One of the biggest moral and political issues that face us is the challenge of our broken criminal justice system. It is a bloated, messy, unsophisticated monster that has failed our children and communities. We need to make some big changes if we want to reposition the United States to be the global leader of the 21st century. If we don’t reform our jails, we will be at a tremendous disadvantage in the global community. While the entire system needs a major multi-faceted overhaul, we can do something relatively simple that can change the game forever. Legalize marijuana.

Last year, the FBI reported that 12,196,959 people were arrested in America. Of those, 1,552,432 were arrested for drug offenses. Nearly half of drug arrests were marijuana related. According to the American Civil Liberties Union, there were 8.2 million marijuana arrests between 2001 and 2010, and 88 percent of those were for simply having marijuana. Instead of going after murderers, rapists, hard drug dealers, pimps or child molesters, our cops have to spend a large part of their days trying to crack down on a guy whose biggest crime is getting the munchies and watching SpongeBob.

If this wasn’t bad enough, there is always the fact that it’s totally racist.

Despite data that shows that blacks and whites use marijuana at roughly equal rates, blacks are 3.73 times more likely than whites to be arrested for marijuana, according to the ACLU.

This column does not offer me the

space needed to speculate as to why that number exists, but one thing is self-evident: Legalizing marijuana can be one of the most direct and easiest ways to help empower the black community.

I understand the urge by many to fight against legalizing any new substances that were previously illegal. Members of my family have ruined their lives with drugs, and marijuana has the stigma of residing in the same area as cocaine and meth. But we know that’s not true and that marijuana is not nearly as bad as those drugs. We have somehow allowed ourselves to normalize alcohol, a drug that is far more dangerous and damaging to our society while demonizing marijuana. The teetotalers and prohibitionists may have been morally right, but their dreams were creating a hellish nightmare ruled by mobsters who ran the streets. The same is true today. While the “War on Drugs” may be a valiant societal aim, it has also been a failure.

Let’s take the power out of the hands of thugs and into the hands of well-regulated small business owners. We can create a booming sector in a hurting economy, put Americans to work and enforce tough health and safety standards on the product.

We can create laws banning the smoking of marijuana in public places and create a system to go after those who smoke and drive. It will not be an easy process, and there will be missteps and lessons that need to be learned. But the potential problems of tomorrow are far better than the reality of today.

We would be a better society if we were sober. I have never done drugs and won’t use marijuana if it were legalized. But I also don’t drink even though I’m 21. It’s made all the difference in my life, but I would never impose my views on others. It’s time for our laws to do the same.

Rich Robinson is a junior majoring in telecommunication and film. His column runs weekly on Tuesdays.