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Frequent users of Marijuana are not any more lazy than non-users. Researchers from the University of California did a health and nutrition survey on heavy, moderate, occasional, and non-smokers. “Frequent cannabis users engaged in more physical activity than non-current users,” When they quit using marijuana they stopped being as active as they were while using. (Chris Roberts)This research is hard evidence that the stereotype that has been placed on smokers is a myth and used to repress and shame those who chose to smoke. 

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Frequent users of Marijuana are not any more lazy than non-users. Researchers from the University of California did a health and nutrition survey on heavy, moderate, occasional, and non-smokers. “Frequent cannabis users engaged in more physical activity than non-current users,” When they quit using marijuana they stopped being as active as they were while using. (Chris Roberts)This research is hard evidence that the stereotype that has been placed on smokers is a myth and used to repress and shame those who chose to smoke. 

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One of the hoariest notions around cannabis is that marijuana users are indolent, slothful creatures who lay in bed when they're not lying on the couch, laying in the snacks.

This stereotype's origins aren't exactly clear-it is true that cannabis helps many users sleep, which isn't such a bad thing in a country where one-third of Americans have sleep problems -but recent research suggests that not only is the image of the "lazy stoner" inaccurate, the opposite is true.

Frequent and light cannabis users reported more physical activity than non users, suggesting weed may actually encourage physical activity, according to a study of 2,092 US adults published Thursday in the Harm Reduction Journal.

Coupled with earlier research from the University of Colorado in which cannabis was found to aid exercise routines, these recent findings are more proof that much of the classic "received wisdom" about cannabis users and the drug's impact on peoples' lives is propaganda and hogwash deserving of the dustbin, and not much else.

It also means that instead of imposing a burden on hospitals and life expectancies, as some legalization opponents and prohibitionists suggest, cannabis legalization may have a net positive effect on public health.

Researchers from the University of California, San Diego's Herbert Wertheim School of Public Health and Longevity Science looked at responses to the 2005-2006 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Rather than just relying on respondents filling out questionnaires and hopefully being honest, as most drug-use datasets do, participants here had their activity levels measured by accelerometers, devices that gauge both the length and intensity of physical activity.

This study was the first to quantify physical activity-or sedentary behavior-using accelerometers, the researchers wrote.

Participants were also categorized as light, moderate, frequent, or non-cannabis users, depending on how much cannabis use they reported in the last 30 days. (Given attitudes around drug use in general and the fact that adult-use cannabis did not exist in the United States in 2005-2006, drug use rates are generally understood to be under-reported.)

Researchers found that on the whole, cannabis users' activity rates, as measured by the accelerometers, did not "significantly differ" from non-users. However, "[f]requent cannabis users engaged in more physical activity than non-current users," the researchers wrote in their findings.

And when individuals quit using cannabis, they seemed to stop moving quite as much. "Light cannabis users had greater odds of self-reporting physical activity compared to non-current users."

At right, Nick Diaz, yet another inactive cannabis user.
Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

There were some observed limitations in data. Current cannabis users tended to be younger and have lower body-mass indices than non-cannabis users. And half of cannabis users also reported smoking cigarettes; respondents who did not smoke tobacco also tended to be more active. And the devices weren't waterproof, so if anyone did happen to be a cannabis-smoking swimmer, their activity wasn't recorded in the data.

Why is this, what's going on? The study didn't examine what pharmacological effects, if any, might be encouraging cannabis users to be more active, or why frequent cannabis users tended to be more active than non-current users. It does suggest that if someone is inactive for whatever reason, the reason isn't weed-and the world's most popular illicit drug doesn't seem to be slowing down anyone who uses it.

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Science: The 'Lazy Stoner' Stereotype Is Nonsense-Marijuana Users Are Actually More Active

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One of the hoariest notions around cannabis is that marijuana users are indolent, slothful creatures who lay in bed when they're not lying on the couch, laying in the snacks.

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Steve jobs, one of the most successful and rich men in the world once said "marijuana and hashish make me relaxed and creative." The stereotype about marijuana leading to uneducation, like many others, is incorrect.  

