveandtoke.com.au.

On the latest Give & Toke podcast, Paul O’Donoghue speaks with Julian Stefanou, founding partner of West Coast Palms, about the relationship between cannabis culture and medicine, and why the industry needs both to mature responsibly.

From weed nerd to founder

West Coast Palms launched in November 2024, but Julian’s journey began years earlier through global travel and firsthand exposure to different cannabis markets. The company focuses on consistent quality, fresh products, and unique genetics sourced internationally, while also supporting Australian-grown flower through partnerships with craft producers like Golden Days.

Julian believes Australia’s early reputation for local cannabis was shaped by large-scale production that failed to meet expectations. For him, improving quality through smaller, more passionate growers is key to restoring trust.

Culture and medicine share the same goal

A central theme of the conversation is the perceived divide between recreational and medicinal cannabis. Julian argues the distinction is often overstated.

“The scene behind cannabis and the medical cannabis space are both really celebrating the same thing… the effects behind this plant, whether you call it therapeutic properties or just getting high.”

Whether labelled medical or recreational, people are often seeking relief from stress, anxiety, pain, or other challenges. The difference is largely in language and regulation.

What regulation can miss

While Julian supports strong oversight to protect patients, he cautions against reducing cannabis to what appears “on paper”, particularly a narrow focus on cannabinoids. Culture has long emphasised genetics, terpene expression, and real-world effects, and he believes the medical system can learn from that curiosity.

His ideal future blends medicinal rigour with transparency, education, and deeper product understanding.

Looking ahead

Julian’s global experience suggests attitudes toward cannabis can shift quickly once markets open. As laws evolve, he expects greater acceptance worldwide and a gradual move toward systems that balance access, regulation, and patient education.

The medicinal cannabis industry built upon knowledge preserved by legacy culture. A mature, trusted industry will require both clinical standards and respect for the cultural foundations that shaped modern understanding of the plant.

While comprehensive data on the long-term impact of these changes is still emerging, early anecdotal feedback has been encouraging. Magistrates have reported to Rachel and her colleagues that the reform has allowed them to apply greater nuance and fairness, describing it as a welcome shift away from the rigid, black-and-white framework that previously existed. Under the old system, any detection of THC resulted in automatic licence suspension, regardless of impairment or whether the individual was a lawful medicinal cannabis patient.

Rachel is among the most informed voices in Parliament on harm reduction and evidence-based drug policy. Importantly, she also speaks from lived experience as a cannabis patient herself, using alternative medicine firsthand. Her advocacy consistently centres on patient access, education, and fair treatment, without judgement toward those who choose non-traditional therapies.

Shifting the broader Victorian Government remains an uphill battle, but Rachel has been clear about the importance of decriminalisation as a next step. The ACT provides a compelling case study: over the past five to six years, decriminalisation has coincided with a measurable reduction in cannabis-related arrests. In Victoria, where cannabis offences account for approximately 43 per cent of all arrests, similar reform presents a clear opportunity to redirect police and court resources toward more pressing priorities.

Beyond cannabis, Rachel has proven herself a reliable ally on a wide range of public health issues where evidence and wellbeing come first. The successful implementation of pill testing, delivering tangible harm-reduction outcomes, stands as a clear example of what pragmatic, health-led policy can achieve.

Rachel Payne remains a trusted ally of the cannabis community and a leading voice for sensible reform. Hear her reflect on 2025 and outline her plans for the future in conversation on Give & Toke with Paul O’Donoghue right now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or simply visit giveandtoke.com.au.

Michael Sassano of SOMAÍ Pharmaceuticals is focusing on the positives of this change and looking toward a brighter future with greater access for patients worldwide. He recently spoke about how this rescheduling should open many doors for those outside the United States to become more prominent players in the medical market. Given that the US has been unable to achieve GMP certification, this allows other countries to act as medical cannabis suppliers for doctors and hospitals. While Sassano understands the need for very high product quality standards, he also notes:

“It’s a double-edged sword, right? Too strict on quality and there are restrictions to access. And although it might be good if you’re one of the businesses that can do it, I’m still always going to be a purist of access, whether it’s good or bad for my business.”

When viewing the Australian medical market, especially with recent rumblings from the TGA, it can be easy to remove the rose-tinted glasses and shine a light on its shortcomings. Sassano would still point out a few things going right, such as the sheer number of products available (somewhere around 1,700), the fact that Australia is one of the only medical markets offering “pre-dosed” pre-rolls (pending the TGA not continuing to remove patients’ ability to access these products if they choose to), and the country’s “product-friendly” manufacturing capabilities. Some might see this as too much; Sassano says, “That’s access.”

He also posits that US rescheduling could possibly trickle down to Australia finally doing away with its archaic driving laws in regard to medicinal cannabis.

