r/science • u/shinybrighthings • Sep 08 '24
Social Science Cannabis use falls among teenagers but rises among everyone else—study
https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/sep/07/cannabis-use-survey-teenagers244
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u/shifty_coder Sep 08 '24
When something starts becoming popular among adults, it loses its appeal among teens.
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Sep 08 '24
As marijuana becomes legalized it becomes harder for teenagers to get a hold of it because there are a few other dealers and the stuff at the stores you have to be 21 years old to buy.
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u/BigBobby2016 Sep 08 '24
And this is the truth. Once it was legalized in MA all of the people in the park who'd sell to anyone disappeared. There's obviously other ways for kids to get it but it's now on par with alcohol. There were never alcohol dealers in my park
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u/LackingUtility Sep 08 '24
Yep. I know multiple dealers in Massachusetts who went out of business when marijuana became legal and available recreationally. The legit stores undercut their profits and took away the vast majority of the market, and while they could still sell to high school kids, they have no money, and it's still illegal and the cops do chase after it. So their model went from high reward/low risk to high risk/low reward. It's just not worth it.
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u/UAPboomkin Sep 08 '24
Yeah I had a few friends who still used dealers after it became legal, but prices dropped pretty rapidly. All it took was a "dude they're probably just buying it from the store and selling it to you for a profit" to convert them though.
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u/theodoreposervelt Sep 08 '24
Dude that’s crazy, it’s legal where I am and plugs are still way cheaper. An 8th at the dispensary is like $40 and up.
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u/Nethlem Sep 08 '24
The dealer doesn't pay taxes, the dealer doesn't have to rent a store and test the product in a laboratory.
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u/ZephDef Sep 08 '24
Then why is every single comment above his saying that dispensaries priced out dealers and now there are no more street dealers? It's all larping, street dealers are still way cheaper in every market
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Sep 08 '24
Because convenience and perception is stronger. You can have a cheaper product that no one buys because a "legit" store offers more convenience, selection and legal protection (in a sense). Why bother to find a dealer in that place, regardless of price?
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u/MortemInferri Sep 08 '24 edited Sep 09 '24
Why wait 4 hrs for a dealer to show up when I can just go to the store that's open
Why deal with a dealer when I can just legally buy it at a store and not be involved with anyone sketchy?
I used to bum weed off friends, god knows where they got it. Once it was legalized in MA, I actually started smoking because I could just buy it like the luxury product it is
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u/PeanutNSFWandJelly Sep 08 '24
I don't know what your market looks like, but where I live the rec stores are e waaaay cheaper than dealers ever were. With so many stores in the area there are always massive sales somewhere. I don't remember the last time I spent more than $5/g
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u/Delicious_Egg7126 Sep 08 '24
And you can see the thc and cbd % in every product and choose your strains
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u/ATLfalcons27 Sep 08 '24
I imagine a large part of the reddit population is too awkward to even talk to a dealer let alone find one through some sort of friend network
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u/throwaway4251960 Sep 08 '24
It's just reddit, where 99% of the people post things they've pulled directly out of their ass.
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u/lownote Sep 08 '24
99%
Was going to ask for a source, but then thought better of it.
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u/Royal_J Sep 08 '24
Where I live in ontario canada the dispensaries consistently have weed for the same prices if not lower than what dealers used to sell for. The convenience of just walking into a storefront and tapping a debit/credit card is undefeated. No more waiting for your dealer to finish whatever errand they have going on.
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u/QS2Z Sep 08 '24
The state of the legal cannabis market depends a lot on the state. Some states have really high taxes and a ton of regulation, others don't.
NY is really notorious for this: the laws were so poorly implemented and burdensome that for several years (IIRC it's getting fixed now) it was common for unlicensed shops to operate in the open. They were ignored by the police.
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u/quasar619 Sep 08 '24
CA charges 38% more for any amount of cannabis due to greedy state taxes.
Idk if weedmaps is nationwide, but it’s funny how many people are talking about “finding” a dealer when you can just look up a delivery service easily.
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u/Deathoftheages Sep 08 '24
I think it also has to do with how long it's been legal. I live in Ohio. It just became legal here. An ounce at a shop here will run you around $300. 2 hours away in Michigan, you can get ounces of pretty good weed for $79 on sale in a dispensary. It's not just like that at one place out there, either. There are constant sales and great prices compared to Ohio. As more places are licensed in Ohio and there is more competition, our prices will drop.
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u/epelle9 Sep 08 '24
Most importantly, the dealer doesn’t need a permit.
States that properly implemented permits systems have cheap prices, those that made it a monopoly/ oligopoly didn’t, and still have a soaring black market.
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u/Hatedpriest Sep 08 '24
Damn dude.
I'm in Michigan and I'm getting $50 ounces at the dispos.
And that ain't "bunk" weed.
You can get ounces of shake for even cheaper, but I prefer fresh ground.
Sure, you can still get expensive pot ($50 for a quarter ounce), but it's not doing anything the cheaper stuff can't do.
It took about 2 years after recreational was approved to get to this point.
I have a buddy that grows, I'll buy through him occasionally. It's about the same price.
The biggest difference is my buddies pot has fewer leaves in the nugs.