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Steve jobs, one of the most successful and rich men in the world once said "marijuana and hashish make me relaxed and creative." The stereotype about marijuana leading to uneducation, like many others, is incorrect.  

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Marijuana can make someone sleepy or lazy when they are high, but it won't change them in general. It is the same as any other drug, if you abuse it you will see some sort of consequence. The lazy stoner stereotype is dumb, just by looking at most people you wouldn’t know if they smoke or not. It doesn’t make someone lazy, dumb, or a burnout unless they abuse it. There are many successful or even just regular people that use marijuana regularly and it is the people you would least suspect. For example, Martha Stewart, the nice cooking lady we all know and love smokes marijuana with Snoop Dogg.  

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Marijuana can make someone sleepy or lazy when they are high, but it won't change them in general. It is the same as any other drug, if you abuse it you will see some sort of consequence. The lazy stoner stereotype is dumb, just by looking at most people you wouldn’t know if they smoke or not. It doesn’t make someone lazy, dumb, or a burnout unless they abuse it. There are many successful or even just regular people that use marijuana regularly and it is the people you would least suspect. For example, Martha Stewart, the nice cooking lady we all know and love smokes marijuana with Snoop Dogg.  

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The federal bureau of narcotics has been spreading anti marijuana propaganda since the 1930-40’s. Looking at a handful of horrible events they came to the conclusion that these acts were due to marijuana. They believed marijuana use led to violence, rape, crime, and misery. They created The Gore files which reported these stories for the public. This “study” they did gave marijuana its reputation of being a gateway drug. Anslinger, who was the leader of the war against marijuana, had a lot to say about the effects of marijuana. “There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz and swing, result from marijuana usage. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others.​​”

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The federal bureau of narcotics has been spreading anti marijuana propaganda since the 1930-40’s. Looking at a handful of horrible events they came to the conclusion that these acts were due to marijuana. They believed marijuana use led to violence, rape, crime, and misery. They created The Gore files which reported these stories for the public. This “study” they did gave marijuana its reputation of being a gateway drug. Anslinger, who was the leader of the war against marijuana, had a lot to say about the effects of marijuana. “There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz and swing, result from marijuana usage. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others.​​”

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A Brief History Of The False Myth About Cannabis As A Gateway Drug

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When discussing cannabis, those who oppose legalization claim the Gateway Drug Theory, a hypothesis in which the use of cannabis would to the use of so-called hard drugs, such as cocaine and heroin.

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The stereotypes about marijuana have been around for decades, but all of them have been uninformed propaganda which have been proven by scientists through research to be incorrect. While abuse of marijuana can lead to bad things, controlled use can be helpful or relaxing to many people. 

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The stereotypes about marijuana have been around for decades, but all of them have been uninformed propaganda which have been proven by scientists through research to be incorrect. While abuse of marijuana can lead to bad things, controlled use can be helpful or relaxing to many people. 

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These stereotypes can be harmful and are often used to shame people who use marijuana. Lots of the propaganda was also racially motivated, saying that weed is mainly used by people of color and makes them violent. 

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These stereotypes can be harmful and are often used to shame people who use marijuana. Lots of the propaganda was also racially motivated, saying that weed is mainly used by people of color and makes them violent. 

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What I want people to know about weed is that using it doesn't make you evil and shouldn't bring anyone shame. The uneducation lots of people have about marijuana is what leads to stereotypes and misinformation. 

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What I want people to know about weed is that using it doesn't make you evil and shouldn't bring anyone shame. The uneducation lots of people have about marijuana is what leads to stereotypes and misinformation. 

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Marijuana has been known to increase creativity and using a strand called sativa can increase energy and improve focus for some. 

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Marijuana has been known to increase creativity and using a strand called sativa can increase energy and improve focus for some. 

