Chapters 4 and 5

1. Chapters 4 and 5 Alcohol and Drugs

2. Some Organizational Information • The chapter on drugs does not cover the so-called recreational drugs that are more commonly used in the US these days. I will place some information here that is not in the book. However, the same sociological processes of deviance designations and the social construction of reality operate.

3. Some Drug Facts • Only Inuit Eskimos have no record of traditional drug use; this changed when contact with Europeans was established. • Most, if not all, societies integrate drug use into accepted, sometimes ritualistic, cultural patterns of behavior. • Drug use seems to be a vital part of everyday social interaction.

4. Alcohol and Deviant Alcohol Use • Alcohol is the most widely used drug in human history. It has been used for over 10,000 years by humans. There is also evidence that foraging animals seek out rotting fruit (where the sugar has turned to alcohol) despite the availability of ripe fruit at the same location.

5. More Drug Facts • Use of Psychoactive Substances is very common in modern society • Over 2.4 billion prescriptions are written in the US each year earing about $100 billion per year. • Over The Counter drug sales generate $15 billion per year • Over 50% of Americans report having used alcohol within the past month • About 25% of Americans smoke cigarettes (multiple times a day) • About 32% of Americans have tried marijuana (90 million). • In 2005, 44.8% of high school seniors reported "lifetime" use of Marijuana (i.e., used at least once), 37.8% report use in the past year, and 23.1% report past month use (historical "peaks" comparison 1979: 60.4%; 1999 49.7% for lifetime use). • About 6% of Americans have used marijuana in the last month (about 15,600,000 people) • Illicit drug trade = ~$40-100 billion dollars annually in US, legal drugs generate even more money.

6. Early Views of Alcohol • In Colonial America, beer was commonly used, and was considered healthful (in comparison to the water in Europe it was). • Drunkenness was not approved, and was viewed as a problem of moral degeneracy. • Benjamin Rush was the leading proponent of the view that alcohol was dangerous and was an early advocate of the disease concept of alcoholism.

7. Deviant Drinking and its Control: The American Temperance Movement • Temperance was based on the belief in the “disinhibitor hypothesis,” which cross-cultural studies tend to question (see McAndrew and Edgerton’s study on page 76) • Joseph Gusfield’s classis study of the American Temperance Movement shows the political and moral aspects of Prohibition in the 20th century. • The early medical model was more moral than medical and alcohol prohibition more social than a public health issue.

8. The Medical Model and Alternatives • The Yale Center, Alcohol Anonymous and the Jellinek (with Mark Keller) Formulation all solidified the dominance of the medical model. • Challenges to the medical model of addiction by Lindesmith, and Becker (based on learning theory) have not been widely accepted.

9. Recreational Drugs and Drug Effects • Drug effects, such as alcohol and cocaine intoxication, vary in terms of the parts of the brain they influence. • The disinhibitor hypothesis is not supported by cross-cultural studies. • Very few cocaine and heroin users die, when compared to the number who use such drugs. For example, only about 3,000 cocaine users die each year while nearly 3,000,000 use cocaine in any given year.

10. Recreational Drugs and Drug Effects • Cocaine, ecstasy, meth, and heroin are highly addictive and dangerous. • The danger of these drugs is less in the effect than in the unintended consequences of the drug. Compulsive use and respiratory problems cause more harm than the psychological effects of the drugs. • Using the criminal law to control such drug use is inefficient, but may be the only recourse. Recent celebrity problems with drug rehabilitation are a case in point.

11. Recreational Drugs and Drug Effects • Marijuana, the most widely used illegal drug, has never caused a single death in its recorded history. • The Drug Enforcement Administration reports that a lethal dose of marihuana would be to smoke 1,500 pounds in 15 minutes, which is, of course, impossible. • Marijuana use by children is cause for concern, but adult marijuana use may not be worth the effort of enforcement.

12. Drug Use in America: Then and Now • In the early part of the 20th century a larger percentage of Americans were addicted to drugs than today, yet there were none of the problems then that we see today. • Drugs were widely available from doctors, and the criminal subculture did not exist to increase the risk of drug taking (through adulteration and excessive prices)

13. Drug Use in America: Then and Now • In the early 20th century opiates and cocaine were the most commonly used drugs, apart for alcohol. • The Supreme Court limited the ability of doctors to control deviant cocaine and opiate use, thereby helping to create a criminal subculture to provide such drugs. • American foreign policy became a vehicle to promote moral and medical policies throughout the world, thereby globalizing the criminal drug subculture.

14. Drug Policy in America • The Pure Food and Drug Act, the Harrison Act, the Supreme Court decisions of the 1920s and the Marijuana Tax Act form the basis on American Drug policy today. • These policies conflated the drug addict with the criminal, thereby making the drug problem more severe. • Methadone and marijuana policies became the symbol of the futility of American drug policy.