# Attention TV writers: There is no such psychoactive controlled substance as "drugs" **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 7, 2012, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034 "2012-03-07T14:42:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/21 "2012-03-07T20:58:07Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Is it? In my personal experience, no one ever talks about “doing drugs,” or “getting drugs,” or so-and-so being a “drug addict.” They talk about what specific substance they’re using. They “smoke pot,” or “get some 'shrooms,” or “is a meth addict.” Outside of policy and law enforcement debates (and Hollywood) I don’t usually hear people refer to “drugs” without any further elaboration or specificity. I think it depends largely on the context. While the use of the word “narcotic” to refer to any controlled substance does rub me the wrong way, I have to admit it serves as a convenient shorthand way of referring to such drugs. In a legal or regulatory context it may make more sense to say “narcotics” than “drugs which are subject to the Controlled Substances Act and require special prescription blanks, or which are right out altogether.” Similarly with pharmacists and pharmacy techs. I’ve heard them refer to certain stimulants as narcotics if they come under the purview of controlled substance statutes. They have to follow similar laws and regs relating to all “narcotics”, regardless of what the drugs actually do. After all, they’re not _taking_ them, normally, they’re just supplying them. In stories about adolescents, again, I don’t think it matters all that much. I wasn’t an adolescent drug abuser, but by and large, from what I saw of the adolescent “drug culture”, if you will, was that the prevailing ethos was to try anything and everything. After all, it’s in this age group that you find the majority of solvent abuse (i.e. glue sniffing). Older users tend to have more definite preferences. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/22 "2012-03-07T21:28:32Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > No, I’m not on board with this complaint. There are some situations in which it matters what kind of drugs a character is doing, and plenty where it doesn’t matter or the characters wouldn’t know. I agree. In my experience it’s not uncommon to hear people talking about “drugs” in a generic way. When referring to third persons, we don’t always care what kind of drugs are being implicated. “He got fired because he was on drugs.” – 100 percent normal usage ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/23 "2012-03-07T21:42:52Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Maastricht** : > > Right! For us non-Americans, I always have to take from the contents if they mean prescription drugs or the other kind. I always have to make a little mental adjustment when a drug store is mentioned. You do have to tell from context, but it’s fairly consistent. A drugstore sells prescription and over-the-counter medicines, plus a bunch of knickknacks (and in fact the knickknacks are usually the larger part of the business), and medicines can be referred to as “drugs” with a specifier (for instance, one might refer to Nyquil as a “cold drug”). But “drug” or “drugs” used as a noun with no adjective almost always either refers to the illegal ones, or is meant to evoke the illegal ones as a joke (like a pharmacist referring to themself as a “drug dealer”). ---
**Author:** ![OldLobsterClaw](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/eb9ed0/32.png) [@OldLobsterClaw](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldLobsterClaw)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/24 "2012-03-24T01:56:40Z")
I have to come down on the side of the op. It’s one of my pet peeves. Just because it’s common usage doesn’t make it correct or even reasonable. To me it’s just plain sloppy and ignorant, like the long blathers with no capitalization, no definable sentences and paragraphs, rampant misspellings and damned little punctuation. “Drugs” is plural, so the assumption is that the person in question is under the influence of more than one “substance.” “Drugs” includes aspirin, heroin, penicillin, and thousands of compounds good, bad and indifferent. If I went into the pharmacy, walked up to the counter and said “I want drugs” a cop would probably have me doing the perp-walk in pretty short order. That said, for the most part it’s a non-issue when the term is used outside any serious discussion. But when it’s used in any kind of a serious framework, as in DARE or in political debate, it seriously erodes the speaker’s credibility ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/25 "2012-03-24T02:14:21Z")
Wait, so people understand each other perfectly when they talk about “drugs,” but it’s also just plain sloppy and ignorant. Because … ordinary conversation is somehow subject to strict rules of taxonomic nomenclature? ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/26 "2012-03-24T02:17:27Z")
When I’ve interviewed for jobs, no one in HR ever said, “of course it’s just a formality but you’ll have to undergo a urine analysis to determine whether you’ve recently ingested illicit controlled substances.” ---
**Author:** ![Cugel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cugel/32/1199_2.png) [@Cugel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cugel)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 9:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/27 "2012-03-24T09:36:04Z")
[Indeed, if they are using Clarky Cat, they should just say it](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4f4oy2M_Og) ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 10:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/28 "2012-03-24T10:04:11Z")
Writers are lazy when they call it drugs not because nobody ever says that, but because they call it drugs and then just give it whatever effects are necessary for the plot. Is it really so hard to look at what specific drugs actually do and write around that? I mean, yeah, it’s implausible for someone to go to a dealer and just ask for drugs without specifying what kind. And it’s rare that offering you a drug wouldn’t tell you what kind. But I can’t remember hearing that in a long, long time. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 10:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/29 "2012-03-24T10:51:48Z")
