Were? Smoking isn't very cool anymore, but drinking is still pretty cool. It's losing popularity in some circles, but in pop culture, rappers are still in the club ordering bottles, and not of Voss. Weed has a big chance to shake up the alcohol industry, because you can smoke like a Cummins 12-valve until you pass out, then feel fine the next morning. You also don't die if you have too much to smoke. It does have to do some work to get out of the goofy / high schooler / college bro image, but I think they can make it classy (esp stuff like vape pens...the whole blow torch + dabber + water pipe thing has pretty limited appeal because it's too involved and conspicuous).
I am suspicious that smoking pot is just as bad for your lungs as smoking tobacco and we simply don't have decades of evidence yet. It stands to reason that inhaling burnt organics is going to have many of the same effects regardless of which plant is involved.
That's likely true, although with legalization has come the popularity of - and even preference to - vape pens and edibles, which weren't as accessible.
I don't know. It feels like vape pens is one of the least classy things going on at the moment. I think the only thing that can make "weed" acceptable and "classy" is some variation on fancy edibles (or perhaps drinkables to bring the discussion full circle)
That's when I learned that - much like smokers - drinkers were a tribe.