# What killed Whitney Houston? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 12, 2012, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581 "2012-02-12T03:51:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Hippy\_Hollow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hippy_hollow/32/4841_2.png) [@Hippy\_Hollow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hippy_Hollow)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/81 "2012-02-16T02:59:23Z")
> [@elbows](#): > > 2 Things that killed Whitney Houston: > > 1. The ‘depressive to respiration’, effects of some prescription drug, enhanced by the intake of alcohol, possible a bad diet, and a hot bath. She just stopped breathing, and slid, into the bath, in my opinion. > > 2. Bobby Brown. She was raised and protected by loving parents experienced in what the industry can do to a young person. They raised her up to adult hood before letting sign a contract and helped, through their own experiences, to guide her to success without terrible exploitation. She was gifted with remarkable beauty, a spectacular instrument, acting ability and a loving and protective family. > > Then along came Bobby Brown, all gansta, street cred, cool, arrogant and domineering. He swept into her life like a plague. He brought into her life everything her parents had shielded her from, and fell, head first into it with fists full of cash. They had a child, who got a front row seat to the co dependent, addictive, abusive, dysfuntion, 24/7, right down to the reality show. That child is now motherless, and is left with Bobby Brown. God help her. From what I’ve read/cobbled together, you are probably right on #1. I’ll take issue with point #2. From all I’ve read and heard, Whitney was pretty wild even during her heyday in the 1980s. Clive Davis and the Arista execs worked very carefully to preserve a “girl next door persona” but I remember reading Right On! and other magazines suggesting that she was a little grittier than the handlers let on. Remember, there were persistent rumors about her being a lesbian, peaking at the time she started dating Bobby Brown. She had dated Eddie Murphy and Randall Cunningham, both rich, eligible men, and the word on the street was that these were simply PR arrangements. She married BB around the time the rumors were most rampant. And they went away, for the most part. BB is a lot of things, but I don’t think he is a liar. If anything, I figure he’s the type to exaggerate his bad choices. He maintained in his biography that he was a pothead and had dabbled in other drugs when they met, but in fact, Whitney introduced him to harder drugs like cocaine. I find this totally believable; it seems like cocaine was in the water if you were in the music biz in the 1980s. He also wrote that he suspected that he was Whitney’s man du jour because of his image and to put to rest the lesbian rumors (which seems totally true; it was about Whitney’s drug use from that point on). ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/82 "2012-02-16T06:55:41Z")
[The curse of fame: It’s really what killed Whitney Houston](http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/whitney-houston-and-the-curse-of-fame/2012/02/14/gIQAnrJUER_story.html?tid=pm_opinions_pop) ---
**Author:** ![Gagundathar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a183cd/32.png) [@Gagundathar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gagundathar)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2012, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/83 "2012-02-16T07:05:06Z")
> [@](#): > > Fans may pay the bills, but they also siphon the spirit of the adored. It isn’t just lonely at the top. It can be deadly. Interesting perspective. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2012, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/84 "2012-02-17T16:37:38Z")
Ha ha. I was looking down my list of subscribed threads. Saw this: What killed Whitney Houston? incandescent bulbs 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2012, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/85 "2012-02-17T19:37:37Z")
\*\*What killed Whitney Houston? \*\* Her own stupidity. ---
**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:** [February 17, 2012, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/86 "2012-02-17T19:52:01Z")
> [@Fiddle\_Peghead](#): > > I have no idea what killed her, but I will not be the least bit surprised if it had nothing to do with drugs, legal or otherwise. Yes, she had her problems, and entered rehab a few times, but I’ve known people who have done serious amounts of drugs for decades who are still walking around seemingly no worse for the wear and tear. I’ve seen no evidence that she had a life-long, all-consuming addiction that has been alluded to in a number of online sites. If you’ve read Keith Richard’s bio _Life_, you well know how you can do copious amounts of drugs and survive. With him it’s not just hearsay; he chronicles it in detail. You don’t need longterm addiction to die from alcohol and benzos. All you need is tolerance: something that is a goal for drinking (i.e. holding your liquor) and quite quick in benzos. So then you use more of one or both to try to get the same effect as before, and, bingo, pulmonary arrest. It’s yet another reason for my campaign to make benzos harder to get and to drill into people’s heads how dangerous they can be if used improperly. (Even doctors don’t get it). ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2012, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/87 "2012-02-18T15:24:31Z")
Here’s the latest theory someone shared with me. She’s broke, and books her last, disastrous tour, knowing her voice ain’t great. The pressure of having to perform without ‘the voice’, (think about the songs she’s expected to perform!), send her back to drugs, hence the melt downs on tour, and the complaints about her voice. She was supposed to sing at the Clive Davis celebration that night, before an audience of A list celebrity musicians. That’s a tight spot if you ain’t got ‘the voice’. Apparently she’d been consulting several doctors about the damage to her voice, and that very day, received the shattering news, that nothing could be done, things would never improve. Of course I don’t know if one whit of this is true, it’s just a theory I heard. If it’s true, it’s heartbreaking, to be sure. ---
**Author:** ![Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/96bed5/32.png) [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patty_O_Furniture)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/88 "2012-03-24T02:49:31Z")
This just in, er… again. [Whitney Houston drowned in bath after taking cocaine](http://www.bangkokpost.com/learning/learning-from-news/285697/singer-whitney-houston-bathtub-drowning-on-cocaine) > [@](#): > > LOS ANGELES — Grammy-winning pop legend Whitney Houston died from accidental drowning in her hotel bathtub after taking cocaine which could have triggered a heart attack, coroners said. > > Houston, who died at age 48 in the bathtub of a Beverly Hills hotel room last month, likely had some kind of heart attack which caused her to slip under the water, said the Los Angeles County Coroner’s office, on Thursday. ---
**Author:** ![benbo1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e19adc/32.png) [@benbo1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/benbo1)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/89 "2012-03-24T03:07:35Z")
she drowned… in a sea of coke ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2012, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581/90 "2012-03-24T03:43:04Z")
Unlike her former co-star Kevin Costner, she evidently hadn’t developed gills. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-killed-whitney-houston/612581.md?page=4)