The aesthetic difference between addiction and chemical dependency

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The aesthetic difference between addiction and chemical dependency

by Brian Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher

April 19, 2023

There is a pedantic difference between addiction and dependency, but the power of these words to conjure bugbears is based on aesthetic judgements. We recoil from seeing an addict "craving" a drug -- but we have no problem with a chemically dependent person who merely feels like hell because their supply has been interrupted. Let them suffer in silence, it's no skin off our backs. Addicts, on the other hand, are a bother to us.

Update: May 31, 2025
Update: June 01, 2025

They are eyesores. They may even try to rob us. But the chemically dependent user keeps their hell to themselves. We wouldn't know one if we saw one. Besides, if they're chemically dependent on Big Pharma meds, the powers-that-be are more than happy to furnish the goods that the user requires, for a price, of course, of time, money, and the user's own self-esteem and sense of empowerment in life. For who wants to be turned into an eternal patient of psychiatry? That's why we seldom see a "ragged out" Big Pharma patient -- because their medicines are eternally forthcoming from the doctor's office and CVS Pharmacy.

In fact, the very idea of an addict is a Drug War creation -- or at least a creation of a parochial view of drugs. If we truly welcomed Mother Nature's pharmacy and were allowed -- and even encouraged -- to find the best medicines for ourselves, there would be no addiction. There would be conditions that a puritan outsider would be eager to call "addiction," but the user would be able to employ a wide variety of drugs to obfuscate the negative effects of such a pharmacological situation and to thereby move on -- if he of she so desired, of course, for addiction is objectively wrong only to the extent that one's poison of choice is no longer, in fact, one's poison of choice. In our world, that catastrophe is treated with Naloxone and cold turkey. In a truly free world, one in which nature is considered a benefactor rather than a kingpin, we would be constantly working to give the supposed 'addict' new ways to switch courses with the help of a vast pharmacopoeia of psychoactive substances (some "natural," some not), without the gnashing of teeth that we require in today's materialist and Christian Science "addiction protocols."

Author's Follow-up: April 19, 2023

follow-up on essay by the Drug War Philosopher

This, incidentally, is why the Drug War imposes a religion: it is based on the anti-Christian idea that God's creation was not good. The Catholic position has always been that things are not bad. Only people are good or bad based on the way they use things. Why? Because God himself told us that his creation was "good." The Drug War denies that position and is therefore a religion.

Author's Follow-up:

May 31, 2025

picture of clock metaphorically suggesting a follow-up

In reading the drug-related history books of Mike Jay ¹, one sees how drug prohibition was always in the interests of the medical industry and their claim to be the experts on human suffering, both physical and psychological. Before 1914, one could smoke an opium ² pipe in the privacy of one's own home without a "by your leave" from the scientific community. You had no need to assure anyone of your laudable motives in so doing. After 1914, doctors suddenly became the experts as to whether or not you needed opiates. Even if the doctors determined in the affirmative on your behalf, they would still be in the driver's seat. They would prescribe the precise conditions (when, where and how) under which the otherwise evil use of opiates would be magically transformed into a blessed medical protocol by dint of bureaucracy, red tape and ceremony -- this latter typically consisting of stern downward glances from a paternal-looking doctor in a white lab gown, as who should say, "Yes, I am prescribing an opiate for you, but I trust that you will not be so antiscientific as to enjoy any of its effects. Humph!"

This medicalization of mind and mood conditions naturally leads to so-called addiction "crises" by ensuring that the drug-seeking public is only able to choose from a starkly limited number of drugs, most of them created by Big Pharma , which has a vested interest in marketing drugs that turn their customers into patients for life. (This, indeed, is how my own mother got hooked on Oxy, because it was one of the few drugs that her GP could offer her for her 'non-physical' complaints.) The resulting dystopia is not really an addiction crisis, however; it is a prohibition crisis, caused by the limitation of drug choice and the refusal to teach safe use. It could even be called a crisis for capitalism . For if capitalism cannot work without drug prohibition, then there is something wrong with capitalism , not drugs. The world is front-loaded with psychoactive drugs, after all. Our bodies are built in such a way as to profit from them. These are the facts of life. If capitalism cannot accommodate these facts, then capitalism ³ has intrinsic shortcomings. But America, in a bizarre case of mass denial, insists that nature is wrong: that God made a mistake in giving us psychoactive substances and that our role should be to remove all such evil snares from the face of the earth.

