March 15, 2009

Skunk

Posted in Drugs, Society at 11:22 pm by Paul Sagar

The Observer has been getting its money’s worth from the “does skunk turn your teenager into a murdering psychopath?” issue. For those not in the know, the topic has been pushed by a number of newspapers since Julie Myerson published a book detailing aspects of her son’s “descent” into skunk cannabis “addiction”, culminating in her kicking him out…and then getting loads of money for writing about it all.

To be fair, The Observer’s latest offering is fairly balanced, despite the rather alarmist opening paragraphs and hyperbolic headline.

Having said that, I find this quote from Yuppie-on-the-way-up-religious-wacko-Tory-MP Charles Walker particularly infuriating:

“[Skunk] is clearly highly addictive both physically and psychologically”

I find this maddening because it is untrue. Though there is some evidence for psychological addiction (though what constitutes “psychological addiction” is itself a highly contested matter), the plain and simple truth is that there is no scientific evidence for physical addiction to skunk or any kind of cannabis.

When MPs like Walker spout untruth like this, no wonder we’re nowhere near having a grown up and mature debate about drugs in this country.

My second gripe is about the general idiocy of the “skunk turned my angelic child into a pawn of Satan!” declarations being banded about by (some) parents and politicians. To see this, let’s run through a simple reasoning process.

1. In normal healthy human beings, skunk – like all forms of cannabis – has the effect of sedating the user. It generally makes a person vaguely happy and quite hungry. It does not promote violence or aggressive behaviour, in fact quite the opposite. In some cases users may experience paranoia – but that ends when the drug’s effects fade from the brain.

2. So, again, if a person is using cannabis and they are psychologically normal, cannabis will make them relaxed and passive.

3. If a person is psychologically abnormal – suffers from or has a disposition to suffer from e.g. schizophrenia – then using a psychoactive drug like cannabis may well make their condition worse. But the medical jury is still out even on that question.

Conclusions for parents: If your child smokes skunk, is psychologically normal and happens to be a horrible little bastard – be grateful they are getting stoned! Imagine how violent and aggressive they would be if they didn’t have their skunk.

If your child smokes skunk and has psychological problems, then I’m very sorry for you. Their problems may well be exacerbated by the drug – but in that case, the drug is sadly part of a wider problem where other substances (e.g. alcohol) may well be involved. I hope you can get the help which is often sadly lacking for people with mental health problems

Either way the scaremongering about skunk is clearly misguided (or just plain dishonest, cf Charles Walker MP).

Like all drug paranoia crazes, what’s being obscured by the alarmism are some basic empirical observations anyone of my generation could relay to you. For example, I smoked skunk pretty regularly (i.e. at least once a week) from the ages of 14 to 17. Guess what? In the words of Bill Hicks, I didn’t kill anybody, didn’t rape anybody, didn’t maim anybody, didn’t lose one fucking job, laughed my ass off and went about my day.

The same was true of all the people I knew who regularly used cannabis (and later harder drugs, though I cautiously lagged behind on that front). Sure, some of my friends smoked too much and had problems with parents. But in every case, that’s because they had problems with their parents stemming from deeper family issues.

And that’s the rub. In the vast majority of cases when middle class kids go off the rails at their parents, there are likely to be deeper familial issues at work. But then, blaming skunk is such a convenient way to avoid talking about stuff like that.

Personally I stopped smoking skunk regularly from 17-19 because I wanted to get on with my life and do well in college. The worst thing about skunk is that it makes you apathetic and lazy. Many of my friends preferred being apathetic and lazy, and so didn’t stop. They may not have gone  on to prestigious universities, but as far as I am aware they are all pretty happy with their lives regardless of that.

At university I again took up smoking skunk occasionally, but given its mind-numbing qualities I treated it as an occasional indulgence. Rather unsurprisingly, my usage did not spiral into uncontrollable addiction, and I left with a First Class degree, not a “dangerous psychological and physical addiction”. The hysteria-mongers will say “you were one of the lucky ones!”. But that’s ludicrous, given how overwhelmingly the odds were stacked in my favour.

The hysteria currently being perpetrated about skunk is reminiscent of the 1980s “crack epidemic” panic of the USA, when middle class parents became convinced that their children would all turn into pipe-huffing zombies unless Action! was taken. Of course, what actually happened was that the vast majority of middle class kids – you know, those with futures to live for and parents who cared about them – stayed well clear of such a course and grew up to be just fine. A few fell through the net and got into hard drugs – but that’s inevitable given the sheer numbers involved.

The picture, you might note, is generally different for poor, working class children with less invested in their futures and generally worse parental/familial backgrounds. Note that it was those children who really did suffer a crack epidemic in the USA (and still do). But the present rash of editorials and op ed pieces haven’t been concerned with poor children. Skunk is a decidedly middle class concern. And that tells you and awful lot about the nature of the hysteria, and how frivolous it is.

What a shame that nearly 30 years on from the “crack epidemic” madness, we’re still going round in circles whilst watching politicians and middle-class parents squawk madly like chickens on speed.

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