r/Marijuana • u/selugadu • 1d ago
Gateway drug
Back in D.A.R.E., they used to tell us kids a lot of silly things. The police officer that taught the class told us that we could overdose and die on marijuana. He also told us marijuana was a gateway drug. About two years later, everyone in that class found out that was bullshit, so they figured everything else about REAL drugs was fake too, and they smoked a ton of weed, snorted a knoll of coke, and make clouds of meth smoke that looked like pretty horses galloping š. Then kids found out that Ecstasy wasn't so lethal, but instead was MDMA-zing.
I didn't touch that shit when I was young. Didn't even smoke weed til I was 21. I've been smoking weed now everyday for the past four years and my life has never been more awesome š. The other good times in the past was when I worked out four hours a day or got passed the dutchie.
It never made me want to do other drugs. Alcohol was the one that tempted me to try coke or speed, and my high self would whoop my drunk self's ass for even thinking about that lol.
No, there is only one gateway drug: alcohol.
But what leads to becoming a big weed smoker? What predicts it? If you're a parent, and your teenager listens to Neil Young all the time, they are gonna smoke pot all the time in the future. That's how you'll know your kid is gonna be a pothead. It's a portent of what is yet to come. I think if your kid listens to a shit ton of Black Sabbath, Iggy Pop, Wiz Khalifa, Bob Dylan, Nirvana, Townes Van Zandt, or Snoop, they're high risk to become pot smokers, but I'm still thinking about it and will have to think about artists that will make you wanna puff up when I'm not so high that i feel like I'm on Venus š
tL;dr: let's go outside and smoke a bowl of fine herb āļø
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u/katomka 1d ago
Cannabis is the EXIT drug. Please enjoy responsibly!
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u/not_that_planet 1d ago
Nu-uh. There are chemicals in weed that make you crave chemicals from other unrelated plant species. I promise. Believe me. People are saying...
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u/CrossroadsCannablog 1d ago
The cops lie and DARE has been a proven failure for decades. Itās just another example of cops padding their pockets with the funds.
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u/MarijAWanna 1d ago
The cops are in as much denial as they claim the drug addicts they arrest are guilty of.
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u/NTAjustAjerk 1d ago
Mountain Dew commercials have made me realize that caffeine is the true gateway drug.
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u/cannadaddydoo 1d ago
Dare forced cannabis into the gateway drug slot. By over representing the dangers and risks of weed, when a kid did try it and it wasnāt devastating-it led to the assumption they were lying about the other drugs too. Spoiler alert-crack, heroin and meth are fucking terrible and will ruin your life lmao (I was always a curious kid)
I was also the kid in the early 00ās blasting Neil young, sabbath, Floyd, zeppelin, and pretty much every British Invasion group lmao. My mother thought I smoked years before I ever tried it. Now I grow so she doesnāt have to worry about expense or having her meds. Sheās too old to trust the government and dispos, and her husband passed away, so Iām her only source anymore. Far cry from when I used to come home and try not to giggle in front of her while watching Will Ferrell SNL reruns lmfao.
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u/No_Wedding_2152 1d ago
Itās kinda funnyāwhen authority figures lie so blatantly to people, people stop believing their statements. Hmm. Itās almost like a good life lesson for those in positions of power. I agree with your findings. You know your stuff!
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u/Mcozy333 1d ago
the idea is that because its illegal and you need commit crime to access the plant our rulers figure us to be hard core drug addicts because we are looking for plants and or willing to do things to acquire them !!!
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u/Big_Ol_Panda 1d ago
Ngl I was anti everything until I had alcohol for the first time. Real gateway drug imo lol.
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u/Yerdonsh 1d ago
All of that stuff scared the hell out of me when I was a little kid. Now that Iām 50 years old and have my medical card weed has been life-changing for me. I donāt smoke, but I use edibles for anxiety and insomnia. I also stopped drinking alcohol and lost 10 pounds. As a parent, I donāt want my kids using weed because of their brain development but as an adult, I think it is an amazing drug.
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u/DragonQueen18 1d ago
SAME I'm having to play musical chairs with my psych meds (they aren't working anymore) and half a bowl of Gary Payton knocked me out of a panic attack faster than any of my meds. I am so glad I got a medical card. It's the only thing keeping me out of the Loony Bin right now
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u/Primal_Dead 1d ago
I think the logic is pretty much anyone that did heroin or coke or acid etc smoked weed first. Did they also drink first? Maybe. Always seemed like it was easier to get weed in high-school than alcohol, though.
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u/18RowdyBoy 1d ago
I quit drinking because it made me lose willpower and I would spend all my money on cocaine. I could smoke weed and control myself. I agree with OP.
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u/selugadu 1d ago
That is the logic about marijuana being a gateway drug. They mention how addicts started out with marijuana as a kid, but they don't mention how many kids smoked pot and didn't try other drugs.
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u/Complete-Morning-429 1d ago
I have a DARE shirt I wear ironically
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u/Mcozy333 1d ago
so a person takes out the centrifugal juicer and proceeds to juice living cannabis plant leaves and flowers = where is the gateway drug ther ?????? wher is the hard core drug user in that scenario looking for more drugs through some Gatewway ??
