superbowl marijuana

January 29, 2003 8:34 PM

Amusing Op-Ed piece on this year's Anti-Drug Superbowl ad "But this has got to be good news for some. Infertility clinics are in for a big surprise with this one. Forget all those expensive, painful procedures. Simply grab some weed, and boom-boom!" [NORML article]
posted by skallas (51 comments total)

Smoking pot doesn't get you pregnant. Being a 14 year old slut does. Don't be a slut.

Thats what my anti-anti drug commercial would say.
posted by pemulis at 8:44 PM on January 29, 2003

The moral I got from the commercial was that slutty teens give up the sex if you give them pot, and I was like, "Hey alright. I've got to get some pot."
posted by Stan Chin at 8:47 PM on January 29, 2003

what if you're at a party and other people are smoking the marijuana? can you get pregnant that way?
posted by birdherder at 8:49 PM on January 29, 2003

...sounds like a 2-story hooka...

Dude, that be wicked!

Wicked!
posted by SweetJesus at 8:50 PM on January 29, 2003

Girls who smoke, fuck
posted by mathowie at 8:53 PM on January 29, 2003

Anheiser-Busch had eleven separate spots during the Super Bowl. Marijuana got blamed for accidental pregnancy (as if one could really handle something as complex as a bra while stoned). At least they haven't been blaming MJ for car accidents...
posted by apostasy at 8:54 PM on January 29, 2003

Imagine if they hired Carrot Top to do those anti-drug comercials...
posted by pemulis at 9:14 PM on January 29, 2003

There used to be a time when the government funded informational campaigns. The much villified by the right, Sex Education, which is needless to say, left up to today by Rap flavor "Misogyny", the television shows that showcase mutilated and raped bodies of HOT women that detectives go about using forensics to deduce the cause of their death, sexual idolatry that has perhaps never been known before this time--the youngest of girls today prance around in hot pants. And they blame the very left which advocates the legalization of marijuana and of course the need for comprehensive sex education for all of the above?

Sex ed? Who needs it? We here in America have Sexual Dis-Ed. All things that cause something else are now caused by something that US government authority has up til now, not found it worth their effort to let the public onto.

Pot smoking teens who lackidaisically kill each other. Teens who get pregnant because they hit the bud. Teens who are raped were done so because a gateway's a gateway, just ask the virginal vagina of your daughter. Don't of course, blame the turn of pop-culture to the capitalistic vultures who sop of every last bit of our beings to sell this and that. Blame it on pot.

Kids have every reason to be apprehensive about sex. The open predatory-ness of boys these days is unnerving. Perhaps it's always been. But the apprehensiveness of teens about sex has always remained the same. Excitedly nervous about it all.

It's one thing for a society to embrace sexual liberalism. But it's entirely another beast to compliment it with a moralistic war against sex education while the same capitalistic politicians and pillars of morality, who did not and still do not find any problem with predatory advertising campaigns, use sex to increase shareholder value. Making all of us prey.

We're going down, down, down
posted by crasspastor at 9:29 PM on January 29, 2003

apostasy: Anheiser-Busch had eleven separate spots during the Super Bowl.

Wonderful point. I don't have any hard numbers... but my feeling is that the "drunk girl putting out (and/or being raped)" is a recognizable character in our culture for a reason. But I haven't seen "stoned girl putting out (and/or being raped)"... well, at all (which is not to say it never happens).

Doesn't seem to follow... knowing what I know about the effects of both substances.
posted by cadastral at 9:43 PM on January 29, 2003

crasspastor: Yet these same moralizing politicians rail against the very culture of promiscuity you criticize, and when they do they are vilified for trying to censor artistic expression, usually by those who support more sex education. Which is it, then? Are we vilifying pop culture's seedier sides or are we celebrating a pop culture free of state intervention? Those less than savory programs you point to air because censorship is minimal. What exactly are you suggesting? More PSAs? More censorship? More PBS?
posted by apostasy at 9:54 PM on January 29, 2003

I really fucking wish that people would stop taking Michael Jackson's name in vain.
posted by afx114 at 10:03 PM on January 29, 2003

"Girls who smoke, fuck"

Well, back in my day, it was "You have to poke to smoke", which not only rhymed but also had the added bonus of using the word "poke" as a euphemism for sexual intercourse, which made it amusing as hell.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 10:08 PM on January 29, 2003

You know, the Canadian gov't, or perhaps the Anheuser-Busch funded D.A.R.E. agency, ran an ad campaign a while back implying that male, teenage potheads are all nosepicking losers who will Never Get Laid.