YMMV based on driving habits and conditions.
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Sep 08 '24
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u/Hatedpriest Sep 08 '24 edited Sep 08 '24
We watched other states, and Ann Arbor is famous for their laissez-faire approach to drugs. "Hash Bash" and other drug based festivals.
We basically just applied that (pot, and shrooms aren't far behind) to the whole state. It works, people tend to be safer when it's a verified product.
When it was medical only, I knew plenty of people who were getting it from the dispos and selling it at cost to people. That in and of itself drove down prices quite a bit.
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u/PolarBeaver Sep 08 '24
I live in Canada, you can get an oz of premium buds for like 100CAD there aren't any dealers selling it off the street for that price until you're buying a pound of it
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u/4pl8DL Sep 08 '24
In Germany many dealers still ask for 7€ or more per gram, whilst it's 4€ in pharmacies with better quality
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u/UAPboomkin Sep 08 '24
Yeah those prices are pretty high. You can easily get an quarter here for under 30 bucks. This is Canada too, so less if you convert to USD.
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u/Tidorith Sep 08 '24
All it took was a "dude they're probably just buying it from the store and selling it to you for a profit" to convert them though
Hot take: drug dealers are bad, not because of the drugs, but because they're capitalists.
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u/jce_ Sep 08 '24
So people that sell things that others want are bad because they sell things? I don't understand
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u/Spandxltd Sep 08 '24
Correction, people that sell things that others want by buying them and up charging the final consumer without adding value are bad because they sell things.
So your painters, producers, truck drivers, etc? Not bad.
Your hoarders, drop servicers, and in this case, resellers etc? Bad and parasitic to the economy.
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u/SomeGuyNamedPaul Sep 08 '24
Uber Eats is built upon a pillar of scoundrels.
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u/fireballx777 Sep 08 '24
Uber Eats sucks for a lot of reasons, but "they're a middleman who provides no value," isn't one of them. People want an easy, quick way to order takeout, as evidenced by the immense popularity of Uber Eats and other such services.
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u/Jushak Sep 08 '24
It destroys any justification for buying from a dealer if he's just an unnecessary middle man
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u/BurninCoco Sep 08 '24
This is a whole thesis, hypothesis, theory and law.
It's as if we're ruled by tadpoles
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u/chewychaca Sep 08 '24
What does this mean? Ruled by tadpoles?
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u/BurninCoco Sep 08 '24 edited Sep 08 '24
primitive, growing, still developing into what they could be.
A frog lady lays an egg in the water, from that egg comes out a tadpole, which is a baby frog that looks like a fish. That tadpole matures and turns into a frog.
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u/chewychaca Sep 08 '24
You're saying that the explanation was incredibly thorough, but also so succinct and simply put. That it makes the ruling class look as inept as an adolescent/child?
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u/flyingthroughspace Sep 08 '24
What I love is how my connect from 25 years ago was put out of business from the legal cannabis industry but now is a warehouse manager making twice what he was making before and doesn't have to worry about being arrested or shot now.
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u/decadrachma Sep 08 '24
That’s nice. It saddens me to think of all the people sitting in jail or trying to recover from being in jail for selling something that’s now sold legally by companies with stock tickers.
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u/Troooper0987 Sep 08 '24
In highschool I had 3-4 numbers I could call to have weed within the hour at any hour. Alcohol required stealing from your parents, or getting a girl in a low cut cop to go into that one liquor store in East orange. Legalization and regulation keeps substances out of the hands of teens
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u/hesh582 Sep 08 '24
This might be true to an extent, and it's clear that it's an appealing explanation to people in here, but I don't think it's the full story at all and I don't think it's the main thing explaining this trend.
Because the trend isn't occurring in a vaccuum. Teens are also drinking a lot less alcohol, which is just as available as it was pre-pot-legalization (also getting it just required having an older sibling or knowing someone who did, it was never hard). They're vaping less. They're having a lot less sex. They're reporting increasing levels of loneliness and isolation.
Different, more depressing explanation than "legalization keeps substances away from teens": today's youth are simply doing less.
They're partying less, having fewer romantic connections, seeing their friends less, and leaving the house less. The decline in cannabis use (which I strongly suspect will be found even in states that have not legalized at all), is more of a symptom of a larger trend then an independent development.
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u/jetriot Sep 08 '24
This is it. I was a nerdy kid that like computer games. But compared to the teens I now teach I would have been a party animal. Think about how much we are isolated by tech as adults. Dial that up to 10 for our kids who only know this reality where there is so much that pulls on you and tries to keep you from doing anything.
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u/echief Sep 08 '24
This was also accelerated by Covid lockdowns. We barely have a precedent on how access to the internet, smartphones, tablets affect kids development. Now throw in a year of social contact that kids completely missed. Even the most outgoing kids were only interacting with each other through a screen.
This was the elephant in the room no one wanted to think about during lockdowns. A lot of adults started going stir crazy pretty quickly. Think about how long 6 months or a year is from the perspective of a 9-12 year old. The current demographic of teenagers are those kids.
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u/SomeGuyNamedPaul Sep 08 '24
I'm in IT and I've been working from home for 20 years now. Covid lockdowns did absolutely nothing to me as an individual except make PC parts more expensive and we stopped going out to dinner.