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Some of the most successful people have been endorsers or users of marijuana, proving that the stereotype is wrong. Some of the best music has been made while musicians have been on marijuana. Including, The Beatles, Sublime, Nirvana, Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, and many more iconic rock bands all claim they were high whilst either performing or making their music. Once The Beatles started smoking marijuana they said "We were smoking marijuana for breakfast. We were well into marijuana and nobody could communicate with us, because we were just glazed eyes, giggling all  the time.” 

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Some of the most successful people have been endorsers or users of marijuana, proving that the stereotype is wrong. Some of the best music has been made while musicians have been on marijuana. Including, The Beatles, Sublime, Nirvana, Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, and many more iconic rock bands all claim they were high whilst either performing or making their music. Once The Beatles started smoking marijuana they said "We were smoking marijuana for breakfast. We were well into marijuana and nobody could communicate with us, because we were just glazed eyes, giggling all  the time.” 

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"I remember it pretty well y'know," Paul McCartney explains on the Adam Buxton Podcast, "We were staying in that hotel [the Delmonico in New York City] and we were on tour, so we were all together in the hotel suite. We were having a drink and then Bob [Dylan] arrived and disappeared into a backroom. Then Ringo went back to see him and after a couple of minutes Ringo came back into the suite looking a little dazed and confused and we said, 'what's up?' and he said, 'oh Bob's smoking pot back there', and we said, 'oh, well what's it like?' and Ringo said, 'the ceiling feels like it's coming down a bit'."

It is a pop culture moment that has gone down in history as a seismic event, capturing the imagination and spawning thoughts well beyond the simple happenstance that it represented. "Because we had never had it before," explained Paul on the podcast, and thus the meeting has been catapulted towards the rarefied tag of a cataclysmic moment. It is remembered in pop-culture publications as the first time that The Beatles delved into drugs, a magical mystery ride that would leave an indelible mark on the band's back catalogue forevermore.

There is an argument to be made that Bob Dylan and The Beatles represent the two most influential forces of the counterculture movement. They are both lionised luminaries in their own right, whose influence transcends the field of music and manifests as an essential strand in the fabric of our everyday lives. It is this glossy-eyed narrative of two titans meeting and mutating the world of culture with a liberating toke that has transmuted the story from simple circumstance to urban legend status, a status that helps pave over some of the factual cracks.

For instance, despite Paul McCartney's assertion that "we had never had it before," a George Harrison quote in Anthology seems to contradict this. "We first got marijuana from an older drummer with another group in Liverpool," Harrison is quoted as saying. "We didn't actually try it until after we'd been to Hamburg. I remember we smoked it in the band room in a gig in Southport and we all learnt to do the Twist that night, which was popular at the time. We were all seeing if we could do it. Everybody was saying, 'This stuff isn't doing anything.' It was like that old joke where a party is going on and two hippies are up floating on the ceiling, and one is saying to the other, 'This stuff doesn't work, man.'"

These differing tales represent one thing and one thing only, that at one point in the swinging sixties, The Beatles were bound to meet with drugs; it was as much of a prognosticated certainty as taxes and death. The reason that Paul's version of events is the celebrated story is because it's a million miles away from being trite, with an undeniable underlining tale of truth - it may well have been the first time they had all shared a spliff together. "We dashed into the backroom to partake of the evil substance," McCartney jokes, "And that was quite an evening. It was crazy, it was great fun. But I'm not sure Bob is too keen on being labelled as the guy who turned The Beatles on [to drugs]." And no doubt this begrudging was owing to all the baggage that such a title entails. Not to mention the fact that Dylan was also disbelieving at the time that the four-piece were about to pop their pot cherry.

As Peter Brown, the music moguls present with the Beatles on the night explained, in the Steven Gaines novel, The Love You Make, "[Dylan didn't believe the band had never smoked pot before] he looked disbelievingly from face to face. 'But what about your song?' [Dylan] asked. 'The one about getting high?' The Beatles were stupefied. 'Which song? John managed to ask. Dylan said, 'You know...' and then he sang, 'and when I touch you I get high, I get high...' John flushed with embarrassment. 'Those aren't the words,' he admitted. 'The words are, 'I can't hide, I can't hide, I can't hide.'"

