Would you look down on/think less of an otherwise respectable neighbour for smoking weed in his garden?

[MoonBaby1]

Sorry if this has been done To death. I know that mumsnet hasn’t famously been that accepting of any smoking but I wanted to see what other parents felt.

We are a respectable (I hope!) family with good relations with all our neighbours. No loud music, parties or bins left out etc.

My dh enjoys a few spliffs a night in our garden and it’s never raised any problems. Earlier today a very lovely neighbour we know and trust made a lighthearted joke about me burning a few cardboard bits left from Christmas (our garden does not border anyone else’s) when I said I hope the smoke is ok he said ‘better than the shite your fella smokes after dark! ‘. Is it still socially unacceptable to smoke weed or is he a bit older and out of touch?

I’m now way overthinking this and I’m worried that people think we’re not a nice family because they can smell weed smoke. I know I shouldn’t worry what people think but it’s got under my skin! I’ve even name changed here despite being anonymous because I’m usually the nice SEN mum posting about special needs and diet.

Yes. Massively.

OP you keep saying your garden doesn't back onto anyone else's house as though that means it affects no one else. However, your neighbor has in their friendliest way possible told you they can smell it. They prob can't leave their windows open. You say it was lighthearted. Perhaps they were using this opportunity to let you know your husbands habit is affecting their family.

I went to someones house once,and the man of the house smoked weed. He wasn't in at the time,but the house reeked of the horrible smell. When I came home,I was due to go for a drink at my local pub later, and had to change all my clothes, and wash my hair,as the stink of weed had permeated everything on me.

If I had gone to the pub in the same clothes,the landlady would have told me to leave the pub,with weed stinking clothes.

You’re really not that bright if you think your kids definitely won’t try smoking when they get older because it’s repulsive right now. The stats for children of smokers prove otherwise.

@MoonBaby1 when I said I hope the smoke is ok he said ‘better than the shite your fella smokes after dark

Can you really not see what your neighbour is saying to you here?

It doesn’t matter what we think, because your concern is how you are viewed by your neighbours, not MN opinions.

But having been concerned that your bonfire smoke might be an annoyance to your neighbour, your neighbour clearly told you that it smells better than the ‘shite’ your DH smokes.

Why else would he have said it?

How can you seduce that your ndn is more ‘open minded’ than MNers, where the biggest objection has been what your ndn referred to : the smell.

Deduce, not seduce. !

Our neighbour, who is incidentally the president of the expat Conservative Party for his extremely conservative home country, has a house next door (between us) with room-by-room lodgers. Normally he keeps them in check, but one of his tenants smokes such strong pot that we sort of smoke it along with him.

He stands outside the front door and smokes pretty regularly. It's pretty gross, to my way of thinking anyone who smokes pot in the morning is going nowhere in life but different strokes and all that.

I texted my neighbour to ask him to do something about it, he was polite about it (we're friendly) but nothing really came of it.

I’d massively judge you. Weed is grim.
Regular weed smokers always seem to play it down but it does affect your personality in negative ways no matter how much you lie to yourself.

I wouldn’t judge but I’d hate the smell, as others have said. My neighbours smoke it a lot and the smell hangs around for days and seems to stick to everything. It seeps into our flat and I can’t stand it!

1. It's illegal. And 2) if the smell is wafting into my garden / house / kids bedrooms and causing a nuisance, I would not be happy. Plus 3) "a few spliffs a night", described less sympathetically, is the same as "all evening, every evening". If you love it that much, smoke inside the house. There's a house like yours a few doors down from me and it stinks. I am so thankful I don't live next door. I would turn a blind eye to the odd spliff once a week, but every night is just unneighbourly and inconsiderate. Your family is not as respectable as you think you are!

For context, My parents def would judge you. However, they think that cannabis / heroin / drugs In general are all the same ...but I’m quite sure they also wouldn’t recognise the smell of it so they wouldn’t know. All a generational thing

Yes. Of course it is. Summer of Love anyone? Swinging sixties? It's not new. It's just that most people of 'that generation' seem to have grown out of it and realised what a waste of time and money it is. Every night? Addicted, surely?

Get your husband/tell him to get a dry herb vaporizer. It's more efficient (so it'll cost him less) and he'll probably be the only person who can smell anything.

As Philip Larkin didn't say, sex and drugs were invented in nineteen-ninety-three.