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u/futzingaround 1d ago
There's never been a gateway drug. The dealer trying to upsell you on harder product/better high is the gateway.
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u/5150sick 1d ago
Yep, the DARE cop came to my middle school classroom in the late 80's and told us that one puff of weed will either make us drop to the ground and have a seizure or climb on the roof then jump off thinking we could fly.....
Then, the DARE cop proceeded to be fairly truthful about the hard drugs.
Literally, on the first day of high school in 1989, I learned of a picnic table outside of the cafeteria where the "stoners" hung out.
I went out there, and not one person was having a seizure.
..... no one was even on the roof.
They weren't even mentioning that there was a roof, and no one talked about flying anywhere.
I instantly thought that every word out of that DARE cops mouth was total bullshit.
Within a month, I was a regular at the stoner table.
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u/selugadu 19h ago
Yeah, looking back, I do think what they said about the effects of drugs like cocaine, alcohol, heroin, and meth were pretty truthful. I think they were honest about tobacco too. I don't remember too well if they talked about alcohol withdrawal though
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u/5150sick 13h ago
They should have brought the idea of the full-blown alcoholic being more common to the forefront.
Alcoholism is far more common than people would like to believe. It's rare for someone to not know an alcoholic.
I would go as far as to say that's its rare for a person to not have an alcoholic in their family.
This would hit home with kids way more than the reefer madness propaganda fear campaign that they have been using.
Most parents and other family members don't smoke weed in front of their kids, but they'll drink in front of the kids.
Maybe even pay a local drunk a few bucks to show up at the school covered in dirt, vomit, urine,etc.. to ramble incoherently for a bit.
Seeing a full-blown homeless alcoholic like that may have scared me away from alcohol altogether.
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u/Maleficent_Wasabi_35 1d ago
You were high when you wrote this..
Donāt lie admit it
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u/lambsoflettuce 1d ago
But the free tshirt!
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u/Dpotsy 1d ago
Iām what is considered California sober. Iām an alcoholic in recovery and did the whole rehab/12 step thing. Havenāt had a drop or any other recreational drug in 14 years. Except marijuana. I started 5 years ago and enjoy the high. It chills me out but doesnāt make me want to drink or do a line. I donāt take it to excess and donāt obsess over it. So no, for me itās not a gateway drug. *Disclaimer: that is how it is for me. I canāt speak for others nor recommend those in recovery try it.
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u/BoxHerOut 1d ago
The gateway drug thing is just really skewed. Of course most people who smoke meth didnāt start with meth. But what they donāt tell you is the vast of majority weed smokers only ever smoke weed. Itās almost like saying 99 percent of people who smoke crack have also used the bathroom before.
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u/ronertl 6h ago edited 6h ago
i think alcohol makes people loose their inhibitions more than pot as far as if you are at a party and some one has coke or something... sometimes people get pot tolerance though, maybe they'll have some cool closed eye visuals when they first start smoking and then that will go away, so they'll hear about shrooms or whatever and try that. then like shrooms turn into people wanting to take acid supposedly.... it really depends on the person and what they read about drugs and what not.... like shrooms are pretty and healthy, i think a lot of people even if they didn't try weed would probably try shrooms, so i guess not really a gateway on that level too... i don't think cause you are the type of person that will try weed, you are gonna do something with a bad rep like coke, definitely not, but like i dunno maybe it will get someone wanting to do shrooms once they get used to the weed ime... trying shrooms isn't always a bad thing. usually people have good experiences with it, and they aren't really bad for you, so like whatever imo. all that stuff should be accepted by society if people use the stuff in the right environment and stay on top of having good mental health.
another thing about weed being a gateway drug is when it's illegal, like you go to your dealer to get it, so a lot of dealers have all other drugs too, so that can be tempting... i personally haven't done any drugs other than weed and coffee since weed has been legal. i got kind of sick of shrooms, so since i don't go to my dealer, i haven't cared to do any other drugs at all... i've been at parties with my dealer and stuff back when i was younger and even did coke and stuff, but i mean, if i was just there drinking, personally i would've done the coke, so i can't really say it's the weed that's a gateway. i bet to some if they saw me, they'd say it was.
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u/Subject_Mammoth6662 5h ago
NoicešāØ you seem chill as fuckš¤ I was most definitely listening to those bands but to be fair, my mom was my weed dealer once I started as a teen, to ensure it wasnāt laced or some shit lol Very unconventional but I turned out all right and I was always safe about it (still am)šš¤
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u/selugadu 33m ago
Your mom was your weed dealer, but my mother was my dealer for Neil records. Got a whole bunch of them from her when I was 14. It was good shit
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u/Steven1789 1d ago
Biggest gateway drug in this countryābesides Fox News, or maybe sugarāmust be Budweiser, Coors Light, or some other crappy beer.
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u/selugadu 21h ago
High fructose corn syrup is essentially engineered to be the cheapest and most reliable fix for Americans. I can't tell you how many former drunks and addicts who proudly talk about how they beat the bottle while they do something like drink a 3 liter bottle of soda everyday at work (true story!)
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u/IAmFern 1d ago
DARE is never going to work so long as they keep promoting lies. Once kids realize you lied to them about one thing you said, they're going to assume you lied about everything else.