Original subtitles

(school bell ringing)

(girl) Come on, kid, it's just

a little reefer roach cigarette.

Okay, drug dealer.

One smoke of the marijuana, please.

Oh, no, I am addicted to heroin now.

Marijuana is a gateway drug

and that's the blunt truth.

Dope isn't dope, it's for dopes.

I'm sorry, Miss Axford, this is stupid.

Yeah, uh, I'm not gonna do this

in front of the whole school.

Well, Scooper, then maybe you shouldn't have graffitied

"Reading sucks! All over the science lab.

Prove to me it doesn't suck. You can't!

All right, guys, assembly's in an hour.

It's either this or summer school.

You choose.

Plus, according to my drug education worksheets,

all of this is completely true.

(Adam clapping)

Yes, the soul of the theater is truth.

But what was said here today

is as true as the night is bright.

Ha! That is to say,

nay, to declare, it was false.

Hi, Emily! Like my hat?

Come on, dude, I told you, not while I'm at work.

I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself.

What we teach kids about drugs

in this country is completely wrong.

'Tis I, Webby award nominee Adam Conover,

and I present to thee, "Adam Ruins Everything."

(whistling)

Listen, Drew Carey, all you adults

always tell us the same thing--

Weed's gonna kill us, it's a gateway drug.

Lying isn't funny.

Oh, no, for most people, weed is essentially harmless.

Whoa-kay, no way, Jose.

Look, I know this stuff

is a little overboard, but...

you can't tell kids weed isn't bad!

Of course I can. It's true.

And we've known it for decades.

Counting deaths from the substance alone,

alcohol kills 88,000 people a year.

Tobacco kills 480,000.

And marijuana kills absolutely no one.

(buzzer)

Uh, according to curriculum,

marijuana can get you hooked on harder substances.

It's a gateway drug.

Yeah, educators have been saying that for years,

but it's not true.

Most people who try marijuana

don't even continue smoking marijuana.

This dude knows what's up.

Now, that doesn't mean that it's perfectly safe.

Dude, I thought you were cool.

Oh, I wish! If you're under 25,

smoking weed can lead to memory problems

and poor cognitive functioning.

But if you're an adult,

and your brain has finished developing,

it's really your choice.

Adam, wrong way. Also, not in a school.

Sorry, I usually only smoke at parties,

and I'm rarely invited to them.

Yeah, wonder why.

The truth is, if you know the risks

and you use it in moderation, weed is no big deal.

And, in fact, humans have been using it for millennia.

Humans started growing cannabis as a crop

over 8,000 years ago.

This crop will feed our family for a year,

and this crop will make movies way funnier.

(Adam) In 440 BCE, Herodotus wrote about

the ancient tradition of cannabis steam baths.

Fellow citizens, as a wise man

once told me, VapeLife! (laughing)

And in America, for many years

marijuana was available

in over-the-counter medications.

Step right up and try

Professor Horkorium's Rejuvenating Tincture!

Now with the Arab hashish.

For most of America's history,

weed was legal. No one cared about it.

All right, so what changed?

I mean, there must be some reason we banned it.

Oh, there is. And it's real weird.

Enter Harry Anslinger, commissioner of

the Federal Bureau of Narcotics

and a staunch prohibitionist.

Our funding has been cut! They'll shut me down

if I don't find a new chemical to demonize.

Let's see, what are people scared of for no good reason?

A-ha! Mexicans!

And Mexicans smoke marijuana!

That's it! Hey, racist mob...

(all) Hmm?

Marijuana makes Mexicans thirst for white blood.

Spread the word!

(mob shouting)

Anslinger used that racism to fuel

a propaganda campaign against the drug,

testifying before Congress...

Marijuana is an addictive drug

which produces in its users

insanity, criminality, and death!

(Adam) Soon, the "Marijuana causes violence" meme

was everywhere, from newspapers to movies...

Just a young boy. Under the influence of the drug,

he killed his entire family with an axe.

...to subtle political cartoons.

(man) Nazi propaganda.

What does that even mean?

Why would he just say the words, "Nazi propaganda"?

Honestly, no idea. But, it worked.

