How drug warriors have destroyed America's faith in the power of education
by Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher
August 15, 2025
The War on Drugs has destroyed America's faith in the power of education. In fact, it has made us think of education as WRONG in and of itself, at least when it comes to drugs! This fact alone should make freedom-loving Americans renounce prohibition on principle, as an affront to the core ideas upon which democracy is based: first and foremost, the idea that education is actually a GOOD thing.
Florida state Senator Paula Hawkins is the poster child for this new self-imposed Dark Ages in America. Paula is (or rather was) the Nancy Reagan crony who stood up in her state legislature in the middle of the drug-hating 1980s and waved a copy of Andrew Weil's classic book in the air, "From Chocolate to morphine 1 : Everything You Need to Know About Mind-Altering Drugs.2" Hawkins was incensed that Weil's book dared to tell the honest facts about drugs and drug use from a viewpoint other than that of a fearmongering prohibitionist 3. She wanted to have the book banned from school libraries and even sought to have Andrew Weil himself silenced. Fortunately, these attempts on her part ultimately backfired in at least two enormous ways: first by giving the book much-needed publicity among the general public, and second by drawing the world's attention to the disturbing fact that drug prohibition implies (and even ultimately requires) the outlawing of free speech -- and of factual education itself4.
THE NEW RIP VAN WINKLE
The materialists of the western world are like Washington Irving's Rip Van Winkle when it comes to drugs. They are just now awakening from an intoxiphobic slumber that has lasted millennia. It never even occurred to us during this dogmatic downtime of ours that we should actively seek out and use psychoactive medicines for the psychosocial benefit of humankind. We are just now, in the 21st century after Christ, beginning to realize what the indigenous peoples of the world have known all along: that the world is full of psychoactive substances with obvious beneficial effects: substances found in lichen, fungi, animals, trees, flowers -- yea, even in our own so-called "sober" biochemistry. Unfortunately, our response to this newly discovered truth about the world, that it is a world full of drugs, has been the response of a frightened ostrich. We have refused to accept the world as it is and have used censorship and fearmongering to remake the world in accordance with our jaundiced perception of it. Rather than acknowledging the fact that nature is full of potential godsend medicines, we have the hubris to travel the globe to physically destroy such substances, so great is our pathological desire to re-create the world so that it accords with our drug-hating prejudices.
CONCLUSION
Seen in this light, we should not be surprised at the attempts of Drug Warriors to deny the benefits of education itself. Education is anathema to those who wish to rewrite history in accordance with western prejudices. What Hawkins and company insist upon is indoctrination about drugs, not education.
If the dunce cap fits, wear it. What else can you call worrywarts who ignore all the downsides of their prohibitionist impulses and are completely clueless about the endless potential upsides of mind- and mood-improving medicines?!
If you're looking for an anti-Christ, just look for an American presidential politician who has taught us to hate our enemies. Gee, now, who could that be, huh? According to Trump, Jesus was just a chump. Winning comes before anything at all in his sick view of life.
All of our problems with opioids and opiates could have been avoided had the busybody Chicken Littles in America left well enough alone and let folks continue to smoke regulated opium peaceably in their own homes.
It's because of such reductive pseudoscience that America will allow us to shock the brains of the depressed but won't allow us to let them use the plant medicines that grow at their feet.
"My faith votes and strives to outlaw religions that use substances of which politicians disapprove."
In 1886, coca enthusiast JJ Tschudi referred to prohibitionists as 'kickers.' He wrote: "If we were to listen to these kickers, most of us would die of hunger, for the reason that nearly everything we eat or drink has fallen under their ban."
This is why America is creeping toward authoritarianism -- because of the prohibitionists' ability to get away with everything by blaming "drugs."
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.
Americans were always free to take care of their own health -- until drug warriors handed doctors a monopoly on providing mind and mood medicine.
We've all been taught since grade school that human beings cannot use psychoactive medicines wisely. That is just a big fat lie. It's criminal to keep substances illegal that can awaken the mind and remind us of our full potential in life.
How else will they scare us enough to convince us to give up all our freedoms for the purpose of fighting horrible awful evil DRUGS? DRUGS is the sledgehammer with which they are destroying American democracy.
The War on Drugs has destroyed America's faith in the power of education. In fact, it has made us think of education as WRONG in and of itself, at least when it comes to drugs! This fact alone should make freedom-loving Americans renounce prohibition on principle, as an affront to the core ideas upon which democracy is based: first and foremost, the idea that education is actually a GOOD thing.
The materialists of the western world are like Washington Irving's Rip Van Winkle when it comes to drugs. They are just now awakening from an intoxiphobic slumber that has lasted millennia. It never even occurred to us during this dogmatic downtime of ours that we should actively seek out and use psychoactive medicines for the psychosocial benefit of humankind. We are just now, in the 21st century after Christ, beginning to realize what the indigenous peoples of the world have known all along: that the world is full of psychoactive substances with obvious beneficial effects: substances found in lichen, fungi, animals, trees, flowers -- yea, even in our own so-called "sober" biochemistry. Unfortunately, our response to this newly discovered truth about the world, that it is a world full of drugs, has been the response of a frightened ostrich. We have refused to accept the world as it is and have used censorship and fearmongering to remake the world in accordance with our jaundiced perception of it. Rather than acknowledging the fact that nature is full of potential godsend medicines, we have the hubris to travel the globe to physically destroy such substances, so great is our pathological desire to re-create the world so that it accords with our drug-hating prejudices.
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