Why is ‘Cannabis-user’ Shaming Still Acceptable in No Shaming America?

This Loco Ocho Diary Entry is brought to you by a little Better Than Nine Delta 8 and CBD tincture, but mostly a half a blunt of Purple Gelato #33 Flowers from California.

I haven’t written a Loco Ocho Diary entry in way to long. It wasn’t that I wasn’t inspired. I have several articles that are saved as drafts that are 95% done and I just got crippling writers’ block. Fortunately, I refound my old ADHD medication – smoking good flowers.

As I was sitting outside my office smoking a blunt (that’s like a joint, but in a cigar wrapper for all the white people reading), I saw people walking around and started to bug out a little. I started worrying that if my neighbors and colleagues smelled the blunt and saw me smoking cannabis, some of them would think that I was a bad employee, neighbor, businessman, etc. As I was having this conversation with myself, one of personalities said,

“You what’s bullshit? We live in a society that vilifies shaming to the point of ruining peoples’ lives, however, it is completely acceptable to shame a cannabis user.”

“That is bullshit.” I responded to myself. Then I started thinking about this commercial for Halo Top Ice Cream. It had an obese woman in extremely tight clothes dancing around her apartment eating ice cream with the basic message of “Eat as much of this shit as you want. You’re you and no one can judge you for that.”

I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. For some context, I see obesity as an addiction to food. If you research the relationship between obese people and food, it is exactly the same as a drug addict and their drug.

What I saw this commercial saying was, “We’ve developed a drug for you that you can binge on with no consequence.” I read the nutrition facts for some of Halo Top Ice Cream and a 2/3 cup serving has 40% DV for saturated fat and 17% DV for cholesterol. I’m confident that the girl in the commercial wasn’t going to stop at 2/3 of a cup, especially since the front of the container says “Only 7g of carbs per pint!” Those saturated fat and cholesterol numbers are high for 1 serving, their astronomical for a whole pint. You also have to take into account that the company was advertising directly to a population that already has high cholesterol and fat.

My first instinct was to go write something hilarious, but probably fat shamey, in the YouTube comments for the commercial. I was way too late. The comments for this video were really mean. I read a few comments from the people saying, “Fat shaming is not cool. This causes people mental health problems…”

Obesity is a public health crisis in the country. Obese people add huge costs to our medical system because they get sicker, with chronic illnesses, at a clip of about 80% more than a person who is in good shape. However, health insurance companies can’t charge them more because that’s discrimination. When I was like 25, I was stupid enough to tell a health insurance company that I used tobacco. They nearly doubled my rates and it took me 15 years to get “tobacco user” off my health care record. I have also turned down job offers because they said they required a marijuana test that I wasn’t going to pass.

So, I’ve, not only been shamed for my cannabis use, but also discriminated against.

Why is this okay?

We live in a country where you aren’t allowed to shame people for a behavior that is actually bad for them and detrimentally affects all of us, but you can make fun of potheads on prime time TV.

Every time a late night talk show hosts makes a joke about a celebrity getting busted for cannabis, they always make a tired stoner joke about that person. The audience gives a fake laugh and the stupid monologue continues. What would have happened if Jimmy Fallon made a joke about Demi Lovato saying, “Maybe she should have kept using drugs because getting clean has made her fat.”

That dude would probably be fired or resign in less than 48 hours.

Then I started thinking about how shaming people causes stress and mental health problems and realized that it was true. I should have been happy, relaxed, and proud that I have the ability to smoke a blunt during my lunch break, but instead, I felt scared and ashamed. This is because of shaming.

We need to decide what to do with shaming. We need be consistent and allow shaming or condemn it universally. I think we need to be compassionate with people because shaming someone who already has problems is bad.

I guess that why its still socially acceptable to shame cannabis users – there’s nothing really wrong with us so we don’t run to Twitter like a bunch of babies and ruin people’s lives if they make a stoner joke. Maybe its because cannabis users are nicer people. Maybe we’re more secure in ourselves.

However, It’s so frustrating that I can’t make jokes about people based upon their lifestyle choices, but my lifestyle choices are fair game for everyone.

Just for shits and giggles, next time you hear someone make a stoner joke, get all offended and be like, “Cannabis shaming isn’t cool, bro. Those people have it tougher than you think.”