"Viciados em puxar a erva maldita": representações sociais sobre usuários de maconha em Uberlândia-MG no período da ditadura civil-militar (1965-1980).

Abstract

The central objective of this research is to analyze the historical construction of social representations of Cannabis users in Uberlândia-MG during the civil-military dictatorship, characterized by a process of deepening repression of illicit substance use. The main sources of this investigation will be: criminal cases regarding the offense of drug use and trafficking (Article 281 of the 1940 Penal Code) and their respective modifications by decree-laws; the press, including periodicals from the cities of Rio de Janeiro and Uberlândia; and legislative and legal sources on the prohibition of drugs throughout the 20th century in Brazil. Through the press, we will observe how public opinion in brazilian society constructed and reproduced social representations of cannabis users, highlighting structural characteristics of what was considered typical behavior of a cannabis user. By examining criminal cases, we will observe the construction of social representations of cannabis users, focusing on the specific and particular behavior of the police-judicial apparatus through the discourses of police officers, delegates, prosecutors, judges, witnesses, and defendants, seeking to understand the key issues of cannabis use repression in Uberlândia city. During this period, Brazilian society did not objectively distinguish between drug traffickers and users of illicit drugs, a process that resulted in widespread state-driven punishment of anyone who dared to come into contact with psychoactive substances. The prohibition and repression of the trafficking and use of socalled “toxins” in Brazil’s history can largely be summarized as the persecution of cannabis. We will demonstrate how the prohibition of cannabis developed in Brazilian history, initially related to social issues concerning the subaltern population emerging from slavery, and how its consumption was nationalized during the civil-military dictatorship. We will explore how the press constructed the common image of a cannabis user and how local Criminal Justice sentences unprecedentedly punished individuals from various social backgrounds and classes who consumed cannabis.