Poisoning the Drug Policy Debate in 8 Simple Steps
One of the primary facts worth knowing about the modern drug war debate is that it has been contaminated for decades. Anyone endeavoring to advance this conversation must navigate a dense fog of false dichotomies, red herrings, racist demagoguery, and McCarthian fear-mongering that serves to amplify the absurd while obscuring even the most simple truths.
While discussing this matter yesterday with NORML's Paul Armentano, I learned of a marvelous ancient document which sets forth in basic terms the fundamental strategies that have long been employed to destroy the drug war debate. "Themes in Chemical Prohibition" by William L. White was published in 1979 by the National Institute on Drug Abuse. It is easily the most insightful material ever produced by that agency:
THE PROHIBITIONIST THEMESA review of chemical prohibitionist literature reveals eight themes which appear to emerge from the tactics of most such movements. The tactics utilized to produce these themes are as follows:
1. The drug is associated with a hated subgroup of the society or a foreign enemy.
2. The drug is identified as solely responsible for many problems in the culture, i.e., crime, violence, and insanity.
3. The survival of the culture is pictured as being dependent on the prohibition of the drug.
4. The concept of "controlled" usage is destroyed and replaced by a "domino theory" of chemical progression.
5. The drug is associated with the corruption of young children, particularly their sexual corruption.
6. Both the user and supplier of the drug are defined as fiends, always in search of new victims; usage of the drug is considered "contagious."
7. Policy options are presented as total prohibition or total access.
8. Anyone questioning any of the above assumptions is bitterly attacked and characterized as part of the problem that needs to be eliminated.
After almost 30 years, this remains a complete inventory of the instruments one can expect to find in any prohibitionist's tool belt. It reads like the Bill of Rights of drug prohibitionist rhetoric, a universal guide that could well be found folded up within the coat pockets of drug war generals from Washington, D.C. to Vienna.
Only through strict adherence to these principles is it possible to effectively defend a drug war that destroys all which it claims to defend. Only under these rules could the continuation of costly and catastrophic public policies be considered politically viable, while even partial reforms bear a burden of presumed political suicide. Only in this climate of perpetual hysteria can our leaders be intimidated and stripped of their will to lead, forced instead by perceived orthodoxy to reluctantly, yet willfully, march us further into the drug war abyss.
This post isn't about how to end the drug war. I don’t quite claim to know that, although I've got a few ideas. Rather, this is an introduction, for anyone who may need it, to the rules of mainstream drug policy debate. We must know each of these rules by heart, because it is our duty to break them at any and every opportunity.
Update: Here is just one example of the absolute falsity of item 3 on the above list.
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redditScapegoating
Comment posted by Sanho Tree on Mon, 03/31/2008 - 5:35pmSociologist Craig Reinarman put it most succinctly:
"Drugs are richly functional scapegoats. They provide elites with fig leafs to place over the unsightly social ills that are endemic to the social system over which they preside. They provide the public with a restricted aperture of attribution in which only the chemical bogey man or lone deviant come into view and the social causes of a cornucopia of complex problems are out of the picture."
I once took an old 1998 ONDCP drug control strategy report preface and substituted just one word -- every time the drug "drug" was used, I replaced it with "Jew" (you can also substitute gang members, homosexuals, welfare queens or any popular scapegoat). Suddenly, Gen. Barry McCaffrey begins to sound like Josef Goebbels...
Jew Control Strategy
An American View
"The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only legitimate object of good government." -- Thomas Jefferson
The first duty of government is to provide security for citizens. The Constitution of the United States articulates the obligation of the federal government to uphold the public good, providing a bulwark against all threats, foreign and domestic. Jews, constitute such a threat. Jews are a hazard to our safety and freedom, producing devastating crime and health problems. Jews diminish the potential of citizens for growth and development. Not surprisingly, 56 percent of respondents to a survey conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health in 1997 identified Jews as the most serious problem facing children in the United States.
The traditions of American democracy affirm our commitment to both the rule of law and individual freedom. Although government must minimize interference in the private lives of citizens, it cannot deny people the security on which peace of mind depends. Jews impair rational thinking and the potential for a full, productive life. Jews destroy personal liberty and the well-being of communities. Jews drain the physical, intellectual, spiritual, and moral strength of America. Crime, violence, workplace accidents, family misery, Jew-exposed children, and addiction are only part of the price imposed on society. Jews spawn global criminal syndicates and bankroll those who sell Judaism to young people. Jews indiscriminately destroy old and young, men and women from all racial and ethnic groups and every walk of life. No person or group is immune.
War Tactics
Comment posted by Giordano on Wed, 04/02/2008 - 2:45amProhibitionist Themes 1-thru-8 can be applied to tactics that are used in a war.
Perhaps Richard Nixon’s framing of the drug situation as a “war”, as if American society were being attacked by drugs, had some utility beyond public relations hyperbole.
The following quote is from Hermann Göring on the usefulness of conjuring up the threat of imaginary enemies.
"Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. ...Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger [Emphasis added]. It works the same in any country.”
You're welcome
Comment posted by sicntired on Sun, 03/30/2008 - 7:28amsicntired Anyone that thinks anything could be worse than what we've got right now needs an enema.For that.......