It’s kind of like “food.” Kind of. You have things called baby food, cat food, dog food, etc. Cereal used to be called breakfast food. But there is nothing called just “food.” ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 10:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/30 "2012-03-24T10:57:18Z")
> [@Misnomer](#): > > The “drugs” thing doesn’t bother me, but I _always_ notice when a TV show character walks into a bar and says, “I’ll have a beer” (sometimes it’s “I’ll have a draft”). I’ve been a regular at several bars during the 19 years that I’ve been drinking legally, and I have never in my life asked for “a beer”\* or “a draft.” If the bartender knows what you drink they’ll either simply hand you one or they’ll confirm your order (“Stella?”) before handing you one. I get that the writers don’t want to/can’t name a particular brand, but it bugs me every time. > \*I did once say “beer me” to my favorite bartender, but it was my third or fourth one and I was making a _Cheers_ joke. You do that in Pennsylvania, especially if you ask for a lager, and you’ll wind up with a Yuengling. ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/31 "2012-03-24T12:24:59Z")
> [@asterion](#): > > You do that in Pennsylvania, especially if you ask for a lager, and you’ll wind up with a Yuengling. And then end up on PJ, I guess. Wait… :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Folacin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folacin/32/3195_2.png) [@Folacin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folacin)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/32 "2012-03-24T12:39:56Z")
> [@ugly ripe tomato](#): > > I support this rant. For pete’s sake, you wrote a whole script already so just make up a name and some effects. “Your Honor, the suspect was using zenegrifid, known on the street as Black Wings, which is known for making the user violent and delusional.” Or they can save the exposition, just say drugs (which everyone in the US at least will understand to mean “dangerous controlled substance”) and move on. Shows will occasionally invent a name if they want to run around stomping out a unique danger before people get hurt, or reference PCP if they need to have trouble subduing a suspect. But, the generic “drugs” means they don’t have to stop and explain that “bezephenol acid/Black Wings” is illegal every time they mention it (for those folks coming in in the middle of the episode). ---
**Author:** ![Pitchmeister](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pitchmeister/32/3459_2.png) [@Pitchmeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pitchmeister)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/33 "2012-03-24T13:08:24Z")
> [@Beware\_of\_Doug](#): > > It’s kind of like “food.” Kind of. You have things called baby food, cat food, dog food, etc. Cereal used to be called breakfast food. But there is nothing called just “food.” Although I did once eat at a streetside diner in New Zealand that had a big sign that said “Food”. No shit! ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/34 "2012-03-24T14:11:56Z")
Approach the dude on an urban street corner and express an interest in procuring “drugs” and he is likely to turn away your commerce. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/35 "2012-03-24T17:30:22Z")
> [@Beware\_of\_Doug](#): > > It’s kind of like “food.” Kind of. You have things called baby food, cat food, dog food, etc. Cereal used to be called breakfast food. But there is nothing called just “food.” Clearly you’ve never seen _Repo Man_. White cans with black letters that say “Food” and “Beer.” I think another recent movie did that too. Personally, I like saying “foodstuffs.” ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/36 "2012-03-24T17:41:09Z")
Trade: phenodihydrol benzidrex. Street: the Embalmer. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/37 "2012-03-24T17:59:10Z")
> [@asterion](#): > > You do that in Pennsylvania, especially if you ask for a lager, and you’ll wind up with a Yuengling. You say that like it’s a bad thing somehow. > [@Lemur866](#): > > “Becky’s on drugs! Omigod!” > “Wait, is Becky sneaking out to smoke pot by the bleachers during study hall, or is she turning tricks for crack?” > “Beats me, she’s on drugs!” > “So pot, cocaine, heroin, whatever, it’s all drugs.” > “Exactly.” “How do you know she’s on drugs?” “She asked me for a Pepsi.” 😃 ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/38 "2012-03-24T18:51:04Z")
This is a silly nitpick. I can picture a conversation with the OP: Some Guy: Yeah, his wife was caught with drugs. It’s a bad situation. OP: I’m sorry, was she caught with Cocaine, Pot, Heroin, or what? And I’m sorry, but why am I supposed to be able to identify specific types of drugs? Me: There’s drugs in this bag. You: Heroin? Cocaine? Crack? Crystal Meth? Me: Uhhh, I dunno. ---
**Author:** ![Carmady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f04885/32.png) [@Carmady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carmady)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/39 "2012-03-24T19:07:36Z")
“Johnny’s grades are down… do you think he might be on coke or heroin or marijuana or opium or meth or or shrooms or LSD or X or dope or…” “You already said that one, dear. Dope is slang for heroin.” “Is it? I thought it was slang for marijuana.” “No, that would be pot, honey.” “What were we talking about again?” ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034/40 "2012-03-24T19:30:12Z")
> [@OldLobsterClaw](#): > > “Drugs” is plural, so the assumption is that the person in question is under the influence of more than one “substance.” Yes. And if someone says “Do you like my pants,” the assumption is that they are standing in front of you wearing two or more pairs of jeans. And if they say “I can’t find the scissors,” you assume they have lost more than one cutting implement. > [@Carmady](#): > > “Johnny’s grades are down… do you think he might be on coke or heroin or marijuana or opium or meth or or shrooms or LSD or X or dope or…” > > “You already said that one, dear. Dope is slang for heroin.” > > “Is it? I thought it was slang for marijuana.” > > “No, that would be pot, honey.” > > “What were we talking about again?” “Let’s just search his room. There might be some killer shit in there!” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/attention-tv-writers-there-is-no-such-psychoactive-controlled-substance-as-drugs/615034.md?page=3)