The Disconnect Between Marijuana Use and Marijuana Users

Today, marijuana use is widely considered acceptable in states that permit legal consumption. There’s overwhelming public support for marijuana legalization, so much so that a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center showed that only one out of every ten people thought it should remain illegal federally. Many people don’t perceive cannabis the same way they may have viewed it even just a decade ago. Most see marijuana as more akin to alcohol nowadays.

The American Addiction Centers published their findings from a survey of just over one thousand people in 2023 that compared participants’ thoughts about alcohol use and marijuana use in a variety of scenarios. The results weren’t entirely surprising: by and large most people consider alcohol more dangerous and more addictive than marijuana. However, there was an aspect of the study that was paradoxical.

The survey showed that people who had never used marijuana before thought alcohol was a more dangerous substance than marijuana, 25% more dangerous. As far as addictiveness, whether people had used cannabis, alcohol, both, or neither, all participants thought alcohol was more addictive than marijuana. The survey also showed that people are more likely to use alcohol than cannabis while celebrating something or relaxing after work. Top concerns for using each substance showed that those surveyed were far more worried about the health and social consequences of alcohol use.

All of the people surveyed concluded that marijuana was less addictive, less dangerous, and less likely to be abused in certain circumstances. However, when it came to people the participants would lose respect for if they knew they used marijuana, the tables turned quickly.

The survey asked participants to indicate whether or not they would lose respect for a certain type of person if they knew that person used alcohol or marijuana. Participants showed they had less respect for almost all these types of people if they used marijuana compared to the lost respect for people who drank alcohol. Despite conveying throughout the rest of the study that they thought marijuana was far less dangerous, they had less respect for certain people who used marijuana as opposed to alcohol.

Topping the list was pregnant women, and this was the only category where people indicated they would have less respect for a person using alcohol. Over 80% of people said they would have less respect for a pregnant woman using alcohol, whereas 73% said they would have less respect for that person if they used cannabis.

Every other category on the list showed people having less respect for marijuana users than those who use alcohol, some by a wide margin. The survey indicated there’s a disconnect between people viewing marijuana as safer than alcohol, but also viewing someone as less worthy of respect for using it.

Some of the largest discrepancies in percentages belonged to elected bureaucrats, police officers, and US presidents, with nearly twice as many surveyors saying they would have less respect for these people if they knew they used marijuana compared to knowing they drank alcohol. This is unsurprising, considering these are the professions that create and enforce marijuana laws throughout the country. It makes sense that people would lose respect for those they would see as hypocritical.

Two other groups losing points in the public eye for using marijuana are bosses and parents. For both of these groups, participants were more than twice as likely to lose respect for them if they knew they used cannabis as opposed to alcohol. These types of people ranked at the bottom of the list, with only 22% of people indicating they would have less respect for a parent who consumes marijuana, as opposed to the 11% that said they would respect a parent less for using alcohol.

Religious leaders and pilots topped the list under pregnant women, but the margins were slimmer. With only a 5%-9% difference, it seems participants would lose quite a bit of respect for both pilots and religious leaders were they to know they used either alcohol or marijuana. However, marijuana did rank slightly higher in each of those categories.

Schoolteachers and doctors also ranked high on the list, and their margins weren’t as close. Schoolteachers ranked fourth on the list, with 31% of respondents saying they would lose respect for a schoolteacher who used cannabis, whereas just under 20% said they would lose respect for that person if they knew they drank alcohol. Doctors ranked sixth on the list with a similar margin. 27% of respondents said they would lose respect for a doctor who used marijuana versus 18% that said they would lose respect for them if they drank.

In every category other than pregnant women, people surveyed said they would lose more respect for someone who used marijuana than someone who used alcohol. These are people who, in the very same study, indicated they thought marijuana was less dangerous and less addictive than alcohol. And yet, they still said they would think less of someone who used marijuana than someone who used alcohol.

People have been conditioned for years to understand that marijuana is a bad drug. Even people who know better, and these days many do with the information available, still harbor the negative, antiquated stigmas attached to marijuana. They know it’s fairly harmless in most cases, but when they think of someone else using it, they think degenerate.

It’s a telling survey. It seems people can easily recognize the dangers associated with alcohol and marijuana respectively, but they don’t want to know about anyone using it. When a parent mentions going out to a bar for a social event, that’s fine, but if that same parent prefers to smoke a joint to unwind instead, they’re twice as likely to be disrespected for doing so. According to the survey, only 15% of people would bat an eyelash upon hearing a firefighter say they had a few beers after work, but if that same firefighter infers that they’d rather smoke a joint, nearly twice as many people would admonish them for it.

For whatever reason, knowledgeable, reasonable people will, on the one hand, state that marijuana is safer than alcohol, and on the other, they’ll give the side-eye to anyone they think uses it. It’s an odd, oxymoronic worldview, surely shaped by the way the federal government classifies marijuana. Until that classification gets changed, it’s rational to expect this disjointed opinion of certain types of people who use marijuana to continue.