Despite writing for a weed-focused magazine, I actually don’t smoke weed or eat edibles or get high at all. As a recovering alcoholic, I maintain total sobriety at all times, without exception. Some people in recovery are “California sober,” meaning that they abstain from drinking (and other drugs) but smoke weed. I say, more power to them! I just know myself, and full sobriety is what my own recovery experience depends on. (Also, I’d lose my day job if I had even trace amounts of THC in my system.) So, no weed for me, only hemp oil for medical purposes.

Given that, it might seem odd that I’m furious about the new definition of “THC” that governments at the federal and state levels have passed into law. You’d think I’d be emotionally removed from the discussion as someone who doesn’t deal with THC at all. Why should I care if they’ve tripled down on keeping THC illegal? 

The answer: I consume hemp-derived products. And, as I explain below, anything affecting THC’s legality affects hemp’s legality, which in turn affects me. But there are other reasons why I’m so worked up about this too. Here are my thoughts on the matter. You’re free to agree or disagree, naturally. I’m just speaking my truth.    

For one example of a state that’s already doing this, read “California Bans THC in Hemp Consumables, Expands Definition of ‘THC.’”

If you consume hemp products (CBD oil, etc.), you absolutely will be affected by the new THC laws.

Legally, there are two kinds of cannabis: marijuana and not-marijuana. The latter of these is referred to as “hemp” in legislation. Marijuana is generally illegal, and hemp is generally legal. In order for you to lawfully grow, sell, purchase, consume or do anything else with cannabis, you have to be using cannabis that the government has labeled “hemp.” 

Think of it like a distinction between U.S. English and UK English when referring to a small, flat cake. In the United States, that cake is called a cookie; in the United Kingdom, that cake is called a biscuit. We’re talking about the same thing, but the choice of word gives the cake a different meaning in your mind. Likewise, “marijuana” and “hemp” are different words for the same thing: the cannabis plant. Laws give that plant different names under different conditions in politicians’ minds, and those conditions are linked to penalties (prison, fines, etc.). 

Basically, it’s all about labels. Change the label, and you change the conditions. Something can be legal at 11:59 p.m. and illegal one minute later if its label changes the next day. And with the expansion of the definition of “THC” in legislation, it is now a lot easier for cannabis to be labeled “marijuana” and a lot harder for cannabis to be labeled “hemp.” Consequently, the hemp products in your kitchen that are legal when you go to bed can be considered marijuana when you wake up – not because their ingredients changed, but because the way politicians have chosen to label those ingredients has changed. 

The old labeling system measured only the dry weight of a plant’s delta-9 THC content, which was not allowed to exceed 0.3% if you wanted the plant to get the “hemp” label and be legal.

The new labeling system keeps the 0.3% THC threshold, but now you’re not just measuring the delta-9 THC content. Instead, you’re adding up 30 kinds of THC – all of which, when combined, can’t total more than 0.3% THC. The odds of not exceeding 0.3% THC now are practically impossible, so getting the “hemp” label is practically impossible as a result.

Due to the expanded definition of “THC,” your hemp gummies, CBD oil (classified as hemp), CBN tincture (classified as hemp) and anything else you buy that is free from psychoactive THC (namely, delta-9 and delta-8) might be treated like a bag of chronic. Doesn’t get you high? Doesn’t matter. It’s not about what gets you high anymore – even THCa is illegal, and it’s a scientific impossibility to get high off of THCa. It’s about the label, and the label has changed.

If you want an idea of how everyone involved in the hemp market will be affected by this, read “Texas Poised to Ban Consumable Hemp Products Containing THC: A Scorched-Earth Approach to Closing a Single Legal Loophole.”

It’s a flat-out lie to claim that the new THC laws don’t affect hemp’s legal status.

Here’s an analogy using the visible light spectrum’s colors as counterparts for cannabis’s compounds.

Let’s say that yellow is illegal. If you’re caught in possession of anything yellow, you can be arrested, fined and imprisoned. The definition of what counts as “yellow” is determined by state and federal politicians, and you have to follow any orders they give you. If yellow curtains brighten up your bedroom and make you happy, too bad; it’s illegal to have them, so you may not have them. If dandelions grow in your yard, cut them and surrender them to the police, or you’ll be arrested for growing them. And so on. No yellow allowed.

But there’s one caveat: Yellow is allowed if it’s part of the red-and-yellow blend that makes orange, and it constitutes no more than 50% of that blend. If you own something orange that contains more than 50% yellow, it’s legally considered yellow, and is therefore illegal. People who love a good 50-50 ratio of red-to-yellow in their orange are happy, and they go through life obeying the law against yellow.

Now the law changes. “Yellow” is redefined in a way that makes orange illegal if it contains more than 1% of yellow. Technically, orange is still legal, yes. And all the people who love buying orange things don’t mind that the law has changed, because they expect things to continue as normal simply because the politicians announce, “Orange is still legal.” 

