Is marijuana any more of a gateway drug than alcohol? As I define a gateway drug: A lesser substance that leads the user to use another more dangerous/addictive/powerful substance.
EX: The Pot smoker who sees people snorting a line of coke and decides to try it. The intoxicated person on substance A is not getting high enough and decides to try substance B to get that much higher.
In the latter I would say Pot and Alcohol could be synonymous with substance A.
Argument: It is the personality of the user of substance A that decides to use substance B, not the drug specifically they are using.
So either alcohol or pot can be used as the gateway: Pot gets the bad rap because it is illegal in my opinion. Yet I firmly believe alcohol impairs ones judgment and decision making abilities more than marijuana in a case by case model. So I would say alcohol is the larger gateway than marijuana.
I’d like to hear from past experience and from young and old alike.
Personally, smoking pot in college was just smoking pot. Those who were snorting coke, or putting things in their veins were not in the same rooms as those smoking pot. Dropping a hit of acid or eating a mushroom maybe but not the coke and or heroine. At least in my 80’s experience. Add Crystal Meth, more Heroine use and ecstasy into the loop for now-a-days and the mix gets thicker.
I think the whole gateway drug concept is bulljive devised by antidrug lobbyists. Of course most hard users of drugs tried pot or beer first- those are the two easiest to acquire, especially for a teen. It’s like saying “chopsticks” is a gateway song for Beethovens 5th. The idea that pot smokers automatically at some point decide that pot isn’t intense or whatever enough for them anymore and they need something harder is bunk. The high you get from pot and crack or cocaine is completely different (upper vs downer) and I know many many people who are content their whole lives with pot type soft drugs and don’t progress further.
The “gateway” thing is an anti-drug propaganda myth. Most people who smoke pot do not go on to harder drugs. Marijuana is no more likely to lead to cocaine or heroin addiction than cigarettes or beer.
I’m going to buck the trend a little bit and say that while most pot smokers never do a harder drug, it’s awfully hard (at least in my neck of the woods) to obtain harder drugs if you don’t smoke pot first. Why? Because the same people dealing harder drugs begin to trust you enough to mention them only after you’ve been smoking with them or buying pot off them for a bit. Just socializing and drinking with them won’t convince them you’re not a rat.
Similarly, once you find out that the scare stories about pot are bunk, it’s only logical to wonder if the scare stories about, say, mescaline are similarly bunk. Then someone can’t get mescaline for you but offers mushrooms instead. Then LSD and X becomes available, because people know you’re “cool” with mescaline and shrooms.
It’s not a gateway into harder drugs per se, it’s a gatekeeper for harder drug *users *and dealers to get to know you and offer you things they wouldn’t offer you at a straight party with booze.
And, of course, all of this is only due to the fact that the substances in question are illegal. If there was no need for a dealer to be cautious, (or no need for a dealer), there would be no need for a shibboleth.
I also don’t believe in the concept of “gateway” drug. I think that there’s more of an argument maybe for “gateway” socalization; if you’ve got to deal with people doing illegal things to get your pot, then it’s possible going to be spending time with more people who are doing illegal things, which includes being more likely to be around “harder” drugs.
Which, of course, is an argument for legalization.
But, as for it truly being a gateway, I don’t think so. It does, though, provide a relatively harmless, relatively accessible introduction to what it’s like to intentionally alter your mind via recreational drugs/chemicals.
There’s nothing inherent in pot that makes it a gateway drug. What could there be? The only thing I can think of would be that since pot is a mild hallucinogen, a user might be curious about the stronger hallucinogens like mushrooms and LSD. But the experiences of coke and heroin are so different from pot that I can’t see how experience with one would encourage use of the other. And few pot smokers go on to try acid.
The only thing I can think of is that pot introduces you to the ritual of buying drugs illegally. If you get the urge to try some coke, you’ll be versed in the ritual of scoring and know some dealers, who will already trust you, as WhyNot says. Also, as she notes, so many kids hear so much bullshit about weed, that they might ignore warnings about coke or meth, even though those warnings are better founded.
However, these things are a function of illegality and poor education, rather than anything inherent in pot itself.
The only real reason pot is a gateway drug compared to alcohol is the fact that pot is illegal.
Simple logic follows that if you are already in contact with illegal drug sellers, you are more likely to be offered a free hit of something more dangerous and powerful. This would increase the chances of using and abusing said drugs if you are prone to such behavior.
Therefore, if pot was legal and taxed and sold where liquor was sold, it would be no more of a gateway than alcohol.
I have quite a number of serious substance abusers in my immediate family and circles of friends.
In my observation and experience, this “gateway” theory is dubios. I am referring to pot/alcohol (lesser drugs) to heroin, coke, etc (harder drugs).
I drink, quite heavily at times, and I don’t have any urge to smoke pot or snort coke. And I have the means (money and connections).
A sibling and several friends have gone straight to hard drugs (coke, various pills) without having tried or even wanting to try pot first. In fact, they would pass on the pot even if there was nothing else around for them to get high from. They would rather sleep.
As another poster already mentioned, the high from pot or the drunkenness from alcohol is really quite different from a high you would get from a harder drug like coke. So making that jump for the reason that you want a better high is off, IMHO. I have no doubt seen people upgrade to a stronger substance but these people have highly addictive personalities and would inhale markers if that were the only thing laying around.
I think a more common leap would be that from nicotine to alcohol or pot. Well, that’s how it happened for me and most people I know. Nicotine counts as a lesser drug, doesn’t it?
I think that current drug policy is absolute insanity, particularly in the states…
But I’d actually agree that Marijuana is to a degree a “gateway” drug (no one I know has used harder drugs without first trying Marijuana). But that is NOT because for any kind chemical or psychological reason, it is pure because there is no hard dividing line between Marijuana and harder drugs. To me this is primary reason FOR legalising Marijuana (the whole supply process, not just possesion).
If ice cream was illegal it would be a “gateway substance”. The same criminal networks that supply hard drugs (once you get far enough up the food chain) would also supply Ice Cream, it would be part of the same culture. Also, just like Marijuana, the suppliers would get far bigger, more reliable, income from Heroin and Crack than they do from Ice Cream, so it would in their interests to make sure people take Heroin and Cocaine.
There have been a number incidents in the UK (including one I know from personal knowledge, not just media coverage) where affluent middle class towns that you would not expect to have serious drug problems have the kind of herion problems you associate with deprived inner city districts. When you investigate it turns out that the problems can be traced directly to crack downs on the marijuana trade in the town, that wiped out the supply. With no pot to smoke a few enterprising dealers, and dumb pot smokers, started trying herion instead, years later these had grown into a major drug problem.
