I don't think the culture and drugs are linked in any way, shape or form. I've met a number of drug addicts over the years and they all came from very differnt

I don't think the culture and drugs are linked in any way, shape or form. I've met a number of drug addicts over the years and they all came from very differnt backgrounds: poor as hell, filthy rich, uneducated as well as highly educated and everything in between. Most[] of them shared one thing in common however: whatever misfortune they have in their live, they blame it on someone else. Most often that's the "government". Note the quotes here, by government I don't mean the government as any institution but more as a global conspiracy of evil masterminds that controls their lives and actively work against them at every step they make(which is a surprisingly common belief). At least see that as the common denominator across all the cultures in the last 50 years or so - the hippy movements, the heavy metal movements, the punk movements, the rap movements, and whatever is happening today(I've lost interest and so I have no idea what is popular today). It's an easy way to be part of a community and have the feeling that you are fighting back by doing the exact thing that you are told not to do, without suffering from(immediate) consequences, the way you would if you crash at 200km/hour for instance. And because producing and distributing drugs is illegal, then drugs are clearly not part of the status quo, so that cannot be a part of the conspiracy, right? I'm aware that's an oversimplification of the issue but you can go down that rabbit hole almost infinitely and you can see how that ties all cultures together. [] There are a few exceptions which are a consequence of stress combined with fame for instance but those are the exception, not the rule, at least in Europe and North America.