I'm struck by how judgemental people are on here. Mostly people seem to dislike the smell and think that gives them the right to be incredibly rude and uppity. There are plenty of things I don't like about my neighbours but I don't talk about them behind their backs and I try not to judge, as I realise I know nothing about their lives. And yes, it's illegal, but it makes no sense for it to be and if you want to blame someone for the resulting crime, blame the people who keep it that way.

For the record, I don't judge addicts at all. I feel incredibly sorry for them. What a horrible way to end up and there but for the grace of God...

I don't even judge the people who laugh about the 'silly pearl clutchers' on here, when people (like me and others) have mentioned the devastation caused to people we know by this 'fun hippy drug'. I feel sad for them too.

The problem with drugs, and I include alcohol in this, is that you think you're fine...until you're not and by then the damage is done.

It's actually incredibly sad that people think it's ok / normal, to the point that it's laughable to think otherwise, that the OP's husband has a few spliffs to himself every night of the week when he has young children who I'm sure would like a fully functioning dad around in the future. Ha, ha, fucking ha.

I would say the same about a dad who was necking wine every night.

Honestly, I know the drugs world, probably better than most of the clowns on here having a good lol. You don't heed the warnings at your peril, but at least you'll go down laughing...until you're not.

I think a lot of younger households will be smoking weed. Not in an antisocial way but just the way generations before us would have gone down the pub. I said before that our garden dosnt back onto anyone else’s

I think it depends where you live really. Both the areas i have lived in were full of weed, everyone smoked it. But where my dad & sister live you never smell it.

Its common around here. Im in a row of 4 houses, 3 of the houses smoke weed and 1 doesnt smoke it but the people who visit do. Theres 3 dealers on the street though and i know at least 6 houses who smoke it on this street alone

I wouldnt judge but my partner smokes it and its been "normalised" as such in the area i live in, inreally think it deoenda where you live if people will judge or not

I think generationally a lot of the attitudes here will simply diminish over the years. Younger people do not share the same views.

Legality of anything or otherwise is not morality. There are lots of things which were once illegal and now people are unconcerned once the law changed.

For example, a moral opinion in the 1960s might have been that homosexual men should not be criminalised. But they were until 1967. Legality isn’t the end of the argument.

It's absolutely disgusting and I would hate to live near you.
You can say "we're a nice family" all you want but the reality is you're antisocial, engaging in criminal activity and your poor children has a drug taker as a parent. Several spliffs a night makes a drug addict, it's hardly occasional use.
I'm not someone who is "hysterical" about drug use either, I see it daily in my job.

For example, a moral opinion in the 1960s might have been that homosexual men should not be criminalised. But they were until 1967. Legality isn’t the end of the argument.

Absolutely! But the argument people have been making on here, for not buying drugs while they are not legal, is that it finds a violent trade with countless victims along the way.

The same cannot be said for being gay (homosexuality is not a the best term to use btw ).

www.glaad.org/reference/offensive

"I think generationally a lot of the attitudes here will simply diminish over the years."

I'm not so sure, young people tend to have stronger empathy for the victims of the drugs trade, less accepting of it being okay for children to be enslaved (in and out of the UK). They have had enough of people thinking only of their own happiness with no concern for how it harms others.

I think it has less to do with age than some would hope. I have been one of the most opinionated on this thread and I am a card-carrying millennial who eats avocadoes. I'm probably younger than the OP!

@BeatriceTheBeast

That’s a matter for you. I don’t use the word gay. If someone is offended by the use of the term, I assume they are uncomfortable themselves.

But you can make similar arguments. Before 1967, many rather basic sexual acts were criminal. And with it came criminal culture, blackmail, clubs which operated illegally so people could meet. In other words, the illegality fostered crime. You could have made the same judgment and people did.

Society moves on and is doing so all over the world. Britain used to be a relatively progressive and pragmatic country. Illegality says only that there was a decision to criminalise.

Since we did take a more severe approach to drugs in 1971 the rate of use has gone up and up. I expect it to continue until we get a more sensible approach that puts health first.

I completely agree with your last paragraph @lexmitior and have said a few times that I'm not at all against a move towards legalisation or at least decriminalisation.

But, while it isn't legal, people who have a choice (recreational users) should not be buying it.

Gay men can't choose not to be gay.

Your neighbour is annoyed, and telling you so, so why you need a poll I don’t know. You are clearly the annoying druggy neighbours.

I am another person with a family member left with life-changing mental illness after teenage dope smoking, so yes I would judge you, I wouldn’t want to live next door to you, and I would hate the smoke coming into my garden and house. My next door neighbour has very occasionally smoked in his garden, I can smell it, but it is probably a couple of times a year. Every night is antisocial behaviour.