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Why exactly did the US go so crazy against drugs? Seems like after WWII this war on drugs mentality took root and probably peaked in the 1980s or so with the pe

by api 8y ago

Why exactly did the US go so crazy against drugs? Seems like after WWII this war on drugs mentality took root and probably peaked in the 1980s or so with the peak of the WWII generation's power.

tossawayonphine 8y ago
money
- sheepdestroyer 8y ago
  and racism.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
apsec112 8y ago
A lot of it was because of one man, Harry Anslinger, commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics from 1930 to 1962: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_J._Anslinger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_J._Anslinger
- intertextuality 8y ago
  It's hard to believe that one single ideologue had so much influence, and directly caused so much suffering to so many people. > Marihuana is a short cut to the insane asylum. Smoke marihuana cigarettes for a month and what was once your brain will be nothing but a storehouse of horrid specters. > Anslinger collected dubious anecdotes of marijuana causing crime and violence, and ignored contrary evidence such as doctor Walter Bromberg, who pointed out that substance abuse and crime are heavily confounded and that none of a group of 2,216 criminal convictions he examined were clearly done under marijuana's influence,[9] or a discussion forwarded to him by the American Medical Association in which 29 of 30 pharmacists and drug industry representatives objected to his proposals to ban marijuana. One such statement claimed that the proposal was "Absolute rot. It is not necessary. I have never known of its misuse.", although only the single dissenter (who noted he had once encountered a doctor who had been addicted to marijuana) was preserved in Bureau files.
  - Asooka 8y ago
    Well, we already have the examples of Mao, Stalin and perennial favourite for worst person to have ever lived (even though he doesn't measure to the previous two in terms of atrocities committed) Hitler. Anslinger might be even worse though, because while we recognise the other three as clearly evil (or at least their acts as atrocious), his views are still held as good moral standards by societies around the globe.
anitil 8y ago
I've heard versions of the war on drugs as a veiled racial policy [0]. But, I'm not from the US, and that idea seems too ... convenient (?) so I wouldn't take it at face value. [0] See https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman for the direct quote
- alexanderdmitri 8y ago
  > The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did [0]. For context, that's a direct quote from John Ehrlichman who "was counsel and Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs" under Nixon when Nixon declared the war on drugs. Everything kind of snow-balled from there. According to the chronology provided by PBS [1], perhaps the first groundwork was put in place by LBJ founding the "Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs" in 1968 (campaign year that Nixon won), the timing of which correlates with Nixon's successful campaigning on a "theme to restore 'law and order'"[2]. [0] https://en.m.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman https://en.m.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman [1] https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/ https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/ [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1968_United_States_presidential_election#Campaign_themes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1968_United_States_presidentia...
petre 8y ago
I guess it had to do with hippies protesting aganst the Vietnam war, DuPont's money, Mexican farmers getting a buck, Eastern Block countries being hemp fibre exporters. The US esentially destroyed this industry in other countries, except for China and India who pretty much control this market now.
_bxg1 8y ago
My guess is that, at least when it comes to Marijuana, conservatives are so deeply offended by drugs because they're anti-productivity. Pot slows you down, relaxes you, lowers drive (even just temporarily). For those on the right wing, this translates to, "it makes you lazy, a burden on society, it undermines the American spirit of hard work and self-started progress". They rationalize it any number of ways, but I think that aspect is what makes it personal.
- saagarjha 8y ago
  I mean, alcohol impairs you quite a bit as well. And doing amphetamines can arguably improve your productivity.
  - _bxg1 8y ago
    True, but we tried prohibiting alcohol and that didn't work out. And when the War On Drugs rolled around, Marijuana being grown by hippies was its poster-child, not the cocaine being peddled by gangsters. That was illegal too, but that's not where the emotional heart of the crusade was. Cocaine was used by businessmen on the weekends; marijuana would corrupt little Jimmy and ruin his future as a productive member of society.
    - _Schizotypy 8y ago
      We tried banning everything else and that still isn't working out lol The black market of current day mirror that of alcohol prohibition. No controls on products and rampant violence
- petre 8y ago
  It depends, there are accounts of high drug (cocaine, meth) use in Nazi Germany. In the US people abuse prescription drugs. In highly competitive societies you will see drug use specifically to enhance productivity at least on the short term, with unfortunate consequences.
rangibaby 8y ago
Hemp competed with cotton and doesn't require chemical spraying (it's a weed!). How are you going to convince John Q. Public to ban hemp? Give it a Mexican-sounding name... The Nixon-era War on Drugs: “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.” [0] https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/ https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/

by api 8y ago

Why exactly did the US go so crazy against drugs? Seems like after WWII this war on drugs mentality took root and probably peaked in the 1980s or so with the peak of the WWII generation's power.

