One factor that didn’t matter was parenthood... But neither mothers nor fathers were more likely to oppose marijuana legalization than people without children.The risky white men hypothesis!
One factor that did matter was women’s greater religiosity... Because religious people are more opposed to marijuana legalization, factoring in religiosity narrows but does not eliminate the reverse gender gap.....
A second factor is what’s known as the “risky white men hypothesis.” Researchers have shown that men, and white men in particular, tend to accept risk more than others. This helps explain the gender gap on a number of environmental, health, science, and technology-related issues. For example, white women and men and women of color worry more about the consequences of global warming and nuclear power...Still, taking account of race and gender did not eliminate the reverse gender gap, either.
Ultimately, what best explains the gender gap in marijuana attitudes is the gender gap in marijuana use. Men (all men, not just white men) report using marijuana more often than women. Once marijuana use is taken into account, there is no gender gap in attitudes toward gender gap in marijuana legalization.So it's good old self-interest. But what is it about being male that makes you more likely to use marijuana? I would have connected this to willingness to take risk: Is the male/female gap in marijuana use greater in places where it is illegal? Elder and Greene say:
Research in sociology and psychology has found that men are more likely to engage in deviant and risk-taking behavior, although scholars debate why this is — whether biology, peer influence, different conceptions of morality, or something else.This might be a reason for women to support legalization. We risk-averse women might avoid using marijuana because we won't commit crimes. That would make legalization more important to us if we also want to use marijuana. Also we may worry about people we care about getting into trouble.
Elder and Green predict that the gender gap will close as marijuana become legal in more states, because when it's legal, it seems "less risky or deviant and also less immoral" and because "as Democratic elites increasingly favor more liberal marijuana policies, this will help push Democrats in the electorate, who are disproportionately women, toward greater support as well." That is, women will follow along once the "Democratic elite" position becomes clear.
I've observed over the years that researchers tend to explain any gender difference in a way that makes whatever is true of women good. This is an interesting example of that. You can see that they're presenting the independence and courage of men as "risk taking," "deviance," and insensitivity to "morality." I'm intrigued by the presentation of women as pushed by the Democratic elite. Is being a follower regarded as a positive quality (when you follow the Democratic elite)?
IN THE COMMENTS: Kevin says:
Women are smart enough to know this isn’t going to put more smart, hard-working, marriage and family-focused men into the dating pool.
Posts
106 comments:
wow! this IS new!
Back in the old Temperance Movement, prohibition of alcohol was something Exclusively desired by white males; now things are switched.
As Roseann Roseannadanna would say; oh, NEVER MIND!
women want to control their men, this goes back to at least Eve; if not Lilith
For example, white women and men and women of color worry more about the consequences of global warming and nuclear power
In other words, white men bad, don’t accept our propaganda unquestionably! They have underdeveloped amygdalas! Not easily enough frighted with vague and inchoate arguments combined with a vicious shaking of our witch doctor masks and shaman rattles!
Liberalism is about putting a boot on the neck of scary white men.
Have we not yet understood that men would rather smoke dope or play video games while women would rather have a clean house?
No to mention that women prefer a man with an actual responsible job. But that’s so retrograde, better to go with the global warming/nuclear power thingy!
Research in sociology and psychology has found that men are more likely to engage in deviant and risk-taking behavior, although scholars debate why
Seriously? 'scholars' 'debate why' ? SERIOUSLY? Hello! most men are spares, that's why you can hunt rosters and stags, not hens and does
I'm intrigued by the presentation of women as pushed by the Democratic elite.
1. Marijuana legalization must happen
2. The future is female, but women don’t support it.
3. How can we write the article to square this circle?
#journalism
“risky white men hypothesis.”
I doubt it. Kinda.
No results found for "risky white men hypothesis" -marijuana.
