No Bad Drugs

The arbitrary distinctions at the root of prohibition

Jacob Sullum from the April 2008 issue

(Page 3 of 3)

DeGrandpre persuasively debunks “the two core ideas of the disease model: that use leads inevitably to addiction and that addiction, without ‘treatment,’ guarantees lifelong use.” But those two ideas can be separated, as illustrated by the history of thinking about alcohol abuse. As the sociologist Harry G. Levine noted in a 1978 Journal of Studies on Alcohol article, “the idea that drugs are inherently addicting was first systematically worked out for alcohol and then extended to other substances. Long before opium was popularly accepted as addicting, alcohol was so regarded.” This was the idea that drove the temperance movement’s transition from moderation enforced by self-discipline to abstinence enforced by law: If alcohol was inherently addicting, voluntary temperance was a dangerous illusion. After the repeal of Prohibition, the view of alcoholism as a disease caused by alcohol gave way to a view of alcoholism as a condition that makes it impossible for certain susceptible individuals to drink moderately. Whatever its scientific weaknesses, this A.A.-promoted version of the disease model does not demand abstinence from all and is therefore much more compatible with a legal market in alcoholic beverages than the earlier versions.

Califano seems to accept the A.A. model of alcoholism, which concedes that most people are capable of drinking moderately. While “Just Say No” is the message children should receive with regard to illegal drugs, he says, “The message for alcohol use is more complex: No for children and teens, moderation for adults.” He never explains why “moderation for adults” is not a valid approach to, say, marijuana.

The belief that certain drugs are irredeemably evil and that the current version of the Controlled Substances Act has inerrantly identified them betrays a lack of historical understanding. Heroin originally was sold as a substitute for codeine and a cure for “morphinism.” Cocaine was touted by Sigmund Freud as a nonaddictive all-purpose tonic. After these drugs were demonized, DeGrandpre notes, psychoactive pharmaceuticals such as meprobramate (Miltown), amphetamines (Benzedrine, Dexedrine, Methedrine), barbiturates (Ambutal, Nembutal, Seconal), methaqualone (Quaalude), and the benzodiazepines (Librium, Valium, Xanax, Ativan, Halcion) followed “the same cycle of medical hype, vast nonmedical use, and new and ‘unexpected’ problems of dependency.” DeGrandpre argues that SSRI antidepressants such as Prozac are undergoing a similar re-examination.

The government’s own legal distinctions belie the idea that drugs can be neatly separated into good and bad categories. “Even methamphetamine, [which] drug czar Barry McCaffrey called ‘the worst drug to ever hit America,’ was dispensed to children by prescription until the end of the century,” DeGrandpre notes. Children diagnosed with attention deficit disorder (ADD) continue to receive Ritalin, a drug whose pharmacological action is very similar to cocaine’s, as teenagers who crush and snort their friends’ prescription pills have discovered. “If Ritalin could legally be given to millions of American children despite the fact that its effects were indistinguishable from cocaine[’s] when taken in comparable doses and via the same route of drug administration, then popular and scientific beliefs concerning these two drugs in the twentieth century were nonsensical,” DeGrandpre writes. “Either cocaine is not the inherent demon drug it was made out to be, or Ritalin is incorrigibly evil and corrupting.”

The story of pharmaceutical fashions that DeGrandpre tells highlights a fact that the psychiatric iconoclast Thomas Szasz has long emphasized: Drug prohibition is built on a foundation of mandatory prescriptions. Although Califano seems to believe Ritalin is overprescribed, he presumably would say that giving it to a child based on a valid ADD diagnosis is a legitimate use, while snorting it for fun is not. Likewise, amphetamines can legally be used with a doctor’s prescription to treat obesity, relieve depression, and keep narcoleptics and military pilots awake. But in the government’s view (and therefore in Califano’s view), if people use amphetamines on their own for essentially the same purposes—to lose weight, boost their moods, or stay alert—they are guilty of drug abuse (although I guess that was not true until 1954, when prescriptions were first required for amphetamines). In such cases, the difference between use and abuse lies not in the drug’s chemical structure or even in the user’s goal. What matters is the spell scrawled by a government-appointed medicine man who can transform demons into angels with the stroke of a pen.

