In the mid-90’s when I was in elementary school in Utah we had, each year, a visit from the local police department and volunteer teenagers from the D.A.R.E program to come into our classrooms to shame and scare us away from using drugs. As a direct consequence of their involvement when I became an adult and was addicted to alcohol it took 15 years and serious consequences of my addiction to finally bring me awareness of my problem, because I did not want to be the person they demonized and persecuted, and I had not been otherwise empowered to resolve my addiction because addiction is not a problem of willpower, but of biology.

Vilification of drug use never prevents people from trying or using drugs. The drug wars waged by ours and other developed countries have done nothing to stem drug abuse, because drug abuse is dependent on neurochemical biology in the brain brought about by stressful environmental and nutritional deficiencies and trauma which cannot be controlled by direct social or behavioral intervention. The major side effect of shaming and blaming current or potential sufferers of addiction is merely to prolong their addiction and delay resolution, or prevent resolution entirely, and in turn potentiates the consequences of their behavior on everyone else.

When I was in my early twenties and new to Los Angeles I was really surprised by the abundance of cocaine. I had been led to believe that drug use was taboo, and prosecuted by our laws, and here it was openly indulged without fear of prosecution in white, rich societies. But because of the fear-mongering of my childhood I was nervous to try hard drugs and so I never experimented with them, but also because I was strongly inclined only to use natural substances like marijuana and alcohol, which were plenty enjoyable. Even though I am 6 foot 7 inches tall and 250 lbs, just one tiny crumb of pot will get me stoned off my ass, and because of my health problems pot actually began to make me feel very paranoid and agitated from using it, so it lost its therapeutic appeal whereas alcohol became my medicine of choice.

It is the height of irony and a plainly logical conclusion that places like Utah and the Midwest which led the vilification of drug use should now be plagued by greater pandemics of cheap, deadly drugs like meth and pharmaceutical opioids, because their persecution of drug use and addicts and alcoholics has never been based on biology or wellness but simply on prejudice and fear. All drugs have medicinal effects, the only difference between pharmaceutical, legally permissible drugs and those which are illicit is just regulation. We have decided that some are okay to use while others are not, but the biggest pandemic in our country right now began and continues to involve the legally, mass-produced quantities of opioid painkillers which have the same properties as heroin.

Vilification of drug users and the war on drugs is the very problem which has caused our mass drug abuse pandemic, from oxycontin to heroin to methamphetamine, social stress is extremely difficult for humans to bear, because we rely on each other for our own survival and as such have fragile biological instincts easily damaged by disharmony and conflict, and the persecution of individuals by governmental and religious institutions for human struggles only fans the flames of social discord and biological stresses which lead to the very problems by which we are plagued. I doubt any victims of the recent Michigan Christmas Parade tragedy will see the roots of their trauma in our collective history of the drug war and racist socioeconomic policies of the last 50 years, though it is plainly there.

What most of us do not actively realize is that most crime and other conflict which makes headlines is very often underpinned by addiction. In the book, Chasing the Scream by Johann Hari, he chronicles the origination of the drug war from the traumatic childhood experiences of one single man who would later become the primary author and instigator of our failed persecution of addicts, though we as a society have had a long history of recognizing the anti-social behavior which accompanies addiction and have tried to deal with it in other likewise extremely misguided strategies such as Prohibition, or the D.A.R.E program. In Chasing the Scream Mr. Hari discusses experiments in rats which, when done properly show that animals are NOT actually inclined to use drugs, even when they are plentifully available, but only when their environment is so stressful and unfulfilling as to impair normal social, environmental, and physical development, which is also exactly how it is in human beings.

While other drugs like meth, oxy, or fentanyl have taken headlines there remains a widespread epidemic of cocaine use which goes unnoticed by media or government, largely because of the failure of the drug war and politicians like Joe Biden who prefer to demonize and blame addicts rather than take care of the public health, and as a consequence we as a society must bear the burden of untreated addicts in our places of work, schools, and suffer our own traumas and tragedies from their behavior. I want to be clear that actual drugs of choice are not the problem, it is the facility that drugs provide to intervene biochemically in those human beings who are ill and susceptible to such chemical intervention, because this state also impairs our natural inclinations as humans toward social integration and altruistic behavior. When a human being is alone in the world, struggling emotionally, and burdened with not only unresolved trauma but also health problems of a biochemical and nutritional nature of which they are unaware, how can we expect them to overcome problems like addiction when we who are healthy not only do no support them but actively persecute them too?

