Oh Kay, through the gauntlet and now it is time to comment...
Lets start at the beginning first shall we.
Julianking93 said:
This is something I've been wondering for a while now. In movies, TV shows, literature and even just the common image that comes to mind on this subject always seems to show stoners (or anyone who uses any drug of any kind) as being incredibly stupid and weak minded.
But why is this?
For me, it's the exact opposite. All the stoners I know are actually extremely intelligent and often times are brilliant in their own ways. So why is it that the general public and the media depict weed smokers as unintelligent and borderline retarded?
Is it because the media wishes to give drugs as much shit as possible, so in turn they show the users as stupid because of their drug use rather than just being stupid in the first place? Or is it actually true that most of them are just stupid and I am lucky to know the few intellectual dopers?
What does the Escapist think about this and do you yourself do any drugs of the sort?
OT:
"Stoners" is a very specfic type of marijuana user, a stoner is not someone who tried marijuana once and never again, or even one who uses it once or twice a week, but as someone else in this thread has said this but a "stoner" is someone, who is "chasing the high", so to be fair a stoner who is smoking Marijuana constantly, every day. So a stoner would most likely not only wake and bake but keep going and would smoke over doing other activities like sports, finding and keeping a job, or school work on a regular and consistant basis. the "stupid" aspect of the stoner comes from a misconception about marijuana's effects on the brain, (which is that marijuana causes both long term and short term memory loss) now that is only partly true, marijuana is widley known to cause problems with short term memory which means it's harder to retain information whilst "high", it has less effect on long term memory.
Lets have a look at an example shall we.
The La Guardia Committee Report -
http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/lag/lagmenu.htm
Now this is not a perfect example but when talking about how ingesting a drug affects people you can't sum it up into a single report because of all the potential users in the world how many do you think can be brought together into one place for any amount of time?
The question of whether marijuana is dangerous is less a question of the drug but the user.
That said I'm not saying that marijuana is not dangerous, but it is about knowing the risks, every time you do anything you risk something, just typing up this response puts me at risk, risk of RSI from my improper typing technique, risk of eye strain and other body injuries from the way I sit and use my computer.
Life is risky, it won't stop us from trying. Personally I think that people who jump out of perfectly good planes for fun are a little stupid,
BUT that is my opinon they know the risks and take steps to minimise it. I don't want to see the sport banned, it's what they enjoy and they aren't hurting anyone.
The use of a drug does not automatically confer full blown negative health issues, not everyone who smokes a cigarette will become addicted, even though cigarettes have been proven to be addictive, so whilst they are dangerous they are not as dangerous as people speculate.
For those of you saying that marijuana turns all users into deranged, slow witted, druggos you might have to take the blanket off, lets compare your statement to one that I have started helping in the fight against here in my native country of Australia. "Violent video games turns all children into murderers, rapist and social rejects."
Seem familar?
The effect of any drug is objective, the effect is different for different users.
Now for the question of the Media (and Hollywood's) portrayal of the stoner, and the only way you can say is for Hollywood (Movies, TV Series) and fictional media (Books, TV) is
(mainly) for the humourous effect of having an easy comedic relief characters, or even just easy comedy characters so in Hollywood it's less of a push against stoners as a whole and more poking fun at them. This is how I see it.
As for the media as a whole, (News, etc...) they have an agenda, now this agenda is not inherently bad because they have one, it is how they make their money and report the news. Without getting into too much pagentry, the media reports on what will cause that particular channel/news show will get it more ratings so they get paid at the basic level that is how the media industry works. This is life and as such, because marijuana usage is illegal (this depends on where you live and their laws but for me it is illegal) and also has that particular social stigma about it more than likely bought over from hollywood, and there are certain groups who are vocal about it's usage it makes for "compelling news" and in the end a negative story about a drug bust which raises the trust in the local authorities (the police, local government) will take precedent over stories which don't carry the same amount of shock value. (I have a boatload more to say on this particular issue but for the sake of [tl;dr] and argument staying on track I will refrain).
You have heard my argument, you have seen
my side.
If I can close with this,
Do some research, both sides of the argument, no one side is 100% right but you can get
your opinon from sources that you read not just what you hear from anyone, because if you look at the message that is presented and think who is trying to present this you can see what they will think about the subject.
