Overview

America had a radically different relationship with drugs a century ago. Drug prohibitions were few, and while alcohol was considered a menace, the public regularly consumed substances that are widely demonized today. Heroin was marketed by Bayer Pharmaceuticals, and marijuana was available as a tincture of cannabis sold by Parke Davis and Company.Exploring how this rather benign relationship with psychoactive drugs was transformed into one of confusion and chaos, The Cult of Pharmacology tells the dramatic story of how, as one legal drug after another fell from grace, new pharmaceutical substances took their place. Whether Valium or OxyContin at the pharmacy, cocaine or meth purchased on the street, or alcohol and tobacco from the corner store, drugs and drug use proliferated in twentieth-century America despite an escalating war on “drugs.” Richard DeGrandpre, a past fellow of the National Institute on Drug Abuse and author of the best-selling book Ritalin Nation, delivers a remarkably original interpretation of drugs by examining the seductive but ill-fated belief that they are chemically predestined to be either good or evil. He argues that the determination to treat the medically sanctioned use of drugs such as Miltown or Seconal separately from the illicit use of substances like heroin or ecstasy has blinded America to how drugs are transformed by the manner in which a culture deals with them. Bringing forth a wealth of scientific research showing the powerful influence of social and psychological factors on how the brain is affected by drugs, DeGrandpre demonstrates that psychoactive substances are not angels or demons irrespective of why, how, or by whom they are used. The Cult of Pharmacology is a bold and necessary new account of America’s complex relationship with drugs.

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Reviews

Every decade or two a book comes along that causes a fundamental shift of gaze. Richard DeGrandpre's The Cult of Pharmacology is one. It pulls apart the mythic powers we have attributed to drugs, showing that drug effects are not the products of mere molecules alone but of the deeply politicized meanings inscribed upon them by society which shape how they are used. This book charts a new course beyond the repressive excesses and costly failures of punitive prohibition. It will make fascinating reading for citizens concerned with drug use and drug problems; it should be required reading for policymakers. -Craig Reinarman, coeditor of Crack in America and coauthor of Cocaine Changes Those coming to this book with preconceptions should divest them before starting, or at least try to remain calm. Those who think a book on the role drugs play in our culture cannot possibly surprise them are likely to discover preconceptions they never suspected. This is one of the best books to read if you are coming new to the problems that drugs pose, and also one of the best books for those who think they know everything there is to know about drugs. This is a wonderful book. -David Healy, author of Let Them Eat Prozac: The Unhealthy Relationship between the Pharmaceutical Industry and Depression [A] insightful book on the difficult subject of drugs... -- Andrew Benedict-Nelson Rain Taxi [A]n insightful, historically informed critique of the ideas that guide the war on drugs. -- Jacob Sullum Reason [DeGrandpre] makes important points, which we should take to heart: When the state makes money through the sale of tobacco and alcohol, yet puts people in prison for marijuana use, the government has failed. When the pharmaceutical industry successfully promotes their drugs for use by individuals who will not benefit from those drugs, our system of protecting patients has failed. And when we scientists let such things happen without speaking out, thereby abandoning the social responsibility to use our knowledge for the public good, we have failed, too. -- Michael J Zigmond Nature Medicine [W]ell researched and documented and full of interesting facts. For many readers it will produce a whole new perspective that will have an impact when they reach for the prescription pad or a cup of coffee or disparage the drug user on the street. -- Allen Shaughnessy British Medical Journal DeGrandpre ... delivers a remarkably original interpretation of drugs by examining the seductive but ill-fated belief that they are chemically predestined to be either good or evil... By showing the powerful influence of social and psychological factors on how the brain is affected by drugs, DeGrandpre demonstrates that psychoactive substances are not angels or demons irrespective of why, how, or by whom they are used. Drugs and Alcohol Today In a fascinating and compelling narrative, DeGrandpre details various factors that have influenced and changed the perception and use of drugs in America... The author has credentials and has written about drugs before; his global insights are noteworthy. The beauty of his work is that it leaves readers to weigh the evidence presented and draw their own conclusions. -- R. S. Kowalczyk Choice In a fascinating and provocative read, DeGrandpre provides an illuminating social history of drug use in America, an eye-opening window into the legal drug use industry, and a harsh, Szaszian critique of the increasingly popular disease model of addiction. -- Phillip S. Smith Chronicle of Higher Education This eloquent book gently leads you into a thicket of pharmacological problems. It outlines a set of predicaments and does so with sympathy for the protagonists. For instance, it gives a clear account of Kessler's fight against Big Tobacco during his spell at the FDA, making the rationale for the fight crystal clear-before showing why there are considerable grounds to doubt that Kessler had the right target. Just when you think you know what side DeGrandpre is on, he confounds you. Damn contrarians! -- David Healy Perspectives in Biology and Medicine The Cult of Pharmacology delivers important messages about the bias and irrationality behind drug policy and our approach to drug use, messages that both clinicians and the general public should hear. -- Walter A. Brown Journal of the American Medical Association The Cult of Pharmacology brings badly needed information, insight, and-above all-sanity to the emotionally charged debate over legal and illegal drugs in America, whether LSD, caffeine, or Prozac. This book should be required reading for those whose lives are touched by the war on drugs-which of course means all of us. -John Horgan, author of The End of Science, The Undiscovered Mind, and Rational Mysticism DeGrandpre demonstrates the importance of considering technology within its social contexts... [A]fascinating study... DeGrandpre understands the science of pharmacology sufficiently to explain how these substances actually work. His efforts thus provide an important foundation for historians who will seek to put the findings in broader cultural context. -- Carolyn T. de la Pena Technology and Culture

