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By any other name ... Washington moves to ban the word 'marijuana'

caption: A cannabis plant is shown in the cloning greenhouse on Thursday, January 18, 2018, at The Hollingsworth Cannabis Company in Mason County.
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A cannabis plant is shown in the cloning greenhouse on Thursday, January 18, 2018, at The Hollingsworth Cannabis Company in Mason County.
KUOW Photo/Megan Farmer

There are lots of nicknames for cannabis: pot, weed, grass, reefer madness. But now there’s one name state lawmakers think you should avoid: "marijuana."

Washington Governor Jay Inslee signed a bill striking the word "marijuana" from the text of state laws. Instead, it will be replaced with “cannabis.”

It’s part of a national effort to remove the term from common use.

RELATED: Stop saying 'marijuana'? Lawmakers say it's racist

When the U.S. House of Representatives voted to decriminalize cannabis at the federal level last week, the bill also included a provision to strike "marijuana" from official statutory references.

KUOW politics reporter David Hyde has been looking into where this push to stop saying marijuana came from.

He joined Soundside host Libby Denkmann to discuss the name change.

You can find Hyde's full story here.

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