Cocaine is especially addictive because, more than other drugs, it very strongly impairs hormones which facilitate feelings of guilt and shame. Because the origination of addiction in most addicts is in childhood trauma in which guilt and shame are exploited and manipulated by abusive adults, such drugs become immediately addictive because it effectively and cheaply relieves a sufferer of childhood trauma from the disproportionate, extreme, and unearned hormonal stress which results from such emotionally and physically violent childhoods. But because a sufferer of addiction has increased tendencies to also act selfishly and likely adopted the same or similar antisocial behaviors as their own abusers by which they were raised, will in adulthood commit the same wrongs of lying, stealing, cheating, and hurting others which as a consequence piles on even more guilt and shame to the already heavy burden which followed them into adulthood. Because cocaine so effectively neutralizes shame and guilt this then becomes the only tool by which such adults can deal with their emotional struggles, because there are no other options for them by which they can resolve trauma, pain, hormonal illness, and personal mistakes and wrongdoing.

It is for this reason that an epidemic of cocaine abuse still rages in certain places, but also because cocaine is more expensive than cheaply available methamphetamine and oxycontin it specifically circulates in wealthier, white communities, especially in and amongst groups of adults which run businesses and commerce and underlies a great deal of the current complications of mismanagement, harassment, and unethical behavior and criminality which seems so rampant. By treating the guilt and shame that adults feel from their own behavior it perpetuates more of it, because those feelings are meant to guide and direct the actions of social animals toward those which successfully organize social structures and facilitate a fulfilling and rewarding life, but because such drugs cannot actually remove consequence and conscience those addicts who have done harmful things to others continue to use and abuse those and other drugs because they have not been taught skills to deal with personal mistakes, trauma, and neither can they get effective medical treatment because none also currently exists due to the past vilification of addiction at the expense of medical research and discovery, so drugs and alcohol are the only tools most addicts have access to in order to treat their biological and psychological illness, and then the rest of us suffer under their behavior and by our inaction, ignorance, and prejudices perpetuate it and thus our own suffering and misery.

Drugs and alcohol are not in and of themselves harmful, and when conditions of addiction are resolved they can be enjoyed responsibly and without worry of harmful effect, because a healthy nervous and endocrine system does not get benefit from their introduction into the body, and the absence of abuse is a self-regulating system which results only from healthy biology. It is only because of the misunderstanding and persecution of addicts and alcoholics precisely for their addiction and alcoholism that we are burdened as a society by their untreated addiction and alcoholism. In the menu above is a shortened, six-step, scientifically researched and supported version of steps to resolve addiction and alcoholism, free to anyone, which is the only truly effective recovery program available in the entire world, because before my work nobody has ever actually understood the biochemical origins of addiction and alcoholism, which is exactly why it is still such a widespread problem. When the origins of alcoholism and addiction are addressed, the behavior of untreated alcoholics and addicts which currently plague our society will largely vanish, and every person will be able to live a healthy and satisfying life.

Life is hard, and the conditions which originate alcoholism and addiction will always be present, because it starts in childhood in the abuses and environmental and nutritional deficiencies which are unfortunately very common childhood experiences. Even parents who do their best can accidentally cause them too, unknowingly, because for instance there are chemicals in our food which perpetuate these diseases such as the glycoalkaloid poisons in the nightshade family of plants, which parents wouldn’t know about unless they have read my work which did not even exist until six years ago. The long-form chapter on these conditions from my book, Fuck Portion Control, which addresses health problems like depression, weight, hair loss, insomnia, erectile dysfunction, etc., can also be read for free in my article The Cure for Alcoholism and Addiction. Psychologically, the resolution of trauma and childhood abuse as well as how to prevent it, which underlies addiction and alcoholism problems, and to teach self-empowerment is the focus of my new book, The Perfect Child. All those who suffer addiction and alcoholism were not taught self-care skills which would otherwise resolve the problems, because we were not raised by parents who could teach them to us, and the therapies in both books teach and empower those with these conditions to resolve the shame, guilt, and mistakes of our past which underly and enflame addiction, self-hatred, despair, and depression, and effectively resolves past experiences of pain and trauma.

The widespread legalization of marijuana will actually be a good thing for drug addiction—marijuana is less harmful than alcohol, so it can treat addiction problems without having serious consequences like harder drugs. When we recognize anti-social behavior as having its roots in the traumas and deficiencies of childhood development and show compassion for and help those who are burdened with these problems we will then stop being plagued by their behavior. Until then, we will continue to have mass-shootings, sexual harassment and predation, theft, authoritarianism, murder, and other plagues upon humanity because those are the result of unempowered people trying in their limited capacity to live successfully. Only when they are taught the skills to care for their own needs without taking from others will such problems stop, and drug abuse is only a symptom of this deeper human conflict which, for the first time in human history, we now actually have the capacity, awareness, and resources to resolve, and you can find more of my content on addiction and other health issues at my YouTube channel, or follow me on Instagram and Twitter where I also post food, cooking, and other related content.

Drug abuse and addiction also underlies political and socioeconomic conflict, such as I discuss in my article Politics and Mental Illness, which can also be addressed by effective socioeconomic polices discussed in Fuck Minimum Wage Laws, law enforcement reform by Defunding the Police, and reinforcing our economy with Guaranteed Minimum Income.