How the Drug War Censors Free Speech

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How the Drug War Censors Free Speech

by Brian Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher

May 19, 2025

I have made it clear in multiple essays now how it was always a category error to place materialist doctors in charge of mind and mood medicine ¹ ² ³. This is because materialists are behaviorists when it comes to human psychology and so are dogmatically obliged to ignore all obvious benefits of drug use. They rely instead on quantitative analyses and glimpses under a microscope. The fact that drug use has inspired entire religions is of no importance to them ⁴. Dr. Robert Glatter volunteered himself as the poster child for this purblind outlook on drugs and drug use when he wrote an article in 2021 for Forbes magazine entitled "Can Laughing Gas Help People with Treatment Resistant Depression?"⁵ What a pass the world has come to when a scientist can ask such a question without being laughed off of the public stage. Of course laughing gas could help! Such incredulity on Glatter's part only makes sense when we ignore the obvious and look instead for answers under a microscope. William James certainly knew the inspirational qualities of laughing gas ⁶. As for myself, I can say with certainty that my depression would be cured for life if I could but intermittently use substances like laughing gas according to a strategic therapeutic schedule. There is absolutely no question about this, even if scientists cannot find a way to quantify this fact for use in a PowerPoint presentation. Such use would give me the therapeutic breaks that I would need from my depression while making the "down" times far less problematic, thanks to the therapeutic value of the anticipation that I would feel about my intermittent use.

This is all psychological common sense. It is blazingly obvious. No wonder then that scientists embrace the inhumane philosophy of JB Watson ⁷ ⁸. If they failed to do so, they would have to protest the War on Drugs, or else realize that they were being cringing and cowardly in the face of academic censorship ⁹. Instead, the doctrine of behaviorism throws them a lifeline by giving a veneer of "science" to their inability to see any positive uses for the psychoactive substances that our politicians have demonized as "drugs."

What I failed to realize, however, is that this category error naturally leads to the censorship of free speech about drugs ¹⁰. After all, if doctors are really the experts when it comes to psychoactive drug use, then only THEY can talk about drugs "advisedly." If a layperson dares point to out that there are any positive qualities to certain drug use, they are thought to be giving medical advice and so can be censored on the grounds of public safety. I have encountered this censorship myself, from a source where I would not have expected it.

Actually, there are at least two causes of censorship working together here. In addition to the misguided assumption that honesty about drugs is the same as medical advice, the editors were also clearly influenced by the Drug Warrior's notion that Americans are children when it comes to outlawed substances: that we have a duty NOT to educate them about such substances but rather to make them fear and loathe the substances that our politicians have ruled beyond the pale -- when used by any demographic, for any reason, at any dose, ever.

If any free speech about drugs manages to survive this censorship, then the Drug Warriors haul out their tired dictum that it is wrong to "glorify drug use," and this in a country in which Jim Beam vodka runs nightly TV ads targeted at young people ¹¹ ¹².

This censorship is increasingly hardwired into the Internet with the help of algorithms, written apparently by philosophically clueless techies. That's why I find sites like Reddit to be creepy and Kafkaesque ¹³ ¹⁴ ¹⁵. Any criticism of drug policy that conflicts with the prohibitionist pieties of the brainwashed mainstream is subject to sudden and anonymous suppression, and this without explanation, or else with an explanation that makes no sense whatsoever. When I tried to criticize federal drug policy in a review that I uploaded to Archive.org, it was automatically deleted as "spam."¹⁶ Apparently, techies now consider inconvenient truths to qualify as spam whenever the subject is drugs. What a joke when I think how techies used to praise the Internet for bringing free speech to the world. I sent over 20 snail-mail letters by way of protest to the Archive staff at 300 Funston Avenue in San Francisco -- including Alexis Rossi, Jason Scott, Joy Chesbrough, and Mark Graham -- and not one of them bothered to reply, even by email. The court in Kafka's "Trial" was more responsive than are the mavens of censorship in the Internet age.

Only scientists can talk about drug use these days, and only when they couch their discussion in scientific terms about uptake inhibitors and chemical pathways. A passionate defense of holistic and common sense healing is tacitly illegal. This is why the Internet is full of sites about misuse and abuse of "drugs," with scarcely any sites extoling their benefits unashamedly. The impression that this censorship leaves -- and which it is meant to leave -- is that positive use of drugs is a contradiction in terms. And so Americans are indoctrinated "know-nothings" on this subject -- and all thanks to the category error of placing materialist doctors in charge of mind and mood medicine.

