Cannabis users and Homo Sovieticus. Stigma, culture, and delegitimization in Riga, Latvia

Abstract

Cannabis ‘formula stories’ are disproportionately conceptualized from the gaze of a few mostly high-income Anglo-American nations that not only shape their own narratives and policies of cannabis but are also influential abroad. Lack of research in other mostly non-English-speaking countries has translated into a gap in knowledge about what cannabis formula stories are adopted, and how stigma is conceptualized by cannabis users. Using semi-structured interviews with cannabis users, this paper gives the first insight into how cannabis stigma is constructed in the post-Soviet European Riga, Latvia. Analysis corroborates previous findings of the delegitimization strategies that cannabis users adopt to resist stigma. However, people who stigmatize cannabis use are constructed as Soviet-born and agency-stripped Homo Sovieticus, who perceives all cannabis users as physically discriminable ‘potheads.’ To avoid sanctions, cannabis users, as members of the generation that does possess agency, avoid appearing as potheads. Thus, the knowledge and considered evasion of symbols that adhere to societal discriminatory ideas about ‘pothead’ cannabis users represent users’ ‘secret knowledge’ and their functional relationship with a cannabis-disdaining society. The study demonstrates how exaggerated stories shift user attention away from reflections about consumption patterns and toward a concern for the critical capacity of exaggerated cannabis story disseminators.

Keywords:

• Cannabis
• culture
• stigma
• Riga

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank all my participants who shared their stories with me and provided substance for this article. Thank you to the editors for the special issue of the journal, Michal Wanke and Sveinung Sandberg, whose invaluable advice and support brought the article to publication. Lastly, I would like to thank the anonymous peer-reviewers whose comments were both kind and challenging.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).