T
The420Guy
Guest
A quick pop culture quiz to separate the hip from the formerly hip:
What does the term 420 (pronounced four-twenty) mean?
If you don't know that it is an international code word for smoking
marijuana -- especially at 4:20 and on4/20 -- you are not as with it as you
think you are.
The term floats just below the radar of many baby boomer parents who are
totally clueless about the vast underground that celebrates the term.
Parents will hear about it by spring. The National Organization for the
Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) intends to drag the code word into the
mainstream. For the first time, it will hold its annual conference on 4/20
--April 20, a day known as Stoners' New Year.
"We have scheduled the conference to coincide with 4/20, the date that has
become associated in the popular culture as a special day for marijuana
smokers -- sort of what 'Miller time' has become to beer drinkers," says
its Web site, norml.org. "We hope to build on that tradition."
NORML's Allen St. Pierre notes that, unfortunately, 4/20/99 was the day of
the Columbine school shootings, but says he believes the two were not
connected.
The origin of the term is a bit hazy. Some say it has been a police radio
code for "pot smoking in progress." But Steven Hager, editor of High Times,
has traced it back to 1971, to some pot-smoking wiseacres at a California
high school who met frequently at 4:20 to light up. The term caught on and
was popularized in the counterculture by the Grateful Dead, Hager says.
It is now "known universally around the world by people in the (drug)
culture," Hager says. "And for 20 years, there have been important rituals
and ceremonies that happen on April 20," including those on college campuses.
Those observations now include some teens staying home from school. "At
most public schools, April 20 is an (unofficial) holiday," says John
Heydinger, 16, of St. Paul, Minn. "Kids hang out and party."
Those who party too hearty might say they are "420-ed," he says, or really
stoned.
St. Pierre is amazed "by the mass commercialization that has grown up
around 420. Kids can buy all kinds of stuff with 420 on it," including
clothing through the Net and "skateboards, surfboards, snowboards."
Some teens say they use the term almost as a joke. "It's like you see
someone in the hall at 4:20 and say, '420, dude, ha, ha,' " says Brady
Welch, 17, of Mt. Pleasant, S.C.
Teens don't make much of it at his school, says Jared Holst, 15, of
Englewood, Colo. "Kids just happen to know what it means. Someone will say
when it is 4:20."
Parents are usually oblivious to the reference, says Beth Kane Davidson,
director of the addiction treatment center at Suburban Hospital in
Bethesda, MD. "This is a whole culture with kids." The message is, she
says, "even if your adolescent is at home alone at 4:20, and he smokes up,
he is not alone. He knows somebody somewhere else is smoking also."
St. Pierre has some qualms about going public with the term for the NORML
conference. "As soon as it gets bandied about on the Today show, 420 will
fizzle as a cultural phenomenon."
Pubdate: Mon, 29 Jan 2001
Source: USA Today (US)
Section: Life, Pg 1D
Copyright: 2001 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc
Contact: editor@usatoday.com
Address: 1000 Wilson Blvd., Arlington VA 22229
Fax: (703) 247-3108
Website: The Latest US and World News - USA TODAY
Author: Karen S. Peterson
What does the term 420 (pronounced four-twenty) mean?
If you don't know that it is an international code word for smoking
marijuana -- especially at 4:20 and on4/20 -- you are not as with it as you
think you are.
The term floats just below the radar of many baby boomer parents who are
totally clueless about the vast underground that celebrates the term.
Parents will hear about it by spring. The National Organization for the
Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) intends to drag the code word into the
mainstream. For the first time, it will hold its annual conference on 4/20
--April 20, a day known as Stoners' New Year.
"We have scheduled the conference to coincide with 4/20, the date that has
become associated in the popular culture as a special day for marijuana
smokers -- sort of what 'Miller time' has become to beer drinkers," says
its Web site, norml.org. "We hope to build on that tradition."
NORML's Allen St. Pierre notes that, unfortunately, 4/20/99 was the day of
the Columbine school shootings, but says he believes the two were not
connected.
The origin of the term is a bit hazy. Some say it has been a police radio
code for "pot smoking in progress." But Steven Hager, editor of High Times,
has traced it back to 1971, to some pot-smoking wiseacres at a California
high school who met frequently at 4:20 to light up. The term caught on and
was popularized in the counterculture by the Grateful Dead, Hager says.
It is now "known universally around the world by people in the (drug)
culture," Hager says. "And for 20 years, there have been important rituals
and ceremonies that happen on April 20," including those on college campuses.
Those observations now include some teens staying home from school. "At
most public schools, April 20 is an (unofficial) holiday," says John
Heydinger, 16, of St. Paul, Minn. "Kids hang out and party."
Those who party too hearty might say they are "420-ed," he says, or really
stoned.
St. Pierre is amazed "by the mass commercialization that has grown up
around 420. Kids can buy all kinds of stuff with 420 on it," including
clothing through the Net and "skateboards, surfboards, snowboards."
Some teens say they use the term almost as a joke. "It's like you see
someone in the hall at 4:20 and say, '420, dude, ha, ha,' " says Brady
Welch, 17, of Mt. Pleasant, S.C.
Teens don't make much of it at his school, says Jared Holst, 15, of
Englewood, Colo. "Kids just happen to know what it means. Someone will say
when it is 4:20."
Parents are usually oblivious to the reference, says Beth Kane Davidson,
director of the addiction treatment center at Suburban Hospital in
Bethesda, MD. "This is a whole culture with kids." The message is, she
says, "even if your adolescent is at home alone at 4:20, and he smokes up,
he is not alone. He knows somebody somewhere else is smoking also."
St. Pierre has some qualms about going public with the term for the NORML
conference. "As soon as it gets bandied about on the Today show, 420 will
fizzle as a cultural phenomenon."
Pubdate: Mon, 29 Jan 2001
Source: USA Today (US)
Section: Life, Pg 1D
Copyright: 2001 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc
Contact: editor@usatoday.com
Address: 1000 Wilson Blvd., Arlington VA 22229
Fax: (703) 247-3108
Website: The Latest US and World News - USA TODAY
Author: Karen S. Peterson