One well-known example of this Drug War censorship was the banning of the 2013 Ted Talk by Graham Hancock entitled "The War on Consciousness."¹⁷

Unfortunately, however, even Graham's "free" speech was influenced by Drug War propaganda. He makes it clear that he considers cocaine and heroin ¹⁸ to be beyond the pale. He thereby falls victim to the drug-warrior habit of judging drugs in the abstract without regard for details. He recognizes the folly of that approach on the subject of marijuana, making it clear that his modern distaste for the drug is not meant to be a judgment on other users of the drug. And yet he is more than happy to assume that anyone who uses cocaine or heroin is making a mistake. This, again, is the original sin of the Drug Warrior: to convince us to judge drugs rather than the uses to which they are put. The Drug Warrior opened up a Pandora's box of individual opinions about specific drugs. And yet to ask questions like "Is cocaine good or bad" is like asking "Is H2O water, steam or ice?" Such questions are nonsensical -- and even presumptuous -- until we talk about details: the person using, their goals in life, their biochemistry, their frequency of use, their goals for use, their genetics, their education level, etc. etc. etc. Instead, Graham just makes the breezy assumption that such drugs cannot be used wisely by anyone and so moves on. He thereby reminds us that Drug War propaganda has affected everyone, even those who might seem at first blush to have seen through the colonialist and anti-scientific ideology of substance prohibition.

Coca is not the problem, Graham. Nor is heroin. Nor is opium ¹⁹ . Nor is morphine . Nor is Fentanyl ²⁰ . Nor is 'crack' cocaine .

The problem is our insistence on judging these substances in the abstract, without regard for context. All psychoactive substances have potential benefits for specific people, in specific situations, at specific dosages, alone or in specific drug combinations, etc. In other words, details matter, Graham, not just for marijuana use but for all drug use! Just as laughing gas could help me get off of Effexor ²¹, so could the informed use of a wide variety of drugs that inspire and elate -- yes, even if they are potentially addictive in specific use scenarios. This is why it is so wrong of Graham to breezily blow off cocaine and heroin as dangerous moral snares, especially as those substances are so dangerous today precisely because of drug prohibition, which refuses to teach safe use, refuses to regulate drug supply as to quantity and quality, and refuses to re-legalize the seemingly endless alternatives to cocaine and heroin. Yet Graham gives the impression that "Mother Ayahuasca" shares our own Drug War prejudices about psychoactive substances and that she too believes that cocaine ²² ²³ and heroin are evil and beyond the pale. (Really, Mama? At what dosages are they evil and in which situations? You're not trying to tell me that they are evil incarnate, are you???) Whereas, if that goddess understands anything, it is surely the fact that ill-advised use of any substance can be problematic -- and that the mere naming of a substance should not entail any judgment whatsoever!

Let me end by elaborating on just one common-sense way in which outlawed medicines could be used wisely in a free world -- thereby pushing back against this inane idea that our doctors are the experts when it comes to psychoactive medicines.

Take me, again. In a free world, I would get the help of what I call a "pharmacologically savvy empath"²⁴ to get off of the Effexor that I am currently on. The withdrawal schedule would be gradual -- something that is actually impossible without seeking out the help of a compounding pharmacist, but that's another story. During the withdrawal process, I would have regular strategically spaced mental "vacations" on drugs that inspire and elate, whether for 30 minutes or for an entire afternoon. On Day 1, I might use the phenethylamine that prompted the following user report in "Pihkal" by Alexander Shulgin:

"The entire experience was exquisite. Next day, same sense of serene, quiet joy/beauty persisted for most of the day. A true healing potential."²⁵

On day 7 -- a particularly sunny day -- I might even use morphine to help me appreciate Mother Nature a la the character Augustus Bedloe in "A Tale of the Ragged Mountains," a short story by Edgar Allan Poe.

"In the meantime the morphine ²⁶ had its customary effect- that of enduing all the external world with an intensity of interest. In the quivering of a leaf- in the hue of a blade of grass- in the shape of a trefoil- in the humming of a bee- in the gleaming of a dew-drop- in the breathing of the wind- in the faint odors that came from the forest- there came a whole universe of suggestion- a gay and motley train of rhapsodical and immethodical thought."²⁷

A random variety of such inspiring drug use would take place with the goal of keeping me on the path of Effexor withdrawal, without giving up. This is crucial, because in the old days, I would relapse thanks to just one or two hours of intense existential angst -- whereas such angst could be avoided and obfuscated with the use of drugs that inspire and elate. Again, this is all psychological common sense -- even though it will clash with the behaviorist notion that only the lab-coated behaviorist can tell me what will work for my own mind and mood concerns.

It is just as if America had placed Dr. Spock of Star Trek in charge of determining the propriety of drug use. I may tell him that I find common-sense relief in the occasional use of a wide variety of demonized substances, but he will respond dispassionately as follows:

"That is highly illogical, Brian. I need to look at your biochemistry before I can agree with you that you are REALLY feeling any relief whatsoever."

Then if I say, "But look at me, Spock, I am laughing out loud!"

"Yes," Spock will say, "but are you REALLY being helped with your depression? That will take me years of well-funded studies to determine scientifically. Meanwhile, please stop embarrassing me with your unscientific laughter."