Senior Editor Jacob Sullum is the author of Saying Yes: In Defense of Drug Use (Tarcher/Penguin).

Comments

Episiarch|3.20.08 @ 9:28AM|#

What matters is the spell scrawled by a government-appointed medicine man who can transform demons into angels with the stroke of a pen.

This is the crux of it: state control.

I get a prescription for my pain for Vicodin from my state licensed doctor (and pay him) and then buy the Vicodin from a state-licensed pharmacy (and pay them), I'm a good person.

If I buy Vicodin from somebody on the street to alleviate my pain, I'm a criminal. And the doctor didn't get his cut, and the state didn't get their cut.

LarryA|3.20.08 @ 9:43AM|#

Although it is not always easy to decipher Califano's meaning in this overwrought, carelessly written, weakly documented, self-contradictory, and deeply misleading anti-drug screed

Aw, tell us what you really think. ;-)

|3.20.08 @ 10:19AM|#

"Today's teens' pot is not their parents' pot," he explains. "It is far more potent.…The average levels of THC jumped from less than 1 percent in the mid-1970s to more than 7 percent in 2005."

Every sigle fucking time I hear this monumemental pile of diarrheitc shit, I want to slap the mouth that is spewing it. My response to that overused and never documented claim is Bullshit, Bullshit, Lying Bullshit!

Now that that is out of my system, excellent article, Jacob. Can we make it required reading for drug warriors?

Didn't think so.

Sam Grove|3.20.08 @ 10:29AM|#

I managed to get high quite a few times while I was in prison on marijuana charges.

The only drug problem I saw there was when some guys managed to get hold of some grain alcohol and became violent.

|3.20.08 @ 10:32AM|#

There must be something wrong with me. Every time I read something like this, I think, "Well, that should convince somebody, somewhere, that the war on drugs is totally irrational and pointless."

But it just doesn't seem to work that way. People still run around in a panic and try to ban anything and everything. Instead of trying to think rationally about why the jails need to be full of essentially harmless drug users, they spend their time trying to raise (tax) money to build more jails.

People are morons.

Neu Mejican|3.20.08 @ 11:00AM|#

JsubD,

that overused and never documented claim is Bullshit

I don't know.
Shouldn't market forces lead to innovative improvements in the product.

My impression while I smoked pot (haven't touched the stuff in decades) was that the trend towards better weed was obvious and widespread.

I would be surprised if the trend didn't continue.

Mike Laursen|3.20.08 @ 11:00AM|#

People have an immediate negative emotional reaction to information they don't like. Some are listening, though, and will process the new information later, after they get over the initial reaction -- unless someone keeps pushing on them, keeping the initial reaction going.

Mike Laursen|3.20.08 @ 11:01AM|#

In other words, give them the info and walk away for a while. A lot of people will eventually come around on their own time scale.

Rhywun|3.20.08 @ 11:05AM|#

What an infuriating article. Infuriating because people actually think like this. Argggghhh! The damage done by evil frauds like Califano is incalculable. But it seems to be human nature to look down on drug (ab)users, so I'm not holding my breath waiting for any sanity on this issue from those in power.

|3.20.08 @ 11:08AM|#

The average levels of THC jumped from less than 1 percent in the mid-1970s to more than 7 percent in 2005

Number 1, I don't think this is true based on personal experience.

Number 2, since they are also telling us that marijuana smoke is full of carcinogens, wouldn't stronger pot, requiring fewer tokes, reduce the cancer risk and be a good thing?

Dave W.|3.20.08 @ 11:17AM|#

A lot of people will eventually come around on their own time scale.

A good message to the Mike Laursens Of The World!

|3.20.08 @ 11:20AM|#

My impression while I smoked pot (haven't touched the stuff in decades) was that the trend towards better weed was obvious and widespread.

