there are just substances that, like anything else, can be used and misused
by Brian Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher
February 4, 2020
There is no such thing as 'drugs,' the way that the modern Drug Warrior defines that term. There are simply substances that can be used or misused. To think otherwise is to be superstitious. To think otherwise is to scapegoat substances and thus ignore true social problems that would otherwise cry out for solutions. To think otherwise is to create a make-work program for modern psychiatry, prison guards, sheriffs, the D E A, and Big Pharma .
Yet America is all about keeping Americans and the world from accessing the plants that grow at their very feet under the fiction that politically demonized substances are evil incarnate. This is a power grab that elevates common law over natural law, destroying the human being's right to Mother Nature, which is about as basic a natural right as possible. Not happy thus merely to deprive Americans of godsend medications, Drug War colonialism spreads the war on Mother Nature planet wide, ensuring eternal suffering of the mentally ill and their continued dependency on Big Pharma 12 's addictive meds, all so that imperial America can intervene at will in the countries of its choice, under the pretext of enforcing the American Empire's drug laws -- when we're actually enforcing the monopoly power of Big Liquor and the ideology of the religion known as Christian Science.
Drug prohibition represents the biggest power grab by government in human history. It is the state control of pain relief and mental states.
Most people think that drugs like cocaine, MDMA, LSD and amphetamines can only be used recreationally. WRONG ! This represents a very naive understanding of human psychology. We deny common sense in order to cater to the drug war orthodoxy that "drugs have no benefits."
Big pharma drugs are designed to be hard to get off. Doctors write glowingly of "beta blockers" for anxiety, for instance, but ignore that fact that such drugs are hard -- and even dangerous -- to get off. We have outlawed all sorts of less dependence-causing alternatives.
If media were truly free in America, you'd see documentaries about people who use drugs safely, something that's completely unimaginable in the age of the drug war.
We've got to take the fight TO the drug warriors by starting to hold them legally responsible for having spread "Big Lies" about "drugs." Anyone involved in producing the "brain frying" PSA of the 1980s should be put on trial for willfully spreading a toxic lie.
We deal with "drug" risks differently than any other risk. Aspirin kills thousands every year. The death rate from free climbing is huge. But it's only with "drug use" that we demand zero deaths (a policy which ironically causes far more deaths than necessary).
The UK just legalized assisted dying. This means that you can use drugs to kill a person, but you still can't use drugs to make that person want to live.
The sick thing is that the DEA is still saying that psilocybin has no medical uses and is addictive. They should be put on trial for crimes against humanity for using such lies to keep people from using the gifts of Mother Nature.
It's already risky to engage in free and honest speech about drugs online: Colorado politicians tried to make it absolutely illegal in February 2024. The DRUG WAR IS ALL ABOUT DESTROYING DEMOCRACY THRU IGNORANT AND INTOLERANT FEARMONGERING.
The outlawing of opium eventually resulted in an "opioid crisis"? The message is clear: people want self-transcendence. If we don't let them find it safely, they will find it dangerously.
Drug prohibition represents the biggest power grab by government in human history. It is the state control of pain relief and mental states.