"risky white men" -marijuana About 9 results (0.22 seconds) (men's white t-shirts, mostly)
White males and Taiwanese-American males perceived health and technology risks as low compared to others and endorsed an individualist rather than an egalitarian worldview. Furthermore, African-Americans perceived health and technology risks as high compared to others and were more likely to endorse an egalitarian worldview. There was no evidence for a 'white male' or high risk effect for financial activities. Thus, 'white male' and high risk effects may be limited to the domain of health and technology risks. Because risk perceptions and worldviews of white males and Asian males are similar, 'low risk' effect may be a more suitable term than 'white male' effect.
Women are smart enough to know this isn’t going to put more smart, hard-working, marriage and family-focused men into the dating pool.
"Support is comparable among racial and ethnic groups — roughly half of whites (52%), blacks (56%) and Hispanics (51%) favor legalizing the use of marijuana."
The sameness is explained by the "risky white men hypothesis". Yup.
My hypothesis is that the male body (nervous system) feels different to itself than the female body and that marijuana provides a more desirable tweak to the male body than to the female body. That is, perhaps the experience of having high testosterone is not entirely pleasant and marijuana takes the edge off it, and many men chose to round off that edge. The female doesn't find herself in that condition in the first place, so it doesn't seem to improve the subjective experience within her nervous system.
WaPo: "Only about three-in-ten conservative Republicans (29%) say marijuana use should be legal. Moderate and liberal Republicans are far more likely than conservatives to favor legalization (53%)."
++ ... is not consistent with the 'white male effect':
"Prior research focusing on risk perceptions has led to the observation that well‐educated and politically conservative white males** tend to systematically perceive lower levels of risk from a wide range of hazards when compared to other members of society (e.g., white women, nonwhite women and men)."
**other sources make the same or similar claims about that subset of 'white males'.
The other Kevin is right. Women oppose marijuana use because they know that nothing destroys ambition like pot. It leaves them with no beta providers to latch onto when their youth dries up. And since everything about our society is geared towards maximizing the return on women’s sexual market value at any moment of their lives, no matter how old they are or how bad their choices were in their youth, this conflict is now a thing.
It’s not as bad a conflict as the one between feminists and trans “women” but it is definitely there, waiting to be exploited.
that's fine Professor Althouse, but doesn't have anything to do with marijuana; does it?
Alcohol, cocaine, heroin, skydiving, drag racing; there's Lots of stuff that appeal primarily to males.
Speaking of men, I watched this documentary on male circumcision last night on Netflix.
Gay men friends in NYC had tried to interest me in what they called "male genital mutilation" way back in the early 90s. The leaders of men's rights organizations have always been mostly gay men.
There is no medical justification for circumcising male babies. The foreskin is not just a senseless piece of skin. It is as jammed packed with nerves as a woman's clitoris. Just as with female babies, circumcision is extremely painful and traumatic for male babies.
I wonder whether this male infant experience of pain, abandonment by his parents and the total disinterest of just about everybody in a male infant's pain and trauma has something to do with the male willingness to endure risk. We learn as infants that we're on our own.
"that's fine Professor Althouse, but doesn't have anything to do with marijuana; does it? Alcohol, cocaine, heroin, skydiving, drag racing; there's Lots of stuff that appeal primarily to males."
Yes, it does. I think marijuana has a particular effect that reaches men in a way that it does not reach women. There's the "estrogenic effect." I'm not saying men should want to estrogenize themselves, just that they feel something when they do, and women do not. Just a hypothesis. I'm not a researcher.
Kevin nailed it. The family's social status and financial strength are totally destroyed by habitual drug use. Why so many men are that stupid is a question best answered by Jodan Peterson, but sane women plan for a successful life rather than a destroyed life. Men would do well to follow the women.
When it comes to legalizing marijuana this article makes the case that women are not more liberal than men. It speeds off in the direction of arguing that support for legalization is an embrace of risk taking and risky behaviors, but isn't it really that these men are willing to stay out of other people's personal behavior choices? Women, on the other hand, are willing to ignore their more liberal instincts in the interest of protecting (I would say mothering) others from taking on risky behaviors.