"And what about my life story in the 'Galactic Times'?"

"We obviously cannot publish that, Brian, since your positive use of laughing gas ²⁸ might give people ideas. We do not want other patients to begin thinking that they can be cured without the help of medical science."

Notes for essay entitled How the Drug War Censors Free Speech:

1: Behaviorism and the War on Drugs DWP (up)
2: How Drug Warriors Deny Me the Pursuit of Happiness DWP (up)
3: In Defense of Opium DWP (up)
4: How the Drug War Outlaws Religion DWP (up)
5: Glatter, Robert. 2021. “Can Laughing Gas (Nitrous Oxide) Help People with Treatment-Resistant Depression?” Forbes, June 9, 2021. https://www.forbes.com/sites/robertglatter/2021/06/09/can-laughing-gas-nitrous-oxide-help-people-with-treatmentresistant-depre (up)
6: James, William. 2016. The Varieties of Religious Experience. Goodreads. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28820.The_Varieties_of_Religious_Experience. (up)
7: JB Watson Britannica (up)
8: The purblind coldness of the Behaviorist doctrine is made clear in the following words of its founder, JB Watson, as quoted in the 2015 book "Paradox" by Margaret Cuonzo: "Concepts such as belief and desire are heritages of a timid savage past akin to concepts referring to magic." (Surely, Watson was proactively channeling Dr. Spock of the original Star Trek series.) (up)
9: Coverup on Campus DWP (up)
10: Speak now or forever hold your peace about drug prohibition DWP (up)
11: Jim Beam and Drugs DWP (up)
12: Glorifying Beneficial Drug Use DWP (up)
13: Reddit: the Home Page for Grade-Schoolers DWP (up)
14: Why the Drugs Reddit should not exist DWP (up)
15: The Drugs Reddit just doesn't get it DWP (up)
16: How the Internet Archive Censors Free Speech about Drugs DWP (up)
17: Graham Hancock - The War on Consciousness BANNED TED TALK YouTube, 2013 (up)
18: 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)
19: The Truth About Opium by William H. Brereton DWP (up)
20: Fentanyl does not steal loved ones: Drug Laws Do DWP (up)
21: How Drug Prohibition makes it impossible to get off of Effexor and other Big Pharma drugs DWP (up)
22: Sigmund Freud's real breakthrough was not psychoanalysis DWP (up)
23: “Freud on Cocaine : Freud, Sigmund, 1856-1939 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive.” 2023. Internet Archive. 2023. https://archive.org/details/freudoncocaine0000freu/page/n5/mode/2up?view=theater. (up)
24: Replacing Psychiatry with Pharmacologically Savvy Shamanism DWP (up)
25: Shulgin, Alexander T, and Ann Shulgin. 2019. Pihkal : A Chemical Love Story. Berkeley, Ca: Transform Press. (up)
26: Three takeaway lessons from the use of morphine by William Halsted, co-founder of Johns Hopkins Medical School DWP (up)
27: “Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore - Works - Tales - A Tale of the Ragged Mountains (Text-02A).” 2026. Eapoe.Org. 2026. https://www.eapoe.org/works/tales/raggeda.htm. (up)
28: Forbes Magazine's Laughable Article about Nitrous Oxide DWP (up)

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Drugs that sharpen the mind should be thoroughly investigated for their potential to help dementia victims. Instead, we prefer to demonize these drugs as useless. That's anti-scientific and anti-patient.

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.

Suicidal people should be given drugs that cheer them up immediately and whose use they can look forward to. The truth is, we would rather such people die than to give them such drugs, that's just how bamboozled we are by the war against drugs.

If we let "science" decide about drugs, i.e. base freedom on health concerns, then tea can be as easily outlawed as beer. The fact that horses are not illegal shows that prohibition is not about health. It's about the power to outlaw certain "ways of being in the world."

It's just plain totalitarian nonsense to outlaw mother nature and to outlaw moods and mental states thru drug law. These truths can't be said enough by us "little people" because the people in power are simply not saying them.

Scientists are not the experts on psychoactive medicines. The experts are painters and artists and spiritualists -- and anyone else who simply wants to be all they can be in life. Scientists understand nothing of such goals and aspirations.

The massive use of plea deals lets prosecutors threaten drug suspects into giving up their rights to a fair trial.

The real value of Erowid is as a research tool for a profession that does not even exist yet: the profession of what I call the pharmacologically savvy empath: a compassionate life counselor with a wide knowledge of how drugs can (and have) been used by actual people.

Endless drugs could help with depression. Any drug that inspires and elates is an antidepressant, partly by the effect itself and partly by the mood-elevation caused by anticipation of use (facts which are far too obvious for materialists and drug warriors to understand -- let alone materialist drug warriors!).

Many psychedelic fans are still drug warriors at heart. They just think that a nice big exception should be carved out for the drugs that they're suddenly finding useful.

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How the Drug War Censors Free Speech

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