4 ms·

I will admit that I have a borderline-irrational hatred for weed culture, so consider this a disclosure of biases [1]. Despite the lecture I've gotten from eve

I will admit that I have a borderline-irrational hatred for weed culture, so consider this a disclosure of biases [1]. Despite the lecture I've gotten from every stoner on this, I've never been convinced by people claiming that weed doesn't have side effects. It always seemed like it would make my friends' personalities frustrating, even when they weren't stoned. A lot of this could just be attributed to the fact that "teenage boys are just kind of insufferable anyway", but it always seemed like weed exacerbated things. [2] Obviously this isn't a study, just vibes on my end, so it can reasonably be dismissed immediately, but it does seem like my feelings on this stuff is being a little validated. [1] I still think it should be legal since I think enforcing it is worse than doing it, but I think it'll always make me uncomfortable [2] I was always terrified of doing any illegal drugs because I was always afraid that drug dealers would cut it with something horrible, so I to this day have never done any drugs that weren't federally legal.

ludston 2y ago
Even if it doesn't have physical side effects, it certainly must have psychological ones. My pet theory is that people relying on substances to emotionally regulate can neglect to develop the regular skills that everybody who doesn't rely on substances use for emotional regulation. And that's why some 40 year old stoner's will seem to have the emotional maturity levels of teenagers.
- notyourwork 2y ago
  Don't take this as a disagreement but I wonder from reading your comment: Is there a right way to live life? Your statement appears to be passing judgement to an adult using marijuana as a coping mechanism. Do you also have the same feeling for someone who takes a prescribed medicine for similar emotional regulation? I get there is a line here with certain mental disorders but if someone finds themselves better off (in their own opinion) by using marijuana who are you, or I to judge? Similarly, I don't judge the person who picks up their monthly Rx at the pharmacy, if it makes them feel good. At the end of the day people are just trying to live their life and be comfortable.
  - ludston 2y ago
    So long as they are choosing to live in such a way that improves the lives of the people around them to some degree of their abilities rather than burdening the rest of us then it's fine. Do all the drugs you want.
  - mc32 2y ago
    As Tom Cruise[1] is wont to say, it masks rather than solves. I suppose it’s up to the user to decide the acceptance of not addressing the root cause, but hiding it with chemicals. [1]Sure, he’s out there with religion and stuff but he’s pretty clear-headed there.
  - BoingBoomTschak 2y ago
    >Don't take this as a disagreement but I wonder from reading your comment: Is there a right way to live life? This question has had a clear answer for millennia, although one too uncomfortable for modern feelgood relativists: confronting your problems with strength and willpower.
    - Teever 2y ago
      That's a lot of words to just say "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps like the stoics."
  - roughly 2y ago
    > Your statement appears to be passing judgement to an adult using marijuana as a coping mechanism. Do you also have the same feeling for someone who takes a prescribed medicine for similar emotional regulation? I get there is a line here with certain mental disorders but if someone finds themselves better off (in their own opinion) by using marijuana who are you, or I to judge? I think there's a point where it becomes clear use of the drug is leading to sufficiently negative life outcomes that the drug's doing more harm than good. Alcohol's an easy case here (and a trigger word, so: I'm not comparing alcohol to weed from a health perspective) - many of us will have a pint or a glass of wine now and again to relax, but when you start drinking enough that it's regularly preventing you from meeting your obligations (or desires), you should re-evaluate. It can happen with prescription drugs, as well - a friend of mine was prescribed something for anxiety that wound up effectively rendering them homebound. At that point, it's not really serving its purpose as a coping mechanism.
- szundi 2y ago
  This is my experience within my high school class. Those who used alcohol and weed tended to be frustrated without them.
- readthenotes1 2y ago