Then again, it could just be the patriarchy: white males live in such a priviliged world that what seems like risky behavior to others is not for them.
I was born in a shack in the middle of the cornfields in rural Illinois.
The same was true for my sisters. However, my sisters had an option not available to me... marrying up, that is, improving their financial status by marrying a higher class man. And they did.
I did resort to very high risk strategies to improve my financial and social status when I was a young man precisely because I was not viewed by women from an upper middle class background as a suitable mate.
Over a long period of time, my high risk strategies worked and I did dramatically improve my financial and social status.
gilbar wears a hangdog look, as he says... okay, i stand corrected, Professor Althouse
There's the "estrogenic effect." I'm not saying men should want to estrogenize themselves, just that they feel something when they do, and women do not. Just a hypothesis.
That there’s whatcha call an interesting thought.
Young men tend to hang out in larger and better-bonded groups than women (such as sports teams), so use is more likely to spread wider.
Funny thing; most of the middle class white women I know are weed smokers. The husbands are usually the more sober.
I wonder how this fits in with the whole white middle class woman wino thing?
Now to marijuana.
I was raised by a WWII vet father to be stoic and to ignore pain. Sports training, especially for football, was really focused on ignoring pain. My dad raised me to be the next generation to storm the beaches in a hail of machine gun fire, like his generation did at Normandy.
I began to search for a way out of my pre-ordained sacrifice when I was 16 and it's not exactly an accident that I started smoking pot at that age.
My willingness to engage in risky behavior increased dramatically. What the hell! I was destined to be cannon fodder anyway.
I sometimes put FailArmy on the Roku, and my dad keeps saying "Stupid!" at the ridiculous things the young guys try to do. The young women are usually just drunk.
Seriously? 'scholars' 'debate why' ? SERIOUSLY? Hello! most men are spares,
Every man lives with this truth, and women, with there utter inability to empathize with men, can’t see it. Probably because to accept that men are pretty much expendable would cast a shadow on women’s self image of virtuousness and selflessness. Which is pretty true mostly when applied to their children, it just doesn’t really extend beyond that in any deep way.
Here's one article about the difference in the effect on males and females (basically saying that marijuana has a greater effect on women (because of estrogen).
"f CB1 receptors are overly activated because of interactions between THC and estrogen, the system falls out of balance, and negative consequences can result. For instance, adolescent women who use cannabis had larger amygdalas than their cannabis-using male cohort or non-using women. This is an important brain region in the “threat circuit,” and indeed, these women had a more negative mood and heightened anxiety compared to their peers."
Funny thing; most of the middle class white women I know are weed smokers. The husbands are usually the more sober.
I only knew ex weed smoking women and still weed smoking men, but I am in my sixties, so that may affect my view.
these women had a more negative mood and heightened anxiety compared to their peers."
Self medication is a folk trope for a reason.
I don't really know the science here. I would have thought the gender difference was that men feel more and women tend to remain the same. But the article I just read says the opposite.
In any case, I think there is a gender difference in the impact and there's something about cannabis and estrogen.
Too much of a pretzel of leftie themes to unravel. Are we trying to find the thing to say to get people to accept civilization crushing climate policy or are we mad there’s people that think potheads are stupid?
One way to try to research this is to see which strains of marijuana women choose — that is, what effect do women want and what do they actually get and come back for?
Versus what men shop for and buy and buy more of.
From that link: "Uplifting sativas and hybrids dominate female preferences, with both charts combining to include only two indica strains. Even the hybrids offer a patten of euphoric, happy, and uplifting commonalities, suggesting these effects are desirable among female consumers."
"So what strains do women want? According to our data, it’s high-CBD strains and uplifting sativas and hybrids that deliver anti-anxiety effects and taste damn good. Dispensaries: take note of our findings and stock your shelves accordingly."
But what happens to the female hippocampus?
