Pubdate: Thu, 20 Apr 2000 Source: Wall Street Journal (US) Copyright: 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. Page: A27 Contact: 200 Liberty Street, New York, NY 10281 Fax: (212) 416-2658 Website: http://www.wsj.com/ Author: Jerry Epstein, President, Drug Policy Forum of Texas Referenced: Prof. Wilson's OPED is at: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n491/a07.html DRUGS AND THE POLITICS OF FEAR James Q. Wilson and others are wrong about the speculative increase in addiction that might accompany the regulated supply of drugs ("A New Strategy for the War on Drugs," editorial page, April 13). In fact, the evidence is that addiction, which has gradually increased during the past 30 years of prohibition, would gradually decrease, just as it was beginning to do a century ago prior to Prohibiton, a period when there was substantially more use but less than than half the addiction rate of today. The root of Prof. Wilson's error is in failing to understand that the quest for altered consciousness is a function of human will and not of the myriad drugs available. Because he deals with numbers as opposed to real human beings, he lapses into the popular but grossly inaccurate litany that more use means more addiction, etc. In fact, most users never harm anyone through their drug use and addiction is an unusual outcome. For example, according to the 1998 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, of all those who had ever tried cocaine (including crack), only 3% were still using it as often as once a week. Casual users and addicts are two entirely different sets of people. Prof. Wilson has never explained why the rate of addiction rose during the 1980s while the rate of drug use plunged or why addiction continued to rise during the 1990s while drug use was stagnant. To those who have observed the rampant availability of illegal drugs to the young and who understand that addiction is closely linked to such mental states as stress and isolation, it is not surprising that today's harsh repression and vilification has culminated in less use and more addiction. Prof. Wilson's theories of gloom and doom collapse when one tries to describe the group from which these new addicts to highly intoxicating drugs must come. Surely not from the one-third of us who have already used illegal drugs and produced the 2% of our population currently addicted to illegal drugs (while 8% are addicted to legal drugs, primarily alcohol). Would Prof. Wilson argue that only price or risk has stood between these users and addiction, thus turning the very meaning of addiction on its head? And surely not from the one-third who are teetotalers or near teetotalers even in regard to alcohol. The final one-third has two basic characteristics: its members have never used an illegal drug and they now use alcohol in a temperate and responsible manner. There is no evidence to suggest that these people would change in character and a great deal to suggest they would not. To say that this group would produce anyone who would become addicted to other drugs, but not to alcohol, is very questionable and to suggest, as political rhetoric often does, that they would produce 3 to 12 times as many addicts is not only absurd, but indicates a mentality that believes that only a paternalistic government employing its police power stands between the average American and drug addiction. Can Prof. Wilson explain why we should not apply all of his coercive suggestions to alcohol users, who use a drug that dose-for-dose is more closely linked to crime, violence, death, organ damage and fetal damage than cocaine or heroin? The continued monumental waste and inhumanity of the drug war is testimony to the power of the politics of fear. Jerry Epstein President Drug Policy Forum of Texas Houston - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake