Contributor: Missy Matheny
Being a parent is one of the most important (and stressful) jobs a person can take on.
Being responsible for another living being, with their own wants, needs, and opinions, can be trying for even the most prepared individual. And throughout history, caregivers have used many things to help ease the tension levels that can accompany trying to raise little humans.
In the current cultural climate, there are two common socially acceptable substances used by adult caregivers: alcohol and prescription medication.
How society determines what’s acceptable
Alcohol, on a whole, is a socially acceptable way to release stress.
Going out and getting wasted on the weekends is promoted in the media through commercials, television shows, and movies. They show people having a great time, but rarely do they show the consequences of overindulgence. With beer drinking dads being the normal stereotype portrayed on TV sitcoms for decades now, and mothers who constantly drink wine becoming a regular joke for sitcom fodder, their presence in our lives is more apparent than ever.
Prescription medications weren’t always as socially acceptable as they are today.
Before the late 1990s, pharmaceutical companies weren’t allowed to advertise medications directly to the public. According to an article published by Minnesota Medicine, The U.S. Food and Drug Administration relaxed the rules on advertising in 1997. This let prescription medication manufacturers advertise directly to the public. This change lead to an increase of over 50% more prescriptions being used from 1999-2000 among US adults (Source: Ncbi.nlm.nih.gov).
The counterpart to alcohol in prescription medication is Xanax. With over 48 million prescriptions for Xanax written in 2018 (Source: Ncbi.nlm.nih.gov), it’s no wonder it has become a recognizable name in popular culture.
The most recent data available by the CDC states that almost half the adults in the US take at least one prescription medication. Similarly, the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse reports that over 55% of adults in the US, have consumed alcohol in the past 30 days.
Alcohol and prescription medication have been so ingrained into modern society, and so acceptable, that over half the population of the US is using one or the other, and commonly, both.
In 2012, Colorado became the first state to legalize recreational marijuana. With this revolution, people began admitting that they use marijuana. This included parents. And even though over half the population of adults use some form of substance regularly, there came a backlash, and a now standing stigma, against a group of cannabis-loving parents known only as, “Weed Moms.”
A brief history of women and controlled substances:
The first thing that needs to be pointed out is: it wasn’t always acceptable for women to drink alcohol.
Before the prohibition of alcohol in the 1920s, pubs and saloons were either strictly for men, or for women of ill repute (Source: Marieclaire.com). With the outlawing of alcohol, and the birth of the underground speakeasies, women were finally allowed to drink in public with men, albeit in underground clubs. Drinking alcohol was one of the ways women rebelled against societal standards back then.
Prescription medication has a darker history with women, however.
Making women docile and subservient has been the norm throughout civilized history. If that couldn’t be achieved, some husbands and fathers sent these unfortunate women to asylums (Source: Mirror.co.uk). As pharmaceutical companies began advertising directly to the public, they began targeting women in high numbers (Source: nlm.nih.gov). With this, women are being prescribed more and more medications, and, according to the CDC, statistically, women have even caught up to men in opioid deaths per year.
With alcohol once being unacceptable for women to do, and a history of women using it in defiance of cultural standards of the time, alcohol has only found general acceptance in recent history.
Prescription medication has been inundated into our society through advertising. The more the brain sees something, the more it accepts that thing as normal. The consequences of this are being felt now, with opioid addiction becoming an epidemic, and it will continue to be felt for decades to come.
Opinions from Moms
I reached out to some mothers, who use either alcohol and/or marijuana on a semi regular basis, and asked each of them their opinions about why they think there is a stigma against moms who choose to use marijuana.
Courtney K. had this to say, “I believe as a society, we are stuck in this belief we were taught that weed is some gateway drug, and is much worse than alcohol.”
Tammy W. brought up the legal history, “I feel weed has more of a stigma because it used to be illegal, while drinking wine is socially acceptable and legal.” Tammy added that, “I definitely think it’s associated with generational stigmas, like [the stereotype] of the worthless hippy, while you could smoke cigarettes and drink [alcohol] while pregnant.”
Laura C. went into the double standard for women, saying, “Anytime moms do anything to relax, involving something for them, they are persecuted. I swear, if dads keep their kids mostly alive, and fed occasionally, and want to smoke a jay, or drink a whole six-pack, it’s all okay for them.”
Courtney K. added, “…and at some point, that stigma has to die.”
The real cause of the bias
The stigma behind moms using marijuana is a long-term stigma against women, in general, doing anything to relax.
From alcohol before the 1920s, to smoking a joint today. Society seems to look down on moms who need to relax. Moms aren’t supposed to be stressed out, tired, or in need of a little unwinding. Moms are supposed to be available anytime, day or night, ready to make everything “okay.” Moms aren’t supposed to need a break.
Some of the contention in the argument between “wine moms vs weed moms” was created as a way to single out weed moms in the never-ending assault against mothers failing to be perfect. The media uses this narrative to feed the idea that the two parties are somehow against each other. The reality is they aren’t.
Moms and stereotypes
Women are breaking down barriers every day, and the stereotypes of wine drinking moms, or pill popping moms, or the stoner mom, are all just ways the overall male dominated media tries to spark ratings. A good old catfight is always beneficial for ratings (Source: Wikipedia: Media manipulation: Clickbait).
In the end, it’s another way for our society to pit women against each other.
Women are becoming more supportive of each other with every new generation. Close female relationships are touted as important in modern culture, and as women become more and more united, the male dominated world becomes more nervous. If they can tear us down with little pop culture things like #weedmoms, or #winemoms, and have pop culture embrace these stereotypes that they created, then it’s a small victory for their egos, and their hopes of keeping women from standing up for themselves.
Women are uniting
What I heard when asking the women I talked to about the stigma of weed moms was: voices of support for women they didn’t know, to have the right to choose what works best for them, without repercussions, and without backlash.
All of them believed that if a person is a responsible adult, and all precautions are taken, a mother should have the right to use any legal substance in her free time – just like any other person. Holding moms to a higher standard is not only unfair, it’s outright harsh. They have one of the most stressful jobs on the planet.
Maybe we could cut them a little slack, huh?