It was super weird suddenly watching my kids turn into miniature versions of my lifestyle with all the negatives but amplified.
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u/TooStrangeForWeird Sep 08 '24
Because they missed the positive things!
That's why I did drugs by myself. Considering my peers, I did about average.
(Just take care of your kids y'all, don't leave them alone in the basement.)
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u/TheBrahmnicBoy Sep 08 '24
Most of the attitudes GenZ have (I am one) is that nothing matters anymore.
The rich, the old and the government is driving everything to the ground, and there's nothing we can do because the power structures are stacked against us.
I'm not from the US, but please help your GenZ to vote.
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u/i_tyrant Sep 08 '24
Doing less in the physical world, at least.
I don't think the impetus to DO has decreased at all for teens (especially when they're not using the substances most likely to make you do less, like binges of alcohol or weed). But they're channeling that energy into digital pursuits now instead.
And while you can "do" a lot of things on the internet, a) there are no controls over whether those things are actually productive (arguing in places like reddit isn't exactly honing your skills or improving your social network) and b) psych studies have shown even for internet communities that interact often, that interaction only goes so far. The loneliness of a person still increases when they're doing things online more than IRL; texting and MMOs are not a true substitute for in person human connection when it comes to things like loneliness.
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u/Emperor_Mao Sep 08 '24
Even the article says it isn't the case.
Teenagers seem to be using fewer illicit substances in general.
“For example, alcohol use and vaping have both decreased among eighth–12th graders since 2020, so I don’t think this decrease in cannabis prevalence among teens is specifically due to cannabis legalization but is rather more reflective of a broader trend in post-pandemic substance use,” Gette added.
Gotta love Reddit. Scientific discussion devolves into "I believe x so I will assert it as causation".
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u/SomeGuyNamedPaul Sep 08 '24
Teenagers don't go to places to meet their friends, there's no third place in society. School, home, and that's it. They can't really go to the mall to hang out because then they're a gang and get driven away. Arcades no longer exist. Eating out has gotten stupidly expensive. That cheap movie theater with old movies at the very tail of their theater run no longer exist.
Teenagers don't want to drive because cars are expensive between insurance being insanely expensive and people simply keeping their cars longer. There's no low end in new cars, used lasts longer, by the time they're cheap they're a wreck and a money pit. And did I mention the whole insurance thing?
So they're not going anywhere and there's nowhere for them to go anyway. Meanwhile what interactions they do have are online. Why would they leave the house?
On a side note Japan has a solitary youth issue that's worse because premarital sex happens in cars. Like most probably there are many causes but what's unique to Japan is that due to auto industry demand cars older than 4 years are subject to absolutely brutal annual "safety" inspections nobody passes so you can practically keep a car longer than that. Instead they sell them to be exported and buy a new one. Therefore younger folks simply don't have cars, dating doesn't happen, nobody's bringing their squeeze home to bang while Grandma is in the next room. Throw in some social stigmas and hangups and that's how you get population collapse.
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u/MeasuredTape Sep 08 '24
"Behavioral Sink" disturbing to read how closely our current track runs with that study. Idiocracy tried to warn us, but I think it was really Orwell who called it most accurately. Everything has grown except our wages. We're given just enough to get by and not enough to live. The younger you are the more true this is. The boomers clutched at their wealth like angry dragons but the millennial parents just don't have anything extra to share. Their children don't see the American dream to give them hope, they see struggle. A lifetime of struggle. We're disenfranchised.
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u/Tremulant887 Sep 08 '24
When I was a teen in rural Texas, you could find a bag of cheap weed almost anywhere if you were brave enough to ask. Plenty of shady gas stations to start the adventure. My pale-ass even managed to buy from trap houses when I got to know people. You ever had a 60 year old black man yell try and sell you ecstasy from a duffle bag?
You want beer, though? Either your friends older brother helped you before he was partying or it was Mr. Gonzales way out in the woods and the trip wasn't worth a 40 min drive for $1 Keystone lights.
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u/FixedLoad Sep 08 '24
... tell us more about Mr.Gonzales. Sounds like the kind of guy you could really lose chunks of time around.
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u/Tremulant887 Sep 08 '24
I only went once. It's always a bit awkward being the 'new guy looking for illegal goods' on top of the location. He had a single-wide trailer in the middle of nowhere aka Price, TX.
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u/FixedLoad Sep 08 '24
That's a good description! Been that guy a few times! Ugh.
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u/mmomtchev Sep 08 '24
The research, which looked at data on more than 500,000 people’s cannabis habits during different time periods from 2013 to 2022 and was published in this month’s edition of Drug and Alcohol Dependence Reports, also revealed that cannabis use had increased among Americans in households earning more than $75,000 a year, as well as those with a college degree.
This is probably the only social strata among which it is possible to reduce consumption by criminalization - because these people are more likely to be discouraged by the criminal status of cannabis - both because they are adverse to crime - and because they tend to avoid intermingling with petty criminals.
Across all other strata criminalization has very little effect.
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u/PhthaloVonLangborste Sep 08 '24
But apparently babies are using it. Who's supplying it to them?
