[HN Gopher] Dramatic drop in marijuana use among U.S. youth over...
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Dramatic drop in marijuana use among U.S. youth over a decade
Author : geox
Score : 83 points
Date : 2024-10-28 14:11 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.fau.edu)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.fau.edu)
| skyyler wrote:
| >"In the U.S. the current landscape of marijuana legalization in
| adults adds a complex layer to the issues of adolescent marijuana
| use. As more states continue to legalize recreational marijuana,
| the accessibility and perceived normalcy of the drug may
| increase, particularly for adolescents who may view its legal
| status as an indication of safety or acceptability," said Charles
| H. Hennekens, M.D.
|
| Interesting to read this in an article about how marijuana use
| has gone down in the time since legalization efforts have started
| to see success. It almost seems comically out of touch.
| anovikov wrote:
| So you think that the research is wrong?
|
| I see it as very plausible. Kids like to break rules and long
| for forbidden fruits. When weed is no longer forbidden, they
| have no interest in it just as they see little interest in
| getting drunk.
| theboogieman wrote:
| Add the fact that, if legal marijuana is priced low enough to
| make black market dealers less common, the people selling the
| marijuana will now be forced to only sell to people 21+.
|
| I'm not saying that this _is_ the case as legal recreational
| marijuana sale prices in many legal states are high enough
| (due to taxes or artificial supply dampening due to
| restricting who can grow it and how much) to justify the
| existence of a black market, but _if_ that was the case, I'd
| expect a drop off in youth usage.
| alephnerd wrote:
| I think this overstates the interest in drugs among
| Zillenials and Gen Z.
|
| Most people in our cohort tend to follow a "you do you"
| philosophy that cuts both ways - if you choose to or choose
| not to partake in marijuana or alcohol, that's your choice.
|
| Stuff like "marijuana" or "alcohol" isn't viewed as cool or
| uncool, it's just viewed as a yet another consumable like
| coffee or sugar.
|
| Same way some people choose to cut down on coffee and
| others are coffee fiends, it's similar with booze and weed.
|
| Personally, I find that older generations have an
| unhealthily polarized view on weed and alcohol consumption
| - they are split between the "weed cures everything" and
| "weed is the devil's lettuce" camps.
|
| Heck, even this thread has tinges of judgement about how
| younger generations just don't care one way or the other
| about weed as if weed consumption is a core part of being
| young.
| graypegg wrote:
| I guess I'm a zillenial, born 1998. I distinctly remember
| a time in highschool where I saw vaping (the flavoured
| cartridge kind) shift from cool, to just some meaningless
| detail about someone. I totally think this shift has
| stuck. You're 100% right in comparing weed in this
| context to coffee, that exact same pattern happened to
| vaping too.
|
| It's not like there WASN'T drinking, vaping, and weed.
| Just no one is pushing it on you. The pushing is a lot
| more focused on social (and online) things now. But
| that's a different topic.
|
| I'm on board for it being a good thing. The kids are
| alright eh?
| alephnerd wrote:
| > It's not like there WASN'T drinking, vaping, and weed.
| Just no one is pushing it on you. The pushing is a lot
| more focused on social (and online) things now. But
| that's a different topic.
|
| Exactly!
|
| > I'm on board for it being a good thing. The kids are
| alright eh?
|
| That's my opinion as well, but I'm part of the Zillenial
| cohort as well so I'm biased.
| potato3732842 wrote:
| >if legal marijuana is priced low enough to make black
| market dealers less common,
|
| It never is. The overhead from running a lawful business is
| way higher even before you start accounting for all the
| weed specific cost of compliance stuff.
| standardUser wrote:
| It varies from state to state, but legal prices are
| comparable to black market prices in a lot of places. And
| the selection available in legal markets is beyond
| compare.
| mezzie2 wrote:
| Oh, it can be.
|
| I live in MI and weed is really, really cheap here. I
| don't smoke, but I partake in edibles (I have MS and
| nerve pain that meds can't do much about). I can get
| 2000mg of edibles for 40 bucks. And that's without price
| comparing: That's just going to the closest dispensary
| near my house. And lots of places do penny/free joints
| with a very low/no minimum purchase.
| marssaxman wrote:
| That's not the case here in Washington state: legal weed
| is significantly cheaper than the black-market ever was,
| unless you want some high-end specialty bud you most
| likely couldn't have gotten at all back then.
| kredd wrote:
| We've had legal marijuana since 2018 up here in Canada,
| and from the statistics it looks like the market has
| almost caught up. The closest comparison I can think of
| is piracy and beginning of streaming wars (like Spotify
| and Netflix). Sure piracy is free, but a significant
| chunk of people started subbing for the services because
| of the convenience. If you'll only save about $5 per
| purchase, but have to get cash, arrange everything and
| etc., that might be just enough friction for you to just
| go to one of the billion stores nearby.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| A conspicuous absence of black market for other herbal
| products such as tea and cilantro indicates that the edge
| of the black market over the lawful businesses isn't that
| great, if extant at all.
| skyyler wrote:
| >So you think that the research is wrong?
|
| I think a poorly designed study can confirm pre-existing
| biases instead of actually test for anything.
|
| Stating that "research suggests" something doesn't actually
| mean much to me anymore.
|
| I'd love to know what research suggests that "marijuana
| legalization in adults can influence adolescent behavior
| through their perceptions of less risk as well as increased
| availability, both of which may impede efforts to reduce
| adolescent use." The numbers this article is reporting seem
| to suggest the opposite.
| StackRanker3000 wrote:
| I think the other person just mistook your point and
| thought that you were implying that marijuana use _hasn't_
| actually gone down.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| I suspect the research is reasonably accurate, but you will
| always have someone voicing the position of safyism, caution,
| and whataboutism.
| kstrauser wrote:
| I think there's a bit more at play. Let's contrast with
| buying hard drugs like meth. If you want to buy meth, you
| have to figure out how to get in contact with the sorts of
| people who'll be holding it. That means hanging out where
| they hang out and blending in to the point they trust you. By
| the time you've done all that, you've got some sunk costs
| invested in making connections with drug dealers. You're kind
| of bought into the whole ecosystem.
|
| In places where weed is legal, you can go into a store, buy
| some, try it, and if you decide it's not for you, just don't
| do it again. I don't use weed, but yesterday I walked into a
| liquor store to buy a stout beer I like. I didn't have to
| hang out and party with the clerk to get her to trust me
| enough to sell me my beer. I gave her some money, she handed
| me a shopping bag, and that's the end of it. That's what it's
| like buying weed from a dispensary now.
|
| TL;DR if you don't have to hang out with drug dealers to buy
| drugs, you might be less inclined to buy more stuff from drug
| dealers.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| To add, dealers aren't referred to as "pushers" for no
| reason, either.
| kstrauser wrote:
| Good point. No one at a beer store has ever tried to talk
| me into buying more than I wanted, except maybe boredly
| pointing to some display and saying "we have X on sale if
| you want some."
| throwup238 wrote:
| _> By the time you 've done all that, you've got some sunk
| costs invested in making connections with drug dealers.
| You're kind of bought into the whole ecosystem._
|
| Shortcut: go the biggest hospital near you and find the
| fast food joint nearest the ER entrance. The drug users
| discharged after OD treatment will gather there and the
| dealers find then.
| kstrauser wrote:
| You know, that's the kind of thing that seems perfectly
| obvious once you've pointed it out, but it wouldn't have
| occurred to me.
| throwup238 wrote:
| Yeah, I only know because I was the emergency contact for
| a close friend who overdosed. When picking him up I asked
| the nurse about a cheap place to eat afterwards and she
| warned me to stay away from the closest fast food joints
| lest he find a way to relapse immediately.
| pizza234 wrote:
| > When weed is no longer forbidden, they have no interest in
| it just as they see little interest in getting drunk.
|
| I believe drugs (incl. alcohool) are a considerably more
| complex habits.
|
| Getting intoxicated have socially desirable outcomes (if one
| ignores the downsides), unrelated to unavailability. Some
| drugs like weed can also be part of rituals (e.g. "meeting
| and getting stoned").
| dec0dedab0de wrote:
| I think it's because there are less illegal weed dealers.
| Which means there are less people willing to sell to kids.
| Basically making it legal has made it harder for kids to get.
| dartos wrote:
| Vapes are edge and easy enough to get.
|
| Weed is popular among millennials, which are now the
| "cringe" generation so there's that as well.
|
| Weed just isn't as cool as it was before.
