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Interview with a Drug Fiend

A satire on the folly of replacing drug arrests with mandatory medical counseling

by Brian Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher

October 3, 2026



MRS. LALEHAM: Welcome, Brian. Thank you for coming.

BRIAN: Thank me for coming? I am here because of a court order, madam.

MRS. LALEHAM: Quite. Excuse me while I look into your background story.

BRIAN: [softly] Whatever.

MRS. LALEHAM: Let's see here. I see that you have been trying to improve your mind with a variety of drugs. Oh, dear. We've got a long list of phenethylamines and tryptamines, the occasional use of cocaine, and even intermittent opium, heroin and morphia use. Oh, yes, and let us not forget the occasional inhalation of laughing gas, you rogue.

BRIAN: In other words, I used drugs wisely, madam. I am not addicted to anything thanks to my strategically scheduled usage pattern. I should be considered a role model, if you ask me.

MRS. LALEHAM: Well, no one's asking you, Mr...

BRIAN: Pendragon.

MRS. LALEHAM: No one's asking you, Mr. Pendragon.

BRIAN: Apparently not.

MRS. LALEHAM: You're just lucky that you live in a country that treats drug use as a health concern rather than as a crime.

BRIAN: True. At least I cannot be held against my will.

MRS. LALEHAM: That's as shall appear. If your usage pattern is outrageous enough, we may well have to restrict your freedom in a variety of health-inducing ways, ranging from merely inconvenient from your point of view to downright disabling.

BRIAN: What?

MRS. LALEHAM: Speaking of which, what size ankle do you have?

BRIAN: What size ankle?

MRS. LALEHAM: We may have to fit you with an ankle bracelet for your own good.

BRIAN: Well, I've never measured...

MRS. LALEHAM: No worries. We'll get our on-site tailor to take those measurements while he's sizing you up for cuffs.

BRIAN: Cuffs?

MRS. LALEHAM: Just in case, mind, just in case.

BRIAN: In case of what?

MRS. LALEHAM: In case you fail to convince us of the salubrity of your current lifestyle viz. psychoactive substances.

BRIAN: Oh, great.

MRS. LALEHAM: Tell me, when did it start?

BRIAN: When did what start?

MRS. LALEHAM: When did you first get these cravings to see the world in new and novel ways?

BRIAN: Well--

MRS. LALEHAM: When did you decide that your default perceptions were not good enough, that you wanted to, as it were, open the doors of perception and see beyond the veil?

BRIAN: Well--

MRS. LALEHAM: When, in short, did you get this morbid craving to investigate the value of an experiential metaphysic in defiance of the generally accepted physicalism of the schools, particularly as regards ontology?

BRIAN: What exactly are you asking me, lady?

MRS. LALEHAM: All right, you've asked for it, I'll make this as clear as I possibly can, so brace yourself, Brian: Are you or are you not positing the existence of an experiential epistemology with the help of your drug use which, if proven to be true, would render the whole rationalist project of Immanuel Kant null and void, insofar as the Sage of Konigsberg implicitly posited the existence of only one form of consciousness, his so-called "rational consciousness," whereas William James himself believed in the existence of a plethora of conscious states, each with its own potential application for our daily lives?


BRIAN: Well, I--

MRS. LALEHAM: Yes or no, Brian. This is not rocket science, after all.

BRIAN: It's pretty damn close.

MRS. LALEHAM: But I must warn you to be very careful about how you answer my question. Your future freedom, or lack thereof, may depend on the answer that you give.

BRIAN: What? Well, in that case, could you please repeat the question?

MRS. LALEHAM: Stalling won't help you, Brian, but I will humor you just this once with a repetition... Are you or are you not positing the existence of an experiential epistemology with the help of your drug use which, if proven to be true, would render the whole rationalist project of Immanuel Kant null and void, insofar as the Sage of Konigsberg implicitly posited the existence of only one form of consciousness, his so-called "rational consciousness," whereas William James himself believed in the existence of a plethora of conscious states, each with its own potential application for our daily lives?

BRIAN: Well, I feel that--

MRS. LALEHAM: Yes or no!

BRIAN: I--

MRS. LALEHAM: Yes or no!

BRIAN: Um...

MRS. LALEHAM: Yes or no!

BRIAN: Y-y-y-yes?

MRS. LALEHAM: Correct! That's the answer that we health experts like to hear for such a question. Good for you, you can relax now.

BRIAN: Whew! So I can go now?

MRS. LALEHAM: Oh, no, don't relax THAT much. But your answer does absolve you of at least one charge that we might have otherwise leveled against you, the charge that you were merely masquerading as an ontologist for the sake of having a good time on drugs. That would have been SUCH bad form. And illegal, into the bargain.

BRIAN: Wait a minute, are you saying that it would have been wrong if I was merely using those drugs to have a good time?

MRS. LALEHAM: Not exactly wrong, but... Well, my goodness, it's surely bad for your health whenever one is inspired by anything other than fresh air and sunshine...

BRIAN: Yes, yes.

MRS. LALEHAM: Or the yipping of a puppy...

BRIAN: Yes, yes.

MRS. LALEHAM: Or the sighs of one's first love...

BRIAN: Yes, yes.

MRS. LALEHAM: Or the haunting murmur of bees on a summer's eve...

BRIAN: Snap out of it, John Keats, I get your point.

MRS. LALEHAM: Sorry. Sometimes I think that life itself should be outlawed for our own good, it's just so damn enjoyable.

BRIAN: Can I go now?

MRS. LALEHAM: We're almost done here -- for this week, at least.