tossawayonphine 8y ago

money

sheepdestroyer 8y ago
and racism.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

apsec112 8y ago

A lot of it was because of one man, Harry Anslinger, commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics from 1930 to 1962: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_J._Anslinger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_J._Anslinger

intertextuality 8y ago
It's hard to believe that one single ideologue had so much influence, and directly caused so much suffering to so many people. > Marihuana is a short cut to the insane asylum. Smoke marihuana cigarettes for a month and what was once your brain will be nothing but a storehouse of horrid specters. > Anslinger collected dubious anecdotes of marijuana causing crime and violence, and ignored contrary evidence such as doctor Walter Bromberg, who pointed out that substance abuse and crime are heavily confounded and that none of a group of 2,216 criminal convictions he examined were clearly done under marijuana's influence,[9] or a discussion forwarded to him by the American Medical Association in which 29 of 30 pharmacists and drug industry representatives objected to his proposals to ban marijuana. One such statement claimed that the proposal was "Absolute rot. It is not necessary. I have never known of its misuse.", although only the single dissenter (who noted he had once encountered a doctor who had been addicted to marijuana) was preserved in Bureau files.
- Asooka 8y ago
  Well, we already have the examples of Mao, Stalin and perennial favourite for worst person to have ever lived (even though he doesn't measure to the previous two in terms of atrocities committed) Hitler. Anslinger might be even worse though, because while we recognise the other three as clearly evil (or at least their acts as atrocious), his views are still held as good moral standards by societies around the globe.

anitil 8y ago

I've heard versions of the war on drugs as a veiled racial policy [0]. But, I'm not from the US, and that idea seems too ... convenient (?) so I wouldn't take it at face value. [0] See https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman for the direct quote

alexanderdmitri 8y ago
> The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did [0]. For context, that's a direct quote from John Ehrlichman who "was counsel and Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs" under Nixon when Nixon declared the war on drugs. Everything kind of snow-balled from there. According to the chronology provided by PBS [1], perhaps the first groundwork was put in place by LBJ founding the "Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs" in 1968 (campaign year that Nixon won), the timing of which correlates with Nixon's successful campaigning on a "theme to restore 'law and order'"[2]. [0] https://en.m.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman https://en.m.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman [1] https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/ https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/ [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1968_United_States_presidential_election#Campaign_themes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1968_United_States_presidentia...

petre 8y ago

I guess it had to do with hippies protesting aganst the Vietnam war, DuPont's money, Mexican farmers getting a buck, Eastern Block countries being hemp fibre exporters. The US esentially destroyed this industry in other countries, except for China and India who pretty much control this market now.

_bxg1 8y ago

My guess is that, at least when it comes to Marijuana, conservatives are so deeply offended by drugs because they're anti-productivity. Pot slows you down, relaxes you, lowers drive (even just temporarily). For those on the right wing, this translates to, "it makes you lazy, a burden on society, it undermines the American spirit of hard work and self-started progress". They rationalize it any number of ways, but I think that aspect is what makes it personal.

saagarjha 8y ago
I mean, alcohol impairs you quite a bit as well. And doing amphetamines can arguably improve your productivity.
- _bxg1 8y ago
  True, but we tried prohibiting alcohol and that didn't work out. And when the War On Drugs rolled around, Marijuana being grown by hippies was its poster-child, not the cocaine being peddled by gangsters. That was illegal too, but that's not where the emotional heart of the crusade was. Cocaine was used by businessmen on the weekends; marijuana would corrupt little Jimmy and ruin his future as a productive member of society.
  - _Schizotypy 8y ago
    We tried banning everything else and that still isn't working out lol The black market of current day mirror that of alcohol prohibition. No controls on products and rampant violence
petre 8y ago
It depends, there are accounts of high drug (cocaine, meth) use in Nazi Germany. In the US people abuse prescription drugs. In highly competitive societies you will see drug use specifically to enhance productivity at least on the short term, with unfortunate consequences.

rangibaby 8y ago

Hemp competed with cotton and doesn't require chemical spraying (it's a weed!). How are you going to convince John Q. Public to ban hemp? Give it a Mexican-sounding name... The Nixon-era War on Drugs: “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.” [0] https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/ https://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/