The direct effect of that evening - aside from a mild high and one hell of anecdote - is the song 'Got To Get You Into My Life', which Paul explains is a veiled reference to the bands growing love of the devil's lettuce and a burgeoning desire to smoke more of it. However, in a more nebulous sense, the reverberations of the fateful meeting with The Voice of a Generation were somewhat more impactful.

Whilst the Liverpudlians may well have already been dabbling in 'Purple Hearts', a diet pill that doubled-up as a mild party drug, cannabis represented a departure from the commonplace and a deep dive into different drugs that coaxed a slew of fantastic albums each influenced by a substance that helped inspire it, but also the inevitable comedown and the underlying impact that it may well have had one the band's inevitable demise.

Cannabis, in particular, imbued the band's output with a mellower more introspective side. Around their spliff smoking peak, the four-piece put out Help! An album that saw a much more wistful approach to songwriting, with dreamy songs like 'It's Only Love' sounding like they were plucked from the ether of a plume of puffed-out smoke.

Creatively speaking, it wasn't always a benevolent companion. As John Lennon told David Sheff in the novel, All We Are Saying, "The Beatles had gone beyond comprehension. We were smoking marijuana for breakfast. We were well into marijuana and nobody could communicate with us, because we were just glazed eyes, giggling all the time." The band could barely remember their lines for the Help! picture, and they spent most of their time on set gorging themselves on Cheeseburgers.

As ever, the band's relationship with the drug brought forth the notion of harmless creative muse versus harmful gateway to more nettlesome substances. As Paul concludes on the podcast with a note of caution that encapsulates the dichotomy that the substance represented for The Beatles, "It was always to have something in your mind to lean on [...]. Having said that, these days, it's so much more potent, and you do have to warn kids, just to take it easy, whatever you do."

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How marijuana changed The Beatles forever

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"I remember it pretty well y'know," Paul McCartney explains on the Adam Buxton Podcast, "We were staying in that hotel [the Delmonico in New York City] and we were on tour, so we were all together in the hotel suite. We were having a drink and then Bob [Dylan] arrived and disappeared into a backroom.

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Weed has been shown to lead to nicotine addiction, but not any other drug. If someone chooses to do other drugs after using marijuana it isn't because of marijuana. The choices someone makes with their life isn't connected with marijuana, harder drug use is connected with surrounding yourself with bad people or your environment more than anything else. 

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Weed has been shown to lead to nicotine addiction, but not any other drug. If someone chooses to do other drugs after using marijuana it isn't because of marijuana. The choices someone makes with their life isn't connected with marijuana, harder drug use is connected with surrounding yourself with bad people or your environment more than anything else. 

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“Is Marijuana a Gateway Drug?” National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 24 May 2021, https://nida.nih.gov/publications/research-reports/marijuana/marijuana-gateway-drug

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“Is Marijuana a Gateway Drug?” National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 24 May 2021, https://nida.nih.gov/publications/research-reports/marijuana/marijuana-gateway-drug

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Roberts, Chris. “Science: The 'Lazy Stoner' Stereotype Is Nonsense-Marijuana Users Are Actually More Active.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 1 May 2021, https://www.forbes.com/sites/chrisroberts/2021/04/30/science-the-lazy-stoner-stereotype-is-nonsense-marijuana-users-are-actually-more-active/?sh=38dbe4be71fd

Sabaghi, Dario. “A Brief History of the False Myth about Cannabis as a Gateway Drug.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 7 Dec. 2021, https://www.forbes.com/sites/dariosabaghi/2021/12/07/a-brief-history-of-the-false-myth-about-cannabis-as-a-gateway-drug/?sh=1128ff341dec

Taylor, Tom. “How Marijuana Changed the Beatles Forever.” Far Out Magazine, 10 Mar. 2021, https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/how-marijuana-changed-the-beatles-forever/

Tops, High. “Cannabis Stereotypes and Why They're Wrong.” Hightops Cannabis Dispensary, 27 Feb. 2020, https://hightopscannabis.com/cannabis-stereotypes-and-why-theyre-wrong/