The OP’s fallacy (DARE myth #116) is that it assumes drugs are always used to escape unpleasant realities.
Think of extensive drug use as the rich man’s extreme sport. It’s fun, dangerous, and expensive… like parachuting or snowboarding. Instead of asking why a powerful person with a good life would want to use drugs, you may as well ask why he’d want to risk his life sliding down the side of a snowy mountain.
They also use them to stay up all night and work (or party), then to go to bed and get some sleep after taking too many to stay up…then of course they need some speed to exercise without eating enough real food and still appear to be those perky perfect people we all love to see on tv or in the movies. Think Judy Garland: get up, go to sleep, lose weight, be happy. It’s really sad when you think about it; don’t these people have true friends?
I would think that people in the entertainment business DO take drugs more than other people. Entertainers and artists are fairly unique in that a drug induced haze may give them a burst of creativity and actually help their work. For example, a lot of Beatles and Led Zepplin songs were inspired by sounds and sights experienced while using LSD. Actors tend to work hiddeously long hours. Some uppers to get through the day, some downers to sleep at night, and the director is happier because he gets his picture done sooner. If something like cocaine makes the actor’s performance more intense, well then heck let’s get as much of that as we can too.
Conversely, being a doctor, engineer, bus driver, school teacher, and most other jobs require a mind set and skills that don’t mix so well with drugs.
I think that to be an artist you have to have a personality which rebels against authority or is a bit of a non-conformist, which I think is also a personality type that is more likely to experiment with all sorts of things in their lives, including drugs. You wouldn’t expect someone who is extremely rule-abiding to be an artist. You’d expect them to be an accountant.
I wonder if any studies have been done along these lines, which would indicate that certain types of personalities are generally more artistic, and if these personality types are also more prone to drug use.
I’m sure there are plenty of doctors, accountants, etc. who do use drugs. All I’m saying is that since drugs tend to hinder their work rather than help it, and for artistic professions often the opposite is true, that I think entertainers have a higher incidence of drug use. I don’t have any cites to back it up though.
Could boredom be a likely source of drug abuse?
My personal opinion. I don’t believe there is a factual answer.[ul][li]The difference in the incidence of recreational drug-taking in the entertainment industry and beyond is not as high as the media portrays;[/li][li]Where there is a difference, it is a factor of:[/li]* celebrities having more time and less performance pressure (as engineer_comp_geek says);
[ii] celebrities having greater disposable income for recreational drugs;
[iii] celebrities having easier access (through hangers-on or a blind-eye culture in the entertainment industry).[/ul]I think drug use is as much an industry culture phenomenon as anything else. From my own anecdotal experience those in well-paid advertising jobs are far heavier recreational drug users than those in IT and finance.
Yeah, yeah. Movie stars spend their time doing the Charleston on tables while miffing snow and knocking back bootleg gin, then have to show up on the set at 8:00 to emote for Mr. De Mille. Jesus, you people have been reading too much Kenneth Anger!
I tried to Google “substance abuse by profession” and came up blank, but I remember reading that doctors and police have the highest rates. I’ll wager it’s the “boring” professions that drive people to drugs, not the exciting ones like acting.
I have always thought that models, actors, etc. took drugs to help them stay thin. If you get good stuff, who needs to eat? :eek:
No, from what I can tell, celebrities put in far more hours in their work than most of us. No amount of money would be worth it to me for what some actors go through for a film.
I couldn’t find anything better than that, other than someone’s class notes that the medical profession is on par with other professions.
Not in my extensive personal experience.
I. Drugs are expensive
II. Drugs are enjoyable
III. Some drugs aid in creativity
People in entertainment that create stuff are rich and looking for a good time.
Here is my take on it all. It all started with musicians. They started a trend, and now its a thing you are expected to do if you are a celebrity.
Most artists, I mean real artists, which some musicians are, are really depressed people. I mean really depressed. Narcotics make you feel a lot better. Its a really good form of escapism. Many of these artists started a trend for the rich and famous. Now it is just a given.
Also, as you witness in most high schools, most “band” kids are losers. they aren’t popular, and they spend all of their time on their music. They fail classes, etc. These types of people are more prone to drug use. Ya know? They just become rich and famous drug users, instead of dropouts.
Oh well, hope that makes some sense.
Except for the part about most musicians being depressed. I’m gonna need a cite for that one. Seems like a lot of celebrities spend most of their time enjoying the rockstar lifestyle. There is a whole show about it, Cribs.
I have some experience in this area but I’ll spare you the gritty details.
Basically the problem is this: It’s an hour before showtime and there’s a whole room full of people out there who have paid good money to have a fun evening. None of them care that you just had a fight with your wife and that the transmission on your car is going out. They want to have a good time and it’s your job to provide it even though you feel lousy.
So you think, “Well, if I take some of this, I’ll feel great and put on a good show and everybody will be happy.” And, sure enough, it works. So you do it again the next night and the next. You use that substance to manufacture your mood.
(Even the non-substance-using performers I know still go through some kind of ritual before the show to get themselves in the right condition for performing. Some pray, some meditate, some exercise. These rituals are much healthier, but they’re still ‘manufactured moods’.)
The real problem arises the next morning when you don’t feel like going out and getting the transmission fixed. So you think, “Maybe if I took some more of this stuff, I’d be in the right mood to fix the transmission. It sure worked last night.” And it works again and, before you know it, you don’t feel like getting out of bed without taking something.
A corollary to this problem is that substance use is accepted in the entertainment community, it’s practically expected. I can think of no other professions where this occurs.
To a certain extent the entertainment industry is about having a good time. People in general start taking drugs to have a good time. So it hardly seems a stretch to me to think that people in the business for providing other with a good time might not like it themselves.
After reading Bullwinkle’s post I think that like most things there is a spectrum of experiences out there. Some musicians are undoubtedly living like “rock stars” and enjoying the hell out of it, others are using drugs as a crutch to make their life palatable, others are just addicts. This is GQ, so I wonder if there is any way to know which group is the majority?
“Most artists, I mean real artists, which some musicians are, are really depressed people.”
—Cite?
Based on my experience in college many people managed to use recreational drugs and alcohol enjoy them and not mess up their lives. These people seemed to vastly outnumber the ones who did mess up their lives.
Another point I thought of was once you become popular enough to have fans and groupies it is easy to find people to think you behavior is acceptable. If you are in a profession that does not support fans and groupies there is a lot higher percentage of people that will get on your case to clean up your act.
I don’t think there’s a way to really find out. (Maybe put together another ‘USA for Africa’ and have everybody submit a urine sample) I was careful to talk about only the people I know personally.
If I was to throw in all the gossip I’ve heard, I could say this: The people who have had long successful careers are generally very clean and healthy. They may not have started out that way but at some point they cleaned up and got to work in a very serious way. It’s hard to think of a hard-core junkie who’s had a successful career for more than a couple of years.
That’s about as empirical as I can get and it’s still too IMHO-ish. Sorry.