Mmmmm, the sweet taste of cognitive dissonance.

mathowie: As a non-smoker, many's the time I've been tempted to pick up a pack of DuMauriers just to pick up chicks in bars. "Why, sure I've got a cigarette, would you like a light?" Then, I read some advice in Maxim telling people to do just that, and decided it was probably a cheeseball idea.
posted by arto at 10:28 PM on January 29, 2003

I'm suggesting nothing. Only train of thought here.

Sex is ours. Yours, mine etc. Marijuana, though I would never use this tact in argument, is also ours. Yours, mine etc.

Both happen, however, to have dimensions of acceptibility and yet also retain this bullshit "gateway-ness" that to do either, or dabble in any of it, is to ripen yourself for the unknown Penis. But it's a matter of degree.

In other words. What exactly is the message being sent to society that simultaneously finds sexual liberation beneficial but only when it can be profitable and sex ed that empowers children who get all the sex ed they'd never need anyhow gets ie: "Rap flavor "Misogyny", the television shows that showcase mutilated and raped bodies of HOT women that detectives go about using forensics to deduce the cause of their death, sexual idolatry that has perhaps never been known before this time--the youngest of girls today prance around in hot pants."

Personally, I think it broadcasts an authoritarian patriarchal code. Do as we sell to you, but do not sell yourself into admitting that what we are are sexual. Marijuana notwithstanding, for god sakes, marijuana has NOTHING to do with it. Sure, any drug can be a sexual lubricant. But for Authority to conflate the two, uses our pliant minds to find no worth in our very own self-correcting faculties. Therefore we wait for them to explain to us what does and does not cause what. Not quite the renaissance of humanistic potential I felt growing up in the 70's and 80's. More like a horrible societal regression into authoritarian sanctioned superstition.
posted by crasspastor at 10:32 PM on January 29, 2003

I meant "social lubricant".
posted by crasspastor at 10:36 PM on January 29, 2003

Not "sexual lubricant".
posted by crasspastor at 10:36 PM on January 29, 2003

Well, in no way do I want to be to graphic here, but my experience has been when I smoke with a girl, my chances of sleeping with her diminish just because we'll become fairly dumb and hyper-self-conscious.

However, take a girl out drinking, or stay home drinking, or have a couple $6.00 Anheiser Bush Superbowl XXXVII pints at SeaTac Airport, and we are playing a different ballgame.

What a waste of *my* tax money to try and insinuate lighting up will lead to the kind of self destructive behavior experience has taught me follows drinking.

That commercial, and the other one, with the girl on the couch at the party getting pseudo date raped cause she smoked a bowl, is the MTV Real World version of Nancy Reagan in pearls letting me know that it's okay to just say no.
posted by jdaura at 10:38 PM on January 29, 2003

hmm, my anti-drug is sex. I'm less likely to get pregnant if I do light up.
posted by jessamyn at 10:49 PM on January 29, 2003

They used to tell us that pot smoking guys would grow breasts when I was a lad. And some vague muttering about chromosomes that was never substantiated.
Some things never change.
posted by 2sheets at 10:54 PM on January 29, 2003

Imagine if they hired Carrot Top to do those anti-drug comercials...

Jesus fucking christ. Now that's a good way to keep the kids off the dope. I know that if I associated that freak with pot when I first started, my life would have been very different.
posted by password at 11:18 PM on January 29, 2003

I was always told that if you smoke weed, you can't have kids. Two lies make a truth?
posted by cinematique at 12:11 AM on January 30, 2003

I still think the worst of all of these ads is the one with the kids in daddy's den, where the one behind the desk picks up a gun and shoots the other one.

Clearly the problem there is the Devil's Weed. Not the loaded gun sitting out on the desk. Clearly.
posted by mzanatta at 12:19 AM on January 30, 2003

We're going down, down, down, if that's the only way
2 make this cruel, cruel world hear what we've got to say.
Put the right letters together and make a better day.
posted by inpHilltr8r at 12:46 AM on January 30, 2003

The other day, I slipped and fell on an ice-covered sidewalk. I blame marijuana.
posted by cinematique at 1:08 AM on January 30, 2003

You can download all those loony, fear inducing propaghanda commercials here. It made my night. (Realvideo, Mpeg and Quicktime)
posted by Keyser Soze at 3:25 AM on January 30, 2003

So, I'm pretty offended by these ads, and it's been a reasonably long time since I thought using was a good idea (for me). I'm offended that they're flat-out lying to us, and I'm offended that they think we're stupid enough to buy it.

