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The Federation of Aelyria

Japerlasa wrote:Addiction isn't caused by the drug itself, It's the chemicals dealers put in it. People don't go into the hospital with a broken femur and walk out with a morphine addiction, do they?

I have no desire to comment on the rest of this (it is a debate that I don't really have a position in as I don't know enough to form a serious opinion), but this needed to be called out. You are completely, totally incorrect here.

Alcohol, heroin, cocaine, and many other drugs absolutely are addictive in and of themselves. It is not because of additives put into them by dealers. You absolutely can walk out of a hospital with a morphine addiction; it's why we have the ongoing "opioid crisis," because pharmaceutical companies pushed selling opioid (=morphine-type) pain meds to patients, and doctors over-prescribed them.

Cocaine in specific is particularly damaging. Even a single use can permanently alter your brain's cells, removing many of their serotonin receptors. Once they're gone, they may never come back, and without serotonin, you basically cannot get the hormone component of feeling happy about anything. You literally burn up part of your lifetime happiness for a few minutes' delirious high.

THAT is why (purified) cocaine is incredibly dangerous. (Well, that and the fact that it can potentially kill you with a single dose, but the chronic effects are generally the biggest problem.)

Raycena, Bestelesnia, and Economichunger

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