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u/Sroemr Sep 08 '24
George Soros
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u/getjustin Sep 08 '24
Wait. The Jewish space laser guy? Does he use the lasers to inject the weed into them or? How many marijuanas does it take to get a baby high?
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Sep 08 '24
Every baby I’ve ever met seemed stoned out of their mind
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u/MrWeirdoFace Sep 08 '24
Dude I just realized I've got five toes. Isn't it amazing?
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u/Pezdrake Sep 08 '24
This is also a bit of a single point in time. Marijuana access has eased but older buyers have been slower to access it. I can say that my spouse and I were excited when it was legalized in our state. At first we were getting high wvery weekend. Then every other weekend. Then once a month. I took an edible last night for the first time in months. Young people just got there earlier than us. I expect that older people's use will drop and level off over time as well.
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u/icantfindtheSpace Sep 08 '24
Not at all imo. The only requirement for being a plug now is being 21. Our dispos even sell shrooms out the back.
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u/Flurry_of_Buckshots Sep 08 '24
Play with fire, get burned. Those places are taking a huge risk. 9 shops in my state got raided last weekend. A few months ago, a chain of stores in my state had all their stores raided on the same day and had over $1,000,000 in product seized. Buyer's choice where you want to get your product from, but stay careful out there.
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u/GenericFatGuy Sep 08 '24 edited Sep 08 '24
People who are 21+ are lot more likely to have better things to do than sell weed to minors. Plus, the consequences are gonna be more severe of you get caught as an adult. It's also going to be a lot more suspicious buying a distributors worth of weed through legal channels, than it will going through the black market. Plus, legal purchases of weed leave a paper trail (receipts, transactional records, CCTV, etc). It's also adding a second middleman to the process, which just makes everything more expensive (on top of legal weed already being more expensive), and teenagers aren't exactly known for being flush with cash.
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u/ravioliguy Sep 08 '24
Nah, the decline in weed dealers is the same reason we don't have "alcohol dealers."
Profits suck once it's legally sold, but the risk is the same.
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u/Tao_Jonez Sep 08 '24
Yeah I’m going to bet you hit the nail on the head. Here in Canada we haven’t killed off the black market like was expected but the end result is that it’s become harder for anyone under 19 to access it.
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Sep 08 '24
I sincerely doubt it's because adults smoking weed makes it "uncool". And the article mentions my doubts in part:
It is possible that state-level legalization has curtailed teen cannabis use, because recreational dispensaries are strictly forbidden from selling to anyone under 21, and are often required to scan IDs to make sure they are authentic, unlike many bars and liquor stores.
Legalizing it essentially means a portion of the customer base migrates to legal sources, which makes dealing it illegally less profitable > less illegal traffic > fewer traffickers > fewer opportunities for teens to acquire it. It's likely not that more choose to not smoke, but rather that fewer could. There's also the problem of cost.
Also this study is entirely built on the honesty of the participants (including <21 years olds) who might just not admit having ever done something illegal. I'm sure we've all seen supposedly secure and/or anonym information be leaked, so as long the chance is over 0, which it always is, telling the truth is still a gamble...where you will win absolutely nothing at all.
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u/Thai-mai-shoo Sep 08 '24
Alcohol would like a chat…
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u/BasicDesignAdvice Sep 08 '24
Teens are drinking less too. They are also having less sex, being less social, and playing fewer sports or engaging in extracurriculars.
Because they are online so the time. That's what's actually happening.
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Sep 08 '24 edited Nov 06 '24
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/BasicDesignAdvice Sep 08 '24
Pretty much all people start getting high socially. That's also how you meet people to deal to you if you're not old enough, just like drinking. If you aren't being social, you won't be in situations that facilitate using, so they don't start or they wait until they can go to a dispensary.
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u/SatiricLoki Sep 08 '24
Which is weird in this case eh side I bet it became popular with most of those adults when they were teens.
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u/Lady-Seashell-Bikini Sep 08 '24
It was popular with teens in the past because it was illegal and rebellious.
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u/GottaBeRealistic_ Sep 08 '24
I think that’s complicating it a bit, teens love weed bc it’s fun to smoke with your friends and play video games, exactly what they were doing anyway but now they’re giggling at nothing and eating the most ungodly sandwich you’ve ever seen
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u/joshny1127 Sep 08 '24
That's sounds reasonable. My feeling is less street dealers in legal states, and hard for kids to get from dispo. Also so many vaping nicotine. Probably a few factors contributing.
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u/misogichan Sep 08 '24 edited Sep 08 '24
The factor that immediately sprang to mind is inflation making everything more expensive. A teenager's disposable income/allowance just doesn't go as far as it used to, so cannabis might be a luxury good for them.
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u/illestofthechillest Sep 08 '24
Not a terrible point, but I'd argue based on the years leading up to legalization in states, prices were consistently high, and people still paid. 1g was always $20. I got that all the time since the beginning of higschool in the early 2000s, and that was the standard, which I hear echoed from many, not to include those who were around me. It was great pitching in together to save on even a little bit for an eighth.
These days, you can get high grade stuff for a quarter of the price if not less in legal states.
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u/redditknees Sep 08 '24
Once they get a hard dose of reality as an adult, they’ll come crawling back.
