REEFER MARRIAGE

There are many theories regarding the secret to a happy marriage. Enduring love, of course. Shared spiritual values. Respect. And, of course, not getting married at all. 

Now the medical journal Psychology of Addictive Behaviors takes it to a higher level, thanks to a study of 634 married couples:

Examining the couples over the first nine years of marriage, they discovered that husbands who used [marijuana] around three times a week with their wives, were less likely to be violent towards them in the future. Marijuana use by husbands also predicted less frequent attacks from wives.

Would somebody explain to me how weird
orgies, wild parties and unleashed
passions lead to misery?

Did they need a study to discover that people who smoke dope are probably too high to do anything more aggressive than mindlessly flip through 500 TV channels all night? Keep in mind, too, that the study was done by the University of Buffalo, which, just by being a university, is probably skewed toward smoking weed anyway. 

The study didn't taken into account same sex marriages, perhaps assuming violence never comes into play. However, in my foolish youth -- if you call my 20s and 30s youth -- I got looped with male friends almost exclusively. The closest to violence we ever came was fighting for the last Entemann's cookie, deciding who was going out on another beer run, and disagreeing whether Bela Lugosi or Christopher Lee was a better Dracula. How many non-smoking married couples wish it never got worse than that for them?

The director of the study, Dr. Kenneth Leonard, had a theory regarding the study's findings:

"It is possible, for example, that - similar to a drinking partnership - couples who use marijuana together may share similar values and social circles, and it is this similarity that is responsible for reducing the likelihood of conflict."

Take note that it took a professor at the University of Buffalo, where the yearly tuition is roughly $43,000, to come to the conclusion that couples who smoke dope hang around other couples who smoke dope. Look in the damn dorms, doc!

Or maybe it was because Paul looked
like this when he got high.

Interestingly, on the same news site that reported the study, there was a piece about the dissolution of Neil Young's marriage after 36 years. Young, a longtime pot smoker, told the New York Times that he quit in 2012. Coincidence? 

Think back further, when uber-dope devotee Paul McCartney lay down the pipe at the behest of his second wife, Heather. Anyone remember how fast that marriage went down the drain? 

Lately we've been hearing all sorts of dire warnings from the unofficial morals squad regarding the relaxation, or even elimination, of marijuana laws -- the same group decrying the breakdown of marriage. It would be pretty funny if the University of Buffalo study was eventually proven via a gradual decrease in divorces. "Do you, Mary, take John, in lawful weeded bliss..."

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