| throaway89 wrote:
| Yup. Hasn't been cool in Canada since legalization, but a
| lot of milennials still cling to it
| dingnuts wrote:
| weird implication that millennials only did it originally
| out of a desire to be cool, and are still doing it "to be
| cool"
|
| some people just like it more than alcohol, wtf
| dartos wrote:
| I like it more than alcohol, but as a teenager it was
| definitely just to be cool.
| tmn wrote:
| It is not hard at all to find a 21 year old to buy some
| legally and pass it on for a small tip.
| tmn wrote:
| Weed and alcohol remain forbidden due to age restrictions.
| But anecdotally, I grew up in the 90's and 00's. When weed
| was outright illegal and alcohol was as it currently is.
| There was plenty of desire to get drunk among minors. Weed
| had some but very little presence in my area. Today the weed
| presence is much more on par with alcohol among highschoolers
| (or so I'm told) where I'm from.
| smeej wrote:
| My parents actually used this as a strategy when my sister
| and I were teens 20+ years ago.
|
| They casually offered that, as children of the '70s, there
| really weren't any drugs they hadn't tried, so if I was
| interested in any, I could just let them know and they'd get
| them and we could do them together.
|
| Made it seem as uncool as humanly possible, so I never tried.
|
| By the time our youngest brother was a teen, they'd gotten
| overconfident in their success and never made the offer to
| him. He eventually quit using, but it took 12 steps and a lot
| of time and effort my sister and I were spared!
| rozap wrote:
| Or it's legitimately harder to get. In high school we used to
| smoke weed because it was easy to get (friendly local
| neighborhood dealer didn't check ID) and very rarely drank
| alcohol because it was tricky to find.
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| This is not a new trend: https://usafacts.org/articles/is-teen-
| drug-and-alcohol-use-d...
|
| Alcohol and other drug use, teen pregnancy, and sex in general
| have been declining in teens in the West for more than a
| decade.
| Der_Einzige wrote:
| Coincides with the steep rise of incels and men-are-from-
| mars, women-are-from-venus genderfication of the political
| parties. Also Coincides with stuff like men getting comically
| left behind by the education system.
|
| I'd rather deal with a teen pregnancy epidemic than the
| current situation of rising authoritarianism, isolationism,
| and reactionary turn that we are seeing from the youth of
| today.
| standardUser wrote:
| > I'd rather deal with a teen pregnancy epidemic than the
| current situation of rising authoritarianism, isolationism,
| and reactionary turn that we are seeing from the youth of
| today.
|
| You mean the _male_ youth of today.
| NemoNobody wrote:
| Ok, I understand your point but let's be real for a
| minute and just acknowledge that the worse situation that
| you can get. I'd rather hear about how what is happening
| with young men today was happening with young women than
| men - not that that would be better but it would be less
| dangerous.
|
| Young men that are disenfranchised from their society and
| have little to live for are a primary metric political
| scientists use to measure the stability of country.
| Historically speaking, once a society gets too many men
| like that, the society ends.
|
| This isn't a battle of the sexes and women do not win bc
| of what has happened with men.
| standardUser wrote:
| Historically speaking, we have never seen a society where
| women have more education, wealth and status than men.
| This is uncharted territory. Not that I don't fear the
| repercussions of having the bottom 50% of men desperate
| and disenfranchised. But those bottom 50% of men don't
| guarantee societal collapse because they're not then ones
| propping it up, women are.
|
| The question might be, what will women and higher status
| men do about the problems caused by the bottom half men?
| kwere wrote:
| record amount of women are set to be single and childless
| past the fertility window, the most reasonable cause is a
| "lack of eligible bachelors"[0] in similar or better
| socioeconomic conditions.
|
| Record amounts of people will never reproduce creating a
| deep demographic imbalance, bankrupting most social
| programs.
|
| [0]https://www.medicaldaily.com/egg-freezing-rises-among-
| gradua...
| standardUser wrote:
| Sure, and that's not ideal for women, but it's also not
| stopping their dramatic rise in education, wealth and
| status.
|
| As for bankrupting the social safety net, that's a real
| concern, but it's not unavoidable. We've already seen
| into the future in places like East Asia and Western
| Europe. We've got a ways to go in the US before our
| fertility rates match theirs, and they're still holding
| the line. Plus, it's a problem that America is uniquely
| prepared to handle as a nation of immigrants. Once the
| hardcore nativist movement has finishing blowing its wad.
| consteval wrote:
| From my perspective as an outsider looking in (that
| meaning, I have no horse in heterosexual dynamics), the
| problem is we've had no progressive movements for men. At
| best, men have gotten whatever crumbs have fallen through
| the proverbial car seat crack of the vehicle of feminism.
|
| Largely there's only a few different ways to be a
| successful man. Even small deviations from the norm are
| met with ruler whips - and I don't just mean from other
| men. Modern women are incredibly cruel in the way they
| view non-conforming men.
|
| These limitations used to be superpowers. If you could
| perform an adequate display of masculinity, you were
| granted the world. This is no longer the case, which is a
| good thing. But the expectation still exists and is still
| enforced with an iron-fist, just without the riches.
|
| I mean, most heterosexual men I've met wouldn't even dare
| of so much as painting their nails. Let alone opening up
| their mind. How can we expect these people to follow
| along with the train of progressivism when none of it is
| for them? How can we expect them to leave gender roles
| behind when they know, and understand, there is only
| failure and heartache for them if they leave theirs's
| behind?
| mplewis wrote:
| Yeah, I feel so sorry for the men who lose their status
| when they leave behind patriarchy. Won't someone think of
| the poor men. :eyeroll:
| consteval wrote:
| You misunderstand. This is precisely the mindset that
| leave these men in a difficult position.
|
| They're forced to perform an adequate display of
| masculinity to please individuals such as yourself,
| because the moment they don't they get this sort of
| treatment. But performing such masculinity doesn't grant
| them what it used to before. So, one would think they
| would leave it behind!
|
| But they don't, because you don't welcome it. They have
| nowhere to go. Certainly, other men won't take them into
| their communities. And women won't either, because such
| men are weak and not worth their breath. So where do they
| end up if they choose that path?
|
| So naturally they don't choose that path.
|
| The problem here is that they can't "leave behind
| patriarchy". That translates into dying alone still. The
| reality is toxic masculinity is molded not just by men,
| but by women. Mothers, sisters, classmates. From the
| moment they leave the womb, boys understand there are
| strict rules they must conform to.
|
| Enforcing these rules, which you're unintentionally doing
| with this sort of "boohoo" mentality, is part of the
| reason we're in the mess. Meaning, you yourself are
| upholding patriarchy in ways you might not understand.
|
| Part of deconstructing toxic masculinity and giving men a
| fighting chance in a progressive world is being open to
| listening to them and giving them the space for
| vulnerability. You can't do that when you're hell-bent on
| never listening. When in such a position, men and young
| boys are set up for failure. They can't perform to a
| level that is deemed sufficient for progressivism, but
| they also can't perform for a level that is deemed
| sufficient for women and other men.
|
| Only a select few, who have mastered the art of perfectly
| performing outward masculinity while selectively dropping
| little kernels of progressivism, succeed.
|
| The solution is a modern progressive movement for men,
| but there's huge pushback to this idea. Even the notion
| men don't have to conform to even surface-level gender
| roles, like the clothes they wear, is met with huge
| uproar from men and women.
|
| I mean, just ask yourself: do you think the average
| progressive woman would even humor dating a heterosexual
| man who does drag? Do you think the average progressive
| woman would even humor dating a heterosexual man who
| splits the bill?
|
| The answer is a resounding no. Whatever little bits of
| progressivism men have gotten are pretty much just side-
| effects from feminism and gay liberation. But just side-
| effects. Men still can't act feminine, and they certainly
| can't do anything that might get them perceived as gay.
|
| I mean, I find another placeholder for fa*got online just
| about every month. Heterosexual men are sorely lacking in
| progressivist movements that help them and their self-
| identity.
| standardUser wrote:
| > The solution is a modern progressive movement for men
|
| Do you have thoughts on what this should/could look like?
| consteval wrote:
| I think mental healthcare might be a good place to start.
| Campaigns specifically targeting men's mental health,
| particularly more "embarrassing" ones like depression and
| anxiety. Show men who can't bring themselves to brush
| their teeth, show men sitting in their car with a
| revolver in their hands. That's a harsh reality that is
| completely silent, I think.
|
| I think we need to come to terms with men being in
| positions of abject "weakness" - or what we currently
| perceive as weakness. And we do that through visibility.
| Through PSAs, television shows, movies.
