Research shows that cannabis is understood differently across cannabis cultures. In Sweden, young cannabis users are seen as vulnerable, problem-burdened and increasingly embracing drug-liberal attitudes. Despite low prevalence rates, youth cannabis use is considered a high-profile problem that warrants prohibition. Previous studies show that staff in Swedish addiction treatment legitimize resolute interventions by making up young users as irrational. The treated young people claimed instead that starting to use cannabis and quitting were informed decisions. In this article, we revisit interviews with 18 young clients in Swedish addiction treatment, and examine the data with a focus on comparisons (e.g. A is unlike B). We perceive comparison as a tool in the formation of narrative identity, rather than a logical outcome of accounts. We ask what is compared with what in young people’s accounts of cannabis use, and what these comparisons reveal about their thoughts on well-being, the self and the setting. The interviewees used comparisons that drew on cultural, institutional and organizational narratives when they discussed cannabis. Taken together, their accounts instantiated ideas about powerful drug effects, the primacy of the neoliberal subject and the potential of cannabis addiction. We discuss whether these accounts mirror rather than challenge drug prohibition.