BRIAN: For this week?

MRS. LALEHAM: I'm guessing that some of this drug use of yours was not philosophical in nature, that you used at least some of these drugs to override negative voices and to see the world more soberly, ironically enough, as someone unhindered by the negative programming of the past – am I right? -- should that negativity come from genes, upbringing or biochemistry. Would you say that that was a fair characterization of at least some of your drug use?

BRIAN: I would say that it's a ridiculously convoluted characterization.

MRS. LALEHAM: But it is fair, right? Good. That's all I wanted to know.

BRIAN: Good, now we're done.

MRS. LALEHAM: Not so fast.

BRIAN: Damn.

MRS. LALEHAM: Tell me, why do you think that you feel this need to override negativity and to rise above kneejerk built-in responses that sabotage your various initiatives in life?

BRIAN: Well--

MRS. LALEHAM: Whence comes this morbid desire to obtain almost supernatural feelings of calm while improving your mentation by a whole order of magnitude, at the very least?

BRIAN: Well--

MRS. LALEHAM: Think back to your past. Why do you think that you feel compelled to get the absolute most out of your various adventures in life when almost everybody else is placidly content to go blear-eyed through the world, taking their feeble grasp of reality as constituting the be-all and end-all of human possibility in this highly variegated and multiform universe of ours?

BRIAN: Well--

MRS. LALEHAM: Yes or no!

BRIAN: Yes or no?

MRS. LALEHAM: I mean, answer, please.

BRIAN: You wouldn't want to repeat that for me, would you?

MRS. LALEHAM: Oh, very well. Why do you think that you feel compelled to get the absolute most out of your various adventures in life when almost everybody else is placidly --

[alarm clock sounding]

MRS. LALEHAM: Oh, I'm sorry, we're out of time. Consider yourself lucky, Brian, you were "saved by the bell" this time.

BRIAN: So, what's the verdict, Doc?

MRS. LALEHAM: Well, let me see. Based on what I've seen from you today...

BRIAN: Yes?

MRS. LALEHAM: I've got good news and bad news for you. The good news is that I think that we can guarantee your health, for now at least, without the help of ankle bracelets or handcuffs.

BRIAN: That's good.

MRS. LALEHAM: The bad news is that I will need to see you on a weekly basis going forward until further notice.

BRIAN: What? Why?

MRS. LALEHAM: For health reasons, of course.

BRIAN: What health reasons?

MRS. LALEHAM: We've got to get to the bottom of why you have this insane desire for improving your performance in life. This clearly is a result of something that happened to you in the past.

BRIAN: Of course.

MRS. LALEHAM: And when you find it and UNDERSTAND it, you will no longer feel the need to "get above your raisin'," as my grandmother used to call it, and to be better than the rest of us sober folk with the help of time-honored medicines.

BRIAN: [laconically] I can hardly wait.

MRS. LALEHAM: Shall we say 11 A.M. again, next week?

BRIAN: [mumbling] Fine.

MRS. LALEHAM: And do stop pouting. Remember, in most other countries they would have thrown an unrepentant drug user like you in the hoosegow by now.

BRIAN: Well, you've got a point there, I suppose.

MRS. LALEHAM: Of course I do.

BRIAN: As the Bard used to say: "Not being the worst stands in some rank of praise."








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Ten Tweets

against the hateful war on US




The Drug Warriors say: "Don't tread on me! (That said, please continue to tell me what plants I can use, how much pain relief I can get, and whether my religion is true or not.)"

Drug prohibition is superstitious idiocy. It is based on the following crazy idea: that a substance that can be misused by a white young person at one dose for one reason must not be used by anybody at any dose for any reason.

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.

The "scheduling" system is completely anti-scientific and anti-patient. It tells us we can make a one-size-fits-all decision about psychoactive substances without regard for dosage, context of use, reason for use, etc. That's superstitious tyranny.

It's a category error to say that scientists can tell us if psychoactive drugs "really work." It's like asking Dr. Spock of Star Trek if hugging "really works." ("Hugging is highly illogical, Captain.")

According to Donald Trump's view of life, Jesus Christ was a chump. We should hate our enemies, not love them.

Americans heap hypocritical praise on Walt Whitman. What they don't realize is that many of us could be "Walt Whitman for a Day" with the wise use of psychoactive drugs. To the properly predisposed, morphine gives a DEEP appreciation of Mother Nature.

Rather than protesting prohibition as a crackdown on academic freedom, today's scientists are collaborating with the drug war by promoting shock therapy and SSRIs, thereby profiting from the monopoly that the drug war gives them in selling mind and mood medicine.

That's another problem with "following the science." Science downplays personal testimony as subjective. But psychoactive experiences are all ABOUT subjectivity. With such drugs, users are not widgets susceptible to the one-size-fits-all pills of reductionism.

Anyone who has read Pihkal by Alexander Shulgin knows that the drug warriors have it exactly backwards. Drugs are our friends. We need to find safe ways to use them to improve ourselves psychologically, spiritually and mentally.


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Diary of a Drug Fiend

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Unless otherwise indicated, no AI is used in the creation of site content. These essays represent the original ideas of their author and not the ideas that the author SHOULD have based on an algorithmic parsing of existing data. For more on this subject, consider the AI-related viewpoints to which the author subscribes as delineated in the New York Times opinion piece entitled "What 370,000 College Essays Tell Us About A.I.’s Effects on Creativity" by Rebecca Winthrop of the Brookings Institution.

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Copyright 2026, Brian Ballard Quass Contact: quass@quass.com

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