Cannabis has been the most popular drug in the world for hundreds of years. It has a multitude of effects and a rich history that spans back to the oldest civilizations. Because it's been around for so long, there are a lot of myths, misconceptions, and all-out falsehoods that everyone should be aware of.

The Top Myths About Weed

Stoners Are Lazy

There is no evidence that suggests that cannabis use is associated with low motivation or intelligence. While there is some evidence that it may inhibit brain development in younger smokers, there is nothing that suggests a person will turn into the jobless and forgetful idiots that populate popular stoner movies and propaganda.

On the contrary, there's a multitude of tokers throughout history that are respected examples of success and ingenuity like some of our founding fathers, Sir Richard Branson, and the real Jon Stewart.

Mangoes

Citrus and drugs have often been paired together in many combinations. Because of cannabis' sometimes pungent citrus aroma from different terpenes its often associated with a lemony or orange flavor, and those terpenes can also have their own effects.

Myrcene is known to enhance penetration of cannabinoids through the blood-brain barrier, thereby expediting the effects of cannabis. But the levels of myrcene contained in one mango are not quite enough to support such an effect. A person would need to eat about five mangos. Good luck!

Overdose

A person can't smoke enough weed to kill themselves. Scientists tried back in the 70's to give enough weed to monkeys and rats to kill them and they couldn't, they were just high for days and unfortunately suffocated some on the smoke. Someone would have to do a tennis ball sized dab over 15 min to die from drug toxicity. So don't fear, you’re way more likely to just have a psychedelic experience that approaches an ayahuasca trip than suffer life-threatening effects. But someone can totally pass out from taking too big of a hit though, so be careful.

Bad Luck Lighters

Superstitions run deep in many cultures. Stoners are no exception with a couple of strange weed beliefs including the legend of the bad luck lighter. This is the idea that white Bic or other lighters bring a person bad luck. There are a few reasons for this, one being the false report that many musicians were found dead with white lighters in their pocket. In truth, only one has had something remotely like this happen. Kurt Cobain was found with a lighter near him but not in his pocket, and many reports say it was pink. When Bic first started making lighters in 1973, they were only available in black or white. So a lot of dead people were found with white lighters in their pockets.

Bong Water

Bongs use water chambers and percolators to filter and cool down smoke. So it stands to reason that whatever small amount of THC water filters stays trapped inside and a person can drink it later for a chill buzz, right? Hell no. There are some residual cannabinoids in that water for sure, but there are also a ton of carbon particles, resin build up, and general grunge that nobody wants to mess with for the tiny amount of high that a person may get. Just spin in circles if you're that desperate.

Holding a Hit in

One of the first things people hear when they start enjoying cannabis is that they should hold in a hit as long as they can so that they get higher. Well, that's just plain not true. It only takes about four seconds for a person's lungs to take in as many cannabinoids as they can from a hit. So any longer than that and they’re just sticking particles to their lungs that shouldn't be there. If you want to use breath control to get high as a kite, then use a vaporizer and take fewer normal inhales in between vape inhales.

Pain Relief

Cannabis does not decrease pain. We know this because there have finally been new studies with cannabis on a few things and we hope there continue to be a lot more. While it does not literally go into a person’s brain and turn down the volume on pain receptors, it has been shown that the sensation of being high does make being in pain more tolerable. In other words, cannabis helps those in pain be more comfortable but does not reduce the pain.

Low Sperm Count

Ah, the dreaded low sperm count. The bottom line is almost anything that happens to a person’s testicles can damage their sperm count. Tight underwear, hot tubs, and yes, almost every drug a person takes regularly can reduce sperm count. But the important thing to note is, to truly wreck a man’s tadpoles, he needs to be a chronic smoker who plans to be a dad. If one uses in moderation they are likely to have nothing to worry about, other than their stoned sperm swimming in circles, that's totally true.

Gateway drug

During the second wave of the war on drugs, many negative myths about cannabis were pushed as propaganda. Framing marijuana as a gateway drug was a popular argument against its use when there was a lack of real evidence that cannabis itself had any negative effects. Politicians and anti-drug activists reported that the use of cannabis led to the more likely use of other, harder drugs. To this day there have been no conclusive studies to back up this suggestion and few people still back this argument.

Strain Names

Let's just be blunt about this. Strain names don't mean much. Maybe they did twenty years ago, but now so many cannabis plants from different areas of the globe have been crossbred, manipulated, and lost and refound enough to make it all almost irrelevant. Everything is a hybrid. Trust your gut and nose when it comes to interpreting what type of strain is at hand unless the grower is in front of you.

We hope we've helped to set the record straight a and maybe you learned something along the way. Let us know if you've heard of any strange weed myths that we haven't covered.