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SYDNEY - Smoking a joint is no longer cool among young Australians, according to a new poll which found one in three see it as unacceptable.
The new trend, revealed in the latest National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre study, suggests that marijuana has become socially unfashionable in
the same way as cigarettes.
The drug once perceived as harmless is now overwhelming viewed as dangerous, addictive and linked to a range of serious health and social problems.
"Clearly, it's not as acceptable as it once was to be stoned," said Paul Dillon, a spokesman for the centre at the University of UNSW.
The survey found that although almost half of under 30 year olds have friends who use cannabis, one third say that their peer group find its use unacceptable.
Of the 1500 adult Australians surveyed, three in four felt that smoking dope was dangerous or very dangerous, and half thought it could trigger schizophrenia or anxiety disorders.
About 40 per cent think cannabis is always addictive, and one in five believe it is always a gateway to harder drugs.
And 68 per cent thought cannabis use could lead to other crimes.
The results, published in the latest Pfizer Health Report, reflect a shift in attitudes, even among people who are more likely to come into contact with the drug.
"In the 1970s the people who got stoned were cool but now younger people just see a gang of guys who sit around smoking a bong, eating a pizza and watching television," Mr Dillon said.
"There's a general perception they're just "stoners" and that's a real change."
The attitude shift reflects a similar trend in dope smoking itself, with rates that escalated during the 80s and 90s now remaining steady and, in some cases, even declining.
He said it proved the success of school-based drug education programs, which focus on immediate social impacts of the drug rather than the long term health problems it causes.
The findings also suggest that young people are aligning marijuana with tobacco.
"Smoking cigarettes is now realistically unacceptable in this country and it might just be that that same attitude has jumped across to cannabis," Mr Dillon said.
While the public supported more government action on cannabis, 60 per cent thought those arrested on cannabis charges should be referred to treatment programs rather the courts.
The report's only bad news, said Mr Dillon, was that many beliefs people had about cannabis -- like the fact it leads to harder drug use -- were actually incorrect.
"Cannabis seems to polarise people which gives off a black and white impression of the drug," he said.
"It's spoken of as either God's sweet nectar or the devil's own weed but in reality it's something in between."
- AAP