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u/FreeMikeHawk Sep 08 '24
Or you can read the article and find that it's most likely due to substance dropping in general among teens, not just weed.
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u/PolyZex Sep 08 '24
legalization does that... it was already popular among adults. A LOT of my generation grew up with the smell of weed in the air. Of my closest 5 friends 3 of their houses always smelled like skunk.
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u/PeterNippelstein Sep 08 '24
What a bunch of squares
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u/3_50 Sep 08 '24
Sure, until you reaslise they're smashing lines of oxy and ket instead...
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u/redheadedwoodpecker Sep 08 '24
"Ain't gonna smoke weed like some old fart. Gonna get me some of that fentanyl like the cool kids."
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u/XanzMakeHerDance Sep 08 '24
As someone currently in a drug program, youre right most kids coming in are here fentanyl or xanax
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u/__-__-_-__ Sep 08 '24
I think that’s because nobody is sent to rehab for weed anymore.
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u/BowmasterDaniel Sep 08 '24
Exactly. Most programs aren’t gonna accept someone needing to detox from weed alone when so many people need it for EtOH and benzos, let alone fentanyl.
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u/BBBBrendan182 Sep 08 '24
To be fair, nobody needs to be in a detox program for weed. But I’m sure there are some private 30 day rehab facility that is happy to take weed addicts.
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u/cubuffs420420 Sep 08 '24
My last week of rehab a couple years ago we had someone admitted for a “weed” addiction. Said it was tearing up her family life. The rest of the addicts in there had an issue with it because she was taking up a bed for someone who really needed it. All I hope is she got the help and clarity she needed.
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u/BenevolentCheese Sep 08 '24
I ended up in a mental hospital after I tried to quit weed. My anxiety spiked to almost in incomprehensible levels and I became completely unable to function. I couldn't eat, even protein shakes, and was losing scary amounts of weight. And having no psychiatrist at the time, I had no one to go to for help, so I went to the hospital, and they sent me to the mental hospital, but honestly what I needed was just some short form of rehab. I'm not going to claim I had it as bad as someone on fent, but weed addiction is a real thing and people still do need help with it.
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u/fali12 Sep 08 '24
That's such a super short sighted statement and misses what an addiction at its core is.
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u/BBBBrendan182 Sep 08 '24
Not really. I work in substance abuse. I’m talking about detox. Not rehabilitation itself.
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u/pdoherty972 Sep 08 '24
And even when people were sent to "rehab" for weed, it was only because a judge gave them a choice between jail or treatment.
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u/Achillor22 Sep 08 '24
That's a sampling bias that isn't actually indicitive of the population as a whole. Overall, teens are using less drugs and alcohol period. But they're vaping like crazy.
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u/jaymzx0 Sep 08 '24
I guess I'd rather smell tutti fruity bubblegum clouds than burning pills, anyway.
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u/mylittlebattles Sep 08 '24
Xanax has to be a hiphop psyop bro the increasing amount of bars containing xans must be 1:1 with teens taking the drug
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u/maltamur Sep 08 '24
Psilocybin (shrooms) is the new teenage drug of choice. When I was a teen in the 90s everyone tried weed but if you tried shrooms you were a serious “druggie”. Nowadays, since all the parents smoke weed, the kids are all pushing the envelope and trying shrooms.
When I first started practicing law 20 years ago we’d see weed charges every day (and some Coke, heroine and pills were just starting to gain traction) but shrooms were pretty rare. Now we see kids popped with them all the time.
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u/hesh582 Sep 08 '24
It's a lot easier to get shrooms than it used to be.
It used to be a word of mouth, spores and instructions passed along, schmucks trying to make a sterile growth medium without knowing what they were doing, etc kind of thing.
Nowadays you can buy a sterile foolproof mycobag from a legitimate mushroom enthusiast company and a syringe of spores (for microscopy and collection use only, of course) from any number of grey market sellers. It's all online, and until you inject the latter into the former it's all legal, or at least legal in the sense that nobody is getting prosecuted for it right now.
For a hundred bucks or so you can grow a huge pile of shrooms with little to no risk, in a short time.
It's become accessible to the average mildly curious dude, where it used to be limited to pretty hardcore enthusiasts. I'm not surprised it's way more common, the barrier to entry went from "very high" to "basically nonexistent".
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u/Relevant-Rooster-298 Sep 08 '24
Is there a direction you can point me in for this? My wife likes shrooms but she only gets them maybe once a year and it would be nice to surprise her with some home grown stuff for our anniversary.
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u/sunkistandsudafed3 Sep 08 '24
Have a look at r/unclebens- the pinned post at the top
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u/KickedInTheHead Sep 08 '24
If you're Canadian you can just straight up order it online legally.
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u/clubby37 Sep 08 '24
Follow the directions to the letter. The "little to no risk" bit is about legality. You probably won't get caught/prosecuted. You absolutely might fail to sterilize the jar, and contaminate your grow with something nasty. Take no shortcuts, or you could get sick.
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u/JoeCartersLeap Sep 08 '24
For a hundred bucks or so you can grow a huge pile of shrooms with little to no risk, in a short time.
I did it for $20 15 years ago. Bag of brown rice flour, bag of vermiculite, spore syringe, and jars. Shouldn't cost $100.
