Substance Abuse and Addiciton A Very Brief History Essay...

Substance abuse can include any substance or substances such as alcohol, illegal drugs, prescription drugs, over the counter drugs, cigarettes etc. Any and all of these can become addictive to people very quickly. For years, people believed that addiction was a willful vice that they do to themselves. For years is has been viewed as an individual problem instead of a social problem. Americans today have many different views than 100 years ago about addiction, alcohol and drugs. In the early days of the 19th century, it was only a dream that a drug could save a life. Today drugs are used for specific treatments of specific diseases. However, they are also a multi billion-dollar business both legal and illegal that is not only saving†¦show more content†¦The fourth pharmacological revolution was the development of the oral contraceptive, which contributed to the sexual revolution, beginning to occur in the 1950’s and has not yet been stabilized. With oral contraceptives , they are not being used to prevent or treat disease but were being used by people to gain chemical control over their bodies. This may have helped pave the way for attempts to control emotion and thoughts by using chemistry. Drinking is okay, but drunkenness is not. Alcohol use was widely accepted since the time of first settlements. Due to Protestant reformers they discovered that drunkenness was viewed as a serious problem, often punished by putting a man in stocks for such an offense. Clearly the blame was on the sinner, not the alcohol itself. The view of alcohol as a cause of serious problems began in America soon after the American Revolution. Some people even to this day view alcohol as the devil of the demon. The first psychoactive substance to become demonized in American culture was alcohol. It led the way for similar views concerning cocaine, heroin, and marijuana. We are referring to a tendency to view a substance as an active (sometimes almost purposeful) source of evil, damaging everything it touches. This causes society to simply view it as â€Å"bad† and to seek to eliminate it. History of Substance Abuse Prevention Temperance Movement: 1784 Dr. Benjamin Rush wrote a book, The