I was having a conversation with a friend on how Korn and the nu-metal scene got popular and he brought up something slightly out of tangent that in the mid-late 90's, drug usage was about as high as it was in the late 60's/early 70's.  I know XTC was getting very popular at the time, due to the techno getting bigger, and the War on Drugs was in full effect during the 90's as opposed to the 80's and before.  Do you think Drug Usage back then was pretty bad?  How does it compare with the 00's?

Slightly higher, than in the 90's. Even though I never witnessed it first hand, I did back aware of it, slightly earlier.

I was at a friend's apartment, and smelled something weird.

His comment?

"The people downstairs, smoke weed, a lot."

When I was a teen in the late 90's there was some drug use.  I never used drugs although some of my friends did, but I was a big cigarette smoker, as were most of my friends (and alot of us still are).  Maybe with that new age stuff drug use altogather may have been like the 60's.  My brother is 17 (I guess he's in the "popular" group), he said none of his friends use drugs that he knows of, and they don't smoke either.
Its good to see that where smoking was very popular 10 years ago is very un-popular now.

Not gonna bother looking for statistics, but I guarantee that drug use was higher in the early 90s than it was in the late 90s. 1989-91 was when the explosion of meth use occurred, and everyone from losers, nerds, to the prom queens were snorting, smoking, or shooting it. Totally out of control, at least here in California. I remember some of the "cooks" would make it and soak it in paper towels for girls to just drop a piece of the towel into their sodas. Also a way to actually posses it without having a bag of dope on you. Looking back, that was very cutting edge and surprised the technique itself never caught on(maybe it did. I no longer use).

In 1991, meth was as Americana as apple pie.

MDMA (Ecstasy, X, EX, or XTC) was the big club drug.  I swear it is the only thing that made House Music tolerable.  My guess, at least.

LSD (acid) was around, but harder to get, and the quality was often not so good. 

The strength of marijuana got much stronger thanks to better hybrid cutting and hydroponic techniques.  There was still plenty of low-quality weed going around, though.  Know your dealer.

Crack cocaine was still tearing up the inner cities while methamphetamines were starting to rip through rural America.  Heroin was big with the kids once again, which was also really sad to see.  The suburban heroin craze died down by the late '90s, but it's still around and the occasional high school or college student dies of an O.D. now and again. 

Of course, none of the above could hold a candle (N.P.I.) to alcohol, nicotine, caffeine, and Prozac!
http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/12/drunken_smilie.gif

I was big into the whole house scene (and all that came with it) in the mid to late 90s. I reckon it's hard to pinpoint the usage as it's fairly underground. I also think most late teens and early 20 somethings will experiment at some level no matter what year or decade it is - it's almost a part of life.

Hey,
I'm only 17 so I don't remember the 90's too well, but my older brothers all insisted that they never touched drugs, even though they had friends that sometimes did.  As far as me I never did any drugs either (although I smoke cigarettes).
-Tyler

all i know is drug use was a big part of my teens..and it did seem like everyone was smoking weed...but i think the percentage of kids doing coke and dope have gone down..but they've replaced it with prescription pills...i grew up in nyc and in the 90's there was dealers on all corners of most neighborhoods since we didn't have cell phones that was the only way to score so now that we do it just push the dirt under the rug as they say but it still there...

Wasn't Heroin popular in the Mid 90s and during the Grunge years? Like in the movie Pulp Fiction, for example, the guy says, "Coke is dead. Heroin is coming back in a big way." And that movie was from '94.

Also--Why was Prozac and other anxiety depressant and anti-anxiety drugs such a fixture of late '90s (like 1997-1999) pop culture?

Wasn't Heroin popular in the Mid 90s and during the Grunge years? Like in the movie Pulp Fiction, for example, the guy says, "Coke is dead. Heroin is coming back in a big way." And that movie was from '94.

Also--Why was Prozac and other anxiety depressant and anti-anxiety drugs such a fixture of late '90s (like 1997-1999) pop culture?


Heroin was big from about 1994-2000.  Then it seemed to die out.  It's still around, it's just not a huge glut, like cocaine was in the 1980s.  Heroin kills people more easily than cocaine.  Cocaine can kill you, just ask Len Bias, but heroin doesn't make you flip out so much as it makes you fall asleep...

deeper

and

deeper

and

deeper...

...until it finally switches off your central nervous system, which you won't mind because you'll be drowned-rat unconscious!

http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/03/couto.gif

As for prescription pharmaceuticals -- there are just a hell of a lot more of them for a hell of a lot more clinical diagnoses.  Hint: If you're dropping antidpressents in order to "get off" -- best of luck to you!

Yes people develop terrible dependencies on Valium or Ambien, but the REAL trouble is the pain killers.  Everything from Vicodin to OxyContin.  Opioids.  These will turn you into a junkie.  A little pain ain't gonna kill you.  These might.  Be careful.  A lot of people are getting started on drugs such as OxyContin for back pain and migraines -- serious health concerns, but better not fought with a drug more addictive than heroin.  This OxyContin stuff should be for palliative care only.
::)

And yes people always smoked marijuana.  It is now semi-decriminalized in Massachusetts.  As long as you are carrying under an ounce, they can seize the green, leafy substance and fine you $100.  A lot of cities want to line their pockets by making the fine $300.  I want it so if the cop catches YOU with marijuana, the cop has to pay YOU $100!
http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/03/dance2.gif

I'm not going around claiming it's good for you.  In general, it's not as bad for you as alcohol.  True: Whereas, a glass of red wine in the evening has demonstrable health benefits, a joint does not.  Sorry frat boys, drinking all day and all night just beats up your liver.  Okay so you smoke up.  Maybe it makes you mellow.  Makes some people paranoid.  Makes other people nervous. It makes still others mirthful.   Makes me all four at once!  Alcohol is more the social drug.  It's sort of a Jekyll and Hyde for me.  I get loud, rude, crude, and silly.  Damn lucky I ain't been beat up more!  I don't like to drink anymore, not to drunkenness.  

Who would you rather run into on a vacant lot?  A bunch of stoners or a bunch of drunks?  Exactly

Stoners don't bother anybody.  They might want to bum five bucks off you now and again but they don't go holding up convenience stores to get weed money.  Not usually, that is.  Maybe it keeps you from realizing your full potential in life.  Well, come hell or high water, I'm never gonna realize my full potential in this white sport coat and pink incarnation!
::)

I think it's safe to say America effectively lost its War On Drugs when that potsmoking jack@$$ was elected president(not by me). After that, it seemed nobody cared until the idiots singing in grunge bands started offing themselves with heroin, meth, or drug-induced suicides, and the grunge culture began to die with them. Then designer drugs came in and even more deaths followed since doctors, half the time, didn't even know what they were treating! Cocaine and drugs popular in the 80's rather fell out of fashion, since the recession made them too expensive for the average partyer-needing-a-fix, thus the lower-class's love affair with home-cooked meth. Ever since, we've had a prescription-drug bonanza with every 3rd or 4th TV commercial offering a new miracle pill for ED, Weight Loss, Birth Control, Acne, Depression, whatever you think you have, there's a drug for that! Life just seemed so much better when people actually needing prescription drugs looked to their M.D., not the HSN!

"The widespread use of drugs is a symptom of a sick society."
--David Byrne, "Sand In The Vaseline"

Your Pal,
Doc >:(