Moviemaker Telling Kids to Smoke Weed

According to the NY Post, moviemaker Kevin Smith (of Dogma, Mallrats, Clerks, Chasing Amy fame) is quoted as telling kids “weed is good.”   Apparently his pal Seth Rogen coerced him to pick up the new pot-smoking activity last summer.  While we know he’s not the first in Hollywood to promote drug use, and certainly won’t be the last, we do want to address the idea of “Don’t do the other stuff, but weed is good.”    A common misconception is that marijuana is not as harmful as other drugs, is not addictive, is “natural” or is, as Kevin Smith alludes, useful for overcoming a creative slump.

Don’t do it, kids!   In the end, none of it is good but quite on the contrary to Smith’s statement, marijuana use is not only harmful, but can quickly deteriorate a growing brain.   Marijuana is the most common drug used by adolescents in America today.  Parents need to understand that marijuana use is not something to be taken lightly, and it can definitely create lasting negative effects on the user.   It is also hardly a motivator.  Some short-term effects of the drug include:

• Sleepiness
• Difficulty keeping track of time, impaired or reduced short-term memory
• Reduced ability to perform tasks requiring concentration and coordination
• Paranoia, hallucinations
• Impaired or reduced short-term memory
• Impaired or reduced comprehension
• Altered motivation and cognition, making the acquisition of new information difficult
• Psychological dependence
• Impairments in learning and memory, perception, and judgment – difficulty speaking, listening effectively, thinking, retaining knowledge, problem solving, and forming concepts
• Intense anxiety or panic attacks

Hollywood is not going to stop promoting recreational drug use anytime soon so it becomes the responsibility of parents and other adults to offset this seemingly glamourous message with the truth about the dangers of any drug use.

More about marijuana can be found here at Linking Human Systems.

To read the Kevin Smith article on NY Post, click here.