|
| I also think clothing would be a good place to start,
| just because it's so immediately obvious and visible. Get
| protests allowing men to wear skirts at work, and make it
| clear they're still men. I don't think that will fix
| anything really, but I think it could force the issue to
| be looked at.
| DrPimienta wrote:
| Women have made up the majority of college graduates for
| the past 5 decades. And yet the majority of college
| scholarships are for women. If it were the other way
| around, you'd say this is unfair. There are job quotas
| for women, not men. Women make up the majority of
| government benefit receivers.
|
| Yes, if you aren't going to care about a disenfranchised
| minority, you should expect them to be angry.
| standardUser wrote:
| Men used to have one path and it came with some near-
| guaranteed value and status. Now, men have to choose from
| two paths, and neither one has that same level of
| guarantee. That's a problem in an of itself because it
| leads to a psychology of grievance. And it's not
| imagined! Men do indeed have a worse deal than they used
| to by a ton of metrics.
|
| But once men stop crying about what was, they do have a
| choice. And there are new sets of problems and benefits
| that come with those choices. Choosing the traditional
| side is to pick the losing side, but that varies by
| geography. Not only does it still come with a lot of
| benefits in some places, but it's kind of the only viable
| option in some places. The problem is that society can no
| longer accommodate 80-90% of men in those situations
| choosing the traditional path. Maybe more like half. So
| we end up with a lot of losers. Sad, angry, strong, well-
| armed losers.
|
| But the other path IS viable. You can move to [name any
| big city], get an education, get a decent job, paint your
| nails, treat women nicely and, if you ask me, have better
| relationships, better sex, better lives than were ever
| available to most men in the past.
| consteval wrote:
| > But the other path IS viable. You can move to [name any
| big city], get an education, get a decent job, paint your
| nails, treat women nicely and, if you ask me, have better
| relationships, better sex, better lives than were ever
| available to most men in the past.
|
| I agree this is viable, but you have to understand that
| for heterosexual men they face a lot of day-to-day
| backlashes for this. You have to understand the vast
| majority of women will not consider a relationship with
| them. And they will suffer in their career as well. Lack
| of masculinity, or rather perceived masculinity, in men
| means lack of respect across the board.
|
| Because progressivism has not focused on that, so we're
| still dealing with many decades old understanding of
| masculinity. Even extremely surface-level reimagining,
| such as painting nails, is fringe. And I think that
| really demonstrates the problem.
|
| I mean, forget emotional intelligence or vulnerability.
| We're battling black nail polish. We haven't even begun
| to take a crack at the simplest, most surface level
| stuff. Let alone the deeper stuff.
|
| I said this in another comment, but modern heterosexual
| men are in a strange position where they have to perfect
| the art of performing masculinity in most situations, and
| then leaving hints of progressivism where other's find it
| most convenient.
|
| Ultimately, even the most progressive woman is looking
| for a man who is somewhat kind and maybe he can get away
| with painting his nails. But he must still be masculine,
| he must not cry very much if ever, and he must always be
| a low level of emotional labor. Women want to deal with
| things like grappling with the shame of dating a man who
| paints his nails and the social repercussions of that,
| they don't also have the bandwidth to deal with, say,
| depression. That's step 100, we're still getting past
| step 1.
| skyyler wrote:
| > Women want to deal with things like grappling with the
| shame of dating a man who paints his nails and the social
| repercussions of that, they don't also have the bandwidth
| to deal with, say, depression.
|
| When you say "women" here, do you mean yourself? Do you
| mean the women you have interacted with in the past? Do
| you mean all women, everywhere? How do you know how they
| feel about this?
| consteval wrote:
| This is all purely anecdotal as I've noted at the
| beginning, because there's no studies on this or anyone
| looking into this at all.
|
| I don't mean myself, I mean the heterosexual women and
| men I know. I'm gay, almost all my friends are women and
| it's just what I've observed.
|
| And, to be clear, I'm not blaming women. Because
| relationships, too, are a performance.
|
| This part is really important:
|
| > Women want to deal with things like grappling with the
| shame of dating a man who paints his nails and the social
| repercussions of that
|
| It's not just men who lose respect when masculinity isn't
| performed to a high enough standard, women associated
| with them lose respect too. Women have a lot to deal
| with, it's unreasonable for them to also take on
| additional emotional burden when they already have to
| manage the appearance of their relationship to outsiders.
|
| As for how I know how they "feel" - well, I don't. But I
| see their actions and what they choose to tell me. From
| what I've seen, it's extremely risky for heterosexual men
| to be vulnerable in their relationships. The odds are
| incredibly high that will come back to bite them, often
| immediately, sometimes much later. And, women seem very
| hesitant to talk about any perceived feminine traits in
| the men they date. Typically, they do the opposite,
| almost talk them up. I think there's some perception
| management going on.
| standardUser wrote:
| I really appreciate your perspectives on this. This is
| possibly the most important conversation of the current
| era and, like you've expressed, we've barely begun to
| have it.
|
| The part that strikes me the most is the idea that women
| aren't ready to accept new gender norms among men. We're
| definitely in a transition era where expectations are out
| of whack. I do think a lot of women want an unrealistic
| blend of traditional masculinity with just the right
| types and amounts of femininity. And they are _not_
| finding it very often.
|
| This is one of several recent surveys that show a sharp
| and rapid turn away from traditional gender and
| sexuality: https://news.gallup.com/poll/611864/lgbtq-
| identification.asp...
|
| The trend is obvious in Millennials and then it
| absolutely skyrockets among Gen Z. More than a quarter of
| Gen Z women are rejecting traditional straightness in one
| capacity or another. I imagine many more have
| perspectives that are far more open than the traditional
| norm, even if doesn't change how they identify. I think
| that _these_ women are capable of accepting a new form of
| masculinity in their partners. I think they are 10 steps
| ahead and they create a huge opportunity for men to
| embrace their gender in different ways without being
| ostracized. In fact, I think men will be rewarded, and
| the allure of those rewards will accelerate male
| rejection of traditional masculinity.
|
| Not to get too personal, but in my hyper-progressive
| bubble of NYC, I see this exact dynamic playing out
| amongst my younger friends in their late 20's to late
| 30's. And they aren't even Gen Z. I like to think it's a
| preview of the large trends to come.
| consteval wrote:
| I 100% agree things are getting better and only getting
| better. It's just a very slow change, because I think
| those young people have to grapple with the people who
| are raising them and who they respect.
|
| But - I will say in terms of sexuality among women - it's
| not all rainbows (ha). The majority of bisexual women I
| know would not date bisexual men, and they make it known.
| The "gap" in progressivism exists there too, just much
| less. Meaning, a lot of bisexual women are willing to
| accept all kinds of women and have a self-expression of
| wide variety, but many still look for what they deem to
| be a traditional, heterosexual man (when they are dating
| men).
|
| It's complicated and then that really gets into a more
| intersectional issue because the elephant in the room is
| there's many strings connecting sexuality to masculinity.
| I think, in general, there's less genderized implications
| for behavior for women who are bisexual than there are
| for men who are bisexual. Being a bisexual man just comes
| with much more assumptions and baggage about identity in
| terms of masculinity/femininity that I don't really see
| for bisexuality in women. You can sort of see this in
| statistics, where bisexual women self-identify
| significantly more than bisexual men.
|
| But bright side: this is improving, too. I see a lot less
| men hiding their bisexuality these days than I saw 10
| years ago.
| magospietato wrote:
| Unfortunately women's successes are a side issue here.
|
| Disenfranchised men are in a chaotic state right now, but
| it's only going to take one decently charismatic leader
| to coerce them into a globally connected league of
| brownshirts.
| standardUser wrote:
| Shitty men have never had to contend with an alliance of
| empowered women and the ~30% of men who aren't
| susceptible to a cultish victim mentality.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| Societal collapse looks a lot more like the powerlines
| not being fixed then advertising dollars being
| inefficiently spent.
| standardUser wrote:
| Is the implication that we need big, strong men to do
| big, strong man work? Because that era already has one
| foot out the door.
| DrPimienta wrote:
| You have electricity because of men. You have running
| water because of men. You have sewage and plumbing
| because of men. You have internet because of men. It's
| not women smashing apart concrete and installing cables
| and pipes, it's men. Most women I know struggle to pour
| themselves a drink from a newly open gallon jug. You are
| a fool if you believe a team of women can go out in a
| hurricane and replace powerlines at anywhere near the
| same rate that a team of men can.
| standardUser wrote:
| Machines have already supplanted male strength in most of
| the ways it used to be indispensable. Do you see that
| trend reversing any time soon? Any serious observer can
| only see that trend accelerating, rapidly.
