When I was in high school, some kids got stoned, drunk or high. In every case I am aware of, it was meant the same thing - the intoxicating substance being some form of alcohol.
Today, there seems to be a difference. Being stoned or drunk or high may mean three different things.
Can anyone elucidate the differences - if there are any?
I've always understood it as drunk is strictly alcohol, and stoned or high is strictly other recreational drugs, often but not only marijuana. (Well, you can get stoned on cold medicine I suppose.) I've never directly asked my teenage informants, but I've never heard one use any of those words differently than I just described.
Edit: Oh, a distinction: stoned is usually on a depressive, while high can be just about any psychoactive.
stoned
"Stoning is a method of capital punishment where a group throws stones at a person until the subject dies from blunt trauma." The victim is stoned.
Stoned and high = marijuana smoking or other intake of THC (Tetrahydrocannabinol) normally.
High can also be other forms of drugs. LSD and other hallucinogens.
Drunk= intake of some form of alcohol.
Stoned and high = marijuana smoking or other intake of THC (Tetrahydrocannabinol) normally.
High can also be other forms of drugs. LSD and other hallucinogens.
Drunk= intake of some form of alcohol.
The only thing I'd add is some people now get high by sniffing glue and certain aerosol propellants.
some people now get high by sniffing glue and certain aerosol propellants
s/now/even back in the 80's/
The only thing I'd add is some people now get high by sniffing glue and certain aerosol propellants.
While definitely not healthy, that too is a small subset of individuals, particular to a particular generation. It was (once) used by kids desperate to get high, before they were old or knowledgable to purchase the more serious drugs. If you can't purchase pot, and aren't old enough to purchase alcohol, what do you do, turn to what you already have around the house.
Moreover, that pattern was handy before kids started collecting and trading bowls full of their parents' medications (esp. adrenal and other popular drugs directed at kids. Since that's obviously a much more effective high, and 'seemingly' safe (to kids), it a better solution than the mild high and high cost you get from things like paint thinner. (With paint thinner, the room spins and you feel good, before you start hacking your lungs out!)
High can also be other forms of drugs. LSD and other hallucinogens.
Having written a book, and done the necessary research, there aren't that many people who pop LSD anymore, as it's not the same high as other recreational of intensive drugs like Coke. There are still some folks who'll try anything, but basically, LSD is now an 'old folks' drug, pretty much a left over of the 1960s.
Can anyone elucidate the differences - if there are any?
Largely, it will depend upon what decade the story is set. As with many words, the definitions have changed over the years.
GO back 70 years, and it was not a bad thing to be seen as being "Discriminating", that simply meant that you had good taste. And as is seen in many movies and songs, at one time being "Gay" simply meant that one was happy.
Compare "The Gay Divorcee" with "Zorro, the Gay Blade". Exact same word, but very different meanings.
I'd say that the word "drunk" implies the intake of an intoxicating liquid, e.g. alcoholic beverage. "High" would imply a euphoric state, hormone- or drug-induced. "Stoned" is likely to be derived from stone-faced, being in a seemingly unresponsive state.
My 2 ¢.
"High" would imply a euphoric state, hormone- or drug-induced. "Stoned" is likely to be derived from stone-faced, being in a seemingly unresponsive state.
Actually, stoned and high were pretty much synonymous, both meaning essentially the same thing.
Of course, other English countries have even more words.
The first time I heard "pissed", I thought the drunk was mad, because that is what the word means in the US.
The first time I heard "pissed", I thought the drunk was mad, because that is what the word means in the US.
And when you first heard 'as pissed as a newt', you realised our little amphibious friends have quite a temper in their cold-blooded little bodies ;-)
AJ
The first time I heard "pissed", I thought the drunk was mad, because that is what the word means in the US.
As opposed to 'poofed', which doesn't mean anything in any country, but at least has a questionable homosexual association in the UK.