O/r wants to know (Gateway Drug)

**Reca** · 09-28-10, 02:13 PM

O/R wants to know: do you believe that marijuana is a "gateway drug" to other drugs and/or criminal behavior?

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**Standard Dave** · 09-28-10, 02:18 PM

Yes,

It's sold by the same drug dealers, those who start young on Cannabis are likely to move onto cocaine or amphet.

Not everyone who starts smoking cannabis will move onto heroin, crack or meth but people who don't smoke cannabis are unlikely to find a drug dealer and start shooting up the life dominating hard drugs.

**Jenna** · 09-28-10, 03:59 PM

I think it can be, but so can legal substances like alcohol and painkillers.

**Cidp24** · 09-28-10, 05:31 PM

Yes, it is. Along with most any other mind-altering drug such as alcohol. Anyone who gets a high from a substance is likely to try another drug for the experience.

**MacLean** · 09-28-10, 06:44 PM

I believe this depends on more factors than can be answered with a straight yes or no.

Like alcohol or painkillers, someone with an addictive personality disorder is far more likely to progress to ANY mind altering substance they can get their hands on than someone who does not suffer from the same malady.

That's the sum total of what I know on the subject.

**pac201** · 09-28-10, 06:54 PM

I think it is, and I have to agree with the others. The propensity for addiction comes into play...

Be smart, don't start.

**cajunguy** · 09-28-10, 07:01 PM

Having been a D.A.R.E. Supervisor and Instructor for seventeen years, I did a lot of research on this (and many other drug-related subjects), and I truly believe it is.

The problem was getting 11/12 year olds to understand how it could be and get them to believe it.

I gave it my best shot.

Did I do any good? I've got to believe in seventeen years, I may have done a little bit.

.

**SPD** · 09-28-10, 07:43 PM

I think it is.

As has been said before, once you make the jump from legal, controlled substances (alcohol, tobacco, etc) into marijuana, it is a VERY short jump to methamphetamine, heroine, cocaine, etc. These substances are imported and distributed by the same groups of people, and the sellers and customers know they are illegal drugs. I also find very few (as in almost none) places where meth is sold but they don't have weed. Somehow, after seeing the connection literally hundreds of times, I have formed an opinion.

I know plenty of people who drink or smoke who do nothing harder. I know very few people who are/were pot heads who stayed potheads and didn't go to at least pills and at worst meth, crack, etc. Again, not a scientific study, but rather just a trend I noticed after doing this (including 7 years in drug enforcement) for awhile.

As with everything else, there are always exceptions. But they seem to be few and far between.

**keith720** · 09-29-10, 09:34 AM

I don't think that pot, in and of itself, is a gateway drug. However I do think that the situation that pot buyers find themselves in does put them in contact with people who have access to stronger drugs, thereby increasing the chance that the user will try stronger drugs.

**Jks9199** · 09-29-10, 10:53 AM

Can it be? Yes. Is it a guarantee that once you try marijuana, you're inevitably going to end up addicted to coke or heroin or something? No.

Underage drinking and tobacco use are also gateways; tolerance or even simply getting away with it helps to break down the societal conditioning or inhibitions against breaking the law. Start with one, and the next becomes easier.

But it's not something to overstate, either. It's clear today that there are plenty of people who smoke weed, and that's it. Just like there are people who drink socially without a problem and there are alcoholics.

**berserk** · 09-30-10, 12:50 PM

Originally Posted by keith720

I don't think that pot, in and of itself, is a gateway drug. However I do think that the situation that pot buyers find themselves in does put them in contact with people who have access to stronger drugs, thereby increasing the chance that the user will try stronger drugs.

Nicely put.

I've known a lot of potheads who never really got into anything else, but they were a lot more likely to know where to go for the harder stuff than people who abstained (or who had a legal drug of choice).

I think the whole "gateway drug" label is propaganda, but like most good lies it contains an element of truth.

**spcwes** · 10-02-10, 03:20 PM

Yes but there is more involed than just "yes/no" in my opinion. People that can be gatewayed using marijuana could also be gatewayed by alcohol or prescription meds in my opinion but this is where I think it might be fuzzy by some people.

Alcohol is legal, but is abused and in most cases incites people to break the law because of it's effect on the the body.

Prescription meds are legal for who they are prescribed but in most cases are covered by the same laws that powerful drugs such as cocain and meth for people in possession without prescriptions and are often sold by people that sell other drugs.

How I feel in most cases about it being a gateway is that a lot of the people we arrest or make contact with that deal in marijuana also deal in most of the other known drugs in some way or another. So with people that do have addictive issues in the first place having the option to use other drugs provided by the same people that sell marijuana them illegally yes it is a gateway.

So yes, in an around about way I feel it is a possible gateway drug for people with addictive issues and a good warm up for folks that might not have issues with addiction to start with but start to get one due to this particular drug. But it is not the only drug I feel in which can have the same gateway issues.

**Motorwaycop** · 10-02-10, 03:37 PM

I have never done any research, have no stats to back it up but I feel that it is unusual to find a hard use rwho didn't first dabble with pot.
like most others I feel its not a certainty that using pot leads to harder drugs but I do believe that in and of itself pot is to me a hard enough and destructive enough drug.
Now if we could only sort out societies problem and worst drug of choice... alcohol.

**BEK** · 10-19-10, 05:39 PM

I have done alot of research into marijuana and the argument to legalize it or not. I think that anything can be pointed at as a gateway drug, from simple things as OTC drugs to "legal" drugs as Caffeine, alcohol or Tobacco. A bias opionion can point at anything and say "there is the start".

**mack** · 10-20-10, 06:15 AM

I think that it is a gateway drug. Not everyone that smokes pot goes on to harder narcotics, but those that are on harder narcotics probably started off smoking pot. There is the few who go directly to harder drugs and skip smoking pot, and there are those that get addicted to prescription painkillers and never smoked. But I believe that there is a larger majority who started off on pot.

**DeputyDuc** · 10-21-10, 12:09 PM

Yes. Although the grounded folks I know who smoked it at one point never went past it's use.

Segueing here - do you think that .22's are gateway firearms?! (and sorry to go OT): My father wasn't a gun guy, didn't understand my interest in guns. Ddn't tell him I bought a 92FS as soon as I turned 21, and not long after when he learned I had a Ruger 10/22 under his roof since age 18 he said, "what's your mania w.guns?! This .22 is a gateway gun - next thing you know you'll have a 9mm semiautomatic pistol!"

He is a smart man!