Today Huffington Post Live allowed Cheryl Shuman to come on their broadcast and blatantly lie about myself, my family, and an organization I am helping to develop. It was a sad and low point in cannabis history. Below is the response I sent to the show’s host, Nancy Redd.
Hello Nancy,
I was saddened to watch your broadcast today and your interview with Cheryl Shuman in which she disparaged me and slandered my family on your segment. I was amazed that she was allowed to go on and on telling one bold lie after another with no attempt to question the validity of her statements.I am a well-respected activist and author of the book Medical Marijuana 101. I also maintain a blog about the industry at www.weedactivist.com. We recently exposed Cheryl’s and Moms 4 Marijuana’s somewhat nefarious activities in some pieces you can see here:Her bizarre allegations of me having parties for young girls and meth is slander at best and an obvious retaliations for what are real fraudulent activities being put forth by Ms. Shuman.Here is an article on our sentencing so you can have more background on our case: https://weedactivist.com/2013/07/24/flashback-tainted-medicinal-edibles-sentencing/I would be happy to come on your show and set the record straight, but more so, my family and I deserve an apology.Parent 4 Pot also deserves an apology as you allowed for this ethically questionable woman to destroy our fledgling efforts on your media platform without even contacting us that you were discussing the organization on air. It is shameful what you have allowed to happen here to myself and the many other good parents who are organizing because group’s like Cheryl’s have exploited them for personal fame and fortune for too long.Here is a piece on Cheryl defrauding the family of a child with cancer: http://cannadad.blogspot.com/2013/11/sly-generosity-cheryl-shuman-meets_16.htmlShe even has her very own encyclopedia dramatica page that tell of her fame crazed past: https://encyclopediadramatica.es/Cheryl_ShumanI am a good person, a successful business operator and a father of two young sons. You just allowed a woman to go on your show and tell the world I went to prison for throwing meth parties for teenage girls. I can not explain how disappointed I am. I will be pursuing all legal recourse against Ms. Shuman and your show for damages this causes.Please contact me at your convenience to discuss this matter further. I can be reached directly at ________. that is my cell. I appreciate your time and consideration. I look forward to hearing from you.Regards,Mickey Martin
Feel free to send her a response of your own at: info@nancyredd.com or on Twitter @nancyredd; and let her know that it is not okay to use her platform to allow people to publicly slander others without allowing those people to be present to defend themselves.
I am severely disappointed in Ms. Redd, Huffington Post, and of course I expect nothing less than the lowest from Cheryl Shuman after learning about her antics in depth.
I was glad to see that Russ Belville had the courage to stand up and call bullshit on Cheryl for what she said today about me.
I thought wrong. The first question from HuffPostLive had to do with the story they ran on Martin’s Parents 4 Pot and the first words out of Cheryl’s mouth were all about disparaging him and his organization, including unfounded allegations of running ephebophilic pot parties (that’s the word for sexual attraction to pubescent but underaged girls). Most of the segment devolved into Cheryl doing everything she could to slam Parents 4 Pot.Cheryl was grossly out of line in that interview and made me feel ashamed for her. For her to sink to the internet troll lowest common denominator was unworthy of our mission and message… that’s right, OUR mission and message. The great unwashed masses out there don’t distinguish between all these groups; we’re just the “pot legalizers”. And every blog, Facebook, and interview where we spew invective and hurl accusations at our groups and our leaders just shows the mainstream how kooky, juvenile, unprofessional, paranoid, and hateful the “pot legalizers” are. It would have been very easy to just answer the Parents 4 Pot question with, “I’m happy other groups agree that cannabis using parents are good, responsible parents. I’m actually a part of Moms for Marijuana, which blah blah blah…” Then we’d have spent the next five minutes learning about the issue of parents and legalization rather than listen to how awful the leader of this other group that supports legalization is.
I do not always agree with Russ, nor he with I; but in this case he is spot on and I can also take a look at my input into the conversation for ways I can be more productive in my approach.