But by changing the definition of “yellow,” politicians passively changed the definition of “orange,” as the two colors are inextricably linked. So, all the people who love orange are expecting to keep their 50-50 red-to-yellow orange stuff – but they’ll be felons if they do. Those orange towels on their bathroom rack? Jailable contraband. Orange trees in the back yard? Bait for police raids. There’s too much yellow in them, and yellow is illegal.

The new legal concept of the color orange no longer matches what’s in people’s heads when they think of “orange.” And it will be very hard to call anything “orange” anymore, given that you need a 99-to-1 ratio of red-to-yellow to qualify something for the label “orange.” Orange is still legal, but orange isn’t orange anymore.

In that analogy, yellow represents THC, and orange represents hemp. (The percentages constitute figurative equivalents, not mathematical equivalents.) The parallel is that hemp is still legal, but “hemp” isn’t what you think it is anymore. And what probably pops into your head when you hear the word “hemp” is likely now legally labeled “THC.” 

Hemp is still legal, yes, but what you’re used to calling “hemp” is probably called “THC” now because of the new definition of “THC.”

Sanctimonious bureaucrats have made it even harder for me to manage my debilitating chronic illness. 

Like countless others in and beyond this country, I rely on hemp oil to stabilize abnormal electrical activity in my brain. I take prescription medications for my condition too, and although those get the job done to a large degree, they’re ripping my body apart with their side effects. My hemp gummies are the only thing that level me out without harming me in the process – and they work 100% of the time, and fast. 

But the alleged evils of cannabis that are destroying the community, causing mental illness, and blah blah blah (whatever other “Reefer Madness” nonsense these self-righteous politicians spout) make it imperative to expand the definition of “THC.” Politicians pontificate about the dangers of THC, building entire cases on outliers and spurious correlations, gratifying themselves publicly as they play the part of a hero. 

Well, as someone who’s been doing extensive research on cannabis for over six years, I call shenanigans. Cannabis doesn’t do any of the things that fear-mongering anti-cannabis lobbyists say it does. Politicians expanded the definition of “THC” to suck off the alcohol lobby, the tobacco lobby, Big Pharma and anyone else with enough money to buy their power to create and enforce laws that harm the cannabis industry. And even though they didn’t do it expressly to harm me (and other disabled people), I’m furious that they’re harming me (and other disabled people) by having done it. Life with a seizure disorder is already incredibly difficult, and the people purporting to represent me are making it even harder.

Along with all the other disabled people in the United States, I am grievously harmed by politicians’ handling of THC, as I explain in detail in “Marijuana and the Americans with Disabilities Act: How Does the Controlled Substances Act Affect Disabled Americans?.” Photo by Judita Mikalkevičė / pexels.com

I never signed over my power of decision to corrupt strangers who don’t know or care about me.

I see no justification for usurping my free will in determining what I put into my own body, provided that I’m not endangering anyone in the process. If I have hemp gummies at bedtime – or if I were to smoke a joint before going to bed, for argument’s sake – to help me sleep and start the next day seizure-free, how does it make any kind of sense to make that an illegal act? How is that treated in the same way as, for example, driving while under the influence of THC?

Typically, laws that interfere with and are allowed to overrule decisions you would otherwise make for yourself about your well-being tend to cater to the dumbest person alive. The underlying assumption is, “You’re too mentally incompetent to take care of yourself, so I’m forcing you to let me take care of you for your own good.” Laws mandating the use of helmets while riding a bike and seatbelts while riding in a car are other examples of that. I call these lowest-common-denominator laws, and part of my unbridled frustration lies in the fact that I’m not one of the lowest common denominators. I know to protect my skull while engaged in an activity that puts it in jeopardy, and I know what my body can and cannot handle.

However, I’m legally permitted to guzzle a bottle of whiskey while smoking a pack of cigarettes after popping some prescribed Vicodin, even though those things indisputably are bad for my well-being. Clearly, my capacity for taking care of myself is only selectively a priority for politicians. I’m allowed to mangle my body, but only in certain ways. 

And I’m meant to believe that it’s merely a coincidence that all of the legal ways are highly profitable to very wealthy people who are major political donors. … Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, writing the check. I must have some kind of hemp-induced persecution mania.

The hypocrisy in keeping THC illegal in any amount at all is much more extravagant than anyone ever acknowledges, as I explain in “The Illogic of Illegal Weed: A Comprehensive Analysis.” Photo by Mitalivshanbhag CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

I’m too intelligent to fall for the argument that making something illegal will make people stop doing it.

I’m not the smartest person alive, but I’m not one of the people who need to see “REMOVE CHILD BEFORE FOLDING” on a baby stroller either. And I’m smart enough to know that you can’t legislate demand. Legislation determines supply, but never demand. By making THC (including products formerly labeled “hemp”) illegal, politicians are making it harder for consumers to get THC products, yes. But that’s not tantamount to lobotomizing consumers and erasing their desire for those products.