I was thinking about that after I posted. The type of folks I smoked with, the kind of stuff we smoked, are hardly staistically valid samples.

Is it possiible in that from '74-'82, sailors had access to significantly better weed than, college students, white collar workers, et al? With extremely rare exceptions, we were not importers, but bought on the same market as everyone else. As a group, we may have been more discriminating due to travel experiences, but in the states we procured ounces, pounds, and kilos in town.

The potency of what I was smoking then was, at a minimum, as THC laden as what I can get in Detroit today. I am no longer as involved with the scene as I was then so that needs to be considered. That all said, I deny that you can find reefer that is even twice as potent as the good stuff from my youth, or seven times the average stuff.

BC|3.20.08 @ 11:35AM|#

"This under­taking demands the kind of attention we have committed to keeping chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons out of our nation. Marijuana, cocaine, heroin, Ecstasy, and other illegal drugs have demonstrated a far deadlier capability for mass destruction."

So this asshole is implying that drugs are worse than a nuclear attack. This has got to be the single biggest dumb fuck argument I've heard in my entire life. This man is utterly fucking batshit insane.

Angry Mike Laursens of the Wor|3.20.08 @ 11:38AM|#

A good message to the Mike Laursens Of The World!

Hey, what the @#&* do you mean by that?! (Oh, sorry. Overreacted. We've calmed down now.)

Neu Mejican|3.20.08 @ 11:53AM|#

JsubD,

Like I said, I haven't touched the stuff in decades...but in the spirit of discussion.

That all said, I deny that you can find reefer that is even twice as potent as the good stuff from my youth, or seven times the average stuff.

The average stuff from your youth could be more than half as potent as the average stuff today and that would not refute the claim (which when made should include a citation, if it is based on any reality).

7% THC may not be subjectively 7 times as potent as 1%.

The average can move up due to less bad shit without the quality of the good shit changing.

Also, pot smoking is one of those funny things.

Your body doesn't really develop tolerance for the intoxicating effects, but your mind does. Because dope has such a long half-life (days long instead of hours), people who smoke pot regularly are essentially a little bit high all the time. The more they smoke, the more their baseline high moves up, and the more they need to make it feel like they are getting high.

Whether or not the claim about more potent dope is true, of course, is beside the point.

Neu Mejican,
Professional Dope Smoker (retired).

Neu Mejican|3.20.08 @ 11:58AM|#

JsubD,

The point about the subjective tolerance wasn't clear.

Because the frequency of usage significantly changes your subjective experience of the dope's potency. It makes that subjective judgment very difficult to rely on for evaluating the potency of the dope.

|3.20.08 @ 12:04PM|#

If I buy have left over Vicodin from somebody on the street in my family to alleviate my pain, I'm a criminal. And the doctor didn't get his cut, and the state didn't get their cut.

There, fixed it to match my situation.

|3.20.08 @ 12:18PM|#

Meu Mejican,
Yeah, I admiited I'm not a statistically valid sample. I suspect there is NO statistically valid sample on reefer potency variations over time. I stand by my statement
I deny that you can find reefer that is even twice as potent as the good stuff from my youth, or seven times the average stuff*.

* Average stuff (for me) being "columbian". I didn't smoke "dirt weed".

Neu Mejican|3.20.08 @ 12:21PM|#

JsubD,

I suspect there is NO statistically valid sample on reefer potency variations over time.

Actually, I would be surprised if the DEA doesn't do regular testing on the dope that they seize. It should be a fairly representative sample of the market.

Neu Mejican|3.20.08 @ 12:24PM|#

* Average stuff (for me) being "columbian". I didn't smoke "dirt weed".

So JsubD is really just The Dope Commonsewer?

I suspect dirt weed is closer to the average than what you smoke. Who knows if dirt weed is substantially stronger than it used to be.

Not me.

Fred|3.20.08 @ 12:25PM|#

If I buy have left over Vicodin from somebody on the street in my family my own prescription after original condition is gone, to alleviate my pain, I'm a criminal. And the doctor didn't get his cut, and the state didn't get their cut.

