Showing ID & signing in to buy OTC cold medicines?

[ShadowHM]

Oh, I don't know.  Maybe I'm just crazy, but I see a difference between having a glass of wine with my dinner or a beer while watching TV and snorting some cocaine.  Silly of me?

Maybe. :) What if you had to stay up late and be sure to be alert? Caffeine or cocaine for the job? Is there a qualitative difference, apart from the legal issue? They are both addictive. Can you use them without being addicted? Yes.

Just about any substance, legal or illegal, can be abused.  Where I live, teenagers getting high on gasoline fumes is getting to be a problem.

That would be my point. Any drug can can be abused.

I'm not saying that all legal drugs are safe and all illegal drugs are evil.  I'm simply saying that comparing some of the hard drugs, such as cocaine or crack, to alcohol is unrealistic.

gekko
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Crack and cocaine are the same thing, right? (I am not up on my drug terminology.)

I am of the opinion that one can get addicted to anything - psycological addiction is just as pernicious as physical addiction. 'Hard' drugs are an artificial distinction. I have known people who were addicted to cocaine, people who were addicted to alcohol, people who were addicted to nicotine, people who were addicted to marijuana, people who were addicted to caffeine (there are rather a lot of them), people who are addicted to cough syrup...

So what makes any drug 'hard' ? And why is a self-administered low dose of relaxation (wine/beer) somehow different than a self-administered low dose of energy?