|
| And no one is calling for an end to men. Are you kidding
| me?? But pretending that men's size and strength is some
| irreplaceable virtue is laughable.
| DrPimienta wrote:
| Women are not propping up society. The majority of your
| food was grown by men. The majority of your food was
| transported across the country by men. Your home
| (apartment) was built by men. The building you work in
| was built by men. Your water purification, your power
| generation, your internet infrastructure, all done by
| men.
|
| If the next generation of men feels that working these
| jobs will never afford them the ability to buy a house,
| start a family, and retire, then don't expect these jobs
| to be filled by women, because women are neither willing
| nor capable of doing them in the vast majority of
| instances.
| kwere wrote:
| Authoritarianism is present in a lot of postmodern
| "leftist" movements that captivate younger women votes.
| it's justified with "fig leaves" reasons like curtailing
| free speech to contain hate speech, limiting liberties in
| the name of safety, Coercing personal behavior for
| greater causes like climate change, giving privileges to
| certain groups in the name of "penitence to ancestral
| sins", etc....
|
| Isolationism is an issue that is hurting women too, way
| less than males as women tend to have stronger social
| networks
|
| While at scale there isnt a trend of Reactionism, it
| looks that there is a greater political polarization and
| advocacy that compared to past generations hinders
| relations between ideologically different/incompatible
| groups
| standardUser wrote:
| Ignoring the more irritating leftists for a moment, most
| of the left is grappling with finding solutions to real
| problems. It's not "fuck you, change your life to stop
| global warming". It's "oh shit, we need to stop global
| warming and dramatic actions are needed. What do we do?".
| They are questions in need of answers, and no one is
| going to like all of the answers. No one ever does. Some
| answers may be authoritarian, but it's not a desire for
| authoritarianism driving these ideologies, it's a desire
| for solutions and too many people have a blind eye to the
| consequences of their proposed solutions.
|
| Maybe that's too forgiving of a take, but I think you're
| take is too accusatory.
|
| The right just openly supports authoritarianism for
| authoritarianism's sake.
| tpm wrote:
| It would be wrong to ascribe this to the politics, it's the
| change in the physical and social reality that enabled this
| situation, off which some politicians are feeding their
| movements.
|
| Young men might not be as socially adept, which matters
| more now than it did before. And that creates a lot of
| undesirable side effects. But politics didn't create this
| situation.
| DrPimienta wrote:
| Politics had a large part in creating this situation.
| Women have made up the majority of college graduates for
| about half a century now. And yet we still hear that we
| need more women in college, and in fact there are far
| more times as many college scholarships for women as for
| men.
|
| Not to mention that women make up the majority of
| government benefit recipients, and piles of other
| examples. This entire time, politicians have made lots of
| gains from supporting women. Where is the support for
| men?
| pixelpoet wrote:
| > Alcohol and other drug use
|
| Seems like a small thing but it's really not: I appreciate
| your use of "alcohol _and other_ drugs "; the phrase you'll
| hear 99% of the time is "drugs and alcohol", where alcohol
| tries to avoid being lotted in with people using _drugs they
| don 't like_.
|
| Do you know many people prone to beating their wives after
| smoking a joint? Yeah, nevermind any of that I guess.
| Meanwhile, Singapore will gladly imprison or execute you for
| possession of cannabis[0], but as usual alcohol gets a free
| pass. Absolute lunacy, complete lack of logical thinking
| capacity.
|
| From my German point of view, our nation has plenty of energy
| to protest what's going on in Haiti or Syria etc, and while
| I'm not saying those issues aren't important, I want to draw
| attention to how Singapore in particular somehow gets a pass
| for _literal state-sponsored murder for smoking a joint
| instead of drinking a beer_. It 's absolutely no mystery why
| this exception exists: Singapore is rich.
|
| [0] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx251p55le8o
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| One can have a favorable or unfavorable opinion of alcohol
| independent of its grouping with other drugs.
|
| Alcohol doesn't get a pass _because_ is it separated. Seems
| like you are placing excessive meaning on the distinction.
| pixelpoet wrote:
| The phrase "drugs and alcohol" (used 100-eps% of the
| time) in common speech implies a separation of alcohol
| from "drugs", the latter being a worse category.
|
| This "distinction" is like saying "meat and beef", i.e.
| no distinction at all. I'm mostly preaching to the formal
| system choir on HN, I just don't think I'm being out
| there saying the phrase "drugs and alcohol" is no
| accident in trying to distance alcohol from general drug
| use. The name Marijuana itself was deliberately made up
| to have negative connotations [0]:
|
| > The use of "marihuana" in American English increased
| dramatically in the 1930s, when it was preferred as a
| "foreign-sounding name" to stigmatize it during debates
| on the drug's use.[12] [13] The word was codified into
| law and became part of common American English with the
| passing of the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marijuana_(word)
| EvanAnderson wrote:
| > The phrase "drugs and alcohol" (used 100-eps% of the
| time) in common speech implies a separation of alcohol
| from "drugs", the latter being a worse category.
|
| I appreciate you posting this (even if it is terminology
| nitpick). The social connotations associated w/ verbally
| separating alcohol from other drugs hadn't occurred to
| me. I'm going to try to use this phrasing in the future.
| Tade0 wrote:
| The issue with alcohol is that it's present in a lot of
| foods in concentrations suffient to cause an effect. Same
| goes for fermented fruit. Additionally even today it
| serves as a preservative and solvent. You cannot
| meaningfully eliminate it from use.
|
| Meanwhile drugs were always understood as something
| produced for the specific purpose of getting high.
|
| There's a distinction because these are in fact different
| things.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Like I said above, Im not arguing that alcohol isnt a
| drug, just that I think you are making way to big of a
| deal out of the phrasing.
|
| Alcohol isnt viewed more favorable _because_ it is held
| apart. It is held apart because it is viewed more
| favorably.
|
| It is a distinction stemming from real world practice.
| You wont fail a drug test at work and be fired due to
| alcohol. You wont get shunned and kicked out thanksgiving
| for having a glass of wine.
|
| One can argue that people should take alcohol more
| seriously, but coming at it from a semantic rationale
| seems silly.
| serf wrote:
| >It is a distinction stemming from real world practice.
| You wont fail a drug test at work and be fired due to
| alcohol. You wont get shunned and kicked out thanksgiving
| for having a glass of wine.
|
| it doesn't really work like that in practice though -
| there are plenty of 'drugs' that won't ruin your life or
| social-status, and they're not all listed separately like
| alcohol.
|
| I'm a firm believer that the reason the linguistics that
| we now use came about was due to the legalities of the
| substances involved and the market action. Alcohol is big
| business, and legal -- so it deserves a distinction.
| That's about the singular distinction. The market was
| allowed to push phrases into the public purview, and
| luckily for them the phrases stuck.
|
| During western prohibition it (alcohol) was called
| 'poison' or 'narcotic', or 'intoxicant' in the
| propaganda.
|
| The google ngrams viewer verifies this suspicion; the
| phrase ' drugs and alcohol ' wasn't in (real) use until
| much later in American history.[0]
|
| [0]: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=drugs+
| and+alco...
| The_Colonel wrote:
| > Seems like a small thing but it's really not: I
| appreciate your use of "alcohol and other drugs"; the
| phrase you'll hear 99% of the time is "drugs and alcohol",
| where alcohol tries to avoid being lotted in with people
| using drugs they don't like.
|
| "drugs" often means illegal drugs in colloquial use while
| alcohol is legal in most places, so the distinction has a
| use.
|
| > I want to draw attention to how Singapore in particular
| somehow gets a pass for literal state-sponsored murder for
| smoking a joint instead of drinking a beer.
|
| I wonder what's your motivation for such an extreme
| exaggeration. The article you linked quite clearly states
| that the "punishment" for consuming is a 6 months
| rehibilation which, while quite harsh, is very far from
| your claim of death penalty. You need to possess 500 grams
| of Marijuana to get the death penalty which is like a 1000
| or more joints.
| pixelpoet wrote:
| I think it's crazy to be sentenced to death for having
| 500 grams of cannabis. Nobody is going to overdose on it,
| almost nobody is going to make a business of it if it
| were actually legal, ... this isn't a heroin, meth or
| even moonshine operation we're talking about.
|
| Is there really a way to overstate the insanity of state-
| sponsored killing people for this? Please let's not stray
| too far from the subject of, what justification for
| killing this drug user are you looking for?