You are required to dispose of it when no longer needed, if you take it years later you are a criminal. People should not be self medicating, an MD should evaluate your need for meds.

Misuse of drugs is imoral, freedom is drug free, let freedom ring!

Neu Mejican|3.20.08 @ 12:27PM|#

You are required to dispose of it when no longer needed, if you take it years later you are a criminal. People should not be self medicating, an MD should evaluate your need for meds.

That is a statement screaming for a citation.

I am gonna go out on a limb and call bullshit until I see a link or text of a specific statute.

|3.20.08 @ 12:33PM|#

Neu Mejican

I think Fred was trolling satirically or, maybe, satirically trolling.

TallDave|3.20.08 @ 3:23PM|#

overwrought, carelessly written, weakly documented, self-contradictory, and deeply misleading anti-drug screed,

LOL Don't hold back, dude. Tell us what you really think!

Not that I disagree.

Quixote|3.20.08 @ 11:02PM|#

Those who falter and those who fall must pay the price. I will not rest until they are all behind bars.....

Pablo Escobar|3.21.08 @ 5:41AM|#

Smackdown!

Good work Jacob.

|3.21.08 @ 3:12PM|#

Nice article.
Maybe Califano wants to explain how I got A+s on my last (university) exams, cause, you know, I went to class stoned, studied stoned, and even took the test stoned. Awwww my poor memory and concentration skills! I think it impaired my emotional development, too.

Haha....how can impaired "emotional development" be a short-term effect? Propaganda bullshit.

Douglas Gray|3.21.08 @ 8:50PM|#

The root of demonization is this:

I recently spoke with a man whose son started taking illegal substances when he was 14; the boy is now 21 and still struggling. This man can't admit that his son is messed up; it is all the drugs fault, the boy would be happy, successful and well adjusted if not for the drugs.

This reaction still persists in a lot of people.

There is only one serious accident for every 17 million miles of driving. It is that safe, but bad things do happen. Same with drugs. There are a multi-million drugs uses, legal and illegal, every day. In a few cases, bad things happen, but even then the drugs are not the sole cause.

People don't get it. Bad outcomes are often the result of multiple causes, but only one is often singled out.

Red Green|3.22.08 @ 9:39AM|#

The other war, the war on drugs, is taking too long to go away. Califano is one reason why. The old fraud keeps on writing books and getting fed funds. His CASA says it all. He is only about ABuse. There can be nothing else. Columbia U should erect a memorial fountain in his name. Shape it like a urinal and fill it with left over urinalysis samples. His phonyscience has left quite a legacy for us to laugh at in the future.

|3.22.08 @ 10:52PM|#

"If the devout are less inclined than the doubters to use mood-altering drugs, how is it that mostly Mormon Utah leads the country in antidepressant prescriptions?"

Jacob, next time don't mistake a headline for research.

Utah leads the country in per-capita use of prescriptions anti-depressants because Mormons generally don't SELF-medicate.

Most non-Mormons happily slug themselves up with booze, dope and just about every herb that they can chew, burn or boil. We don't. It's against our religion to do so. We don't even drink coffee or tea, much less use so-called "recreational" drugs as alcohol or tobacco.

Since we don't drown our sorrows like most people, prescriptions are our only option when some kind of medication is needed. The same studies that show Utah at the top of the Pharmacy Phrequent Phlyer list also show us at the BOTTOM of per-capita rates of ABUSING prescription drugs, and we tend to get off of anti-depressants faster than folks in other states.

I would also point out that only 60% of the people here are Mormons. A lot of the people on mood drugs are non-Mormons.

Al Francher|3.23.08 @ 9:39AM|#

Did somebody try to slander the Mormons again? You said "generally don't SELF- medicate", well then ,medicate,they still do. A doc"s script makes it different? Sounds ,to me, that you drank the kool-aid of self delusion. But then ,such is life in a theocrazy.