The fact that some people believe such superstitious nonsense is not surprising; the fact that the entire modern mainstream thinks this way is more than surprising -- it is alarming. And yet they do. Until three years ago, the prime directive of the United Nations with respect to drugs was to remove them from the face of the earth. That's right, their goal was a drug-free world ⁴. The idea that this is a worthy goal is based on so many harebrained but unspoken assumptions that one scarcely knows where to begin in confronting them. Imagine the strange spectacle, however, of a UN commission tucked away in a smoke-filled conference room, the delegates drinking port and coffee as they flesh out their plans to deny the rest of the world its own choices when it comes to drugs.

It is amazing to me -- and troubling -- that no one in the 19th century would ever consider the subject of psychoactive substances as a whole: no one was searching for a sustainable drugs policy, one consistent with human liberty; otherwise, they would have realized that they were heading toward a police state the moment that police started playing whack-a-mole with drug use. Such a crackdown would never end, not just because of the resilience of Mother Nature but because of the ability of chemists to extract alkaloids and synthesize new drugs based on biochemical hints from nature herself. Besides, such a crackdown would be based on a completely unscientific notion: namely, that drugs should be judged base on the worst imaginable outcome of use. It never occurred to the mainstream to educate the public and to provide regulated drug choice. Instead, Drug Warriors completely denied the obvious: that drug use has any benefits at all.

To illustrate the absurdity of our situation, please join me in a little experiment. First, read the following quotation from Edgar Allan Poe about the positive effects of opiates, in this case, morphine .

"In the meantime the morphine 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.⁵"

Now, consider how the Drug Warrior reacts to such drug-aided appreciation of life. Do they call for the immediate use of the drug by dullards to heighten their appreciation of the world around them. Do they envision a new world in which the wise use of drugs like morphine could keep the elderly from "leaden-eyed despair"? Do they think of the suicides they could prevent by the wisely scheduled use of such drugs ("scheduled," that is, in the chronological sense of that word and without reference to the DEA's mendacious "scheduling" system in which the agency brazenly denies the many obvious and time-honored benefits of drug use)? Of course not. The Drug Warrior merely ignores any and all drug benefits and tells us to fear such medicines instead.

Whereas a sane response to such drug-inspired insight would be:

"Gee, this substance can open our eyes and make us appreciate the world around us! What an absolute godsend! We need to educate people to use this drug for this purpose in the safest possible way, while teaching about the potential for addiction and giving concrete ways to avoid that outcome: by merely intermittent use of morphine eked out with the random use of a wide array of other drugs with other mechanisms of action, if and when the user wishes to "partake" -- i.e, whenever they wish to transcend self."

In reading the Poe citation, the sane reader would think of those who live lives of "quiet desperation," and immediately connect the dots, saying to themselves: "This drug could help such people!" Instead, we say, "Oh, no, morphine ⁶ is addictive, and that's that." That makes as much sense as refusing to build a fire because one remembers that it can burn people who misuse it. We never stop to realize that addiction is only a "thing" because we refuse to re-legalize the drug supply, refuse to fight drugs with drugs, and refuse to educate about drugs. Our policy creates "drug addicts" whom we can then treat with a pseudo-religious intervention of the 12-step group. And so while the self-interested healthcare providers medicalize drug use, the public at large works to moralize it. And so we have our morality plays, like the 2020 movie "Four Good Days" with Glenn Close ⁷, in which drugs are considered to be the problem, not social policy, and we are encouraged to hate the "dealers" -- those dealers whom prohibition created out of whole cloth by the unprecedented wholesale outlawing of nature's pharmacopoeia.

prohibition is the problem ⁸ , not drugs.

