How Drug Prohibition Outlaws Healthcare

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How Drug Prohibition Outlaws Healthcare

why the War on Drugs is a Crime Against Humanity

by Brian Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher

August 26, 2025

Drug prohibition outlaws healthcare when it comes to mind and mood conditions. I repeat: drug prohibition outlaws healthcare. It tells us that a medicine that could be misused in theory by a white American young person when used for one reason at one dose must not be used by anyone for any reason at any dose. Just imagine the amount of silent, unnecessary suffering that goes on in the world today thanks to this hateful racist, xenophobic and anti-scientific paradigm. Just imagine how many luckless souls toss and turn in bed and contemplate suicide ¹ because we have denied them medicines that could cheer them up in a trice! In a trice! Why? Because we do not consider those sufferers to be stakeholders when it comes to drug policy. We ignore them and their suffering completely and we focus instead on the potential misuse and abuse of drugs by white American young people.

This is the great philosophical problem of our time, the fact that Americans have outlawed healthcare worldwide in the name of fearmongering, in the name of demonizing drugs rather than learning how to use them as wisely as possible for the benefit of humanity. This dystopia cries out to be philosophically parsed and pilloried by the many intelligent westerners who surely know better, and yet I am virtually alone in explicitly pushing back against this great disempowerment of humankind.

But it is just too depressing to focus on the bamboozled status quo, especially for a chronic depressive like myself who has been turned into a ward of the healthcare state by America's prehistoric, racist and xenophobic drug prohibitions.

Let me try therefore to provide some answers rather than simply bemoaning the problem.

The first step in reversing this great injustice -- this greatest of all injustices, this government control of our most intimate thoughts and feelings -- is to recognize that it was always a category error to place materialist scientists in charge of mind and mood medicine in the first place. The proof is extant. In evaluating drugs from a materialist point of view, the first step is always to ignore all obvious benefits of drug use. Today it is all but illegal to mention that opium use has obvious benefits. (Benjamin Franklin could have told us so.) Today it is all but illegal to mention that coca use has obvious benefits. (Sigmund Freud ² could have told us so.) Today no one talks about the wonderful results of the trials of phenethylamines synthesized by Alexander Shulgin. Why not? Because we have been programmed to believe that there are no positive uses for drugs, above all by the brainwashing tactic of censorship, thanks to which the conglomerate media shields us from all reports of beneficial drug use. And so materialists and the media conspire to normalize the unprecedented wholesale outlawing of psychoactive medicines.

Materialists like Dr. Robert Glatter even pretend to doubt that laughing gas has any positive uses for the depressed. Laughing gas, a gas that gives many users a glimpse of heaven itself! Glatter seems to know nothing about human motivation -- the fact that a suicidal person tossing and turning in bed would give an arm and a leg to be able to breathe deeply and look on the world -- at least for a few glorious moments -- in a new optimistic light! He does not understand the most basic human psychology: that anticipation of such states is itself therapeutic and that a wide variety of such drugs could be used intermittently, and hence safely, to help the depressed get through their existential gloom and, more specifically, to help them "stay the course" when it comes to drug withdrawal and rising above suicidal ideation. Would laughing gas ³ work for everyone in this way? Of course not, but that's the whole point! It is pointless to talk about the supposed propriety of drug use without considering the details of that use, including the mindset of the potential users, their goals in life, their biochemistry, their metabolism, their genetics, the nature of their psycho-social upbringing, etc. etc. etc.

In other words, it would be crazy to say that nitrous oxide would "work" for everyone -- but it would be far crazier to insist that nitrous oxide would work for no one -- and that's what our prehistoric Drug Warriors (and their materialist friends in academia) tell us about virtually all psychoactive substances: that they have no positive uses for anyone, anywhere, ever.

But let's return to answers here, lest we become too depressed in considering the childish biases of modern materialists.

After having rescinded the right of materialists to practice mind and mood medicine, we need to start recognizing the real experts in this field. This is difficult to do because we have no name for such professionals in the western world. I suggest, however, that we refer to these future healers as "pharmacologically savvy empaths." These new professionals would be highly empathic individuals with a vast knowledge of pharmacology and ethnology when it comes to the use and potential use of psychoactive medicines. They would help suffering individuals to determine what drug use -- if any -- is right for them given their current circumstances in life, given their biochemistry, given their goals in life, given their genetics, etc. etc. In other words, these empathic individuals would recognize that wise drug use is all about details and that it is superstitious and anti-scientific to demonize drugs in the abstract, without regard to the circumstances of use.

This is, indeed, the core problem with America's drug policy: it encourages all of us to judge drugs outside of context, as being good or bad. And yet no drug is good or bad without regard for details. Even cyanide and Botox have legitimate uses at certain doses in certain situations. To insist otherwise is to outlaw human progress.

Unfortunately, the end of drug prohibition will require a philosophical shift in the Western world. We Westerners are convinced that "science" can do everything simply because it can work wonders in the inorganic world. But placing materialist scientists in charge of mind and mood medicine is like placing the passion-free Dr. Spock of Star Trek in charge of studying human emotion. He just does not get it!

IT'S WORSE THAN YOU THINK

I recently visited the Green Valley Book Fair just south of Harrisonburg, Virginia, a 30,000-square-foot book store "featuring over 500,000 new books at incredible bargain prices." I searched the sprawling facility for hours for any books that cast criminalized drugs in a positive light... and I found only one: namely, "Saying Yes" by Jacob Sullum. One single book.

This points out a real problem for the advocate of a sane drug policy in America. As ethnobotanist Richard Schultes noted, all indigenous societies have used psychoactive medicine for human benefit, and yet these societies never sought to justify that use in books, let alone in a didactic format capable of convincing Westerners of the propriety of such use. And so when one steps into such a bookstore, one feels like the entire compound has been sterilized by a Christian Scientist. As a chronic depressive, I get the feeling that a demonic imp has been there before me, removing all books that would have any relevance to me whatsoever, at least when it comes to my mental state. This, of course, is devastating since all books on any subject lose meaning to the extent that one is deeply depressed -- all books except those that speak of practical and practicable ways to transcend that gloom.

And so the bookstore resembles a 30,000-square-foot wasteland -- and it is with great difficulty that I struggle to transcend that impression.

VARIETY OF RESPONSES

Psychedelic advocates point to the importance of set and setting when using psychedelics. What they fail to appreciate, however, is that all psychoactive substances require an appropriate set and setting. To put this another way, the circumstances of use are of the utmost importance when it comes to psychoactive drugs, not just those that we classify as psychedelics. By circumstances, I mean, the user's biochemistry, their education level, their unique metabolism at the time of use, their genetics, their goals in life, their goals for use, their expectations, etc. etc. Lest the reader have any doubts with regard to this claim they have only to read the reports of users on any psychoactive substance.

Take Kratom, for instance. The online user reports are all over the map. Some find the drug to be the perfect cure for opiate addiction; some find the drug to be more addictive than opiates; some have used the drug daily without problem and have no withdrawal issues; some (rather improbably) report withdrawal issues after just one or two uses.

Individual responses vary enormously. Why? Because the circumstances of use matter when it comes to psychoactive medicine!

This is why it is so important that we in the West begin to recognize drug-use experts in the form of pharmacologically savvy empaths. These professionals would actually take details into account! (Imagine that!) They would work with specific human beings to design drug-use protocols based on the specific circumstances of a specific user. These empaths would base their suggestions on actual wise use -- the wise use that we censor today from all media -- wise use as demonstrated in anecdote and history as well as wise use suggested by simple common sense, a commodity that is in short supply in the age of the Drug War, when our materialists scientists and our prudish politicians are allowed to decide IN ADVANCE whether a specific drug has any benefits for ourselves personally.

ANTIDEPRESSANTS

I have been criticized for inconsistency in light of my disapproval of antidepressant use. If no drug is bad in and of itself, I am asked, then why do I single out antidepressants ⁴ as problematic?

The answer is simple, but it involves a slight subtlety. When I say that no drug is evil in itself, I mean that all psychoactive substances have potential positive uses at some dose, for some person, in some circumstance, when used either alone or in combination with other drugs. In other words, details matter. The propriety of any given drug use must be determined based on circumstances.

But what are the circumstances when it comes to antidepressant use in the age of the Drug War?

First and foremost, such "meds" would not even exist had drug prohibition not given Big Pharma a monopoly on providing mind and mood medicine. Secondly, these antidepressants cause almost unbeatable chemical dependency, a stronger dependency than that created by heroin ⁵. This dependency is made infinitely worse because antidepressants are "the only game in town" for the depressed. In a free world, this dependency could be overcome with the strategic use of a wide range of other drugs, but in the age of prohibition, this dependency is decisive. It turns users of such drugs into wards of the healthcare state.

In other words, there are two ways to evaluate the propriety of antidepressant use. We can view such use in the light of drug prohibition or in willful ignorance of drug prohibition. If we pretend -- with Jim Hogshire in "Pills A-Go-Go" -- that drug prohibition creates a natural baseline, then we can look at antidepressants as the best possible option for the depressed. But if we "get real" and recognize that drug law is outlawing all godsend alternatives, then antidepressants become merely a tool for Big Pharma ⁶ ⁷ to turn us into their customers for life. How can a reader expect me to sign off on antidepressant use in a world wherein I am prevented from using time-honored panaceas and drugs that have inspired entire religions! Why should I accept the materialist chemists "cure" for my depression? What does the materialist chemist know about my desires and goals in life?

