I have no problem with you smoking (or having smoked) pot, KB. And in your case it may have had, as you say, nothing to do with peer pressure.

The impression I had, however, in my own youthful days was that most young people smoked pot for the same reasons they smoked cigarettes and drank beer.

1. "Everyone else" was doing it, so they wanted to do it too.

2. Everyone who was "cool" was doing it, and God forbid that they should be seen as uncool! Or even worse...as wimps or "straights"! Basically, if your parents were against it (and it wasn't a major crime committed against other people) it was cool.

3. They thought it would be fun. And for many, it certainly was. I don't have a problem with that.

And then there were some for whom it became a kind of religion.

These last were the people so amusingly caricatured by Cheech and Chong, and I knew a few who fit right into that mould. It got so bad that practically the only thing they wanted to talk about was different varieties of pot and hash and hash oil, where it came from, how it was made, what kind of high it provided, how pure it was, etc.

I don't know if that sounds like any of the people you hung out with at the time. But I do know this: users should not be prosecuted for use of it or possession of small quantities of it.   

Nor should people be prohibited from growing it for their own private use. If they could, that would eliminate the criminal trade in marijuana right fast, because their customer base for marijuana would vanish. They wouldn't be able to make good money off it any longer, and they'd move off into something else...as criminals always do when a golden marketing opportunity dries up.