There are no "addiction experts" in the age of drug prohibition. We will not know how big a thing "addiction" really is in and of itself until we get rid of all the attitudes, policies and laws that bring addiction about and then prevent us from treating it sensibly. We need a complete about-face for this to happen. Instead of demonizing drugs, we need to learn how to use them as wisely as possible for the benefit of humanity. We need to learn to fight drugs with drugs. Above all, we need to educate users and regulate the drug supply. We need to replace the Drug Enforcement Agency with the Drug Education Agency. The new DEA would be staffed by what I call "pharmacologically savvy empaths ⁹" who would teach safe use an intervene to save lives in cases where use is proving problematic. Meanwhile, we must remember that saying things like "Fentanyl ¹⁰ kills!" is philosophically identical to shouting "Fire bad!" Both statements are based on the idea that we should fear substances rather than learn how to use them as wisely as possible for the benefit of humanity. Please, folks, let's finally rise above the mindset of our paleolithic past!

Finally, all essays about addiction should mention the telling fact that 1 in 4 American women are dependent for life on Big Pharma meds -- and that this is actually considered to be a GOOD THING by most people. How do we explain this, given that most people also deny there are any good uses for outlawed medicines? Clearly, Americans have turned science into a god. They assume that Big Pharma meds are created "scientifically" -- that is, by looking under a microscope -- and that therefore the medicines are "real" cures. What a host of false assumptions underlies that belief! Besides, the Big Pharma ¹¹ ¹² goal is not to cure anything: their goal is to acquire lifetime patients! Meanwhile, we brazenly ignore all obvious benefits of demonized drugs, like the user reports from Pihkal by Alexander Shulgin:

"I feel that it is one of the most profound and deep learning experiences I have had."

"I learned a great deal about myself and my inner workings."

"I acknowledged a rapture in the very act of breathing."

"Rapture, indeed," says the pseudoscientific American. "Our scientists will tell you when you are undergoing rapture, thank you very much!"

Author's Follow-up:

June 01, 2025

Essays of this kind always outrage a certain subsection of scientists involved in the study of addiction. They complain as follows: "But addiction is a real illness! We can prove it using brain imaging techniques!"

Now, I take it as an obvious "given" that there are biochemical markers associated with addictions like alcohol, for instance. But until we legalize and promote psychoactive alternatives to alcohol, the true significance of those markers cannot be assessed. If I have a biochemical predilection to overuse alcohol and I live in a country with no clear alternatives to that drug, then that predilection will be of great relevance in determining my behavior. If, on the other hand, our society taught the safe and informed use of less dangerous drugs than alcohol, drugs that could inspire and elate and take one's mind off of alcohol entirely, then those biochemical markers of mine will mean nothing. No one would wish to use alcohol if they knew it was bad for them personally and they knew that they could achieve the desired self-transcendence in another equally easy and reliable manner. The problem is that the Drug Warriors outlaw all rapid self-transcendence except that provided by alcohol. They then turn around and say, "Oh, dear, look at these people who are obsessing on alcohol! We had better look at their brains to see why they are behaving in this way!" To which I say, "Nonsense. We had better rather look at drug law which has outlawed all alternatives to alcohol use!"

The materialists, however, are committed to the idea that biochemistry is destiny. That is simply wrong. Or rather, if biochemistry is destiny, it is only because government is doing everything it can to make it so. How? By outlawing all substances that could help one rise above biology and thrive in life in new enlightened ways: drugs like the phenethylamines of Alexander Shulgin, which inspired the following user reports in "Pihkal":

"I experienced the desire to laugh hysterically at what I could only describe as the completely ridiculous state of the entire world."

"I feel that I can learn faster. This is a 'smart' pill!"

"The feeling was one of great camaraderie, and it was very easy to talk to people."