Women are less likely to get regular exercise, so their brains are not releasing as many of those wonderful endorphins, leading to a higher incidence of depression. Male suicide rates increase in old age as their testosterone levels plummet.
I think that suicide is another area where white men differ from white women and black people. There is a song about suicide that was popular called “That’s Life” It ends in suicide, but when James Brown covered it, it wasn’t a suicide at the end, instead he killed somebody else, or cut him or. something, I haven’t heard it in a while.
"Women ...are willing to ignore their more liberal instincts in the interest of protecting (I would say mothering) others from taking on risky behaviors."
Dunno, "preventing you from doing something for your own good" sounds like pretty standard liberal operating procedure to me.
Men tend to be more libertarian than women, and are more likely to let the individual decide what they ingest.
Kevin is right; women don't need more men lying around smoking dope and doing stupid things when they should be out working hard to support a family.
So I visit Althouse once or twice a day and read from the top (latest) to (or towards) the bottom (older). Today, reading/viewing the cold water surfer, post I noted several comments alluding to marijuana. While not completely out of place in a blog post about surfing, these comments seemed to refer to some other story. And sure enough, the next post further south was about pot smoking in men.
Which leads me to my larger question,
Do most Althouse commenters when visiting the site first go to their last read/commented on post and work their way up?
-OR-
Do most Althouse commenters read Althouse continuously and therefore regularly comment on the post itself with references to the post just past?
In the end, women tend to be more responsible. I know that'll piss off some folks, and it's a vast generalization because we all know about 20 women who are anything but responsible. But I think women are generally regarded as being more mature, both as adolescents and as adults. Any given football Sunday can prove this out. While I'm screaming at the TV with chicken wing stains on my cheeks and potato chip crumbs in my lap, she's emailing her relatives, reading a novel, shopping around town, and scouring her Mediterranean cookbooks for gluten-free options. In other words, she's getting things done. She looks at me and thinks- do I want legal pot for this guy?
...because "as Democratic elites increasingly favor more liberal marijuana policies, this will help push Democrats in the electorate, who are disproportionately women, toward greater support as well." That is, women will follow along once the "Democratic elite" position becomes clear...
...I'm intrigued by the presentation of women as pushed by the Democratic elite. Is being a follower regarded as a positive quality (when you follow the Democratic elite)?
Of course it is, but the prediction is sound. Women aren't inherently more liberal, in any psychologically meaningful sense of the word "liberal". Like men, they vote their own perceived interest, but they are also more conformist. Since "liberalism" is what authority figures have been preaching throughout the lifetimes of current female voters, that is what they support. That contemporary "liberalism" is highly coercive and authoritarian demonstrates that it isn't the actual liberal content of "liberalism" that attracts them.
Phil pi asked ... Do most Althouse commenters read Althouse continuously and therefore regularly comment on the post itself with references to the post just past?
i read it like a book (a bottom to top book), though i do skip some chapters
Speaking of drug use that is antithetical to the development of marriageable menfolk, my (objectively) lovely eligible daughter had a surprisingly hard time finding her now-fiance. She automatically discounted men who were still getting high on any kind of regular basis, which included a large percentage of the dating pool. She also knew that closed-minded liberals would be incompatible (sigh--there went the neurosurgery resident--he couldn't understand what was objectionable about the idea of government controlling every aspect of one's life. No doubt he subconsciously assumed that HIS values would always be the ones imposed on "those others").
Women are smart enough to know this isn’t going to put more smart, hard-working, marriage and family-focused men into the dating pool.
But treating men like splooge stooges when it comes to reproduction and family law will..right?
"My hypothesis is that the male body (nervous system) feels different to itself than the female body and that marijuana provides a more desirable tweak to the male body than to the female body."