  First heard that from a hippie in the 1980s. For regular consumers who started in their teens, it seems definitely more right than wrong
- tombert 2y ago
  I agree with everything you're saying; I think pretty much all non-prescribed drugs make it really easy to ignore underlying problems; it's why I don't drink caffeine anymore, since I feel like it allowed me to mask my symptoms of sleep apnea for around fifteen years. I still think there's a physiological element to the weed stuff as well, and I do think that the research seems to indicate that, but I don't know anything about medicine so I don't really know what I'm reading with the research.
  - DontchaKnowit 2y ago
    Dont kid yourself, prescribed drugs are even worse in many cases. I was given adderall as a teen and it absolutely wrecked my ability to develop normal routines for hygene, diet, excercise, and socialization. I got off it fairly recently and am slowly rebulding giod habits. But yeah fuck amphetamines. Similar deal with xanax, opiates. They often mask underlying problems.
    - tombert 2y ago
      That's fair. I guess I just think that self-diagnosis is usually a very bad idea, that's what I was trying to get at. At least if a doctor gives you the drug, there's at least some trained professional that believes you'd be better off with the drug than without. Obviously there's a ton of abuse that happens with the medical system and it leads to people getting addicted ending up really fucked up, so I'm not claiming it's perfect, I just think it's better than people randomly grabbing their own drug to get some temporary relief. I didn't try adderral until I was 31 (prescribed), and it really messed with my sleep, which is bad enough as it is; even taking a relatively small dose at 8am, I wouldn't be able to get to sleep until 3:30am. Not entirely sure why I had such a horrible reaction and I decided it was definitely not worth it for me, but I could also see why people get hooked on it. In a way, I'm kind of glad I didn't like it.
      - DontchaKnowit 2y ago
        You didnt have a horrible reaction thats just how the drug works. You get used to it eventually and ur body adjusts but your sleep remains low quality. And yeah I agree self diagnoses and self medication is pretty bad
- roughly 2y ago
  > My pet theory is that people relying on substances to emotionally regulate can neglect to develop the regular skills that everybody who doesn't rely on substances use for emotional regulation. As I understand it, this is basically taken as a given in substance use therapy - there's some reason you're using this (to the degree it's having a negative impact), and it's probably to deal with some kind of emotional or psychological issue, and part of reducing substance use is working through those issues and building up strategies for dealing with them that don't include the drug.
- jrflowers 2y ago
  What are the “regular skills” that everyone develops if they don’t use substances?
- zikduruqe 2y ago
  “Well, Stan, the truth is marijuana probably isn't gonna make you kill people, and it most likely isn't gonna fund terrorism, but, well son, pot makes you feel fine with being bored, and it's when you're bored that you should be learning some new skill or discovering some new science or being creative. If you smoke pot you may grow up to find out that you aren't good at anything.” ― South Park, Season 6 episode called "My Future Self n' Me"
klyrs 2y ago
As a long-time on-and-off habitual user, yeah, weed has side effects and stoner culture is stupid. At best, the heaviest users experience weed like coffee: without it, they're useless; with it, they're back to baseline.
- tombert 2y ago
  Yeah, that's kind of been my outside observation. I don't drink coffee, but I have had a pretty unhealthy relationship with caffeine throughout most of my life. Obsessive Diet Coke drinker (now an obsessive Diet Coke Caffeine Free drinker), drinking upwards of a gallon a day, usually with a few energy drinks thrown in for good measure, and possibly even a NoDoz depending on the day. That much caffeine was definitely very bad for me, hence why I eventually quit cold turkey (that was one hell of a headache!), but for years it was something I very much depended on, in no small part because of my at the time undiagnosed sleep apnea, which the caffeine helped me ignore for many years, which is bad for obvious reasons. I sympathize with habitual weed users, basically any addictive drug is something we should be understanding of. Weed culture really bothers me because people let "stoner" become their entire identity.