One of the main areas Michael has identified as needing improvement in Australia is collaboration between companies. This would likely lead to increased profitability and an explosion of industry growth. However, due to “tall poppy syndrome” or other factors, it appears that underfunded vertical operations too often take the lead over meaningful, collective change.

It is apparent that patient access should always be paramount when discussing cannabis. Michael Sassano’s vision of a “more accessible, no need for a doctor’s prescription” access program—potentially over-the-counter and more direct-to-consumer in the future—is refreshing to hear from someone in his position, especially when other Australian cannabis business leaders are suggesting the industry should unite against legalisation.

To hear the full conversation, you can listen to Give & Toke with Paul O’Donoghue right now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or simply visit giveandtoke.com.au.

Then I hit a wall. Not because of my health, my family, or my choices, but because of the TGA’s latest consultation.

I have been a legal medical cannabis patient in Australia for several years. It has not always been seamless, but it has also been far from the chaos patients endured in the early days of access. I genuinely believed we were past the point of moving backwards. That belief was shaken when, for the second time, my scripts were reduced and explained to me as being “legally” required due to new rules.

I felt pressured to accept it, and I feel many healthcare professionals are scared. After listening to Mimi Sener’s recent appearance on the Give & Toke podcast, I realised she was right in her assessment that this industry is operating from a place of fear, and patients are going to pay the price.

There are already enough barriers preventing people from accessing cannabis. Family attitudes, religious beliefs, cultural expectations, and long-standing stigma all play a role. Patients and operators alike still face judgement in their own communities. Now, the TGA has added another layer. I submitted responses to the consultation myself, and I share Mimi’s frustration when she says, “How dare you have a consultation with patients and not tell them about it?”

I was only aware it existed because I have friends in the industry. Not a single patient was emailed by the TGA, AHPRA, or any government body. That is unacceptable. Access barriers should be targeted and evidence-based, not blanket restrictions. There are reasonable safeguards that make sense, such as limiting flower or high-THC products to adults while offering balanced alternatives for younger patients who may still benefit. What does not make sense is placing broad roadblocks across a patient population of more than a million people, leaving many without care or forcing them into difficult situations.

I acknowledge the immense pressure on doctors. Some are reportedly caring for five to ten thousand patients, and it is easy to see how constantly shifting regulations could push prescribers to walk away altogether. That would be understandable, but it would also mean patients suffer the most. Clinics are capable of educating patients about dosing schedules and harm reduction. A patient using higher amounts can often be supported to reduce safely without losing therapeutic benefit.

What is not care is cutting a patient’s monthly amount by a third or a half overnight. That ignores harm minimisation entirely.

Mimi references global data showing medical cannabis patients typically use between one and three grams per day. If I wanted to switch to an approved vaporiser, the most likely option would be the Mighty Medic, which costs around $540. That price alone is a significant barrier to access and reducing combustion.

My original four scripts are now two. I will likely need to use more to achieve the same therapeutic effect, reach my monthly limit sooner, and potentially be left without medicine to manage my conditions. So now I wait, knowing that the likely outcome of the consultation will be greater restrictions.

Patients are already suffering from this uncertainty, even though nothing is formally set in stone. Clinics and doctors are acting out of fear of potential repercussions, and patients are being negatively impacted as a result. The real risk is that people will be pushed back into the legacy market, where new consumers in particular may struggle to find safe, informed medical guidance.

We need more voices like Mimi’s. We also need more people willing to become informed, engaged, and vocal. For now, the responsibility sits with us to educate ourselves, seek out practitioners and advocates who operate with integrity, and keep both patients and the plant front of mind.

Mimi consistently articulates the core issues around access with clarity and conviction. She challenges fear-driven regulation and reminds both patients and industry why this matters. If you care about the future of medicinal cannabis in Australia, listen to the full conversation on Give & Toke with Paul O’Donoghue on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or simply visit giveandtoke.com.au.

Sadly, I am not sure if I ever tried any of that OG Thai flower at home in Australia, as the majority of what I could find back then was couch-locking bush weed. I have found that cultivars typically known as “indica” knock me out pretty quickly, but those typically known as “sativa” feel more holistically healing while highly functional. I’m still searching for some nice “indica leaning” and balanced hybrid cultivars to cosy up with in the evenings.

Thailand is known for flowers that are uplifting, euphoric, social, and even racey at times, and I am into that. So when the prospect of a boys’ trip to Thailand with my best mates (including Paul from Give & Toke) arose, I was very excited for two things: first, to spend time with my adopted brothers enjoying some R&R, and second, to try some legal Thai cannabis. A close third was to eat heaps of delicious Thai food.

Everyone needs to visit Thailand. Cannabis user or not, Thailand is a wonderful place to travel to and explore. I stayed in Ko Samui for around 10 days, so I can’t really speak for the whole place, but I hope to return again to find out more. We found pretty quickly, travelling the dispensaries, that it was hit or miss in terms of quality unless you spent around 800 BHT/g ($38 AUD) or more for decent flower.