| The_Colonel wrote:
| > I think it's crazy to be sentenced to death for having
| 500 grams of cannabis.
|
| I think it's a bad law, but surely not as bad as you
| originally tried to mislead people into believing.
|
| > Is there really a way to overstate the insanity of
| state-sponsored killing people for this?
|
| Apparently yes, by intentionally making a false claim
| that you get executed for smoking a joint.
|
| > Please let's not stray too far from the subject of,
| what justification for killing this drug user are you
| looking for?
|
| They won't get executed for being a drug user, but for
| trafficking drugs. Given that 500 grams is a huge amount,
| I think it's reasonable to consider the offenders to be
| drug traffickers (even if I don't agree with the
| punishment).
| malermeister wrote:
| A single plant can easily produce 500 grams. In other
| words - you could be killed for growing one plant for
| your own personal consumption.
| 123yawaworht456 wrote:
| not just the West, really
|
| in my very non-Western country, it's been years since I saw
| an adolescent with a cigarette. 20 years ago, non-smoking
| 13-year boys were a minority - I shit you not.
| dylan604 wrote:
| how many of them now vape though? in the US, if you look at
| vaping in adolescents, I would not be surprised to see an
| increase in nicotine users just in a different form.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| Vaping was advertised as a healthier alternative to
| smoking, but it's actually a comeback of smoking.
| dleink wrote:
| Probably, but it is healthier.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| I wonder how much of this is attributable to legalization or
| other factors.
|
| Teen Alcohol use has gone down ~50% over the last 30 years, and
| but there has been no legalization effort there. Similarly, teen
| sex rate has also gone down ~50% over the same time period.
|
| Overall, abstention from behaviors seems to be a major trend. I
| would be curious to know if this is due to a cultural aversion to
| perceived risky behaviors, lack of autonomy, or some other factor
| like rate of behavior modification medicine.
| ToDougie wrote:
| Some ideas:
|
| Parents are being cautious with their (statistically fewer)
| children.
|
| Prevalence of CCTV and panopticon theory making risky behavior
| seem impossible.
|
| Disappearance of third spaces.
|
| Crazy homeless druggies everywhere. Consequences of abuse are
| far more obvious.
| potato3732842 wrote:
| Proliferation of scheduled stuff beyond the school day
| leaving less free time to engage in activities that can't be
| done on a screen.
|
| I think your comment about homeless is too specific to
| certain regions.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Or, the "always there" nature of screen activities makes it
| very easy to never do anything else.
|
| When I was a kid we had no mobile phones, nor did we have
| computers or internet. if you wanted to talk with your
| friends you had to go meet up with them in person. So
| hanging out at the mall or at a park or an arcade was
| pretty common. So were after-school activities, sports,
| band, clubs, etc. A lot of this stuff, being away from
| home, was marginally or totally unsupervised, so there was
| a lot more opportunity to try "illegal" things.
| tayo42 wrote:
| I think I've seen the sex thing attributed to the "loneliness
| epidemic" and internet use that comes up alot.
|
| If that is true, makes sense for the same cause to apply to
| smoking and drinking. Drinking beers by yourself as a teen is
| weird, you generally at least start that stuff with friends.
| alephnerd wrote:
| I'm a Zillenial and my sibling is Gen Z.
|
| Most people our age in general are much more cautious about
| decisions because a bad mistake like an unplanned pregnancy
| can ruin your life.
|
| Also, in general, abstinence and non-abstinence doesn't have
| any moral baggage for us. We aren't judging you if you choose
| to do drugs or have sex, but we also aren't judging people
| who choose not to do that stuff.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Why do you think the caution is higher? do you have any
| thoughts on what _changed_?
| noitpmeder wrote:
| It's more accessible what the negative consequences are.
| For example, I doubt many people 50 years ago knew what a
| lung looks like after a lifetime of smoking, or exactly
| how much it increases your cancer rates. Now everyone's
| seen the photos even if they aren't a smoker.
| michaelsbradley wrote:
| When I was growing up in the 1980s in the US, anti-
| smoking campaigns were everywhere all the time every day:
| on TV, in magazines, posters, etc. A lung damaged by
| lifetime smoking was a common visual.
|
| So I don't think that information is _much_ more
| accessible, broadly speaking, though Internet access has
| certainly increased the amount of information on the
| topic that 's readily accessible.
|
| The shift in attitude could be owing to other factors, or
| maybe it just took time for the warnings to sink in, i.e.
| generationally.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| And people in the 80's knew that pregnancy was a risk of
| fucking.
|
| I wonder if it is change in the way risks are processed
| and considered overall.
| ryandrake wrote:
| I think the definition of "ruin your life" is different
| now than it was in the 80s. Stakes are higher for kids
| now, and one little mistake can put you on the road to
| the have-nots instead of the haves.
|
| Back when I was in high school, you could make mistakes
| and still end up successful. You could get a few B's in
| your grades, you could decide not to do so many sports
| and extracurriculars, you could get detention, you could
| even get in light trouble with the police for horsing
| around--and still make it into a good University and move
| on to a good career. I know because I made all of those
| mistakes. Plus, the consequences for being mediocre were
| not too severe. B students had community college, C and D
| students had decent jobs at the mill and the factory or
| could learn a trade, and so on.
|
| Today, the bar for entry into a comfortable, middle class
| career is so high, that my kid needs to make zero
| mistakes. She has to get straight As, she has to stay out
| of any kind of trouble, she has to have the right
| polished "profile" for all the various career- and life-
| gatekeepers she will meet and need to pass. And if she
| doesn't pass the gatekeepers, where is she going to end
| up? There is no safety net and no real humane jobs left
| for lower-performers. Life is so much more bifurcated
| now, the kids know it, and they stress about not making a
| mis-step.
|
| In the 80s I was competing with my small town. Now, kids
| are competing with the entire world.
| tiberious726 wrote:
| Eh, growing up around the same time as you, I think
| that's just how it's always looked to certain parents.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| I think you absolutely on to something, but I wonder how
| much of this a shift in perception vs reality.
|
| I agree the linear progression of school>College>good job
| seems a lot more cutthroat and inflexible. That said, it
| seems like there are still lots of alternative paths out
| there for smart motivated people- they just arent clearly
| paved.
|
| I have a long time to think about it, but I'm not even
| sure if I will encourage my kids to go to college, for
| the reasons you outlined. They may be better off doing
| work that isnt readily outsourced. Much of this will
| depend on what the economy looks like in 15 years.
|
| As it stands today, I'd be tempted to give my kid 150k to
| start a plumbing business instead of paying for college.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > Why do you think the caution is higher? do you have any
| thoughts on what changed?
|
| In the US, Roe v Wade obviously. In Germany, more and
| more doctors willing to perform abortions are retiring
| and less new doctors enter the force [1], leaving
| pregnant women (or women who think they might get
| pregnant) pretty much down on their luck.
|
| [1] https://www.mdr.de/nachrichten/deutschland/gesellscha
| ft/unge...
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Seems like sex has been trending down since the 80's or
| 90's. I dont think it was because teens had premonitions
| of the 2022 overturn of Roe.
|
| Edit: It seems the correction actually goes the opposite
| direction. Teen sex is lowest in blue states that are
| most protective of abortion, and highest in red states.
| California take the cake with lowest teen sex rate [1].
| Correlation obviously isnt causation, but it is
| interesting to see the clear cultural differences in teen
| sex.
|
| https://www.guttmacher.org/sites/default/files/report_pdf
| /yo...
| alephnerd wrote:
| > do you have any thoughts on what changed?
|
| Caution was always a thing, but societal and peer
| pressure is much less now.
|
| Look at older Millenial shows like Futurama and Archer.
| They are hilarious, but they absolutely perpetuate the
| idea that drinking alcohol is cool and a core part of
| being an adult.
|
| On the other hand, a Zillenial or Gen Z targeted show
| like Bojack Horseman, Rick and Morty, or Solar Opposites
| doesn't show substance abuse in a similar manner - it
| still makes jokes about it, but also shows the dark side.
|
| In high school getting a fake id to drink some beer,
| getting laid, or smoking weed or cigarettes with the
| stoners just isn't a cultural milestone anymore.
|
| It's like what Chef said in South Park - "There's a time
| and a place for everything, and that's college"
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| I dont think it makes sense to draw a causal attribution from
| loneliness.
|
| It seems like these would both be related symptoms of a
| shared cause.
|
| Also, I dont know when the loneliness epidemic kicks in, but
| I usually hear about it in terms of adults. Are teens also
| increasingly lonely?