-- My hypothesis is that men are more likely to face consequences (either due to more use of or more risky use of) marijuana. I present this as evidence for my hypothesis. Something like +90% of drug offenders for marijuana in jail are male; the percent of female marijuana offenders are something like barely 7%. I imagine that a lot of the discrepancy can be explained by men who use it simply knowing how badly the deck is stacked against them, while women, who either don't use or don't get incarcerated for use at the same rate, don't see it as negatively.
Kevin is right; women don't need more men lying around smoking dope and doing stupid things when they should be out working hard to support a family.
Why when over half the time they end up supporting an ex-wife, her new boyfriend and what used to be his family?
Man in my neighborhood owns a local dispensary. Shared that what industry research failed to anticipate was the strong market for women 50 years and older. Maybe the menopausal factor at work?
My hypothesis is that men are more likely to face consequences (either due to more use of or more risky use of) marijuana. I present this as evidence for my hypothesis.
Better find some better evidence, because yours is "Drug Offenders in Federal Prison", and it says:
"Almost all (99.5%) drug offenders in federal prison were serving sentences for drug trafficking.
Cocaine (powder or crack) was the primary drug type for more than half (54%) of drug offenders in federal prison."
And it tends to contradict the "risky white men" nonsense:
"Blacks were 88% of crack cocaine offenders, Hispanics or Latinos
were 54% of powder cocaine offenders, and whites were 48% of methamphetamine offenders."
And only 12.4% of the drug cases in federal prison were for marijuana.
I only knew ex weed smoking women and still weed smoking men, but I am in my sixties, so that may affect my view
Are you sure you're in Vermont Tim? Are you just staying away from Brattleboro and Burlington?
As I recall there was research that said smoking pot excessively made guys have higher estrogen and get big boobs. Unless this was just reefer madness. But perhaps this independently supports the Althouse conjecture.
I think future pregnancy has something to do with it. It's like smoking cigarettes. Girls who take up smoking or pot know they will need to stop when they get pregnant. It affects girl group behaviour & the behaviour of young women groups.
Once a person gives birth, she won't think it's a good idea to take up pot or smoking while breastfeeding. Second-hand smoke is horrible for small lungs. Getting high while watching young children is ill-advised, and mom friends would look askance. Mom's getting high in front of teenagers is a bad example if you don't want your kids to get high or smoke cigarettes. Some girls & women are willing to take it up. But not the norm.
Right: But of those 12.4%, 90+% of them were men. I'm not agreeing with "risky white men;" I'm saying that men are more likely to face punishment for using marijuana, and therefore, more likely to want to see it decriminalized than women, who rarely, face punishment (for whatever reason).
It has nothing to do with whether or not men or women are more risky; it is more looking at the huge disparity in convictions/jail time between men and women and instead positing it is just pure self interest. Men, for whatever reason, maybe risk or liking it more, are way, way more likely to have to deal with the legal problems surrounding marijuana. So, naturally, they're more inclined to want to limit the law's ability to punish people for using or abusing marijuana.
We need to define our terms.
Women are more "liberal", not in the classic sense of laissez-faire, but in the current nanny-state meaning. This explains why liberal men are such bitches.
Everyone must learn to love Big Mother.
My own hypothesis on this is that women tend to trust authority figures more than men, so when the authority figures have been preaching drugs and smoking are bad their whole lives, they are more likely to agree with that position.
Smoking as a general activity is frowned upon by the culture and women haven't quite adjusted to the new nuanced message that smoking tobacco and vaping are bad things, but smoking weed is now good.
Its not just marijuana : " Adult men are 2 to 3 times more likely than women to have a drug abuse/dependence disorder...".
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2235192/
There is a heritable difference in susceptibility to drug addiction.
Right: But of those 12.4%, 90+% of them were men. I'm not agreeing with "risky white men;" I'm saying that men are more likely to face punishment for using marijuana,
Those 12.4% are almost all Mexican smugglers, not pot smokers.
Smoking weed will not be popular among majority of women aged 20-40 unless research shows it's good for babies, born & unborn. We all know it's not gonna show that, so more men then women will use pot. Above age 55, it may be a different story.
