Why do so many people smoke weed these days?

[MontyDonsBlueSuit]

I get the world isn’t a great place for many people but why is it so prevalent now? Is it cheaper than drinking? Or easier to get hold of? I really dislike it and don’t understand why if it’s illegal it isn’t more closely monitored. Am I missing something?

Yah

It stinks

What’s the world not being a great place got to do with it?!

reasons why

1. its enjoyable
2. its being legalised in lots of countries
3. it’s mostly harmless

I think it is much stronger now. I used to smoke it about 25 years ago, as dud lots of people I know. You often didn't know they were until you walked up close to them. And it was usually bought from someone's friend who grew a couple of plants if a window sill. Now it is bred to be very strong (which is why it stinks) and grow in almost industrial conditions by people who are trafficked. It's the reason I wouldn't touch it now.

Because it's fun and people like how it makes them feel, nothing more profound than that.

Plus, it gives you lot the ability to feel superior.

It does not come from criminality is clearly what I meant.
I don’t think pinot Grigio needs county lines.
Maybe your brain is addled by drugs.

I’d rather not have to smell it (can’t stand the smell of skunk) but I’m all for legalising it. Lots of friends use it for medicinal purposes (pain relief, ADHD symptoms, all sorts). Legalising it might reduce county lines activity too.

The sooner the UK legalises it for all the better. Although you can legally smoke cannabis in the UK if you get a prescription. Which is pretty easy to get. So, many of those smoking it are likely to not be doing anything wrong at all 🤷🏼

There was a dude smoking it in Chessington World of Adventures when I went!

This is completely incorrect. You are only allowed to vape or ingest medicinal cannabis and you have to sign to say you will not smoke it.

Ok cool. You have to sign to say you’ll vape it….🙄

I started working in a hospital last year (AHP) and it has it has put the nail in the coffin of any enjoyment I found from alcohol - it's legal, celebrated, encouraged, entire industries and businesses are built around it, people's social lives revolve around it, expensive, etc. etc. - and the fact is, it's poisonous. So very very toxic.

Of course smoking weed, or smoking anything, damages your lungs & massively increases your cancer risk, but I'm in the 'weed should be legal and regulated' camp.

Fwiw my partner smokes weed and drinks beer - I'd rather have him stoned than drunk anytime.

Very good science based video comparing alcohol to cannabis, and its effects on the body.

Spoiler alert; neither are great, but if you’re casually having a glass of wine thinking weed smokers are cunts, perhaps you should educate yourself..

I have one, this is it.
When I was at college everybody who smoked smoked resin. Most of them went on to be useful and productive members of society.
The current crop (see what I did there), with the enhanced strength weed smashing its way through their tiny minds and wasted bodies, doing God knows what damage as it goes, not so much.

You can get it on prescription now extremely easily for many conditions.

To answer your question OP because it's lush. And it's not new! People have been smoking weed in the UK for a couple of centuries! Made more popular in the 50s due to the influence of Carribbean immigrants. Cannabis has been used for medicinal purposes since the 1800s in the UK and it's used for meditative/spiritual purposes in the Rastafari religion.

Really though what do you think is the material difference between smoking and vaping weed in terms of effect? You're not wrong, legally you can only vape and not smoke but the point really is that you can get cannabis delivered to your house perfectly legally if you have any of a wide number of conditions including anxiety which is diagnosed on self report...

It would also open up less aromatic avenues of consumption too. The smell seems to be something a lot of people have an issue with. People smoke it because it’s the most convenient way of ingesting it under current circumstances, but what a lot of people especially on this thread don’t seem to realise is that there are many other methods of consuming cannabis that don’t smell or smell way less pungent. Vaping, edibles, capsules, drinks, tinctures I could go on. It’s just more difficult and costly to access those methods with it currently being illegal.

I doubt the government would want to encourage the smoking of it either due to the fact that smoking anything is harmful to health, so it would be in their interests to encourage other less harmful methods that would likely be just as, if not more popular than smoking which is by far the smelliest way of consuming it. Not that I can see it happening anytime soon, despite the fact that it would eliminate many of the current issues surrounding it and bring in a lot of tax revenue.

I don’t think people who smoke weed realise how boring they become. And defensive too, they seem to have zero inkling of the negative effects it has on them and those around them. They become almost evangelistic about it

I was in Vancouver a few years ago and it was ruined by people walking around smoking weed, it’s legalised there for recreational use. The stench was awful in the downtown area

No wonder life expectancy is going the wrong way, weed smoking brings on COPD and lung cancer much faster than tobacco, not to mention mental health problems including depression and psychosis.

It’s legal in most of America now (along with loads of other places) so it’s in effect been totally normalised. What isn’t great is the fact it’s still illegal in the UK so you have to deal with the awful smell of shitty skunk and associated crime links. I’ve lived in a legal state and typically you don’t smell it at all because it’s mostly vaped or ingested and better still the taxes on it fund public services instead of lining the pockets of criminals.

There’s a man on the estate where my office is and he does it on his lunch break. Everyone walks around (it’s all built on a park) and he’s there casually smoking his spliff

Couple of things to consider for all the anti weed people

People actually want to smoke weed. They do this because it has a pleasant effect. This, despite your indignation, will not change. It’s already illegal, to practically zero effect.

The fact weed is illegal in the U.K. vastly increases the chances of such weed being dangerously contaminated with all sort of bad things eg spice or worse. It also means the potency cannot be controlled. It’s very much like illegal alcohol knocked up in some backstreet, prone to all sorts of impurities.

So, accepting that millions of people will smoke weed regardless, surely the safest and best way forward, is to legalise, decriminalise, regulate and tax the already existing and huge market and make it safer for all, all well as severing the links to criminal activities.

It’s a bit childish to think “ooh why won’t it all just go away!?!”

Try and actually come up with a decent, harm reducing solution, and that doesn’t mean: why can’t the world work why I think it should (stomps feet)… like yer typical mumsnet anti weed hysteric.

It can seriously damage your mental health. It is not mostly harmless.

The problem with cannabis is the smell is so. invasive. Where I previously live my neighbour used to sit near his back door and smoke it. We had it wafting into the back bedroom of the house where my teenage son slept and made the conservatory unusable. Thankfully he stopped as was very aggressive on minor issues and very confrontational. Bit sad really as up to that point he been the model neighbour.

To relax and unwind

Only if you have a predisposition and are smoking extremely strong skunk. Another argument for legalisation.

the vast vast majority of people who take cannabis are absolutely fine. They enjoy it. No harm is caused to others. It’s the illegality in the UK which is the issue. Do you not ponder why other, much more conservative societies such as the US have legalised it? Because it works better for everyone.