Drug Use for Grown-Ups: Chasing Liberty in the Land of Fear

Working in treating addiction for seven years, detox and rehab, my own biases to illicit drugs have certainly shaped my worldview toward them and those that use them. This book has completely shattered all my ill conceived notions. Whether we like it or not, we as responsible adults do have should have the right to use substances for the sake of our own happiness. Of course so long as it doesn't deprive another individual of their own happiness, in that it causes actual harm not just the tired old, "Well I don't 'like' that you do it" etc. America really has a lot more growing up to do, and hopefully soon with the next generation laws will change and toxic anecdotal perspectives will be dust in the wind. I highly recommend this book for both the casual reader and the medical professional alike. If we aren't learning something new everyday, are we really living and growing?

I thought it was a decent read. Hart argues that America's drug policies are largely a product of historical racism and some natural aversion to happiness. As someone who grew up in a Protestant stronghold, I have no doubt that this aversion rests somewhere deep in America's Puritan upbringing.Hart dives deep into the history of the crack epidemic and explains how black people and drugs have been inaccurately conflated and demonized. An example I personally enjoyed was when Hart cites the 'microdosing' or 'elitist psychonaut' community as a group which moralizes drug use in disingenuous roundabout ways: "Psychedelics are OK because we are pursuing spiritual enlightenment. Heroin and crack is bad because it results in mindless pleasure and is something that only black crackheads do".Ultimately, Hart makes a strong moral and logical argument in favor of using drugs responsibly for pleasure. While I do have some nuanced contentions with the position, I mostly agree with Hart and the book ultimately made me a better person. I strongly recommend reading it.

"Carl Hart wants us to know that he’s not a drug addict. Hart, a tenured professor at Columbia, uses drugs copiously, including marijuana, heroin, methamphetamine, and designer drugs. He insists that they do not limit his competency as a professor or as a father. If anything, they enhance them—because, he argues, he engages in the responsible drug use typical of the “grown-ups” in his new book, Drug Use for Grown-Ups" He sounds like half my family, but most of them died from their non addiction.

I feel like this work builds on Timothy Leary but goes further in its social insights and pure science. While Leary's attitude was more pop culture focused, Hart delves more into the racially and historically motivated aspects of the topic. As an added bonus, he delivers one of the best working definitions of racism I have ever read, focusing on behavior above dissection of inner personal biases.It would be wonderful to believe that this work can form the basis of a much more intelligent discussion of drug use, but those biases and assumptions are so ingrained that it will need much more social change to revise all the years of ignorance. When beliefs become morals, they are notoriously difficult to shift, and the number of people carrying deeply formed and unexamined morals related to drugs is huge. Indeed, our entire world history revolves around how populations have been manipulated into drug beliefs convenient to some kind of ruling class, from slavery to the opium wars.Still, it is a rare, honest light on a subject that seems so difficult to even begin to have an unbiased discussion about.

With all due respect, Dr. Hart, how many opiate addicted people have you attempted to help stay sober? Or, are you, in your position as an overpaid, academic researcher, so detached from the experiences of average citizens that you have no understanding of the plight of addicted people who have lost the ability to control their use? You seem to question the disease model of addiction - though you appear to have little or no experience in the area of substance abuse treatment, which is actually a career field of it’s own.As a social worker, I have worked with young and older adults who desired to quit their use of opiates but were unable to do so. Just because you are able to moderately use heroin and amphetamines with impunity, certainly does not mean that other individuals would be capable of using without the possibility abuse and addiction.Should there be any governmental restrictions on human behavior, when individuals are unable to moderate their behavior? If you believe there ought to be oversight of fossil fuel use or enforced compulsory education, then it would seem that you believe in some government oversight of individual freedom. There truly is no difference between government oversight in the area of compulsory education and use of substances with the destructive potential of heroin.I sincerely hope, Dr. Hart, that in 10 or 15 years from now, you don’t attempt to reverse or amend your position on this issue. If you are incapable of humbling yourself and admitting your error, don’t bother trying to ‘set the record straight’ in years to come.

Have to admire the man’s courage to come forward with such a controversial topic. Contrary to what the title might imply, it’s not an instruction manual, but more like his experience in a politically driven environment where the idea that “drugs are bad” is the only mantra. It does show a different light on most common illicit substances used and the real effect they have on the body. The main point is that drugs don’t cause addiction, people do. “If you’re an idiot on drugs, you’re probably an idiot without them as well”.

good service from seller - book is poorly written however and Dr. Hart is most certainly no expert - quite inane cultural observations and naive drug discussion, only worthwhile for a newcomer to the topic probably - disappointing

This should be required reading for grown ups so that they can begin to disseminate useful information to their children about how drugs really work. Insightful, intriguing and we'll worth two reads

A very good book xxx.Wish he had written a longer book e.g. 1000 pages

Basierend auf seiner Forschung als Neurowissenschaftler und persönlichen Erfahrungen mit einer breiten Palette an Drogen, von Marihuana über Cocain und Methamphetamin bis hin zu Psychedelika und Heroin, korrigiert Carl Hart diverse Fehleinschätzungen der Wirkungen dieser Drogen in Wissenschaft, Öffentlichkeit und Politik. Hart erläutert überzeugend und faktenbasiert, dass allfällige schädliche Wirkungen der sogenannten harten Drogen bei weitem geringer sind als die negativen Konsequenzen deren Illegalität und zieht Parallelen zwischen aktueller Drogenpolitik und der Alkohol-Prohibition in USA in den 1920er Jahren. Prohibition hat noch nie funktioniert und hat schwerwiegende Schädigung der Gesundheit der Bevölkerung zur Folge: damals durch gepantschten Alkohol, heute durch fehlende Qualitätskontrolle der Straßendrogen und daraus resultierenden Todesfällen).Hart plädiert für freien Zugang zu Drogen durch mündige Erwachsene, die man für ihr in der Verfassung der USA garantiertes Streben nach Glück ("pursuit of happiness" in der Declaration of Independence) nicht kriminalisieren und stigmatisieren sollte.Die Überzeugung, dass die (angeblich) verheerenden Wirkungen von Drogen eine wesentliche Ursache für soziale Missstände in der Bevölkerung sind, ist in unserer Gesellschaft tief verwurzelt. Carl Hart entlarvt diese Überzeugung als Vorurteil, als "Glauben" ohne sachliche Rechtfertigung und übt heftige Kritik an Nanny-Staaten, die ihren mündigen Bürgern gesetzlich vorschreiben, was sie ihrem Körper zuführen dürfen und was nicht. Sein Buch sollte uns aufrütteln und zum Nachdenken anregen.Ich ziehe einen Punkt ab, da ich mir mehr Fakten über die Wirkungen der Drogen und dafür weniger, für das Thema oft irrelevante persönliche Erzählungen gewünscht hätte. Meiner Meinung nach widmet Hart auch der Darstellung der Diskriminierung von Schwarzafrikanern in den USA durch die aktuelle Gesetzeslage unverhältnismäßig viel Raum. Die Benachteiligung ethnischer Gruppen durch Polizeigewalt und Judikatur ist erschütternd, zieht sich aber allzu penetrant durch das gesamte Werk.Ich empfehle dieses exzellente Buch allen an Drogenpolitik Interessierten, die bereit sind, sich anhand der Fakten von liebgewordenen Überzeugungen zu trennen. Vor allem aber politischen Entscheidungsträgern, die die derzeitige Drogenpolitik mit fadenscheinigen, kontrafaktischen Behauptungen argumentieren.