| aSanchezStern wrote:
| Yeah, younger generations are spending less and less time
| with friends in person [1] and feeling lonelier and
| lonelier as a result [2].
|
| [1] https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-
| room/4037619-teens-a... [2]
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/teens-
| lon...
| Der_Einzige wrote:
| Weed is uniquely fun to do by yourself. It's the ultimate
| drug for zoning out on the computer and playing video games
| with. Weed is the perfect drugs for "incelish" lonely
| teenager who sit at home all day - an increasingly large
| percentage of the youth.
|
| Alcohol is not like this at all.
| logicchains wrote:
| Gen Z men have been becoming more and more conservative
| politically, maybe it also translates into more conservative
| views on drugs and alcohol.
| znpy wrote:
| > Gen Z men have been becoming more and more conservative
| politically, maybe it also translates into more conservative
| views on drugs and alcohol.
|
| i'm not sure that's the right way to read that.
|
| if you cut out the extremes (of the content Gaussian) you see
| that much content geared towards GenZ males is of self-care
| nature: go to the gym, take care of your own body, avoid
| alcohol and other drugs, take care of your mental health and
| go to therapy if you can, read philosophy.
|
| it's a beautiful change since i was a teenager (~15 years
| ago), way much healthier than what i was exposed to as a
| teenager.
|
| it's not problems-free of course, but still, i view it as
| positive change.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Unfortunately, rates of depression, misery, and loneliness
| are also significantly up, so I wouldn't be so fast to call
| the overall cultural change a healthy and beautiful win. I
| wonder how much these factors go hand in hand.
| consteval wrote:
| From what I've seen they go hand and hand a lot. All
| anecdotal of course, but much of the "self-improvement"
| content I've seen for young men is from the angle that
| they are failures, and they can "cure" their inadequacies
| through various channels.
|
| Of course it's not really true, just a bit true. Going to
| the gym won't make you stop hating yourself, any
| bodybuilder will tell you that. Going to the gym, no-fap,
| etc are all chosen as channels because they provide an
| immediate sense of accomplishment while being relatively
| easy. But they don't materially improve the circumstances
| of your life.
|
| It's simple to spend an hour at the gym and you will
| immediately feel better. But you didn't magically gain
| friends, a community, a sense of belonging or a reason to
| live. Those require being uncomfortable and pushing
| yourself mentally, emotionally, and socially. That's much
| more difficult than pushing weight.
|
| Ultimately young men just want to believe and feel like
| they're doing something right.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| The modern american conservative movement is becoming
| decoupled from the _practice_ of evangelical christianity
| (which is the origin of republican teetotaling) even as it
| becomes more closely aligned with its policy goals. So I 'm
| not sure I'd expect to see this connection hold with young
| conservatives. It might though, but I can't find anything
| reputable looking at it directly.
| Der_Einzige wrote:
| The downvotes you experience from making a super obvious
| connection is indicative of why democrats have a real risk of
| losing this election.
|
| The inability to sense the collapse in support for democrats
| among young men of all types (especially strong among
| black/latino young men) is why democrats seem to be
| structurally unable to win over any kind of non traditional
| voting groups en mass.
|
| Left leaning folks have also been sticking their head in the
| sand about the rapid evangalization/anti-catholic reaction
| that is sweeping through American latino communities right
| now. I am witnessing this both among personal friends and
| again and again in the news/sociological articles. Democrats
| are reacting to this by trying to move to the right on
| immigration. It's not working, and we are doomed as a result.
| standardUser wrote:
| I broadly agree with the assessment, but I don't think
| there's an obvious solution. There is only so far the left-
| leaning half of this country is willing to compromise with
| the increasingly less-educated, hyper-masculine right side.
| And while the right side may (barely) have the numbers to
| stay politically competitive, it's also the side rapidly
| losing out in terms of education, wealth and status.
| Backlashes can stall the broader trends, but they generally
| don't reverse them.
| r00fus wrote:
| Could also be that alcohol is like 2x as expensive over the
| past 30 years.
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| Except it's not when adjusted for wages:
| https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3631317/
| r00fus wrote:
| a) your data is only till 2011 and misses some extreme
| inflation in the past 10 years.
|
| b) we're talking youth - who are nowadays also less likely
| to be manning the fast food counters - I remember working
| at 14 years old and now in many states that's not permitted
| until 16. So even less disposable income.
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| Unemployment is lower today than it was 20 years ago:
| https://www.statista.com/statistics/217882/us-
| unemployment-r... (though it hasn't materially changed
| one way or the other).
|
| If teens and young adults NEEDED to work but couldn't
| find jobs, the unemployment rate for that age group would
| show it.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Maybe, But still incredibly cheap for a teen looking to
| drunk. 1.75 Liters of vodka is $8.99 at the corner store.
| That will get 20 kids puking drunk for the price of a
| hamburger.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| There are probably many/a combination of reasons. One thing I
| think that hasn't been brought up in this thread yet is a
| smaller amount of popular media portraying marijuana use in a
| tolerable light.
|
| In terms of movies, how few and far between are big weed
| movies? Was the last one Pineapple Express, 15 years ago? Go
| back a few decades and there were a bunch of big movies, songs,
| etc. year after year about smoking weed.
| dyauspitr wrote:
| The standard answer to this is teens are spending a significant
| amount of their time on social media which ends up replacing
| these other vices.
| thescriptkiddie wrote:
| it kinda seems to me like teenagers are abstaining from
| behaviors altogether, not just risky ones. possible
| explanations that come to mind are widespread anhedonia
| (depression) and the the fact that suburban kids who are too
| young to drive can't leave their homes without their parents.
| AuryGlenz wrote:
| As someone who just quit doing high school senior photography
| last year I think it's a lot more simple:
|
| They don't have time. I can't tell you how incredibly hard it
| is to schedule (and especially reschedule) sessions with many
| of them. A lot of kids _always_ have some sport or other after
| school activity going on. Those sports often have training
| before the school day, after the school day, with actual
| competitions or more training on weekends.
|
| Oh, and summer is no exception.
|
| Combine that with loads of homework and they're being run
| ragged.
| hx8 wrote:
| How accurate can youth self reported drug usage statistics
| actually be? It seems like the type of thing that would sway
| heavily based on if the kids were in a serious mood or a playful
| mood, who was giving the survey, etc.
| moomin wrote:
| The good news is it doesn't really matter. The absolute numbers
| might be inaccurate, but the skew is likely to stay the same
| over decades. So it probably is dropping.
| elliottkember wrote:
| > the skew is likely to stay the same over decades
|
| This is a huge assumption.
| hx8 wrote:
| Yeah, I don't agree with that at all. A simple change such
| as "More schools are giving the survey right before
| standardized tests instead of at the end of the school day"
| may skew numbers over years.
|
| Edit: There's probably dozens of variables with how the
| survey is given that will skew the bias. They probably
| don't even ask the exact same question in the exact same
| way on the physical survey.
| mikem170 wrote:
| > A simple change ... may skew numbers over years
|
| Is this your guess, or is there other conflicting data?
| elliottkember wrote:
| The point is that we don't know, and this means the data
| may be wrong. For an experiment to prove something, you
| need to control for these variables.
| moomin wrote:
| You can't do experiments on entire populations. That's
| precisely why we have studies in the first place.
| hx8 wrote:
| Am I the only one that questions the validity of self
| reported survey data? No, the concerns are extremely well
| documented, including documentation about psychological
| and situational factors that impact the results.
| rgbrgb wrote:
| worried about the youth if this is true. are we alienating them
| from a relatively safe form of mischief and mind expansion by
| making it legal and socially accepted?
|
| hoping that perhaps it's reporting error as kids get smart about
| surveillance etc. hoping for the kids.
| jackcosgrove wrote:
| Kids these days!
| chis wrote:
| Teens are basically doing less of everything because of the
| phones. Alcohol, sex, getting a drivers license, going to movies,
| basically any activity you could name has declined rapidly
| starting around 2012 when phones became ubiquitous.
| throw09230923 wrote:
| Maybe they are just more informed with phones.
|
| Memes about permanently stoned people are spreading fast.
| Propaganda about "cool" hippies does not work any more.
|
| The same with myths around sex, real anti-conception
| effectiveness...
| Spivak wrote:
| Except no one has been able to establish any kind of causation.
| The observation is real but the explanation is dubious.
|
| If you consider sex, drugs, and alcohol to be forms of "stuff
| to do" then it sorta sounds plausible but why driver's
| licenses? Why not sports or extracurriculars? Why not video
| games? Why are tabletop rpg getting more popular?