So, the question is: who produces these ads? Can action be taken? Instead of bitching about it on the internet, can we flood the ad agency with letters, telling them to shove these ridiculous insults up their collective asses? Send a clear message that, if they continue to produce these lies, that we will not buy a single thing from any of their other clients? I don't know - I don't really believe that little boycotts like that will work, and I'm not really any kind of activist, but I'm pretty pissed. What to do?

"It's the money."
posted by majcher at 4:59 AM on January 30, 2003

You know, I frequently tell a friend of mine that the whole world smokes and he just doesn't know it. It truly is a secret society with code-words and everything. I just had the thought that perhaps the advertising directors who create these commercials are even more likely to be smokers themselves and are probably having a grand old time hamming it up at the government's expense! Really, some of the commercials are so ridiculously insulting, perhaps they're subliminal satire.
posted by PigAlien at 5:52 AM on January 30, 2003

Well, in no way do I want to be to graphic here, but my experience has been when I smoke with a girl, my chances of sleeping with her diminish just because we'll become fairly dumb and hyper-self-conscious.

I agree (partially). I have found that, generally speaking, men tend to get horny when they are stoned, whereas most women don't become more sexual under the influence of marijuana. I even had a friend who used to hide his stash from his girlfriend not because she disapproved, but because it reduced his chances of having an amorous evening. Of course, my stoner buddy astutely deduced that "Weed dries chicks up. You know....the same way it gives you cotton mouth."

I think a 30 second spot featuring my hesher friend pontificating about the effects of marijuana on female secretions would make a much more effective anti-drug message.
posted by Devils Slide at 5:54 AM on January 30, 2003

Clearly the problem there is the Devil's Weed

*paranoid* What is wrong with my weed?
posted by Devils Slide at 6:03 AM on January 30, 2003

I once smoked pot and got pregnant. The ad is reality.
posted by tolkhan at 6:04 AM on January 30, 2003

Which came first, the pot or the poke?

of course a lot of harder drug users started smoking pot first, the false corollary being "people who don't use hard drugs didn't smoke pot."
posted by DBAPaul at 6:44 AM on January 30, 2003

I'm waiting for the "if you by gasoline, you are supporting terrorism" spots.
posted by corpse at 7:17 AM on January 30, 2003

I [heart] crasspastor.
posted by Red58 at 8:00 AM on January 30, 2003

and now for the feminist take on this ad campaign. to paraphrase one of the people on the bitch board, it would have been more realistic if the "marijuana: harmless?" squib came up as the girl said "don't worry, honey, we'll try again in the morning..."
posted by pxe2000 at 8:19 AM on January 30, 2003

I'm waiting for the "if you buy gasoline, you are supporting terrorism" spots.

You can exhale now.
posted by ook at 9:26 AM on January 30, 2003

er... perhaps I should've linked to the actual thing instead of the article about "hey wouldn't it be cool if we had this thing". Or there's this other thing. Or maybe I should quit while I'm behind.
posted by ook at 9:30 AM on January 30, 2003

When I was at Davis, "Reefer Madness" was shown as an on-campus movie in 194 Chem. Of course we'd get high, or drunk, and laugh hilariously at it.

Go Aggies
posted by Eekacat at 9:32 AM on January 30, 2003

OK, the ads are ridiculous. The connections made are highly unlikely, and it seems strange to me that the Govt. is not focusing on things like coke and other drugs which are far more serious. Personally I see smoking up the same way I see getting drunk; not the worst thing in the world, but you make yourself damn stupid, at least in the short term, and lose a good bit of judgment when you're doing either.

However, the "SUV terrorism" ads or "gas terrorism" ads are just as ridiculous, as far as the US is concerned. First, of our imported oil, only about 1/4 comes from Arab OPEC nations. Indeed, major suppliers to the US include Mexico, Nigeria, Canada, Norway, the UK, and Iraq through the Oil-for-Food Program. (source). 44 percent of oil comes from domestic sources. (source).

Basically, only 12 percent of our oil comes from the Middle East. Europe and Japan, on the other hand, get a far greater percentage of oil from the MidEast - makes sense, seeing that the transport costs from the MidEast to Europe are a lot less than from the MidEast to the US.

Basically, drugs = terrorism and driving = terrorism are about the same as far as completely illogical and bias-driven arguments are concerned.
posted by Kevs at 10:06 AM on January 30, 2003

Devils Slide >> It has been my observation of the opposite effect....female version of viagra actually. Not that it ever made me any more likely...only the magnitude of enjoyment was greatly enhanced. ;-)
posted by SweetIceT at 11:16 AM on January 30, 2003

Sex while high is terrific, but it hardly puts one in the mood. You gotta be there first.