"This feels marvelous, and a whole new way to be much more relaxed, accepting, being in the moment. No more axes to grind. I can be free."

The effectiveness of a given drug for any given person is determined by a wide variety of factors, only one of which is our personal biochemical predilections. Such predilections would be "taken onboard" by any sane drug user in a free world, but the propriety of our drug choices should ultimately depend on the big picture of the user's current place in the world and not on the fetishizing of any one input as being all-powerful, such as one's biochemical predilections.

Addiction

Notes for essay entitled The aesthetic difference between addiction and chemical dependency:

1: Mike Jay https://mikejay.net/books/ (up)
2: The Truth About Opium by William H. Brereton DWP (up)
3: What the drug war tells us about American capitalism DWP (up)
4: “‘Drug-Free World’ No More! Historic Resolution at the UN Spells End of Consensus on Drugs.” n.d. IDPC. https://idpc.net/blog/2022/12/drug-free-world-no-more-historic-resolution-at-the-un-spells-end-of-consensus-on-drugs. (up)
5: “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)
6: Three takeaway lessons from the use of morphine by William Halsted, co-founder of Johns Hopkins Medical School DWP (up)
7: Glenn Close but no cigar DWP (up)
8: Drug Prohibition is the Problem, not Drugs: what the movers and shakers get wrong in the drug re-legalization debate DWP (up)
9: Replacing Psychiatry with Pharmacologically Savvy Shamanism DWP (up)
10: Fentanyl does not steal loved ones: Drug Laws Do DWP (up)
11: Seife, Charles. 2012. “Is Drug Research Trustworthy?” Scientific American 307 (6): 56–63. https://doi.org/10.1038/scientificamerican1212-56. (up)
12: LaMattina, John. n.d. “Why Is Biopharma Paying 75% of the FDA’s Drug Division Budget?” Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnlamattina/2022/09/22/why-is-biopharma-paying-75-of-the-fdas-drug-division-budget/. (up)

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Mad in America publishes stories of folks who are disillusioned with antidepressants, but they won't publish mine, because I find mushrooms useful. They only want stories about cold turkey and jogging, or nutrition, or meditation.

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. It has made us prefer censorship and fear-filled ignorance to education!

Psychiatrists refuse to acknowledge that it is hugely disempowering to turn patients into wards of the healthcare state with dependence-causing "meds." End drug prohibition and end the psychiatric pill mill.

"Dope Sick"? "Prohibition Sick" is more like it. The very term "dope" connotes imperialism, racism and xenophobia, given that all tribal cultures have used "drugs" for various purposes. "Dope? Junk?" It's hard to imagine a more intolerant, dismissive and judgmental terminology.

National Geo published an article entitled "Coca: a Blessing and a Curse." Coca was never a curse. Most people used it wisely, just as most people drink wisely. Doctors demonized it because it really worked and it could put them out of business. https://abolishthedea.com/sigmund_freuds_real_breakthrough_was_not_psychoanalysis.php

Many psychonauts (like Terence McKenna) praise psychedelics while demonizing other psychoactive substances. No substance is bad in itself. All substances have some use at some dose for some reason for some people in some circumstance.

The 1932 movie "Scarface" starts with on-screen text calling for a crackdown on armed gangs in America. There is no mention of the fact that a decade's worth of Prohibition had created those gangs in the first place.

The existence of a handful of bad outcomes of drug use does not justify substance prohibition... any more than the existence of drunkards justifies a call for liquor prohibition.

At best, antidepressants make depression bearable. We need not settle for such drugs, especially when they are notorious for causing dependence. There are many drugs that elate and inspire. It is both cruel and criminal to outlaw them.

The best harm-reduction strategy is to re-legalize drugs.

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The aesthetic difference between addiction and chemical dependency

Author's Follow-up: April 19, 2023

Author's Follow-up:

May 31, 2025

Author's Follow-up:

June 01, 2025

Addiction

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Break the ice with a sledgehammer: place this book on your coffee table.

Diary of a Drug Fiend