The Cult of Pharmacology delivers important messages about the bias and irrationality behind drug policy and our approach to drug use, messages that both clinicians and the general public should hear. Walter A. Brown The Journal of the American Medical Association For many readers [The Cult of Pharmacology] will produce a whole new perspective that will have an impact when they reach for the prescription pad or a cup of coffee or disparage the drug user on the street. Allen Shaughnessy The British Medical Journal Part social history and part polemic, The Cult of Pharmacology offers a compelling, if at times disturbing, examination of the ways in which science has been manipulated by commercial and political interests to uphold otherwise arbitrary distinctions between safe and unsafe drugs, or good and evil consumers, or substance use and substance abuse in modern America. Erika Dyck Isis This is one of the best books to read if you are coming new to the problems that drugs pose, and also one of the best books for those who think they know everything there is to know about drugs. David Healy, author of Let Them Eat Prozac: The Unhealthy Relationship between the Pharmaceutical Industry and Depression The Cult of Pharmacology pulls apart the mythic powers we have attributed to drugs, showing that drug effects are not the products of mere molecules alone but of the deeply politicized meanings inscribed upon them by society, which shape how they are used. This book charts a new course beyond the repressive excesses and costly failures of punitive prohibition. Craig Reinarman, co-editor of Crack in America: Demon Drugs and Social Justice The Cult of Pharmacology brings badly needed information, insight, andoabove allosanity to the emotionally charged debate over legal and illegal drugs in America, whether LSD, caffeine, or Prozac. This book should be required reading for those whose lives are touched by the war on drugsowhich of course means all of us. John Horgan, author of The End of Science, The Undiscovered Mind, and Rational Mysticism By showing the powerful influence of social and psychological factors on how the brain is affected by drugs, DeGrandpre demonstrates that psychoactive substances are not angels or demons irrespective of why, how, or by whom they are used. Drugs and Alcohol Today

Author Information

Richard DeGrandpre is an independent scholar of drugs and other “technologies of the self.” He has a doctorate in psychopharmacology and was a fellow of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. He is the author of Ritalin Nation: Rapid-Fire Culture and the Transformation of Human Consciousness and Digitopia: The Look of the New Digital You. He has also written numerous scientific, theoretical, and popular articles on drugs and is a former senior editor at Adbusters magazine.

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