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Cannabis & Social Experiences

Cannabis has many uses and ways of being consumed, though one might imagine a typical stoner to hit their bong in the comfort of their home and maybe watch some TV with a bag of potato chips before crashing for the night. Smoking weed has long been a treasured, but hidden, past-time for many, as cannabis has long been excluded from mainstream culture by the law and outdated anti-cannabis propaganda. With the rise in cannabis legality & usage, it’s becoming more and more acceptable to share cannabis with friends, and unabashedly leave the house while high. We wanted to take a look at what people’s social experience with cannabis is like, and where they like to enjoy it collectively.

How is Cannabis Experienced Socially?

While this plant medicine is not for everybody, and there are many varying experiences with its different strains and usage, studies are starting to show that one of Cannabis’ many uses includes combating social anxiety. The strains that most often produce fruitful social experiences are sativa-dominant, like our energizing & award-winning “Premium Jack.” Successful cannabis use can help keep the consumer relaxed and present in the moment. Social cannabis experiences certainly vary from person to person, as Courtney (32), said, “If I’m going out to a public place like a bar or big party, I tend to smoke less. I don’t like the idea of having to socialize with new people while high. With friends, though, it tends to be a bonding, silly experience that I love.”[i] For many cannabis lovers like Courtney, being high around new people can feel uncomfortable or overwhelming, but with friends, smoking becomes a fun bonding experience. Set and setting can be very important and impactful to one’s experience of cannabis—having a safe and comfortable environment to be in, and having a good mindset going into the experience, will better help you to relax and experience the positive effects cannabis has to offer.

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Where & When is Cannabis Enjoyed Socially?
While most people probably still enjoy cannabis with friends in the comfort of their own home, the spreading legalization of cannabis has led to more open and canna-friendly experiences. At Venice Beach, California, you can barely walk 100 ft without smelling another whiff of reefer. Many people love to enjoy this fruit of nature in the great outdoors, whether it be at the beach, on a mountain, or at the local park. Cannabis is often also enjoyed at music festivals and concerts, regardless of how good of a job security thinks they’ve done. 420-friendly smoking lounges have been popping up in places like Canada and legal states in America, where adults over 21 can now consume cannabis like they would at a bar and get together with friends or meet new ones. One of these lounges is Cannabis Café[ii] in Los Angeles where you can enjoy the herb with friends and squelch your case of the munchies with specially paired, cannabis-inspired dishes. Although smoking in public is still illegal in most cases, cannabis lovers are nevertheless growing their capacity to get high as a community and are starting to perceive that smoking a joint as an adult is just as acceptable as enjoying a beer.   There’s a good amount of people who will only use cannabis socially, similar to how they’d only drink socially: when they’re out with friends who are also partaking. In the 2018 National Cannabis Survey conducted by Statistics Canada, “33% of people who had used cannabis in the past three months said they spent $0 on it.”[iii] It’s probably safe to assume that these people were sharing a hit off a friend’s joint instead of getting free weed from the local dispensary.
Times Are Changing
As the cultural perspective of cannabis grows and expands, more and more people are opening up to public use of this plant medicine. “2 out of 3 Americans say marijuana use should be legal,” according to 2019 data from Pew Research Center,[iv] so it’s only a matter of time before cannabis gets legalized on a federal level. All in all, the future’s looking bright for cannabis to become further socially acceptable and enjoyed by us the way it should be: together.