Censored Bookstores in the Age of Drug Prohibition
by Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher
March 25, 2026
Yesterday I traveled to Blue Plate Books in Winchester, Virginia, one of the largest used bookstores in the region. My plan was to buy books that would help me flesh out my understanding of drug-related issues. This was naive of me, however. Even though the store features tens of thousands of books, the vast majority of the authors of those books ignore the fact that drug prohibition even exists. The few books that treat of demonized drugs do so from the point of view of addiction and abuse. There are no books about how opium can improve your love of nature or about how phenethylamines can make the suicidal wish to live or about how the use of laughing gas can change your views of reality -- as the use of laughing gas eroded William James's dogmatic fealty to passion-scorning materialism and behaviorism.
Visiting Blue Plate Books merely reminded me of how censored Americans are when it comes to drugs. There is almost a total censorship in America on the topic of drug benefits -- with all censorship working to ensure that we consider drugs a problem rather than a solution.
Someday, in a sane world, there will be plenty of book titles like the following:
"How I used opium wisely to improve my life."
"How I used morphine wisely to improve my love of Mother Nature."
"How I got off of cigarettes and alcohol through the safe and informed use of phenethylamines."
"How I rose from my depression with the wise use of a variety of drugs, including opium , coca, and phenethylamines."
Ten Tweets
against the hateful war on US
A generally educated person meets new ideas with curiosity and fascination. An illiberally educated person meets new ideas with fear. --James B. Stockade.
The Drug War is the ultimate example of strategic fearmongering by self-interested politicians.
We need to stop using the fact that people like opiates as an excuse to launch a crackdown on inner cities. We need to re-legalize popular meds, teach safe use, and come up with common sense ways to combat addictions by using drugs to fight drugs.
Cop and detective shows are loaded with subtle drug war propaganda, including lines like, "She had a history of drug use, so..." The implication being that anyone who uses substances that politicians hate cannot be trusted.
Prohibitionists think that they merely have to use the word "drugs" to win an argument.
Properly speaking, MDMA has killed no one at all. Prohibitionists were delighted when Leah Betts died because they were sure it was BECAUSE of MDMA/Ecstasy. Whereas it was because of the fact that prohibitionists refuse to teach safe use.
Both physical and psychological addiction can be successfully fought when we relegalize the pharmacopoeia and start to fight drugs with drugs. But prohibitionists do not want to end addiction, they want to scare us with it.
Drug War propaganda is all about convincing us that we will never be able to use drugs wisely. But the drug warriors are not taking any chances: they're doing all they can to make that a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Imagine someone starting their book about antibiotics by saying that he's not trying to suggest that we actually use them. We should not have to apologize for being honest about drugs. If prohibitionists think that honesty is wrong, that's their problem.
This is why the foes of suicide are doing absolutely nothing to get laughing gas into the hands of those who could benefit from it. Laughing is subjective after all. In the western tradition, we need a "REAL" cure to depression.
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