There are crocodiles
Okay - it's like this. There's a tribe living by a river, and in the river there are crocodiles. The tribe has one particular piece of wisdom passed down through the generations. It goes like this: if you happen to meet a crocodile, don't stick your head in its mouth. Every now and then - and who knows the reason - people ignore this advice. Which is sad. Because they die. But very stupid because they were warned. They had a choice. The moral of this story is - you can't afford to be stupid. There are crocodiles.
-- Press Gang, season 5, episode 6
Look, I'm going to make this very simple: you do recreational drugs, you're an idiot. I don't care. There is no excuse for a person of reasonably decent mental health and circumstance living in the modern western world to even consider it.
They can kill you. They can stuff up your life and your body, and they sure as bloody hell fuck up your brain.
You know this. You have been told this many, many times, by many, many people. It is a fact. Irrefutable. You ignore it, you are willingly putting your life at risk, and that makes you a moron.
I don't care if you only try it once. I don't care if it's "only pot", or if you think you know what you're doing.
Because you fucking know about addiction, and how one not-so-bad thing can lead to way worse things. And no, "I wouldn't do that" is not an acceptable reply. Because that is one thing you don't know.
You don't know if you have a biological disposition to addiction. You don't know if you have panic disorder just waiting to be triggered by one breath of cannabis smoke. You don't know if, tonight, instead of making you cuddley, that E will make you scream and shout and smash until they hold you down and you pass out.
You don't always know what you're getting, where it came from, who made it and out of what. You can't know that, while you've willingly given up some control of your mind, someone won't come along and take advantage of that. You never know when something might go wrong with your immediate environment, and you can't predict when you will need to be able to think clearly and act quickly. You can't be sure you won't do something stupid, or something you will seriously regret.
If you do the research, you can probably guess at how much damage you're doing to your brain with each hit, and how long term that may be. But if you were to do the research, I don't see how you could even contemplate it.
And, honestly, how fucking pathetic are you, how shallow is your life, that you think you need to be out of your mind to enjoy yourself.
I'm not talking about people who do have legitimately terrible lives or very serious mental health problems, of course. Drugs aren't any good for them either - in fact they will generally make things much worse - but I can at least understand their perspective a little. Sometimes things get so shit that solutions are hard to see, and drugs are easy, drugs make it feel better for a while.
No, I mean everyone else. Everyone. I mean the dumbfucks who waste what little money they have on something so profoundly destructive and entirely unnecessary, as well as the dumbfucks who have more money than anyone could ever need and do the same. The ones of any income whose lives are so devoid of anything of real worth - or, there is worth there, because there is worth everywhere, but they themselves are too up their own arses to appreciate it - that they fill themselves up with fads and noise and substances when what they need is actual substance.
But the trippy, philosophical ones too, have no excuse. You can believe in free love and peace and the power of the universe, man on your own steam.
Hippies, partiers, rockers, derros, hipsters, spoilt brats, misfits, artists, musicians, whatever, I don't care. You want to chill, you want to fly? You don't need drugs for that. Really, you don't.
Alcohol, maybe. I'm not necessarily talking about alcohol with any of this. I do think a lot of Australians, especially younger ones, have a deeply flawed attitude towards it at the moment, and abuse and binge drinking are a serious issue. However, provided you really do moderate your intake, it is markedly safer than other recreational drugs. It's also ingested in a far more natural way (as opposed to snorting or stabbing or smoking), and is easier on the body and brain. There's still a chance of biological predisposition to addiction and abuse, and still plenty of health risks with extended use, but most of the time, with moderation, it's not quite so bad. Indeed, there are even some social benefits. Gets the normal, healthy tension out at the end of the week. Hell, the odd drink actually has some health benefits. I'm not interested in the stuff myself, and my position of drugs as idiocy stands for alcohol when people go overboard, but I don't begrudge people the odd beer or wine.
My point is, if you need drugs for happiness, I seriously pity you. There's more to life; there are endless sources of joy in the world. Most people always have the chance to be happy. If you want to be really really happy for one night, your body can easily provide you with the neurotransmitters to do that. Go out, feel the music move through you, and let the dopamine and adrenaline work. You want to relax and be spacey with your mates, then just relax. Put some cool music on, breathe deep, talk low, and you'll feel calm and spacey.
But, actually, that's still not my point. That's a little aside. Maybe I'm wrong and it's just me who can work that way. If so, fine, I accept that, and revoke the above paragraph (except the statement that everyone has the chance to be happy, that I truly do believe).
The real point, the one that I don't see how anyone could properly contest, is this: you do drugs, knowing what we know, then you're an idiot, pure and simple, and I have very little time for you.
There are crocodiles. Only an idiot would stick their head in one that they've been warned about.
ETA: Cut for length, bits and pieces of editing.