The internet has brought us a lot of things. It’s nice not to have to go to the library and sort through the card catalogue (remember those?) to find the answer to a question, but there are also some serious drawbacks. Some of those drawbacks are young adults getting involved with ChatGPT in unhealthy ways, the availability of pornography (often without age restrictions), and the easy access to gambling and lottery tickets.

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller reported:

Welcome to America: the land of the free, home of the pothead sports gambler.

Alas, the U.S. has crossed two alarming milestones this week.

The first is that gambling is now officially the biggest source of entertainment for Americans.

Data shows that in 2025, more Americans spent roughly $166 billion wagering bets on sports. This figure far surpasses the revenues of the movie, music, book, and museum industries, according to Forbes. In fact, it’s larger than the total revenue of those industries combined, Forbes noted.

The second is that marijuana is now officially the most popular daily drug.

The article includes the following X post:

The article notes:

To put it into perspective, for nearly three decades, the number of daily marijuana users stayed below 10 million. That number was at its lowest in the mid-90s, when it dipped under 5 million daily users. It seems to have really taken off during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The article concludes:

This is one giant social experiment. Never before has there been a society of marijuana smokers. And never before has gambling been at our literal fingertips. Something tells me this experiment will fail and leave the wreckage of brains, families, and relationships in its wake.

We don’t know the age of the marijuana smokers. I can only hope that they are past the point where the drug can impact their brain development. I sincerely wonder where the people who are regularly engaging in these activities will be in five years.