Sex, Drugs and Rock'n Roll: How a community incurs social injury from drug-use
The other day I was listening to comedian Margaret Chow and was somewhat taken aback at now nonchalantly she spoke about drug use and the drug culture. The presumption behind her libertine drug consumption was a non-challant description of the transaction as if she were buying bread or milk at the local grocery store, with little idea of its social impact. It suggested to me what the relationship between the Ancient Roman elite and the underclasses must have been like a couple of thousand years ago; the elite living in the lap of luxury paying little attention to how their actions affected the rest of their community.
One only needs to take a look at Puerto Rico to observe how grotesquely the drug world distorts ordinary social life.
Contrary to the current Police Superintendent's claims, who since day one has been marked by his poor grasp of actual crime statistics in his own jurisdiction, crime has been escalating in Puerto Rico with continued turf-wars over drug territories. Certainly, however, this has been going on well over 2 decades, and more. Jose Luis "Pinchi" Mendez, Mendez commented in a recent interview his surprise as to how, after returning in 1971 from a long period in the US and Europe during the 1960s, what had been an isolated case of drug use had become much more common. In my own family, a distant cousin succumbed to the world of drugs, but not before stealing valuable family paintings to sustain his addiction during the 1980s. Nobody has heard from him, and he is presumed to be dead.
There are obviously many factors that play into the emergence, sustenance, and growth of the drug culture in Puerto Rico: US demand, Latin American production, Puerto Rico's intermediate political circumstance. Finally, let we forget, at the core of it all are the drug's own chemical properties.
Drugs are addictive simply because they mimmic neurological actors as cocaine does with dopamine, the brain's principal neurotransmitter. By flooding the brain with what the brain believes to be dopamine, leading to the 'heightened' sense of perception, the brain counterbalances this overabudnance by reducing the number of dopamine receptors. After the high, when the artificial dopamine (cocaine) has been flushed from the body and perceived dopamine levels return to their normal state, the smaller number of receptors lead to a reduced neurological functioning. To return to its 'normal state', the drug user is therefore forced to resort to the drug once more, in a vicious cycle which ultimately deteriorates both mind and body.
The mere suggestion that we should legalize hard-core drugs, as was done with alcohol during the era of Prohibition, is to gravely misapply a historical lesson as it will only end up worsening the situation. A similar argument might be maade for the alleged 'medicalization' of the drug. Its not going to work, even if you take into account that the economics point to that direction. (While the price of drugs may at first decline, demand will actually spike up as a result of its inevitable neurological dependency, leading eventually to the formation of a black market. It is this black market that you wanted to avoid in the first place.) Once an individual becomes a part of the drug culture and use, it is extremely hard for them to get out. Drugs are the 'venus fly-trap' of modern urbanites.
The question then arises as to how and why individuals enter this world in the first place, and how this can be countered. An observation of the social dynamics can give us a clue.
By increasing the overall incidence of crime in a community, as well as the general perception of crime[1], the drug culture inhibits social activity and the consequent valid and functional economic transactions in a community. The 'streets are dangerous', so you are less likely to be out on the streets; when you are on the streets you are less comfortable in your ordinary activity. Overall financial and economic transactions decline. Yet, in turn, this reduced economic activity reduces the economic opportunities available, and in turn, force those who cannot enter the ordinary economy to enter the fly-trap of the drug economy. The more depressed an economy, the greater the population growth that floods the 'carrying capacity' of an economy, the more favorable environment for a drug culture.
There are other less-obvious secondary side effects. The 'base' price of living increases because the 'normal' investment in security is elevated. In a safe community, for example, there are less costs involved given the sharply reduced necessity for locks, alarms, iron bars, and video cameras. A good pad-lock will cost $150, an alarm system will cost some $50 per month, and video equipment some $200. You will need iron bars on all your windows and doors as well--lets say $500 or more depending on the size of your residence. This leads to, on average, around $100 extra that you have to spend on security per month that you would not have otherwise incurred. (Criminals even enter into private security companies for these very reasons. Given that they are typically small mom-and-pop companies, they usually do not have the wherewithal to do the required background checks.)
Another important but overlooked side effect is its impact on scientific and technological innovation. To do innovative and leading edge- science and technology you need a critical social ingredient: privacy.
You need a trusting nonjudgmental forum where you ideas will be severely analyzed, and where a distinction between that analysis and personal criticism is severely drawn. Equally important is that you need to also make sure that nobody is snooping in on your ideas, obviously for financial gain or the benefit of third parties. Here non-state actors (and some state actors) utilize the pretext of 'security' to regularly violate individual privacy at their own desire, and often for ulterior ends unknown to their contractors. Since security implies that the guard is given an inordinate amount of leverage, what must be a power trip to psychologically disturbed individuals, the 'guardian' typically does not report back all of his own activities. Hence the typical abuse of power that occurs in institutions related to 'security'.
There is but one inevitable result--the absence of the social trust required for genuine innovation.
You can have all the money in the world, but the absence of this critical social element will undermine all the investments that are made. It is clearly the case that the 'scientific culture' and the 'drug culture' are in direct odds with one another.
NOTE:
1. Most who are actually killed tend to be those of the world.