If opium ⁸ did not exist, if coca did not exist, if phenethylamines did not exist... in short, if there were no drugs that inspired and elated, then I might well consider antidepressants to be a godsend for some people. But for anyone with a knowledge of wise drug use -- for anyone who realizes that there is such a thing despite government censorship -- the use of antidepressants is a nightmare: it renders one dependent for life, turning one into a ward of the healthcare state, meanwhile dulling the mind rather than inspiring it.

This does not mean that antidepressants have no uses. No one can say that about any drug. Your unique circumstances may make antidepressants a godsend for you personally at some point in your life. But we need to remember that one of those very "circumstances" is the fact that you live in a world that has outlawed almost all alternatives to treating depression -- and so when you say that antidepressants "work" for you, that statement should come with a very important caveat: a reminder that you do not live in a free world when it comes to healthcare!

To put this another way, the following are two very different questions:

1) Does antidepressant use make sense given the drug-hating world in which we live?

2) Would antidepressant use make sense in a free world?

I maintain that the answer to that latter question would almost always be no. And yet even in a free world, I would always leave open the possibility that a given antidepressant (in some imaginable protocol, at some imaginable dose, in some imaginable combination, etc.) might be just what you, reader, might need at some point in your life. What do I know about your specific situation? I would be especially likely to make that concession, given the fact that in a free world, you could always rethink your decision to use. You could strategically use other drugs to get off antidepressants should you eventually choose to do so -- whereas in the age of the Drug War, it is almost impossible to rethink your decision about antidepressants once you have made it since it is so difficult to end long-term use of such drugs -- at least, in the absence of drug re-legalization ⁹ , which would permit you to "fight drugs with drugs."

CONCLUSION

Drug Prohibition outlaws our right to take care of our own health. It is therefore nothing less than a crime against humanity ¹⁰.

Notes:

1: Why Americans Prefer Suicide to Drug Use DWP (up)
2: Sigmund Freud's real breakthrough was not psychoanalysis DWP (up)
3: Forbes Magazine's Laughable Article about Nitrous Oxide DWP (up)
4: Antidepressants and the War on Drugs DWP (up)
5: Hall, Wayne, and Megan Weier. 2016. “Lee Robins’ Studies of Heroin Use among US Vietnam Veterans.” Addiction 112 (1): 176–80. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.13584. (up)
6: Seife, Charles. 2012. “Is Drug Research Trustworthy?” Scientific American 307 (6): 56–63. https://doi.org/10.1038/scientificamerican1212-56. (up)
7: LaMattina, John. n.d. “Why Is Biopharma Paying 75% of the FDA’s Drug Division Budget?” Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnlamattina/2022/09/22/why-is-biopharma-paying-75-of-the-fdas-drug-division-budget/. (up)
8: The Truth About Opium by William H. Brereton DWP (up)
9: “National Coalition for Drug Legalization.” n.d. National Coalition for Drug Legalization. https://www.nationalcoalitionfordruglegalization.org/. (up)
10: Drug Prohibition is a crime against humantiy DWP (up)

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The problem with blaming things on addiction genes is that it whitewashes the role of society and its laws. It's easy to imagine an enlightened country wherein drug availability, education and attitudes make addiction highly unlikely, addiction genes or no addiction genes.

Just think how many ayahuasca-like godsends that we are going without because we dogmatically refuse to even look for them, out of our materialist disdain for mixing drugs with drugs.

What are drug dealers doing, after all? They are merely selling substances that people want and have always had a right to, until racist politicians came along and decided government had the right to ration out pain relief and mystical experience.

The book "Plants of the Gods" is full of plants and fungi that could help addicts and alcoholics, sometimes in the plant's existing form, sometimes in combinations, sometimes via extracting alkaloids, etc. But drug warriors need addiction to sell their prohibition ideology.

I've been told by many that I should have seen "my doctor" before withdrawing from Effexor. But, A) My doctor got me hooked on the junk in the first place, and, B) That doctor completely ignores the OBVIOUS benefits of indigenous meds and focuses only on theoretical downsides.

In the age of the Drug War, the Hippocratic Oath has become "First, do no good."

Freud thought cocaine was a great antidepressant. His contemporaries demonized the drug by focusing only on the rare misusers. That's like judging alcohol by focusing on alcoholics.

Scientists are responsible for endless incarcerations in America. Why? Because they fail to denounce the DEA lie that psychoactive substances have no positive medical uses. This is so obviously wrong that only an academic in an Ivory Tower could believe it.

Now the US is bashing the Honduran president for working with "drug cartels." Why don't we just be honest and say why we're REALLY upset with the guy? Drugs is just the excuse, as always, now what's the real reason? Stop using the drug war to disguise American foreign policy.

If there were no other problem with antidepressants, they would be wrong for the simple reason that they make a user dependent for life -- not as a bug (as in drugs like opium) but rather as a feature: that's how they "work," by being administered daily for a lifetime.

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