|
| You could just as easily blame ubiquitous access to porn for
| most of this as well and it would be just as plausible.
| candiddevmike wrote:
| TikTok brain rot. Streamers. Influencers.
|
| Teens are living their lives vicariously through other
| people. Capitalism has finally created the perfect
| consumption slave. They buy what they're told to buy via peer
| pressure feedback loops and stay at home contended with their
| entertainment bubble.
| MisterBastahrd wrote:
| People complaining they don't have money for groceries with
| their collection of different colored $40 stainless steel
| mugs in the background.
| spiffytech wrote:
| > but why driver's licenses?
|
| Anecdotally from my social circles: youth already hang out
| online, with any or all of their friends at the same time.
| Why go somewhere just to see fewer people? And once you're
| there, are you going to do something besides chat and play
| games, which works fine online?
|
| Older generations saw a driver's license as freedom, but
| younger generations don't see as much appeal in what a
| licensed driver is free to do.
| mock-possum wrote:
| Well - in the case of porn, that'd be putting the cart before
| the horse.
| bawolff wrote:
| I don't think phones are to blame for movies declining in the
| age of streaming. The more shocking part is that anyone is
| going to movies these days.
| hx8 wrote:
| What hardware are teens most likely to stream on? I would
| guess teens are more likely to stream to phone/tablet than
| the general population.
| r00fus wrote:
| Why blame phones when you can simply blame cost? Everything is
| crazy expensive nowadays - from cars&insurance to movies &
| alcohol.
| galleywest200 wrote:
| Marijuana is dirt cheap in legal states. I am talking like an
| ounce for $80 in some places.
|
| You can also still get the half-gallons of super cheap vodka,
| but getting that is more difficult because you need someone
| who is 21 to procure it for you.
| canucker2016 wrote:
| Many high school dances have lower attendance or are
| canceled altogether. see
| https://www.today.com/parents/social-media-killing-school-
| da...
| ravenstine wrote:
| Is there _anything_ that today 's youth are doing that isn't in
| decline? Allegedly, they're drinking less, doing less drugs,
| having less sex, watching fewer movies, driving less, owning
| fewer cars, watching sports less often, and so on. Maybe they're
| playing more games? Or are the youth _seemingly_ doing less
| overall because the way we are polling them has changed?
| randomNumber7 wrote:
| Phones was already an argument.
|
| At least from my observation in germany I would add that it is
| also maybe due to less opportunities.
|
| Here the youth has also less money and less good job
| opportunities while the cost of living has dramatically
| increased. When you want to move to a new flat the rent is
| insane.
| mock-possum wrote:
| Weed isn't exactly expensive though.
| Glawen wrote:
| Is this really a thing or just repeating their laments? Gen Z
| are also a very whiny generation that don't seem to tolerate
| the 'suck it up we all went through the same shit' message.
|
| I mean young engineers in my company get paid nicely in
| comparison to their older peers. Noone can really complain
| about not finding a flat and live correctly. Moreover they
| are definitely not into having kids, as they prefer to keep
| money for leisure, so I really don't buy their whining.
| KK7NIL wrote:
| > I mean young engineers in my company get paid nicely in
| comparison to their older peers.
|
| No, they don't, not after you adjust for inflation and
| housing prices.
|
| And young engineers are a very privileged few, the vast
| majority of young American workers have had it much worse.
| Good luck getting a respectable job that will allow you to
| buy a house and raise a family while your wife stays at
| home without a STEM degree nowadays.
|
| And the US education system is uniquely terrible at STEM
| education before college, meaning many American kids who
| could have gotten onto the STEM gravy train instead get
| replaced by immigrants like me.
| ToDougie wrote:
| I know a few couples making an incredible amount of money
| (both engineers, or lawyers, or doctors, or some
| combination thereof) on a path to retire by 40 (50 at the
| latest) with no kids, and they don't seem to have any
| desire to have children to spend those post-retirement
| years with. Their lives are full of collections, but I just
| look at those trinkets and shrug.
|
| I'd rather have my kids go hang out with their kids in the
| back yard and throw a ball around, scrape a knee, cry,
| grow, and then extend an invitation to hang out again next
| weekend. But I can't because they have their "reasons" to
| not have children which have always seemed superficial
| (barring the obvious serious health issues) and usually
| based on a fear mindset and a desire to enjoy a life of
| overconsumption, leisure, and gluttony.
| HaZeust wrote:
| >"I mean young engineers in my company get paid nicely in
| comparison to their older peers."
|
| Yeah, because they're 10% of Gen Z (and I'm part of that
| 10% Gen Z). Most of my peers, my former classmates, and
| friends are struggling to make ends meet in an increasingly
| antagonistic status quo to present-day starters, the likes
| of which are not comparable to any other contemporary time
| - both through anecdotes and data - excluding 1971-73, and
| that was quickly rectified (and you STILL have people who
| joined the workforce in those years complaining about it 50
| years later). And as for kids, they can't afford them.
| Young engineers probably can, old news - but that's not the
| bulk of the generation. If you want a functioning society,
| you must account for options and outcomes for ALL sectors
| of the bell-curve. Not _just_ people from the sectors you
| associate with.
|
| This comment screams myopia and a lack of perspective, and
| an obvious lack of interest in trying to amend either.
| bawolff wrote:
| Interestingly, all these examples (except maybe driving/cars)
| are activities associated with numbing oneself.
|
| Maybe the youth just have better mental health than in
| yesteryear.
| dageshi wrote:
| Perhaps tiktok is a cheaper, more convenient solution for
| numbing?
| pesus wrote:
| I don't think this is a very accurate interpretation. Maybe
| for some, but I'd reckon sex, drugs, and alcohol (and
| partying in general) are more often than not used for the
| opposite reason.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| I think they can be associated with numbing oneself, but
| aren't necessarily. I would also associate most of those
| things with vivacity, exploration, spontaneity, and risk
| taking.
|
| Perhaps there is also a shift in the dominant narrative of
| associated with these activities.
|
| Studies seem to show the youth mental health is at an all
| time low. I wont go as far as to claim that lack of drinking
| and fucking is the cause, but I do think they are related,
| perhaps as the result of a third factor.
|
| I don't have data to support this, but my gut tells me the
| root may be more reserved and cautious approach to life in
| general.
| mmanfrin wrote:
| > Maybe the youth just have better mental health than in
| yesteryear.
|
| Hiiiiiighly doubt this.
| jasonfarnon wrote:
| smut, obviously
| ikmckenz wrote:
| Suicide is pretty much the only thing bucking the downward
| trend. As kids stop having sex, doing drugs, smoking, etc. they
| are killing themselves.
| joshdavham wrote:
| > In 2011, 23.1% of adolescents indicated they were current
| users, but by 2021, this figure had dropped to 15.8%.
|
| I suspect that these results are being confounded by the covid-19
| pandemic. Clearly there has been a decline in use, but it's not
| clear what's behind it, especially when teens couldn't go outside
| during that time and pass a joint around mouth-to-mouth.
| hmmm-i-wonder wrote:
| It was declining before covid hit, and from what I've seen
| reported (sales etc.) use increased at the start of covid then
| trended back to normal (declining) rates.
| oigursh wrote:
| If you get wasted on anything, or do anything silly, or act
| weird, someone will pull out a phone and video you.
|
| That would have stopped a lot of the testing my limits I did when
| I was young and even more dumb.
| kkielhofner wrote:
| > If you get wasted on anything, or do anything silly, or act
| weird, someone will pull out a phone and video you.
|
| Anecdotally this seems to be the key impact. With social media
| almost everyone now has a "brand" and that brand is typically
| not supported with a post of you out of it, sloppy, etc.
|
| Along those lines, there also seems to be MUCH more emphasis on
| health - granted superficial health (looking good) but health
| nonetheless. Fortunately the standards for "ideal beauty" for
| women especially have shifted from the 90s/2000s no-such-thing-
| as-too-thin dangerous and extremely unhealthy to a physique
| that is well-muscled and actually healthy (while being
| inclusive of different body types).
|
| When I'm at the gym and the high school/college kids show up I
| just can't believe their level of physical fitness and
| development. Self-selecting given it's the gym but when I was
| in high school (class of 2002) the most fit kid on the
| football, basketball, track, volleyball, etc teams would look
| out of shape next to what appears to be the "average" gym-goer
| of this generation. The numbers also seem to be quite a bit
| higher - there are A LOT of these kids hitting it really hard
| in the gym.
|
| Needless to say this clearly obsessive-level focus and work is
| not supported by using drugs like marijuana and alcohol. If
| nothing else having a lot of followers is much more important
| and "cool".
