State Cannabis Agency’s Subway Ads Appear to Target Teens, Defying New York Law
New York's Office of Cannabis Management launched the "Cannabis Honestly" campaign, featuring subway ads that seem to target teenagers, which state law prohibits.
In July, New York's Office of Cannabis Management began a taxpayer-funded "Cannabis Honestly" outreach that has drawn criticism for displaying subway ads featuring youths and slogans that seem to normalize marijuana use. State law bars any cannabis advertising aimed at persons under 21, especially on public transit, yet the ads depict a teen on a phone with a warning about mixing weed and alcohol and another showing a teen with a parent urging adult-only legality.
The campaign's website advises parents to treat cannabis like other medicines and provides "risk-reduction coaching," despite research from The Lancet Psychiatry and JAMA indicating little therapeutic benefit and increased risks of psychosis, depression, and anxiety among adolescents. Critics argue the messaging effectively green-lights teen consumption while glossing over serious health hazards such as cannabis-induced psychosis and hyperemesis syndrome.
The piece also notes the absurdity of a state agency promoting a controlled substance to minors, likening it to a hypothetical liquor-authority vodka ad.
Why it matters
State-funded ads that appear to market marijuana to minors could violate law and influence teen drug use.
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