Drugs in US Media

It’s May of 1977. Newsweek reports on a new, cosmopolitan social trend: “a little cocaine, like Dom Perignon and Beluga caviar, is now de rigueur at dinners… the user experiences a feeling of potency, of confidence, of energy.” Before, cocaine was “scary” to young, white americans. As of 1977, cocaine is sexy.

White girls “do” cocaine. Black girls “do” heroin. At least, that was what we were taught. Big whoop, people use drugs! But by teaching citizens to associate Mexican immigrants and “the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities … and vilify them night after night on the evening news.” Boy, did it work. Mainstream news almost always bases conversations about drugs on crime [7]. The Nixon Administration used the evening news to fire up a moral panic that depended on hysterical “societal reactions against certain drugs and drug users” [5]. Sensationalist media preys on our culture’s values, hopes, and fears to pull in the largest audience possible.

American mass media is made to entertain, not to inform. It’s news, not legal evidence. The news thrives on exaggerated scandals and drama to maximize profits. Forms of mass communication like radio and TV programs, newspapers, ad campaigns, and even streaming services like Netflix release information to the public all at once. With such a wide reach, whoever controls the media controls the culture.

Crime and drug media (like TV shows and news stories) are told from law enforcement’s perspective. We are taught that morally good, clean people don’t use drugs. We are told scary stories about dealers in “The Ghetto”, told to “just say no.” We are shown scary photos of faceless “addicts.” We treat drug use as a crime because of a political agenda. Instead of recognizing real harm, the news industry and government interests work together to represent drug use as a “social problem” to be exterminated.

Sources

1. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/
2. Alexander, Michelle. The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. Rev. ed. New York: New Press, 2012.
3. Montagne, M. (2011). Drugs and the Media: An Introduction. Substance Use & Misuse, 46(7), 849–851. doi:10.3109/10826084.2011.570609
4. Drug Policy Alliance. “A Brief History of the Drug War.” From https://drugpolicy.org/issues/brief-history-drug-war
5. Murji, K. (1998). The agony and the ecstasy: Drugs, media, and morality. In R. Coomber (Ed.), The control of drugs and drug users: Reason or reaction? (pp. 69–85). Westport, CT: Harwood Academic.
6. Murji, Karim. “Agony and Ecstasy: Drugs, Media and Moral Panic.” Policing Drugs. 1st ed. Routledge, 1998. 121–138. Web.
7. Manning, P. (2013). Drugs and Popular Culture in the Age of New Media (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315871080