|
| If anything I'm more interested in usage statistics of steroids
| and other performance-enhancing drugs. Some of the physiques,
| performance, etc I see just don't seem possible to achieve
| naturally at 16-25.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| 'Cause they aren't doing it naturally.
| lenerdenator wrote:
| Marijuana is now "the man", complete with licensing and lawsuits.
|
| The hip young people are moving on to things that are still
| transgressive.
| _fat_santa wrote:
| My bet is that this all stems from higher housing prices / cost
| of living.
|
| Previously you moved out at 18 or so and moved into a
| dorm/apartment with folks you age and this dynamic introduced a
| space where you could experiment with "vices" (alcohol, drugs,
| sex, parties, etc).
|
| Now with cost of living being so insane, kids are instead
| choosing to live with parents and thus never get a space to
| experiment like this. And by the time they do have enough money
| to move out on their own, the "experimentation" phase is largely
| over.
| hmmm-i-wonder wrote:
| On the flip side, the number of kids I see smoking/having sex
| at their parents houses now blows me away. My generation
| (millenials) it was a lot more rare to find tolerating/"non-
| narc" parents. Most of my friends with kids figure they'll do
| it anyways so might as well let them be safe about it.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| If I was a parent of a teen I would just be glad they are
| socializing and fucking instead of being depressed in their
| room alone and doom scrolling.
| adventured wrote:
| It's due to the decline of in-person socializing by young
| people.
|
| Young people don't get introduced to it as much. Less in-person
| peer pressure. Fewer parties. Young people do things in groups
| that they won't bother doing alone because it's not as fun.
| rifty wrote:
| I think I want to see this juxtaposed against all-type drug usage
| rates for youth before examining this as a cultural trend towards
| less drug usage. I have a feeling during this period of drop for
| marijuana and alcohol with the youth, we will see an increase in
| prescribed drug usage like SSRI and stimulants by youth, with
| prescription and lack of it.
| d--b wrote:
| Maybe marijuana getting a lot stronger plays a role here? I for
| one could smoke a joint while I was a teen, but nowadays the
| stuff makes me super sick every time, like the last two times I
| had to lie down and ended up barfing before getting better.
| wly_cdgr wrote:
| Well yeah, legal things aren't cool. I'm sure they'll find
| something else that's still illegal to use/abuse/do instead
| owenversteeg wrote:
| I'm going to repost a comment of mine from a while ago, because I
| still believe the main cause is simple: Weed just isn't cool
| anymore.
|
| >[Marijuana] revenues have actually declined on a per-state level
| for three years now in some states despite inflation. General
| sales tax receipts are up by 27% since 2020 [0] and meanwhile
| California's weed sales are down. Even better, until recently
| they were rising at a rapid pace, having rose 2.82x from Q1 2018
| to Q2 2020. [1]
|
| >The reason why is obvious to anyone who's attended a party in
| the last few years: weed isn't cool anymore. Partly by being
| illegal, it used to be cool, but now it's accessible to anyone. A
| lot of people had that realization when they heard "oh, I'm into
| weed now" from their uncool middle-aged uncle whose previous
| hobbies had included LARPing and painting miniatures. It's not
| even just about the legality though: smoking a joint is a hell of
| a lot cooler than sucking on a USB stick that smells like candy
| grapes, and vapes, being far more convenient, have now been tied
| to weed's image. Something being cool is far better marketing
| than any ad ever designed.
|
| [0] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/QTAXT09QTAXCAT1USYES
|
| [1]
| https://www.cdtfa.ca.gov/dataportal/charts.htm?url=CannabisT...
| darth_avocado wrote:
| Legal weed sales being down doesn't necessarily mean people are
| no longer using it. It just means people aren't buying it
| legally and paying taxes.
| Tade0 wrote:
| So many people who want to have a say regarding policy don't
| understand this.
|
| My country has a particularly high rate of sugar consumption.
| Are we a nation with a sweet tooth? Hardly, as it's inversely
| correlated with alcohol consumption as measured via sales
| figures and the process of moonshine production is greatly
| enhanced by the use of sugar as feedstock.
|
| Meanwhile there's a whole movement that aims to limit alcohol
| availability in stores. A noble pursuit, but a misguided one,
| as the reported increases in alcohol sales over the past
| years are actually a sign of people preferring to buy instead
| of producing their liquor now that they can afford it.
| citizenpaul wrote:
| It could be that weed is now orders of magnitude stronger than
| it used to be. Its almost impossible to buy something that is
| not some sort of specialized ultra high THC strain. A lot of
| people myself included don't want to be that messed up, so they
| cant even function. Its like if you could no longer buy
| anything lower than 180 proof alcohol to drink. A lot of people
| don't want to be that drunk and would just stop or greatly
| limit their drinking.
| LisperFan wrote:
| I wonder if there is a link to the increased use of Adderall and
| other ADHD treatments. Younger people may no longer be self-
| medicating because they have other, more effective alternatives
| available.
| Rallen89 wrote:
| A thing I dont see alot of people talking about here is the
| increase in strength over time. For first time users who
| experience a more 'modern' weed strain that will mess you up if
| you dont have a tolerance, I dont think they would try it again
| soon.
| thechronic wrote:
| As with all things, there are probably many interdependent
| reasons for this drop, but the one for my use is that weed is
| just too strong these days.
|
| When I was 16 in the 90s, weed was mild, bags were filled with
| seeds, and worst case you'd get some dry mouth and maybe
| lightheaded after passing a couple joints around or hitting a
| gravity bong in your friend's parent's sink. Now you take a
| couple hits of some joint that turns out is 25%+ THC and dipped
| in kief and you're taking a cold shower wondering if you're a
| waste of life (you're not). It's just not fun, and the people I
| know that love weed are likely addicted and hiding from their
| feelings.
|
| As an adult my favorite weed experiences have been hanging with
| locals in Jamaica smoking some regular outdoors sitting on the
| beach trying to understand the patois. The opposite of walking
| into an LED flooded store in Manhattan or whatever that store
| that thinks they're the Apple store is in LA that gives me
| migraines. I feel like the industry got into an arms race and
| forgot that weed is to relax amongst friends, not get blasted
| into oblivion.
| easymodex wrote:
| I will quote one of the nested comments which really hit the mark
| imo:
|
| """I think the definition of "ruin your life" is different now
| than it was in the 80s. Stakes are higher for kids now, and one
| little mistake can put you on the road to the have-nots instead
| of the haves.
|
| Back when I was in high school, you could make mistakes and still
| end up successful. You could get a few B's in your grades, you
| could decide not to do so many sports and extracurriculars, you
| could get detention, you could even get in light trouble with the
| police for horsing around--and still make it into a good
| University and move on to a good career. I know because I made
| all of those mistakes. Plus, the consequences for being mediocre
| were not too severe. B students had community college, C and D
| students had decent jobs at the mill and the factory or could
| learn a trade, and so on.
|
| Today, the bar for entry into a comfortable, middle class career
| is so high, that my kid needs to make zero mistakes. She has to
| get straight As, she has to stay out of any kind of trouble, she
| has to have the right polished "profile" for all the various
| career- and life-gatekeepers she will meet and need to pass. And
| if she doesn't pass the gatekeepers, where is she going to end
| up? There is no safety net and no real humane jobs left for
| lower-performers. Life is so much more bifurcated now, the kids
| know it, and they stress about not making a mis-step.
|
| In the 80s I was competing with my small town. Now, kids are
| competing with the entire world."""
|
| This nails it, the bar for "normal" life is really high, coupled
| with social media where every day you're bombarded with what you
| can achieve if you try really hard or pay enough money for it -
| traveling, having fun, luxury, having a perfect body and being
| envied by other people, etc. Being an overachiever try-hard is
| cool these days. Weed makes you a bit lazy and when you smoke
| you're not 100% super productive and you're not living your life
| to your "fullest potential".
| ShepherdKing wrote:
| Communication about health risks for marijuana use needs to be
| on-point, especially among young people. From what I've read, use
| during brain development (prior to ages 25-30) risks learning
| disabilities and other mental health disorders due to how it
| affects cortisol. Marijuana is also an immune system suppressor,
| which may explain some elevated cancer rates. The effects on the
| immune system may also explain some food allergies, but
| susceptibility for fungal and viral infections resulting from
| marijuana use is fairly well established.
|
| Citing some relevant papers on the subject:
|
| https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8229290/
|
| https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7258471/
|
| https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3930618/
|
| https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4586361/
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