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Why Drug Prohibition is a Crime against Humanity

by Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher

August 28, 2025



Drug prohibition is a crime against humanity1. It is staggeringly cruel. It forces untold millions to suffer in silence.

Take me, for instance. I am attempting to get off and stay off the Big Pharma 2 3 med called Effexor 4 . And it's not easy. The withdrawal downsides are hideous and can continue for years. And yet it is clear to me -- absolutely clear -- that I could use a variety of drugs like coca and opium 5 and phenethylamines in a strategic and safe way in order to transcend Effexor downsides and truly get off that dependence-causing drug -- starting today! Starting right now! I could get off Effexor! This is just psychological common sense. And yet our drug policy tells us that drugs must be outlawed for everybody if they could be misused by the white young people whom we refuse to educate about safe use.

This algorithm represents a veto on human progress. It represents the end of personal health care. It is illegal to take care of one's emotional and mental health in America. Illegal.

If Americans had a clue what was going on here, then all sites on the topic of Effexor withdrawal would contain protests against drug prohibition, the drug policy which makes that withdrawal impossible. And yet no one connects the dots. That shows how successful the Drug Warriors have been in blinding us to all benefits of demonized substances.

Drug warriors should be put on trial for denying me the godsends that grow at my very feet, for denying me the right to take care of my own health. That is a crime against humanity.

How do they get away with this?

Answer: They never consider any stakeholders in their drug policy debates except for white American young people -- the ones whom they refuse on principle to educate about safe use. They never take into account the depressed whom they are forcing to go without godsend medicines.

A few months ago I wrote about a progressive cousin who spoke favorably about the idea of killing drug dealers. That cousin has a deeply depressed wife. I should have said to him: "That drug prohibition that you champion is the reason why your wife is living in hell 24/7!!!"

Alas, the Drug War clearly demonstrates that you can fool all of the people all of the time. You can even convince progressives to abjure time-honored freedoms in an effort to keep Americans from using godsend medicines. Propaganda is all-powerful. As historian William Shirer wrote in The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich:

"No one who has not lived for years in a totalitarian land can possibly conceive how difficult it is to escape the dread consequences of a regime's calculated and incessant propaganda."


The Drug War proves that propaganda works, even in so-called democracies -- and this is a truth that the world has to come to terms with if freedom is to survive on planet Earth. Unless we take steps, like re-legalizing Mother Nature based on common-sense democratic principles, then racist politicians will continue to successfully promote inhumane agendas at the behest of self-interested billionaires.




Notes:

1: Drug Prohibition is a crime against humantiy DWP (up)
2: Seife, Charles. 2012. “Is Drug Research Trustworthy?” Scientific American 307 (6): 56–63. https://doi.org/10.1038/scientificamerican1212-56. (up)
3: 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)
4: How Drug Prohibition makes it impossible to get off of Effexor and other Big Pharma drugs DWP (up)
5: The Truth About Opium by William H. Brereton DWP (up)








Ten Tweets

against the hateful war on US




I can't imagine Allen Ginsberg writing "Howl!" while under the influence of mood-damping drugs like Inderal and Prozac -- but then maybe that's the point: the powers-that-be do not want poets writing poems like "Howl!"

One merely has to look at any issue of Psychology Today to see articles in which the author reckons without the Drug War, in which they pretend that banned substances do not exist and so fail to incorporate any topic-related insights that might otherwise come from user reports.

If there were no other problem with antidepressants, they would be wrong for the simple reason that they make a user dependent for life -- not as a bug (as in drugs like opium) but rather as a feature: that's how they "work," by being administered daily for a lifetime.

It's amazing. Drug law is outlawing science -- and yet so few complain. Drug law tells us what mushrooms we can collect, for God's sake. Is that not straight-up insane? Or are Americans so used to being treated as children that they accept this corrupt status quo?

Ketamine is like any other drug. It has good uses for certain people in certain situations. Nowadays, people insist that a drug be okay in every situation for everybody (especially American teens) before they will say that it's okay. That's crazy and anti-scientific.

The prohibitionist motto: "Billions for arrest, not one cent for education."

First we outlaw all drugs that could help; then we complain that some people have 'TREATMENT-RESISTANT DEPRESSION'. What? No. What they really "have" is an inability to thrive because of our idiotic drug laws. 3:51 PM · Jul 15, 2024

No wonder the "Justice" Department relies on plea deals; otherwise juries could use nullification to free those charged with mere drug possession.

Wanna show drug warriors the error of their ways? Legalize all less dangerous drugs than alcohol and then deny work to those who test positive for liquor and confiscate their property if beer cans are found on-site.

I just can't believe... [image]


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Copyright 2025, Brian Ballard Quass Contact: quass@quass.com

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