Canada legalized pot a few months ago. Schools, libraries, athletic clubs, churches all needed to come up with rules about it.
Man in my neighborhood owns a local dispensary. Shared that what industry research failed to anticipate was the strong market for women 50 years and older.
It would be great if it cured bitterness.
"white women and men and women of color worry more about the consequences of global warming and nuclear power",
Anecdotal, to be sure, but I have never heard a woman of color express worry about global warming. With many white women it is near obsession but don't even try to get them to explain it.
Shared that what industry research failed to anticipate was the strong market for women 50 years and older.
Ask and ye shall receive! Two posts later:
, the months or years before a woman stops menstruating, might explain why a woman with no previous history of mental illness might suddenly come down with a bad case of psychosis. And the absence of estrogen after menopause might explain why a woman’s psychotic symptoms could suddenly resemble those of a very young man....
Kevin is right; women don't need more men lying around smoking dope and doing stupid things when they should be out working hard to support a family.
The deal used to be the man worked himself into an early grave supporting his wife and children while women stayed home and raised the children and maintained the household.
Women decided they were unhappy and changed their end of the deal. That was "progress". Now that men are unhappy and are changing the deal, it's a "problem".
Well said, Gahrie.
"white men in particular, tend to accept risk more than others. This helps explain the gender gap"
You mean, like, the gap in building businesses, inventing theories, creating technology, you know, like, the stuff of civilization?
women want to control their men, this goes back to at least Eve; if not Lilith
Women have always controlled their men. It's just that we used to be more subtle about it. ;-)
Liberal women may be more appealing to men who are stoned.
I suppose 'manipulated' would be a better term than 'controlled'. Flattery has always paid off bigly as men tend to believe even the most contrived adulation.
"My hypothesis is that the male body (nervous system) feels different to itself than the female body and that marijuana provides a more desirable tweak to the male body than to the female body. That is, perhaps the experience of having high testosterone is not entirely pleasant and marijuana takes the edge off it, and many men chose to round off that edge. The female doesn't find herself in that condition in the first place, so it doesn't seem to improve the subjective experience within her nervous system."
With a sample size of one, I don't think that is the case. For one thing, it is betas, and esp low betas long term, who tend to prefer pot. A guy cranked too high on testosterone is going to be competing with other males for mates, to get laid. Pot reduces that drive a bit, at least for a lot of guys. I think that too much testosterone causes an increase in violence and, consequently, competitiveness. I do know a couple people in high stress positions where they are excell in their competitiveness use pot to take the edge off their aggression - so a high stakes litigation attorney may smoke a little between cases, but never when involved in one. But they tend to rigorously control their pot usage, and never let it control them or their lives. But most of the guys I know who smoke pot much beyond their early 20s probably have low T, and not tge high T that you hypothesized.
I think for guys, starting to smoke pot is maybe overly risky behavior. I know when everyone started smoking my freshman year in college (1968-69), it was attractive because of the risk, and the guys seemed to start somewhat in correlation with their willies to engage in risky behavior. But the long term chronic pot users I know are almost all low betas in attractiveness. Interestingly, most every guy I knew in college smoked at least some through college, but the vast majority, who were going somewhere, gave it up sometime in grad school or upon graduation from such. Almost none of the potheads were able to finish grad school, and most didn't even bother starting.
Just like getting women drunk, most every guy I know who has smoked pot has tried to get a woman stoned in order to get into her pants. Duh. Compare a couple minutes of time and a quarter ounce or so of seman against nine months of pregnancy, and the reason that males engage in riskier behavior is pretty obvious.
Makes sense Women get more paranoid on the kronic. It definitely confirmed my own anecdotal bias. It also confirms that males who supports prohibition are low T cucks. Biggest pot smokers I ever met were Roughnecks.
Masculinity as all about "risky" behavior and evolution thinks that is a good thing.
