Gateway theory

honestly, the first time i smoked weed was when i was going through heroin withdrawals at the age of 18. and my mom smoked me out.

gateway theory is complete BS.

 

No but I have seen it, one kid who started smoking weed in middle school is now out of school and always on acid, coke, and pills including oc 80's. Really though, alcohol and cigarettes should be considered the gateway drug, not weed.

 

Marijuana is a gateway drug. Coffe is a gateway drug. Boredom is a gateway drug. The point is, if you start smoking pot, chances are you will start tripping shrooms\acid. maybe some pills, start drinking more.Your mind is going too do what it wants, marijuana isnt forcing you to go shoot up. It just gets you acess too shoot up.

Personally, I agree with the gateway theory.Yet all of the illeagl drugs in the US kills fewer people then the legal ones.You can't tell me you would have tripped shrooms before you smoked pot. In some cases people become meth heads before pot because meth is used in jobs such as a truck driver to stay awake.

 

Most humans always want better. A guy with a Mercedes that he was dying to get will eventually want a Ferrari or Lamborghini of some sort. That doesn't make the Mercedes a gateway car, does it?

Don't get me wrong though, weed is like a Bugatti to me.

 

A large part of any perceived gateway effect with regards to cannabis is it's illegal, so most people have to resort to buying it from the same black market that provides far more dangerous and addictive substances as well.

 

Exactly, if you could buy a pack of 20 joints from the gas station you wouldn't have to go through a drug dealer who has shrooms\acid\ex\heroin\meth etc

 

Once again i find myself saying OSG is correct!!

Also, think about it this way. Every serial killer, every child rapist, every terrorist, Drank water in the days leading up to their crimes. Does this mean water is a gateway to violence? If 60% of americans have smoked marijuana(not sure on this #), obviously most crack fiends are going to have smoked at some point in their life.

 

I think Marijuana is a gateway drug.

Me and my friend had a talk about it one time. He has experimented far more than I have and started use at an age that was far too young.

We both agreed that the reason why it is a gateway drug is are society and the psyche instilled in us at a young age. I was taught that all drugs were bad. In health class drugs were all labeled in one category...drugs. We are taught that there are differences in the drugs but that all the effects equal the same thing...bad.

So when some Joe Smoe hits a joint at a party a few times, gets high and enjoys it he thinks to himself "well that wasn't bad like I was taught." If the person does not delve into knowledge on drugs for himself this can lead to the rationalization that what we are taught is bullshit. Therefore, what else have you been missing out on? Then they step up to coke or whatever their preference.
Hence...gateway drug.

Is this always the case? Of course not. Does it happen? I've seen it with my own eyes.

It's in the uneducation.

 

Someone mentioned a gas station earlier and I feel it is exactly like that like. When you go thru a large drug dealer that deals more than weed you're getting offered different things and would buy them on impulse. It's like saying the Arizona Iced Tea is a gateway drink to snickers because you see it on the way out of the gas station.

 

I mostly disagree with the gateway theory, but it is true that many start with marijuana and move on to harder drugs. But this definitely isn't marijuana's fault. Obviously there's nothing in the weed that makes you crave the harder drugs. Maybe it awakens some curiosity to try different drugs to experience different highs, but it's not an uncontrollable curiosity. I place all responsibility on the person for his or her choices, not on the weed.

As for me, I've been smoking for a year and a half or so, which I know isn't the longest time. But I haven't tried any other drugs, and I don't really want to. I would do shrooms if I had the opportunity, but I don't care nearly enough to try and set that up. Weed is good enough for me and it's going to stay that way.

 

"I just got some opium in you wanna try some of that too?"

It's the dealer's fault, not the marijuana

 

Nicely put. I feel this exact same thing. I read through things like the Pandora's Box forum and see all these different drugs i wouldn't mind trying, but i know if i had any doubt about it i could say no.

 

prohibition is the gateway. not weed. theres no magical chemical in weed that makes you wanna go pick up a dose of black tar. just doesnt happen. think about it like this, if it were legal, being regulated, having age limits put onto it, do you really think somebody could be exposed to other harder drugs through the convenience store? no. just wont happen unless somebody was in there and tried slingin shit on you.

but under the stepping stone theory, milk could be a gateway to alcohol. anything can be a gateway to something else. its how life works. a hug goes to a kiss, a kiss goes to a feel, a feelgoes to a hand job, a handjob goes to a blowjob, a blowjob goes to 69, 69 goes to sex... jesus why did i just do that?

but my point is. prohobition in itself is the gateway. simply because its forcing you to go to hard drug dealers who sling other ish, tht eventually talk you into doing shit. ive seen it before several times, it isnt fun to watch. but if those people were buying there shit from a store, chances are your not going to go into heroin.

 

i personally think weed is a gateway drug in a way. I started smoking weed and now pills and shrooms are coming into play. but weed didnt make me do those things i did. marijuana is a safe drug and there is no real proof that it is a gateway drug. It depends on the person and how there brain is wired. and wow i so high lol

 

The gateway theory is two fold.

1. marijuana is illegal. the same people that deal weed, probably deal or know someone who deals other harder drugs.

2. marijuana is pretty harmless (comparative). When I was in Private catholic schools (especially high school) we were taught that drugs are bad and that's it. As a young kid, I even said to myself, "I'm never gonna drink alcohol or smoke cigs because thats gross and dangerous and unhealthy".
But look at me now. I don't mind the occasional cigarette with the girlfriend or the beer and a movie night. When I tried my first cigarette, I thought to myself, "This isn't so bad. What else have I been lied about?" And that starts a chain reaction of curiosity. Thankfully, I research things instead of blindly shooting up myself.

http://www.erowid.com/ has really helped me research stuff. For right now, marijuana is perfectly fine. Maybe if it's available I'll try Shrooms or LSD, but I'm not actively seeking it.

 

Curiosity is the gateway.

 

Similiarly, playing baseball could be perceived as a gateway to lacrosse. That doesn't make it true, and has just about as much meaning as saying Marijuana is a gateway to heroin, cocaine, or any other drug for that matter.




This post reminds me of that D4 song, "Minimum Wage is a Gateway Drug."

 

this topic came up in my statistics class the other day.
basically the person that came up with the gateway theory proposed a false inference about the relationship between people who smoke marijuana and people who do hard drugs.

there is no denying that there is an "association" between people who smoke and people who do hard drugs
but that does not at all mean that smoking marijuana "causes" people to do hard drugs.
there are definitely many of the same variables affecting both people's likelihood to smoke and their likelihood to do hard drugs.

 

Do we have to make cars illegal because there is a chance we can die in a car accident? Or maybe make cars illegal because we can speed in cars, and that might lead to accidents? The whole gateway drug rationalization is off-base imo because it doesn't provide a hypothesis that is specific to marijuana.

In scientific fields, to have something verified as a legitimate theory, the hypothesis has to be testable and retestable in a way that proves the existence or nonexistence of THAT SPECIFIC PHENOMENON. The fact of the matter is that the Gateway drug phenomenon is too ambiguous, and can be applied to almost anything...however, because the theory deals with an illegal substance, the theory is given much more leeway. It's not "right," but it's not illegal like the substance it denounces.

Honestly, we all end up trying drugs with other people anyway. Just make social contact illegal and the world won't have any drug problems...How far do we have to go?