AACE INTERVIEW: Yoko Miyashita of Leafly
Yoko Miyashita of Leafly
“I want to share this insight with folks who come to Leafly as a cannabis resource, particularly since many have previously overlooked the plant’s potential for creating social change.”
As a teen in Toronto where I grew up, I always gravitated to the older women in the room, I would seek out them and ask them a question, “how did you get to where you are now?”. One of my favorite women that I spoke to was a famous Hong Kong actress at a party at a producer’s home. I asked her “how?” and she looked at me and said “Hold your ground and take care of your skin”, I was thirteen and have been using sunscreen since then.
Yoko reminded me of the strong women I went up to and asked for advice. A good heart and an eye for where the next path was for making the world a better place. I am honored to have Yoko on AACE and now in my old age I will always answer any young woman if they asked me “how”, I would say “hold your ground and make the world a better place.” - Ophelia Chong
We are defined by where we come from, what we’ve done and how we interacted with society, such as your past writings in micro-financing and poverty alleviation (Link.). Normally our paths are straight with few deviations, and your path to bringing equity to cannabis was set before you even had the thought of the industry.
We learn early from our parents how we should see the world and how to forge our paths. How did your immigrant parents instill in you the insight to see the world as a place to bring equality and equity?
As immigrants, you inhabit the world of the in-between, always sitting on the fence between your old and new worlds. The language barriers my parents faced and the otherness we inhabited were readily apparent in some of the places we lived, including Texas in the 1980s. They embraced their new life here, but were never fully a part of it - they loved the principles of equality and equity imbued in American culture and instilled those values in all of us. But growing up, often translating and interpreting for them, I was attuned to who was included and had achieved equality and where the reality fell short of the ideal.
Falling short of the ideal is what led me to major in Ethnic Studies as an undergraduate at Cal-Berkeley. When we understand when and why systems and institutions have fallen short of our ideals, we understand what needs to be done to fix them.
For decades, the cannabis community was broken down into two camps, one that isolated itself out of self-preservation and the other that was at the forefront of legalization. Both groups shared the same threat of arrest and incarceration, yet they persevered together to bring state-by-state regulations.
Leafly has been at the forefront of bringing advocates to the front to be acknowledged and supported. As the CEO of Leafly, how will you carry this on given the renewed focus on the wave of legalization and social equity across the states??
Leafly is at the forefront of the effort to legalize by educating, normalizing, and destigmatizing cannabis. We believe that social justice must be a key component of legalization in order to make the cannabis industry more equitable and inclusive. For example, in June we launched Seeds of Change, a first-of-its-kind report that compiled all available state data and measured states’ efforts in making social equity a foundational part of cannabis legalization. The report also examines the history of race and cannabis in the US and includes policy recommendations and academic resources for legislators. In addition to producing reports and data, it is imperative that we as an industry push to acknowledge that for, the past 70 years, the War on Drugs has inflicted disproportionate harm on BIPOC communities -- and most importantly, that we take collective action to ensure that Black and brown communities have a seat at the table and equitably benefit from this industry.
Education is a critical component of the path to equitable legalization. We have to de-program, so to speak, the notion that cannabis is bad or harmful and educate populations by sharing real facts, science, and greater knowledge about the plant’s potential. I’d love to normalize cannabis usage in the Asian-American community and provide sound facts and information to members of the community, many of whom have been fed a lot of nonsense and incorrect cannabis information for decades.
Your parents immigrated to the US for a better life, and in the early years you were their conduit to the outside world as their translator, and it was your first job. Do you feel that with that early introduction you are able to be the “translator” of cannabis to those who seek more knowledge?
(As CEO of Leafly, I feel that one of your top responsibilities is to break down all information and to parse it to those who need it at work and outside of it, as opposed to when you were General Counsel of Getty Images. I think more people ask about “weed” than “stock photography” in social situations)
This is a great question. You’re right - I have always filled the role of a translator, in one way or another. As a kid, I translated for my parents, and now, in my current capacity, I am working to translate cannabis and its benefits so people can make decisions about how to incorporate cannabis in their lives. Cannabis has transformative potential, and we can create thriving and robust cannabis markets that will fuel real change in our country. I want to share this insight with folks who come to Leafly as a cannabis resource, particularly since many have previously overlooked the plant’s potential for creating social change. The Leafly team and I strive to serve as a conduit in this regard, demystifying the plant and educating the public about its potential, using data, science, and information, not myths and stereotypes.
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