It is my experience that smoking pot makes most girls just want to make love to a carton if Ben and Jerry's. Not you.
posted by brittney at 11:39 AM on January 30, 2003

It is my experience that smoking pot makes most girls want to make love to a carton of Ben and Jerry's. Not you.
And then there is my experience that smoking pot makes most girls want to make love to a cartoon of Tom and Jerry. With you.
posted by G_Ask at 12:10 PM on January 30, 2003

Seems no one has mentioned the ad that I find perhaps most insulting out of all of them (though this pregnancy one really is over the top as well). I'm sure people have seen the one where it shows some kids smoking in a bathroom stall presumably at a concert. It replays the scene a few times, and in the last one a cop busts in and arrests them.

Now, I don't smoke weed (clean for over a year!) for certain personal reasons, but most of my friends do. The logic of this ad really gets to me. So... people shouldn't smoke weed because it's illegal and you could get busted by the law! Why is it illegal again? Because you shouldn't smoke it. Riiiight....
posted by swank6 at 12:20 PM on January 30, 2003

I have a theory that there's a subversive element to these ads...hidden somewhere deep in the War on Drugs is a mole secretly pushing for marijuana legalization, and she or he is the one behind these ads. It's the only explanation that makes sense, because I find it too hard to believe that even someone relatively clueless about marijuana could possibly really buy the messages in these ads (especially the faulty logic, like the gun one, or the "supporting terrorism" one, or the police one that swank6 mentioned).
posted by biscotti at 12:44 PM on January 30, 2003

*paranoid* What is wrong with my weed?

I'm not sure, but if you send some over I'll try to find out.
posted by mzanatta at 12:55 PM on January 30, 2003

I have a theory that there's a subversive element to these ads...hidden somewhere deep in the War on Drugs is a mole secretly pushing for marijuana legalization.

I've considered that myself, especially with those "Drugs Fund Terrorism" spots. That's only a half-step away from being a pro-legalization message (once you stop to think about WHY narcotics are so profitable).
posted by Dirjy at 2:22 PM on January 30, 2003

The connections made are highly unlikely, and it seems strange to me that the Govt. is not focusing on things like coke and other drugs which are far more serious.

The government still believes the bogus "gateway" theory, so marijuana is where the government has built its Maginot Line.
posted by Dirjy at 2:23 PM on January 30, 2003

Who produces these ads? Why, its the Office of Drug Control Policy!

And if you think its just ads these people are creating to get their zealotry across, you are dead wrong.
posted by Ogre Lawless at 2:58 PM on January 30, 2003

The problem with the commercials is that by so blatently telling lies about the effects of pot smoking, the anti-drug forces lose (with kids at least) any credibility.

Imagine you're a 16-year-old straight-edger and you see these adds, then you hear the honor students talk about how stoned they got over the weekend. Eventually, you're going to start thinking, "maybe those ads are wrong, I won't shoot my friend cause I smoked pot."

Then, they might think "maybe they're wrong about heroin... maybe it's not that bad."

So, instead of just being straight foward like "really, pot iss not that bad, but some of these other ones can really fuck you up," the anti-drug groups lose any trust the kids had in them.
posted by drezdn at 4:14 PM on January 30, 2003

Keep picturing the Inbred Brothers in a series of anti-drug commercials.

FADE IN

Two slow-witted men covered in filth stand in front of an electrical outlet. One of them is holding a bent up wire hanger.

Emmit: Hey, I betcha I could put this in this hole.

Lyle: I betcha you cain't!

Emmit: Bet I can!

Lyle: Betcha you--

Electricity noises, flashing lights, smoke, etc.

Announcer: Smoking marijuana impairs judgement; it's more harmful than we all thought.

These ads crack me up, but it's pure gallows humor. It seems pretty clear to me that only through absurdity can one argue the absurd. Their ultimate goal is to commit injustice, and no rational arguement will support that. What they need is the rabid, seething, foaming support of the uneducated masses.
posted by son_of_minya at 4:34 PM on January 30, 2003

Oddly enough, while stoned, one of my good friends turned down a threesome with two very good looking females.

When he was back to his normal state of mind, he was understandably pissed off.
posted by Dillonlikescookies at 5:00 PM on January 30, 2003

I think Pepsi's Osbournes commercial (and the Osbourne's show in general) was the real anti-drug/alcohol message. Do lotsa drugs, be like Ozzy.
posted by eyeballkid at 1:24 PM on January 31, 2003