Pipe Dream Blues

By Amanda Slater

Named after a song that tells the story of a woman’s battle with drug addiction, “Pipe Dream Blues” is a book that deals with the correlation between racism and the war on drugs. According to the text, “Substance abuse is the single major leading social, economic, and health problem confronting the African-American community.” The book goes on to say, “While blacks and other people of color in the United States comprise less than 15 percent of all drug users, the damage and havoc caused by substance abuse and by the destructive impact of the federal government’s drug war is felt much more deeply in those communities.”

Furthermore it states that, “an FBI study notes the fact that while blacks represent only 12 percent of all illegal drug users, blacks are 41 percent of all those arrested on cocaine and heroin charges.” The book argues that people of color are those who are being targeted in the war against drugs, rather than those responsible for drug trafficking, and asks the question of whether or not the CIA has in fact escalated the drug crisis in the US, or even assisted the “efforts of drug traffickers.”

Although the book includes a good deal of evidence suggesting that drugs are a key force in tearing apart the black community, there is not a clear cut argument as to how drugs are directly linked to blatant racism. There is a conspiracy theory, as mentioned in the text, speculating that the African American community has been targeted for destruction specifically through the medium of drugs. According to the book, it is believed that either a group of “white racists,” or a section of the government is “carrying out a plan of black genocide via drugs.” The text points to “ample historic evidence,” which correlates high levels of positive black activism with the increased presence of illegal drugs in the black community. It is stated that, “Most notably, as the Civil Rights and Black Power movements of the Sixties gained momentum and after the urban rebellions in the major cities, more illegal drugs entered into the Black community than at any other time in history. Prior to today’s crisis, the greatest amount of heroin use in Black American history occurred between 1965 and 1970.”

However, it is here that Lusane seems to overlook the fact that the civil rights movement occurred during a time in which drugs became more popular than ever among members of all races. The “psychedelic 60s” and the 1970s were notorious for the “hippy movement,” which involved a good deal of heavy drug use. Interestingly, in many political commentaries on or portrayals of the time period, white drug users are featured more often than black drug users, thus refuting the idea that our society has attempted to criminalize only the black community as drug users. It seems that in actuality, during the time that blacks and whites used drugs most heavily, white college-aged individuals were the poster children for illegal drug use.

I do not say all this to discount the negative effects of drug trafficking on the black community. Lusane is correct in his identification of drugs as a key problem in this regard. However, it seems that Lusane attempts to correlate black drug use primarily with continuing racism, which seems a bit unfounded. Instead, the present-day issue seems to be primarily a class distinction. Is it more plausible to assume that the black community is being torn apart by drugs because white supremacists are attempting to execute a genocide, or because the people who often become most enslaved to drugs are those who are underprivileged and feel that they have few options in life, and unfortunately, many underprivileged, urban areas have a higher concentration of black residents than white.

Perhaps the key factor in the modern-day drug devastation of nlack communities is a lack of socio-economic options that would drive one to drugs regardless of race. Breaking down this hypothesis, there is a lack of options in underprivileged, urban areas. School systems are often poor. Thus, youth often do not see education as a way to escape poverty. Furthermore, most cannot afford a college education. Many underprivileged, urban youths see professional sports, careers in entertainment such as hip-hop, or a life of crime, often in the drug industry, as their only options of escape. Furthermore, depression is higher in underprivileged areas, increasing the likelihood that drugs and alcohol will be used as an escape from the harsh realities of life. When any substance is used primarily as a means of escape, the chances of addiction and dependence are greatly increased.

“I think that drugs are just a convenient way to discriminate against black people and stereotype them as criminals,” says Schoolcraft Community College sophomore and education major Amber Dalby. “White people do drugs just as often if not more than black people.”

Despite this assessment, however, it is plausible that the higher arrest rate of black individuals for drug related offenses also relates to a class distinction. Police patrol underprivileged areas more closely, which have notoriously higher crime rates. Thus, police are watching more closely for any kinds of crime in these areas than in privileged, “quiet” neighborhoods. Since there is a higher concentration of black individuals in these underprivileged areas, the likelihood that a black individual will be arrested for a drug-related offense is greatly increased, and again, does not speak so much to the concept of racism, as it does to the idea of class distinction. Thus, I think to say that modern-day racism is a direct correlate to these trends is to ignore some of the real, underlying issues.

I say “modern-day” racism, because I do think that racism of the past has contributed heavily to the class distinctions between races. People of color are just now starting to get equal pay and job opportunities for doing the same amount of work that white people had in the past done for higher pay. Furthermore, in the past, many white employers wouldn’t even hire a black employee, which made finding a well-paying job much more difficult for a black individual than for a white individual. Although much of this racism seems to have been decreased, it is extremely difficult to break out of the socio-economic class of one’s background – even in America, the land so widely celebrated to be the “land of opportunity.”

Class distinctions based on race were also fueled by other means. “About right after World War II, Detroit had equal pay for work in factories,” says Eastern Michigan University Junior and Fine Arts major, Tory Weeber. Weeber stated that she does think that racism has some correlation to the war on drugs, but she also seems to share the sentiment that the current drug struggle in the black community, if influenced by racism, was influenced primarily by the racism of the past. She went on to say that past racism has contributed to the class distinctions between, and thus, she believes actual drug devastation has more to do with a class distinction than with racism itself. However, Weeber does believe that the racism of the past has set people up to fall into the lower class systems and thus fall more easily into traps of drug dependence and devastation. Weeber went on to further state that, “[Back then] there were specific zones for white managers and immigrants. According to my Sociology 205 Social Problems class with Mary Burnes, the privileged members of the white community got the housing first. Realtors would draw a ‘red line’ around white neighborhoods and would steer Blacks away from there. Then Realtors would use white prejudice and fear of black people to further divide the neighborhoods. Realtors would watch white neighborhood to see when activity in the neighborhood was the highest and would hire a black person to walk through the white area during that time of day. The Realtors would then post bulletins saying, ‘Don’t let Blackie move in’ or something of that nature, encouraging fear of black individuals and encouraging white residents to move out of their neighborhoods when it appeared to them that white people were beginning to move into the area. The Realtors then let white people sell their properties to the Realtors for less than property value. The Realtors would then turn around and sell the property to black people for double the property value – which not only served to racially divide neighborhoods, but it also put black individuals into greater debt than white individuals.”

However, one assumption that “Pipe Dream Blues” is accurate in making is that the need is greater than ever to address the devastation caused by drug trafficking and abuse – especially, as noted by the book, in communities of color. The book claims that the danger of the drug war isn’t the continuation of illegal drug use, but rather that it will “mask the brutal social realities that must be addressed if suffering and destruction caused by the drug crisis is to stop.” And perhaps this is true. Those with privileged backgrounds must champion the cause of those without a true voice in our society, and seek to break down socio-economic class barriers. It is only with such efforts that society will truly begin to take steps towards further progress.