The very first comment addressed what I was going to point out- the temperance movement was driven by females overwhelmingly. So is today's anti-porn movement. In short, women are largely expected to be opposed to vices engaged in by men.
Still, 49% to 59% is not that big a difference, if women tend to be about 10% more sensible than men (a perfectly reasonable guess)... For the past several weeks I've seen, on the grocery store magazine racks, a glossy, pot-leaf-emblazoned magazine called "Women And Weed" so there's already a highly recognized market out there, it would seem.
So that old comment about women without men would still be living in grass huts was correct. The men would smoke them.
Masculinity as all about "risky" behavior and evolution thinks that is a good thing.
> the temperance movement was driven by females overwhelmingly
The temperance story was that low class men would spend their wages drinking at saloons, then stagger home and beat their starving wives and children. It also got a lot of support from the evangelical movement, which also opposed tobacco, coffee, and pretty much anything along that line. My grandfather, born 1870, was part of that risky movement and supported women's suffrage, black civil rights, and prohibition. He was Republican :)
The temperance story was that low class men would spend their wages drinking at saloons, then stagger home and beat their starving wives and children.
Not just 'low class' men. Remember that Eleanor Roosevelt's father [T.R.'s brother] was a drunken and abusive husband.
Individual differences motivated by sex and gender.
Don't assume 'against legalization' is 'against weed' - I voted against legalization here in WA despite being a massive pothead. Didn't want the state involved with another 'sin tax' but I am over it. Some of these women could be 'cannabis purists' that are fine with the black market.
But - given my experience probably not (I am always the exception in many cases). I'd love to get to the bottom of this as this woman here could use a female smoke buddy. Don't get me wrong - my SO of many years is a great weed smoking companion. He cleans all our bongs and such every day - my Weed Butler. Living in WA state, up to our eyeballs in weed - you'd think there would be tons of women to hang with and talk weed. Nope.
It would be interesting to see what women opposed to legalization think about alcohol, gambling or other risky behavior. IMHO drinking causes way more problems, and puts one at more risk than weed (assuming legality). A 20-something binge drinker that then has the nerve to get all Puritan about weed - talk about hipocrisy. SOMEBODY is buying up all that cutesy flavored vodka - Smirnoff is not making Pineapple Coconut Sorbet Light flavor for 40 year old white dudes (are they)?
Question: Women are generally more liberal than men, so why is there a "reverse gender gap" on marijuana legalization?
One logical answer:
Men should stop smoking cannabis for at least SIX MONTHS before trying to start a family because the drug alters the DNA of their sperm and 'may pose a risk to their children'
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-6512173/Scientists-discover-cannabis-alters-DNA-sperm.html
The open-access study:
Epigenetics. 2018 Dec 6. [Epub ahead of print]
Cannabinoid exposure and altered DNA methylation in rat and human sperm.
Murphy SK1, Itchon-Ramos N2, Visco Z1, Huang Z1, Grenier C1, Schrott R3, Acharya K1, Boudreau MH1, Price TM1, Raburn DJ1, Corcoran DL4, Lucas JE5, Mitchell JT2, McClernon FJ2, Cauley M6, Hall BJ7, Levin ED2, Kollins SH2.
(All in various departments of Duke University)
"...A large number of studies have assessed the deleterious effects of cannabis use on a range of outcomes [4], including adverse effects of prenatal exposure during pregnancy via maternal use [1]. A growing body of literature has begun to focus on the potential heritability of effects resulting from pre-conception cannabis exposure [5].
At least two studies in rodents have reported that adolescent exposure to cannabinoid agonists (prior to conception) results in different drug seeking behavioral phenotypes in adult offspring [6,7]. There is a currently a gap in knowledge about cannabis use effects on paternal reproductive factors. Identifying the sources (pre- versus post-conception) and their differential impacts on offspring is necessary for setting prevention effort
priorities..."
Discussion
"This study is the first to report that cannabis use among males of child-bearing age compared to non-using males results in substantial disruption in the DNA methylome of their sperm..."