I had high hopes of hitting some dab bars and trying some hash, but unfortunately it seemed nowhere to be found in Ko Samui. They would have the equipment for it for sale but not the hash. This was due to the fact that they were not actually allowed to sell concentrates at that time, and it can be challenging navigating Thailand’s ever-changing restrictions and unclear expectations for tourists.

Thankfully, Paul organised a facility visit for us at Jungle Haze Farms. This was an absolute highlight of our trip; we met their head grower/owner and got to tour the facility, hear about and see how they grow, what inputs they use, the cultivars coming down the pipeline, and we learned how to take cuttings of clones and set a tray up for them (we found out later they all rooted!). To cap it all off, we got to sit down with some huge bags and tubs full of freshly cured flower, see and smell the wonderful product they put out, and choose two 3.5 g packs to take home.

I went with Amnesia Haze and Cap Junky and found them both to be absolutely wonderful: the Haze left me with a nostalgic giddiness like the first few times I ever properly got high, but with a racey edge ramping things up, and Cap was just the most perfect daytime smoke that kept me lifted but with a clear mind. The effects were exponentially better than anything I’ve had from the medical offering in Australia and so pronounced on me that I struggle to remember their terpene profiles specifically—but I would know them if I smelled either of them ever again. Proud to say that with two days left before we returned home, I didn’t have any flower left to leave behind…

Beautiful country, beautiful community, beautiful cannabis. Thailand was everything and more than I could have hoped for, and I’m dying to go back. Much to my envy, Paul recently returned from a visit to Bangkok, and in a special episode of The Catch-Up with , it was good to hear more praise for a place that gets unfairly derided when it comes to legal cannabis. If you approach it humbly and with respectful curiosity, you can witness magic bloom right before your eyes.

To hear the full conversation, you can listen to Give & Toke with Paul O’Donoghue right now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or simply visit giveandtoke.com.au.

After moving to Vancouver, Aussie cultivator Angus Murray spent time with seasoned growers, honing his craft and embracing Canada’s more open lifestyle and non-judgemental view of cannabis use. As he notes, “everyone in Vancouver knows [BC Bud is] really special.” While Canada has taken a more progressive stance through reform and regulation, it hasn’t been perfect - and the search for a model that truly serves all who want to engage with cannabis is ongoing.

Australia, however, hasn’t lost all of its cultivators to the northern hemisphere. Despite working with two reputable Canadian companies, Murray chose to return home and after working with Cann Group, now grows with Golden Days in South Australia. Their first harvest is in progress right now and the results are promising.

With a “plant-first” attitude, Murray remains committed to helping cannabis “express its genetics as best as possible.” His approach, shaped by both Canadian and Australian experience, represents the potential for Australia to evolve its own cannabis culture.

You can hear more of Angus’s story on his recent appearance on the Give & Toke podcast with Paul O’Donoghue. Listen right now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or simply visit giveandtoke.com.au.

Owning and running his own clinic, Dr Joynson quickly realised that he didn’t want to be just another specialist in a narrow field. Instead, he shaped a consultation style designed to meet each patient where they are. Sometimes that means a serious conversation. Sometimes it means a laugh to break the tension. Sometimes it means ensuring that a physical exam feels safe and respectful. When speaking about a recent consult, Dr Joynson noted that what a patient “needed wasn’t a doctor to tell her what was wrong. What she needed was someone to listen. Being heard can heal significantly.”

Listening as the Foundation of Care

That focus on listening has become especially critical for neurodivergent patients, a group often overlooked or dismissed by traditional medicine. Dr Joynson has found cannabis to be a valuable therapeutic tool for many of these patients, even as some of his colleagues remain sceptical. He’s also wary of how rising awareness has led to over-pathologising everyday behaviours and a culture of self-diagnosis. Women and gender-diverse people, in particular, have long been under-recognised in this space.

For Dr Joynson, acknowledging these failures matters. He argues that doctors need to be willing to apologise for the ways the system has let people down. Simply validating the patient’s journey can lay the groundwork for trust.

Relationship Rules for Healthcare

This approach underpins his work with Dr Justin Coulson on Relationship Rules for Healthcare, a book aimed at helping clinicians lead with empathy, trust, and connection in an increasingly complex world. At its heart is a simple reminder: medicine isn’t just about treating conditions, it’s about building relationships that make healing possible.

As the healthcare landscape evolves, Dr Joynson believes adaptability is key. The best doctors, he says, are “medical chameleons” and are able to shift tone, perspective, and approach to meet patients’ changing needs without losing sight of their humanity.

To hear the full conversation, you can listen to Give & Toke with Paul O’Donoghue right now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube or simply visit giveandtoke.com.au.