How drug warriors have destroyed America's faith in the power of education
by Brian 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: Everything You Need to Know About Mind-Altering Drugs.1" 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 2. 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 itself.
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.
The whole drug war is based on the anti-American idea that the way to avoid problems is to lie and prevaricate and persuade people not to ask questions.
We would never have even heard of Freud except for cocaine. How many geniuses is America stifling even as we speak thanks to the war on mind improving medicines?
Scientists cannot tell us if psychoactive drugs are worth the risk any more than they can tell us if free climbing is worth the risk, or horseback riding or target practice or parkour.
We should no more arrest drug users than we arrest people for climbing sheer rock faces or for driving a car.
The drug war is a meta-injustice. It does not just limit what you're allowed to think, it limits how and how much you are allowed to think.
If we can go overseas to burn poppy plants, then Islamic countries should be free to come to the United States to burn our grape vines.
To say that taking SSRIs daily is better than using opium daily is a value judgement, not a scientific one.
Many articles in science mags need this disclaimer: "Author has declined to consider the insights gained from drug-induced states on this topic out of fealty to Christian Science orthodoxy." They don't do this because they know readers already assume that drugs will be ignored.
Drugs like opium and psychedelics should come with the following warning: "Outlawing of this product may result in inner-city gunfire, civil wars overseas, and rigged elections in which drug warriors win office by throwing minorities in jail."
Freud found that cocaine CURED most people's depression and he "got off it" without trouble. I'm on a Big Pharma antidepressant that has a 95% recidivism rate for long-term users. Drug prohibition is insane and a crime against humanity.
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.
The whole drug war is based on the anti-American idea that the way to avoid problems is to lie and prevaricate and persuade people not to ask questions.