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/15592294.2018.1554521?needAccess=true
"Men should stop smoking cannabis for at least SIX MONTHS before trying to start a family because the drug alters the DNA of their sperm and 'may pose a risk to their children'"
Yeah this too. Don't consume it if you're trying to have a baby.
Really, no one looking to get married says, "I've got a great plan! I'm going to marry a pothead." That goes for men; that goes for women.
RigelDog said...
Speaking of drug use that is antithetical to the development of marriageable menfolk, my (objectively) lovely eligible daughter had a surprisingly hard time finding her now-fiance. She automatically discounted men who were still getting high on any kind of regular basis, which included a large percentage of the dating pool. She also knew that closed-minded liberals would be incompatible (sigh--there went the neurosurgery resident--he couldn't understand what was objectionable about the idea of government controlling every aspect of one's life. No doubt he subconsciously assumed that HIS values would always be the ones imposed on "those others").
To the Barrel.
Get it at the Althouse Amazon Portal
" Flattery has always paid off bigly as men tend to believe even the most contrived adulation."
A little bit goes a long way.
Glad to see hour hostess acknowledge that women are the Statist Sex.
Women don't want their mates sitting on the couch all day toking.
Then taking money out of her purse to buy more legal weed.
Liberal women may be more appealing to men who are stoned.
Nope. Not if they're smoking the good stuff.
More men support legalization then women for the same reason more men are libertarians.
Lots of men don't give a shit about anyone else. Live, die, whatever. You're on your own dude.
Women are more likely to think "What about the children?" or the effect on the family or other people.
All this legalization of MJ is going to have massive - and expensive - health benefits down the road.
The same liberals who love MJ, hate cigarettes.
Both are bad from a health care stand point.
but there's $$$ to be made. And that's all America cares about.
I’m guessing there is no statistical difference between liberal men and women on this issue; the gender difference comes from libertarians, who skew male.
Women are more divergent? That's probably diversity, but a statistically significant minority will always be Pro-Choice.
Pot makes people fat, perhaps.
Are we missing the Mom effect? If marijuana is legal, that means my son/daughter can buy it and smoke it and then get interested in harder drugs (gateway BS, but still evident in a lot of thinking)
Interesting discussion. My wife smokes pot and I do not. Yet, I place legalization at a much higher priority than she.
My thoughts on legalization come back to "What's it going to cost me, a non-user?"
If we leave people to deal with the fallout of what they're doing, without government cleaning up after them, then legalization doesn't present any more of a problem than alcohol.
Then I wonder if I'm compelled to endorse it. If I have to put up with potheads, in a way that I don't with drunks, then no.
Though when it comes to women's supposed 'moral superiority', I know far more women who are drinking, even as they'll scold others. More chardonnay, dear?
Ann Althouse said, "You can see that they're presenting the independence and courage of men as 'risk taking,' 'deviance,' and insensitivity to 'morality.'" (emphasis added)
If the same pattern were seen, but with the genders reversed, the WaPo analysis would have been along the lines of "You can see that they're presenting the independence and courage of women as 'innovation,' 'independence,' and 'inclusive willingness to embrace new models of morality.'"
Re. my last comment, yes, I should have been a little more precise and written "Ann's retelling of the WaPo analysis."
Because they don't want to hang around with stoner losers??
As Roseann Roseannadanna would say; oh, NEVER MIND!
You got your Gilda Radner characters mixed. That would be Emily Litella.
In the end, women tend to be more responsible. I know that'll piss off some folks, and it's a vast generalization because we all know about 20 women who are anything but responsible. But I think women are generally regarded as being more mature, both as adolescents and as adults.
You're confusing a lower tolerance for risk with maturity. It's not the same thing.
Fernandistein, "-" means "not" (i.e., result does not include)in Google search syntax, so you searched for results that include "risky white men" and do not contain the word "marijuana". Try again.
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