A Natural Right?

[MSimon]

Intoxication: The Universal Drive for Mind-Altering Substances

History shows that people have always used intoxicants. In every age, in every part of the world, people have pursued intoxication with plants, alcohol, and other mind-altering substances. In fact, this behavior has so much force and persistence that it functions much like our drives for food, sleep, and sex. This “fourth drive,” says psycho-pharmacologist Ronald K. Siegel, is a natural part of our biology, creating an irrepressible demand for intoxicating substances.

In this book Siegel draws upon his twenty years of groundbreaking research to provide countless examples of the intoxication urge in humans, animals, and even insects. The detailed observations of his so-called psychonauts--study participants trained to explicitly describe their drug experiences--as well as numerous studies with animals have helped him to identify the behavior patterns induced by different intoxicants. Presenting his conclusions on the biological as well as cultural reasons for the pursuit of intoxication and showing that personality and guidance often define the outcome of a drug experience, Siegel offers a broad understanding of the intoxication phenomenon as well as recommendations for curbing the negative aspects of drug use in Western culture by designing safe intoxicants.

RONALD K. SIEGEL, PH.D., is a psychopharmacologist on the faculty of the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at the UCLA School of Medicine and is a leading authority on the social and psychological effects of drug use. The author of Fire in the Brain and Whispers: The Voices of Paranoia, his research has also appeared in Psychology Today, Scientific American, and Omni as well as the Journal of the American Medical Association and the American Journal of Psychiatry. He lives in Los Angeles.

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From a review:

Well, such stubborn people need to do some serious rethinking. Because what good is science unless it questions and investigates? But to make Spiegel even more controversial; he also experiments on animals when investigating why animals (and remember, the human being is an animal, too) choose to become intoxicated by various means. And also when they choose not to. These experiments clearly show how all animals use narcotics. So in other words, man is not alone in this struggle for a changed state of mind.

So what does this all mean? Well, it shows that the so-called War on Drugs is as futile as it is pointless, since there will always be and always has been people who choose to subject their bodies and minds to different drugs that the state or ruling class has decided should be illegal, and it also shows that it's indeed possible use narcotics and still be a very functioning member of society. Not all drug users end up as pathetic heroin junkies. The politics of drugs are extremely complicated, but arguing strictly from emotional points of views while refusing to accept new and mind-blowing ideas is, to put it simple, quite stupid.

Of course Siegel doesn't imply that everyone should do as much drugs as possible all the time whenever they feel like it. But what he does indeed do is giving all those millions of users of legal drugs - prescribed medication, coffee, cigarettes, and so on - something to think about, and he also clearly shows how all those Just Say No and other anti-drugs campaigns do more harm than good. After all, it's a human drive to become intoxicated, so why should some campaign manage to erase this drive? It's not going to happen, and people need to understand that.

Our culture encourages and even romanticizes the use of alcohol and cigarettes - two of the most deadly drugs man has ever come up with - and large corporations make billions of dollars from prescription drugs that are often a whole lot more harmful than the strongest your local dealer can provide you with. This is hypocrisy to such an extent that it's almost impossible to even comprehend, and Spiegel and his team of researchers therefore deserve all the credit they can get for trying to enlighten people they way they do. But just like any other type of fundamentalism, the anti-drug people will probably ignore Mr. Spiegel and all his knowledge, and this will in the long run do more harm to the human race than all the drugs in the world could ever do.