his page collects news item commentary about drug issues; but not the "junkie winds up in prison" kind.  It's more about drug use in society, attitudes towards medication, and so on.  More serious than criminal, more wide-spread than individual.

More recent additions are added on top of the page.

January 6, 2003

In further related news, the dangerous, placebo-esque, brain-chemical altering drug Prozac has been approved for children.

The US Food and Drug Administration said on Friday that it has approved Eli Lilly & Co.'s Prozac (fluoxetine) to treat depression and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) in children and adolescents aged seven to 17 years.

It's clearly a coup, since while no more than "most" adults are depressed and OCD from time to time, "all" teenagers are, on a regular basis.  And most are quite eager to consume just about any sort of weird chemical they get a chance at, as stories of smoking banana peels and sniffing glue should attest.  Whether they'll want to take a drug that they're supposed to is open to debate, since as all parents know, the best way to get a teen to not do something is to say they have to.

In a larger perspective, the prospect of every teenager on earth taking legalized drugs to try and "even them out" scares me.  Feeling fucked up at least half the time is sort of the whole point of being a teenager, due to your changing body, society's expectations of you, greater freedom and responsibility, hormones surging, etc.  I'm not in favor of drugs that alter the brain chemistry of adults, personally.  But then that's why I would never dream of taking LSD or other such things, since I'm relatively pleased with how my brain works now, and wouldn't want to risk screwing it all up for no reason other than boredom.

I've always been of the, "Suck it up and smack yourself out of your funk, you weakling." mindset.  People want attention and want to feel miserable since it gives them an excuse to be too lazy to do anything productive.  It's a way to avoid real life.  And I've been depressed a few times, and felt it was all hopeless, so I am basing this somewhat on personal experience.

It seems like bullshit to me that you can take a pill and be happy again.  Well you can, I mean you can take a drug and get a ton of extra energy, or be manic for a while, but I think virtually everyone who feels that way could do it on their own, if they just made an effort.  And the pill won't work forever, somewhat like junkies keep needing more and more cocaine to get high.

That being said, a guy I know and see once or twice a year has been depressed and pretty miserable to be around for about four years.  Gloomy, unpleasant, quiet, moody, etc.  You'd be quite happy if he decided he was too depressed to show up, rather than showing up and ruining the evening for everyone else.  I saw him this year around Xmas... and he was like a new man.  Well, that's an exaggeration, but he was not at all depressed or unpleasant to be around.  He had energy and vitality and was interesting to talk to, and seemed like a real person.  And he mentioned at one point that he'd been taking Zoloft for some months, and it was making an amazing difference.  He felt good, had energy, wasn't depressed or gloomy all the time, and it was extremely evident in his behavior, long before I had any idea he was achieving better living through chemistry.

Which sort of throws a monkey wrench in my "drugs are bullshit" theories, huh?

I guess I'll agree that if a person is so down that there's no getting worse, and has been down for years, they might as well try anything short of partial lobotomy.  It might even work. (The anything, not the lobotomy.)  Children and teens are so pushed and pulled by forces beyond their control that I think it's absurd to turn to medication in anything but a last resort.  Virtually all teens go through periods of depression, and for virtually all of them it's due to a breakup, or problems with their parents, or school troubles, etc.  Which, if cured/improved, would cure/improve their mental state.

And yeah, it's probably a lot easier to give a kid a pill than it is to actually look into improving their life in multiple ways.  Especially if the parents paying for the pill would have to look at themselves and make changes to help their kid's life improve.  And perhaps the kid will be happier on the pill, and therefore less likely to turn to more dangerous drugs, or get knocked up, or run away, or fail every class and ruin their future career aspirations.  And maybe they'll feel better, and therefore make changes in their life to improve it, and therefore be able to kick the drug and live a real life without chemical dependency.

But it's hard for me to not see this as a way for the drug manufacturers to get their hooks into their market at an earlier age, much like the cute cartoon cigarette ads. Train a 13 y/o that they'll be miserable without your magic pill, they never learn any depression coping skills, and you've got a customer for life. 

All site content copyright "Flux" (Eric Bruce), 2002-2007.