The Sad News About CBD Cupcakes

As I stood at the window of a Weed World Candies truck on Manhattan’s Sixth Avenue last week, a gray-haired man I didn’t know tapped me on my shoulder. “It doesn’t work,” he said, motioning at the truck, which sells candies laced with a cannabis- or hemp-derived compound called cannabidiol.

“I didn’t ask you,” I responded, turning back to the window.

“It doesn’t work,” he reiterated, louder, as though it was easier to believe that he had been misheard rather than dismissed.

We went back and forth like that for several rounds, yelling at each other in 30-degree weather in front of an RV wrapped in marijuana-leaf graphics and blasting Bob Marley music. Finally, he stopped trying to enlighten me and shuffled off to let me buy my lollies in peace. As I tore into my new treats, I realized the whole thing had been a scene from the internet’s dominant cannabidiol discourse come to life: Some money had