Since morality is routinely invoked in discussions about banning THC, let’s look at this from that angle. Given that I’m not morally outraged by someone possessing or consuming a plant, I’ll examine this through the lens of one of my own moral issues: veganism. I object to consuming animal-derived products on moral grounds. And if I were idiotic enough to think that it would save the animals if meat processing and consumption were made illegal, maybe I’d be out making a self-righteous speech to shame people into supporting that law. But I’m not. I know that people who want to eat meat would simply find a way to do so without getting caught. That’s supply and demand. That’s Microeconomics 101, freshman stuff.

I abstain from consuming animal-derived products because I feel spiritually compelled not to consume them. But that’s my choice. Other people feel differently and act differently, and that’s their choice. I respect that we have different stimuli for our consciences, and I’m satisfied with controlling my behavior and mine alone. By contrast, politicians – and their supporters – who ban THC to elevate citizens’ moral standards act with mystifying ignorance. Only people who can’t comprehend the nature of demand treat it as though it were externally controllable.

If the logic of this argument doesn’t suffice, look at the history that bears it out instead. In the same way that Prohibition didn’t stop people from drinking, banning THC (and products formerly labeled “hemp”) hasn’t stopped people from consuming it.

Conclusion

Like anyone else, I hold strong opinions about things that really matter to me in a deeply personal way. When it comes to the sleight of hand that effectively transformed hemp into THC, I object on the above grounds and others. 

I’m not wealthy enough to buy politicians and turn things around, and I’m not charismatic enough to change the minds of people who support the expanded definition of “THC.” But I’m not alone in resenting this outcome, and I hope that anyone who read this far feels validated in knowing that they too aren’t alone. 

The information in this article and any included images are for educational purposes only. This information is neither a substitute for, nor does it replace, professional legal advice or medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about laws, regulations or your health, you should always consult an attorney, physician or other licensed professional.

Kathleen Hearons is a writer, editor, linguist and voice over actor from Los Angeles. She specializes in creative writing and research-intensive analysis and reporting.

 

Sources and Suggested Reading

Head Magazine Articles. khearons.com. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://khearons.com/head-magazine-articles/. 

Hearons, Kathleen. “A Green But Booze-Free St. Paddy’s Day for Sobriety Warriors – California Sober and Traditionally Sober Alike!.” Head Magazine. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://headmagazine.com/cant-drink-on-st-patricks-day/. 

Hearons, Kathleen. “California Bans THC in Hemp Consumables: Expands Definition of THC.” Head Magazine. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://headmagazine.com/california-bans-thc-in-hemp-consumables/. 

Hearons, Kathleen. “First Thanksgiving Native American Tribe Among Those Harmed by Law in Deal to End Government Shutdown.” Head Magazine. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://headmagazine.com/first-thanksgiving-native-american-tribe-among-those-harmed-by-law-in-deal-to-end-government-shutdown/. 

Hearons, Kathleen. “Is Delta-8 Bootlegged THC?.” Head Magazine. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://headmagazine.com/is-delta-8-bootlegged-thc/. 

Hearons, Kathleen. “Marijuana and the Americans with Disabilities Act: How Does the Controlled Substances Act Affect Disabled Americans?.” Head Magazine. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://headmagazine.com/marijuana-and-the-americans-with-disabilities-act-how-does-the-controlled-substances-act-affect-disabled-americans/. 

Hearons, Kathleen. “Reefer Madness: The Real Story Behind the Anti-Cannabis Classic.” Head Magazine. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://headmagazine.com/reefer-madness-the-story-behind-an-anti-cannabis-classic/. 

Hearons, Kathleen. “Texas Poised to Ban Consumable Hemp Products Containing THC: A Scorched-Earth Approach to Closing a Single Legal Loophole.” Head Magazine. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://headmagazine.com/texas-poised-to-ban-consumable-hemp-products-containing-thc/. 

Hearons, Kathleen. “The Illogic of Illegal Weed: A Comprehensive Analysis.” Head Magazine. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://headmagazine.com/the-illogic-of-illegal-weed-a-comprehensive-analysis/. 

“New THC Rules Take Effect July 31. Here’s How Texas Got Here.” Texas Policy Research. July 22, 2026. Accessed Aug. 22, 2026. https://www.texaspolicyresearch.com/new-thc-rules-take-effect-july-31-heres-how-texas-got-here/. 

Small, Craig. “Hemp Industry Alert: Federal Ban on Hemp-Derived THC Products – Immediate Action Required.” Clark Hill. Nov. 14, 2025. Accessed Aug. 23, 2026. https://www.clarkhill.com/news-events/news/hemp-industry-alert-federal-ban-on-hemp-derived-thc-products-immediate-action-required/.