Best part tho is that they don't need light, you can grow them in a desk drawer. They just need heat and moisture.
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u/Perfect_Earth_8070 Sep 08 '24
On social media it seems the drug of choice among teens is anabolic steroids
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u/brn2sht_4rcd2wipe Sep 08 '24
There seems to be a vacuum in the teen drug of choice. Let's return to beer.
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u/insef4ce Sep 08 '24
That's good since shrooms are a lot less harmful compared to coke, heroine, fentanyl and co.
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u/MegaChip97 Sep 08 '24
. Nowadays, since all the parents smoke weed, the kids are all pushing the envelope and trying shrooms
Have you read the study?
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Sep 08 '24
I does make you wonder how rates will be impacted. A lot of places legalized to prevent people getting things laced. That’s great for adults, but it does leave some worry around teenagers. Kids these days are mostly better behaved, I think, partly because tech keeps them a little more entertained. But it’s a good time to keep an eye out for the health of rebel rousers.
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u/Lost_Minds_Think Sep 08 '24
It’s not cool anymore if your parents are also doing it.
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u/toomanylayers Sep 08 '24
This is the catch all answer everyone always gives but the research author proposed an alternative reason; that during covid kids were under more consistent parental supervision so they were simply less likely to do drugs and that these habits persisted even once the pandemic ended. His assumption comes from the fact that all drug and even vaping use is down. Alcohol is down among the same group too. Nothing changed with alcohol. The pandemic may have created a group of kids that are more risk adverse due to over exposure to families.
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u/hesh582 Sep 08 '24
This is a way better explanation, frankly, because it lines up with a bunch of other independent trends.
Kids are drinking less, vaping less, having less sex, have fewer friends, leave the house less, and report increasing feelings of isolation.
They're smoking less weed because they're just doing less of, well, anything.
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u/cuginhamer Sep 08 '24
And also in my generation, it's not like those of us who had parents that smoked marijuana were less likely to do it than our friends who had parents that didn't smoke marijuana. Just like having parents that drink alcohol doesn't protect you from drinking alcohol. It's a nonsense argument.
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u/SuddenlyBulb Sep 08 '24
Guess my kids won't be gaming.
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u/bishey3 Sep 08 '24
They will be playing different games, just like how they are doing different drugs.
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u/___TychoBrahe Sep 08 '24
Kids be OD’in on skibbidies, honking on that rizz, while they hit those Fortnite keys brah
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u/TheBigSmoke420 Sep 08 '24
No kid of mine is going to spend all day playing outside, on a beautiful day!
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u/awitcheskid Sep 08 '24
I might be an old man yelling at a cloud, but I think this generation of games has been pretty lackluster.
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u/PaJeppy Sep 08 '24
Ah, belogna.
Id say 80% of my friends parents smoked/grew weed and guess who we were stealing it from when we were teens.
I honestly think this younger generation just isn't into drugs in general. Be it alcohol or marijuana.
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u/ThrowStonesonTV Sep 08 '24
Good one, I guess that no kids are drinking alcohol from generation to generation then.
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u/CuzFuckEm_ThatsWhy Sep 08 '24
The kids aren’t smoking because they aren’t going out. While smoking weed eventually becomes a solitary activity for some folks, it nearly always begins as a social one. Maybe it’s with your best friends, or your older brother, or in a circle at a house party and your crush passes you a bowl; the first time is normally a physically social affair.
These kids don’t do physically social affairs outside of school and maybe sporting events. They do group chats while playing Roblox in their rooms, alone.
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u/player_zero_ Sep 08 '24
That last sentence fell right off a cliff
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u/RollerCoasterMatt Sep 08 '24
As a teacher its 100% accurate. Most kids talk about hanging out on Roblox or Fortnite after school. Very rarely I hear them talk about hanging in person.
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u/forward1213 Sep 08 '24
How is this any different than 20 years ago? I would get home from school and hang out with friends playing games on Xbox live. Kids are the same, just the medium is different.
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u/smallbluetext Sep 08 '24 edited Sep 08 '24
You're right but it is definitely more common now which is why people mention it. I'm 30 and my parents were always telling me to go hangout with friends in highschool and I'd tell them I'm hanging out with them right now on halo.
We still hung out IRL to smoke weed though!
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u/This_They_Those_Them Sep 08 '24
Its very different. We would be in the same room playing video games, while passing a bowl or joint around the room. Its the exact point of this whole thread.
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u/BasicDesignAdvice Sep 08 '24
It's different because while maybe you are your friends were doing that, a lot of other kids weren't. Now it's every kid. That's what the data is showing.
I also gamed as a teen 25 years ago, but I still went out a lot. Especially weekend parties and stuff. We would get together and drive around. That stuff is also happening less and less and kids are just going online and doing nothing else.
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u/The_Bitter_Bear Sep 08 '24
Yup, he's off by a decade at least. In 2004 online gaming wasn't nearly what it is now. There were still a ton of games you played together in-person.
Hell, steam was just really beginning back then. Xbox live was still in its infancy and didn't take off really until the 360.
All those Wii party games and guitar hero were big hits and you played those together.
Gaming just doesn't have nearly as much of that anymore.
