How Scientific American reckons without the drug war
in response to 'A Talking Cure for Psychosis' by Matthew M. Kurtz
by Brian Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher
March 6, 2023
open letter to Professor Matthew M. Kurtz, in response to 'A Talking Cure for Psychosis' in the March 2023 print edition of 'Scientific American'
Dear Professor Kurtz:
When we say that drugs by themselves have not solved the problem of psychosis, I think we must specify which drugs we are talking about. As you know, we live in a country in which almost all psychoactive medicine is outlawed. So when we say that "drugs are ineffective," we are really saying that "drugs that work according to reductionist criteria" are ineffective. The latter is a very different statement from the former.
I would also caution against the reductionist approach in treating psychological disorders. I have been chemically dependent for over 40 years now on drugs that purported to treat my depression via scientific reductionist criteria. Not only has my depression not been "cured," but I have been turned into a ward of the healthcare state, taking expensive pills that tranquilize me rather than empower me to live large.
You write of a "new era of psychology," but psychology remains blind to all the obvious reasons why banned psychoactive drugs could help the depressed: Even if these substances did nothing but elate, they could be used intermittently to give the patient something to look forward to (which is far better than shocking a patient's brain or having them commit suicide). Moreover, coca wine has empowered the lives of HG Wells and Jules Verne, helping them to work harder, giving them greater self-esteem, creating a virtuous circle. In the 19th century, poets used opium 1 wisely, in what author Richard Middleton called "a series of magnificent quarterly carouses,2" improving their work and giving them "something to look forward to," again creating a virtuous circle. Alexander Shulgin has synthesized hundreds of non-addictive drugs that elate and inspire the user. These drugs have not been found to be ineffective in treating psychological problems: rather they have been completely ignored in fealty to the Drug War ideology of substance demonization.
Scientists are blind to the benefits of such "drugs" because to acknowledge them would be to violate Drug War orthodoxy, which tells us that certain substances have no positive uses, for anybody, anywhere, at any time, ever -- which, of course, is an anti-scientific lie, as there are no substances of that kind in the world. Even cyanide and botox have legitimate medical uses.
Science today is censored by the Drug War. And this will never end as long as we continue to pretend that the Drug War does not even exist.
Champions of indigenous medicines claim that their medicines are not "drugs." But they miss the bigger point: that there are NO drugs in the sense that drug warriors use that term. There are no drugs that have no positive uses whatsoever.
NIDA is just a propaganda arm of the U.S. government -- and will remain so until it recognizes the glaringly obvious benefits of drugs -- as well as the glaringly obvious downsides of prohibition. We need a National Institute on Drug Use, not a National Institute on Drug Abuse.
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 give kids drugs to improve their concentration -- but if adults use drugs to concentrate, we call them names and throw them in jail.
If drug warriors were serious about saving lives, they'd outlaw guns, cars, and all pleasure trips to Mars.
America arrests people whose only crime is that they are trying to be all that they can be in life... in such a way that psychiatrists are not getting THEIR cut.
Before anyone receives shock therapy -- or the right to assisted suicide -- they should have the option to start using opium or cocaine daily -- in fact, any drug that makes them feel that life is worth living again.
Oregon has decided to go back to the braindead plan of treating substance use as a police matter. Might as well arrest people at home since America has already spread their drug-hating Christian Science religion all over the world.
Folks like Sabet accuse folks like myself of ignoring the "facts." No, it is Sabet who is ignoring the facts -- facts about dangerous horses and free climbing. He's also ignoring all the downsides of prohibition, whose laws lead to the election of tyrants.
Drug warriors are full of hate for "users." Many of them make it clear that they want users to die (like Gates and Bennett...). The drug war has weaponized inhumanity.
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