6005076909_ce3a687ca0_zThe death of the gritty, soulful singer, Amy Winehouse, was all over the media last week. Amy reportedly died from alcohol and drug abuse and complications of emphysema, a lung disease she developed from smoking crack and cigarettes.  At 27 years old, she joins Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison and Kurt Cobain in the 27 Club, all having died at that age. It is the sad, but all too familiar story of the young, talented risk taker who gets a taste of fame and gets caught up in a life of excess and addiction.  Given the serious downside of recreational, mind-altering substances, why would people take them at all?

The tendency to use drugs has been present in all cultures throughout time and has been a pervasive part of human nature. In his book The Compass of Pleasure: How Our Brains Make Fatty Foods, Orgasm, Exercise, Marijuana, Generosity, Vodka, Learning, and Gambling Feel So Good, David J. Linden writes:

All cultures use drugs that influence the brain. They range from mild stimulants like caffeine to drugs with potent euphoric effects, like morphine.  Some carry a high risk of addiction, some do not.  Some alter perception, others mood, and some effect both. A few can kill when used to excess.  The specific attitudes and laws relating to psychoactive drug use widely vary among cultures, however….those drugs used by insiders are considered acceptable, while the use of drugs by outsiders is condemned and confirms their status as somewhat less than human…. Across cultures and over thousands of years of human history, people have consistently found ways to alter the function of their brains….”

Linden tells of ancient Roman nobility using opium freely, even military emperors.  Apparently, it was easier to go into battle stoned.  The poppy plant, from which opium is derived, became a Roman symbol as it was stamped on coins, inscribed upon temples and integrated into religious practices.

In the 1800s, in Ireland, alcohol was very popular with many locals making their own from potatoes or malted barley. The Total Abstinence Society gained acceptance and thousands took a pledge not to drink alcohol.  This led many to turn to ether to get a non-alcoholic buzz. The effects of ether were similar to alcohol, with much faster onset and recovery, ranging from a euphoric stupor to unconsciousness.   It could be drunk in a liquid form or inhaled as a gas. Ether later became used as a general anesthetic. I found it rather humorous that many ether drunks suffered burns from burping while smoking or from farting too near a fire.

Linden also tells of Peruvian shamans preparing and giving people a natural herbal hallucinogenic drink called ayahuasca, similar to  LSD,  in the early 1900s.  He goes on to tell of pill parties in his college days at Berkeley in the early 1980s where bowls full of assorted pills were passed around and a person reached in and randomly grabbed two pills and downed them.

In fact, partaking in psychoactive drugs is not an exclusively human activity. Animals in the wild consume psychoactive and hallucinogenic plants and fungi.  Birds, monkeys, and elephants have all been observed purposefully partaking in naturally fermented fruit and berries. In Siberia, domesticated reindeer snack on a hallucinogenic, bright red mushroom, amita muscaria, and stagger around for hours.

Linden says:

The psychiatrist Ronald K. Seigal holds that all creatures, from insects munching psychoactive plants to human children playing spinning games to get dizzy, have an inborn need for intoxication.  He writes “This behavior has so much force and persistence that it functions like a drive, just like our drives of hunger, thirst, and sex.'”

These monkeys have learned a shortcut:

image source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/gruenemann/

Share this article!

4 Comments

  1. I think profit motives and political-legal reactions have also shaped the choice of drugs predominant in different cultures. Coca leaves were given to slaves and workers to chew because they would work longer and faster. Same for caffeinated drinks. Alcoholic beverages seems to have been one of those human tinkering projects (how powerful can we make it) with unanticipated detriments. The consumption of distilled spirits (whiskey and gin) during the Middle Ages lead directly to the formation of municipal police forces, to control the behavior of the intoxicated poor. They tended to loot warehouses and destroy property.

    A big chunk of our clinical business is now random and pre-employment drug testing required by local companies where the jobs involve driving or machine operation.

    I’m sorry Amy Winehouse died so unhappily. I don’t believe it was inevitable, though it seems to have been her choice because she was unable to manage emotional pain of some kind. Too much of many kinds of things (drugs, sex, negative emotions, bad food) can damage bodies and relationships. Addicts do become sober every day though. People can choose to change.

    • Debbie Hampton Reply

      I agree completely. There is no doubt in my mind that, even though most drugs are now illegal, their is and has been monetary, political and societal gain to be realized by many factions from their use and regulation. Even the legality of them is a pawn in this way. Personally, I see not partaking in any of them…alcohol included…as a way to have personal power here and not be included in any of this. I never really thought of it that way before.

      I also do think Amy Winehouse’s death and others like hers are preventable. Society is partly responsible for this by aiding, indulging and idolizing this kind of behavior by artists, I feel.

  2. Interesting facts and viewpoints. The video points to a genetic basis for the taste for alcohol in both humans and monkeys. There’s another factor!

    I wonder what it is about 27? It’s not quite the Saturn Return year, but getting very close.

    • Debbie Hampton Reply

      Welcome back! Research is just confirming what human (and animal) behavior have long demonstrated. It does make me have more compassion somehow to know that it is all physically based, but like most anything that begins in the genes, choice and environment can have a strong influence if not completely change the propensity. Perhaps, if more people knew this earlier in life, there would not be a 27 club.

Write A Comment