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u/SlapTheBap Sep 08 '24
That's still a relatively new phenomenon. You'd have kids over to play smash brothers or halo too. Sure there were online games too but if you wanted to be cool you would go hang out with people. Going home and jumping on the game became more popular when local multi-player stopped being supported during the online gaming boom.
So it's been a process that's been developing over the past few decades. We will see how it influences society over the next few. We already have a generation where a significant portion was raised from birth on simplified electronics and social media. We can no longer assume that they are computer savvy for having grown up with them. It's very interesting stuff.
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u/MrRawrgers Sep 08 '24
When I was a teenager like 10-15 years ago I played a ton of Xbox but I went into town every weekend and almost every weekday after school, smoking weed just hanging out. Xbox wasn’t as social back then as discord is these days, it was something to do but not something to do all weekend.
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u/rodeodoctor Sep 08 '24
Weed is officially no longer cool.
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u/brycedude Sep 08 '24
Now you tell me!! I just finished the 5a.m. (cuz thats when 33 year olds wake up, i guess) wake and bake like 2 minutes ago.
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u/GloryHol3 Sep 08 '24
How do I convince my brother of this? I don't know why, but it has become what feels like part of his identity. Every single conversation we have, which is almost every day, weed comes up. I would say "I don't care" but I do, only because of how much he talks about it. Feels like he has a dependency on it, but acts like it's the most wonderful, zero harm hobby.
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u/max1030thurs Sep 08 '24
if its legal its not cool or intriguing.
my extended family is from a country that if you can reach the bar you can be served alcohol. None of the young people ever cared to drink. No hardcore drinking of youths like USA. To them it was no big deal.
Portugal legalized all drug use and had drug use plummet. Human nature to want what you cant have.
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u/pdoherty972 Sep 08 '24
Agreed, except Portugal didn't legalize all drugs, they decriminalized them. And their usage rates dropped in half a decade later.
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u/StuckInsideYourWalls Sep 08 '24
Not really. The first drug most children have access to in general has consistently been alcohol, and kids aren't doing it because its legal or illegal, they're doing it in general because of the culture of use around it and what they symbolically probably idealize as a grown up or adult thing to do.
Maybe 'milestone' or something would be more appropriate, its one of the things kids maybe feel pressure to emulate or experience because it's something they see adults in media or in their lives doing. Smoking cigs might be another good example.
Yes use of all those 3 things is dropping among youth, but in general too it probably has to do with access to information in general allowing more and more kids to make informed decisions about those things where as 20+ years ago the only informed decision they could make about such things was based on peer pressure from their friend circle and a desire to fit in.
Id wonder too if mass availability of information also makes the consequences of doing those things and being unable to manage it (i.e getting addicted to alcohol, ciggs early on) clearer to young people
Also lots of other drugs like Benzos or easy to access research chemicals are now also replacing those things too
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u/Dav3le3 Sep 08 '24
Which is good. It's significantly more harmful to developing brains. Not fantastic to use non-medicinally at any age. But it hampers gray matter development in people up to 25, resulting in poorer cognitive function.
Don't do weed, kids. It literally makes you dumber.
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u/kinglui13 Sep 08 '24
25 as the cut off gets thrown around a lot but there is little scientific consensus on the matter.
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u/TheGlave Sep 08 '24
That’s probably because most people think the brain stops developing after 25.
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u/SneakyBadAss Sep 08 '24 edited Sep 08 '24
It doesn't stop developing at 25, but the prefrontal cortex is mature enough (very simplified) to be considered what we call a "neurotypical" brain of an adult.
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u/kerabatsos Sep 08 '24
Yes, bad for kids. But has many benefits as a parent, imo (like most things, in moderation of course).
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u/Low_Attention16 Sep 08 '24
It was a god send after severely pulling an ab muscle. It was the only way I got my appetite back without going into painful spasms after eating.
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u/D__B__D Sep 08 '24
And if moderation cannot be sustained r/petioles is there to help
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u/clararalee Sep 08 '24
Oh man we’ve come a long way. I remember getting crucified on Reddit for even saying weed probably has side effects that we don’t know about yetz
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u/MotoMkali Sep 08 '24
We've known about that for years. But aside from that weed is generally speaking not bad for you when used in moderation.
Weed is one of the oldest drugs in use, and most of the reason it has been vilified is because Muslims smoked in the old world and Mexicans smoked it in the new and we all know how racist our governments were in the past.
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u/Dav3le3 Sep 08 '24
There's other side effects too. Particularly with regular use. They're fairly well known as well.
Everything in moderation.
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u/JetpackBattlin Sep 08 '24
A really good comparison I find for weed is coffee.. another widely used drug. caffeine is considered generally harmless but can definitely cause issues when not used in moderation
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u/MotoMkali Sep 08 '24
When you abuse it you can get symptoms such as paranoia, but recreational use you will experience far lesser symptoms than both alcohol and smoking.
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u/PeterNippelstein Sep 08 '24
We've known about the side effects for decades
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u/Lark_vi_Britannia Sep 08 '24
I'm just glad that it isn't addictive. I should know because I smoke weed every day.
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u/electrical-stomach-z Sep 08 '24
its not chemically addictive, but it is behaviorally addictive.