ludston 2y ago

Even if it doesn't have physical side effects, it certainly must have psychological ones. My pet theory is that people relying on substances to emotionally regulate can neglect to develop the regular skills that everybody who doesn't rely on substances use for emotional regulation. And that's why some 40 year old stoner's will seem to have the emotional maturity levels of teenagers.

notyourwork 2y ago
Don't take this as a disagreement but I wonder from reading your comment: Is there a right way to live life? Your statement appears to be passing judgement to an adult using marijuana as a coping mechanism. Do you also have the same feeling for someone who takes a prescribed medicine for similar emotional regulation? I get there is a line here with certain mental disorders but if someone finds themselves better off (in their own opinion) by using marijuana who are you, or I to judge? Similarly, I don't judge the person who picks up their monthly Rx at the pharmacy, if it makes them feel good. At the end of the day people are just trying to live their life and be comfortable.
- ludston 2y ago
  So long as they are choosing to live in such a way that improves the lives of the people around them to some degree of their abilities rather than burdening the rest of us then it's fine. Do all the drugs you want.
- mc32 2y ago
  As Tom Cruise[1] is wont to say, it masks rather than solves. I suppose it’s up to the user to decide the acceptance of not addressing the root cause, but hiding it with chemicals. [1]Sure, he’s out there with religion and stuff but he’s pretty clear-headed there.
- BoingBoomTschak 2y ago
  >Don't take this as a disagreement but I wonder from reading your comment: Is there a right way to live life? This question has had a clear answer for millennia, although one too uncomfortable for modern feelgood relativists: confronting your problems with strength and willpower.
  - Teever 2y ago
    That's a lot of words to just say "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps like the stoics."
- roughly 2y ago
  > Your statement appears to be passing judgement to an adult using marijuana as a coping mechanism. Do you also have the same feeling for someone who takes a prescribed medicine for similar emotional regulation? I get there is a line here with certain mental disorders but if someone finds themselves better off (in their own opinion) by using marijuana who are you, or I to judge? I think there's a point where it becomes clear use of the drug is leading to sufficiently negative life outcomes that the drug's doing more harm than good. Alcohol's an easy case here (and a trigger word, so: I'm not comparing alcohol to weed from a health perspective) - many of us will have a pint or a glass of wine now and again to relax, but when you start drinking enough that it's regularly preventing you from meeting your obligations (or desires), you should re-evaluate. It can happen with prescription drugs, as well - a friend of mine was prescribed something for anxiety that wound up effectively rendering them homebound. At that point, it's not really serving its purpose as a coping mechanism.
szundi 2y ago
This is my experience within my high school class. Those who used alcohol and weed tended to be frustrated without them.
readthenotes1 2y ago
First heard that from a hippie in the 1980s. For regular consumers who started in their teens, it seems definitely more right than wrong
tombert 2y ago
I agree with everything you're saying; I think pretty much all non-prescribed drugs make it really easy to ignore underlying problems; it's why I don't drink caffeine anymore, since I feel like it allowed me to mask my symptoms of sleep apnea for around fifteen years. I still think there's a physiological element to the weed stuff as well, and I do think that the research seems to indicate that, but I don't know anything about medicine so I don't really know what I'm reading with the research.
- DontchaKnowit 2y ago
  Dont kid yourself, prescribed drugs are even worse in many cases. I was given adderall as a teen and it absolutely wrecked my ability to develop normal routines for hygene, diet, excercise, and socialization. I got off it fairly recently and am slowly rebulding giod habits. But yeah fuck amphetamines. Similar deal with xanax, opiates. They often mask underlying problems.
  - tombert 2y ago
    That's fair. I guess I just think that self-diagnosis is usually a very bad idea, that's what I was trying to get at. At least if a doctor gives you the drug, there's at least some trained professional that believes you'd be better off with the drug than without. Obviously there's a ton of abuse that happens with the medical system and it leads to people getting addicted ending up really fucked up, so I'm not claiming it's perfect, I just think it's better than people randomly grabbing their own drug to get some temporary relief. I didn't try adderral until I was 31 (prescribed), and it really messed with my sleep, which is bad enough as it is; even taking a relatively small dose at 8am, I wouldn't be able to get to sleep until 3:30am. Not entirely sure why I had such a horrible reaction and I decided it was definitely not worth it for me, but I could also see why people get hooked on it. In a way, I'm kind of glad I didn't like it.
    - DontchaKnowit 2y ago
      You didnt have a horrible reaction thats just how the drug works. You get used to it eventually and ur body adjusts but your sleep remains low quality. And yeah I agree self diagnoses and self medication is pretty bad
roughly 2y ago
> My pet theory is that people relying on substances to emotionally regulate can neglect to develop the regular skills that everybody who doesn't rely on substances use for emotional regulation. As I understand it, this is basically taken as a given in substance use therapy - there's some reason you're using this (to the degree it's having a negative impact), and it's probably to deal with some kind of emotional or psychological issue, and part of reducing substance use is working through those issues and building up strategies for dealing with them that don't include the drug.
jrflowers 2y ago
What are the “regular skills” that everyone develops if they don’t use substances?
zikduruqe 2y ago
“Well, Stan, the truth is marijuana probably isn't gonna make you kill people, and it most likely isn't gonna fund terrorism, but, well son, pot makes you feel fine with being bored, and it's when you're bored that you should be learning some new skill or discovering some new science or being creative. If you smoke pot you may grow up to find out that you aren't good at anything.” ― South Park, Season 6 episode called "My Future Self n' Me"

klyrs 2y ago

As a long-time on-and-off habitual user, yeah, weed has side effects and stoner culture is stupid. At best, the heaviest users experience weed like coffee: without it, they're useless; with it, they're back to baseline.

tombert 2y ago
Yeah, that's kind of been my outside observation. I don't drink coffee, but I have had a pretty unhealthy relationship with caffeine throughout most of my life. Obsessive Diet Coke drinker (now an obsessive Diet Coke Caffeine Free drinker), drinking upwards of a gallon a day, usually with a few energy drinks thrown in for good measure, and possibly even a NoDoz depending on the day. That much caffeine was definitely very bad for me, hence why I eventually quit cold turkey (that was one hell of a headache!), but for years it was something I very much depended on, in no small part because of my at the time undiagnosed sleep apnea, which the caffeine helped me ignore for many years, which is bad for obvious reasons. I sympathize with habitual weed users, basically any addictive drug is something we should be understanding of. Weed culture really bothers me because people let "stoner" become their entire identity.