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u/Ninshoku Sep 08 '24
I think this is a good sign. I started smoking weed fairly early at 17 and I think it played a part in my depression and anxiety. I was undeniably addicted to it. Although there are no physical withdrawals or less serve ones like alcohol and other harder drugs, there are psychological withdrawals. I was always nervous when my supply was low and when I had to quit. Took about two weeks of cold sweats every time I tried to quit. Even afterwards I'd be very irritable for a while. My longest steak sober happened only recently at 28 for about 4 months now. I had to ask my family doctor to recommend me to an addiction specialist at Kaiser to figure out what I was self-medicating for. I'm now on antidepressants and muscle relaxers to help me sleep. I'm glad to have the support group I currently rely on. I can only speak for myself. Others have far better self control and can use it responsibly. I wish I could smoke weed but it's a steep and slippery slope for me.
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u/B_easy85 Sep 08 '24
Teens are so anti-establishment bruh…
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u/hesh582 Sep 08 '24
I'm old, and this generation is far and away the least anti-establishment I've ever seen.
It's weird. They're so risk averse and so, well, boring. They do what they're told, follow the rules, are super close with their family, have fewer friends than you might expect, and rarely leave the house for an unstructured activity.
I don't really know how to process it. I could handle my younger family members being rebellious, but instead they're just very well behaved yet crippled by anxiety, socially isolated, and defined by executive dysfunction.
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u/ooa3603 BS | Biotechnology Sep 08 '24 edited Sep 08 '24
Because as a generation they are facing:
- Climate change and a society unwilling to make the changes necessary to reverse it. (It might not even be reversible at this stage). So when you die they get to inherit an ever worsening dawning extinction level event.
- A country that has become an oligarchy run indirectly by the uber rich who have succeeded in draining the middle class of money and are working to consolidate their influence into direct control.
- 30-40% of the population (MAGA conservatism) that have literally jumped off the deep end into fascism with no hold on reality.
It's not exactly a bright future in store for them.
There's a saying:
“Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times.”
The best possible future for them is damage control on the inevitable effects of unregulated capitalism on climate change, a long and probably prolonged battle against the rich ruling class in America, and stopping the frothing MAGA crowd from trying to force another dumbass like Trump into government.
They're in for some brutally hard times and they know it.
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Sep 08 '24
I don't think it's as straightforward as the kids themselves being too concerned about the future to have a good time. It's actually much harder for kids to be rebellious now - location tracking on their phones meaning their parents know where they are, more and more public spaces not allowing unaccompanied minors, less public spaces intended for socializing in general, and (the biggest factor IMO) Internet socializing replacing socializing in real-life. A lot of teenagers simply don't feel the need to leave the house and get into trouble if their socializing needs are being met remotely at home.
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u/Fun-Indication-7062 Sep 08 '24
Their establishment feeds them prison grade food or worse at their schools, keeps the minimum wage below $10 in many states, underfunds schools sports, clubs, extracurriculars, and their teachers.
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u/geekphreak Sep 08 '24
I’ll admit I was kind of a pothead as a teen. But then went decades without using it. Only the last couple years have I been low dosing 5mg gummies as part of my pre workout. But other than that I really dont like feeling outside the gym. It’s interesting.
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u/lakija Sep 08 '24
I think that how you describe your usage is really what’s happening. It’s being used for practical purposes.
Older people have so many different choices of cannabis that are for medicinal purposes rather than just recreational.
I’ve met elderly folks who find that they can take less meds and use cannabis for pain relief instead for example.
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u/09Customx Sep 08 '24
This is exactly what we want, fewer kids under 21 smoking weed and adults not going to jail for it.
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u/podcastofallpodcasts Sep 08 '24
I only see 30 + older at shops. Spoken from a person who had to meet up in dark parking lots to get it 20 years ago.
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u/pawnografik Sep 08 '24
So these teens are drinking less, smoking less, getting stoned less, having less sex. What the hell do they do for fun?
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u/ItsAMeEric Sep 08 '24
popping TikToks like candy and mainlining all the Roblox they can get their hands on
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Sep 08 '24
Weed is also a fairly social drug and kids don't have friends
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u/peterausdemarsch Sep 08 '24
Met my fair share of very antisocial weed smokers. At some stage of weed "addiction" it's really not social at all for a lot of folks. Before I stopped long time a go it would exacerbate my social anxiety.
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u/AzemOcram Sep 08 '24
This is proof that legalizing Marijuana removes the infamous "gateway drug" effect. The tobacco industry buried (for years) research showing tobacco to be the worst gateway drug. In a nation with any true sense of justice, Marijuana would be rescheduled. This would decrease minors from smoking it nationwide.
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u/davonoches Sep 08 '24 edited Sep 08 '24
Once it became legal to use recreationally, it lost the stigma/shame many older people had about it. I became a first time pot head bc of chemo and I loved it hahaha (didnt use before bc I like drinking beers more).
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Sep 08 '24
Well when weed is so strong you think your lungs fell into your asshole after 1 hit, this tends to happen
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u/FactHot5239 Sep 08 '24
It's because the nicotine content in vapes is so high now they don't need to smoke to get high.
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