In 1937, Congress banned marijuana

and later, with Anslinger's help,

they passed the first

mandatory minimum sentencing laws

which made it so that your first time

getting caught with this

could put you away from two to ten years.

Mm, thank you, that's what I thought.

(Adam) And the true irony is,

the government knew Anslinger's claims were false.

Scientists proved marijuana wasn't connected to violence

or insanity in the '40s.

And in 1973, a bipartisan commission

recommended Nixon decriminalize it.

But, Nixon being Nixon...

Mr. President, literally everyone agrees,

marijuana is safe.

Out! Get out! I have zero chill!

The war on drugs begins now!

I don't understand. If he knew it was safe,

why would he be so tough on it?

Well, why don't you ask

Nixon's aide, John Ehrlichman.

He said, in 1994...

We knew we couldn't make it illegal

to be either against the war or black,

but by getting the public to associate the hippies

with marijuana and blacks with heroin...

Did we know we were lying about the drugs?

That's a real quote? Yeah.

That's a real quote.

Nixon started the war on drugs

to bully his political enemies and minorities.

His own aide admitted it.

I can't believe I've been teaching this to children.

At least it's better now, right?

You wish.

Despite laws being loosened in a few states,

mandatory minimums are still in effect

all across the country, and marijuana still accounts

for nearly half of all drug arrests.

And, despite the fact that white and black people

smoke at basically the same rate,

black people are four times as likely

to be arrested for marijuana.

Look, we know for a fact that weed isn't dangerous,

but we're still following racist old laws

and throwing countless people of color

in prison for no reason.

(car approaching, distant music)

(tires screeching)

Listen up!

Everything this barf-boy told you is wrong

and will kill you!

Well, we actually have fact checkers, but--

Shut it, barf-boy! Before you barf everywhere.

Drugs aren't cool. D.A.R.E. Says so.

Oh, the D.A.R.E. Program!

That was a massive failure

that may have actually increased drug use.

(taser clicking) Ooh!

(Adam coughing)

Told ya he was a barf-boy.

♪

(Adam) Ever wonder why?

♪

Ah, fish oil, the trendiest

and stinkiest health fad of the moment.

My omega-3 fatty acids are on "flark."

Flark is the new fleek.

Ever wonder why it gives you such gross burps?

No-- (belches)

Blech. I'll tell you.

Because the vast majority of it is rancid.

Fish oil is actually a delicate product

that requires very careful processing

to make sure the oil doesn't oxidize. Yuck.

This oxidization occurs when fish oil

comes into contact with heat, light, or oxygen.

But I don't know if you've noticed,

heat, light, and oxygen are, um, everywhere.

So, oxidization happens all the dang time.

One study found that out of 36 fish oil products tested,

over half had oxidized above the recommended limit,

and, on average, only contained 68%

of the omega-3 fatty acids that were listed on the label.

Ugh. That is so not on flark.

So, what will happen if you eat this stinky fish juice?

Mm, no one knows yet, but a good rule of thumb is,

if it tastes bad, which this stuff

definitely does, don't eat it.

And leave the fish goop in the ocean, where it belongs.

(gulping)

(officer) Okay, kids...

who wants to see what every drug looks like?

Ah, watch out for this one.

Weed. It might be laced with black tar heroin.

And this is LSD. Don't do it!

Makes you see things, like... dragons.

Or cartoon characters that are real twisted.

(camera shutter clicks)

And this-- oh, is a loose Tic-Tac.

Mmm, orange, my favorite. Mmm.

Oh, hello!

Everybody, come say hi to Daren, the D.A.R.E. Lion.

Daren, what do you want to teach the kids today?

The D.A.R.E. Program was a massive failure

with horrific consequences.

Aah! Not you!

You are a disgrace to that sacred suit.

Look, you mean well, but the "Just say no"

propaganda you're peddling

can actually increase drug use.

Adam, tread lightly. He's a cop.

Oh, I'll be fine.

Authority figures love being challenged.

Oh, you can't challenge me

because I know the truth.

If you do any drug, even once,

you're gonna become an addict.

And let me tell you something.

You're gonna die! That's ridiculous.

This zero-tolerance, abstinence-only approach

took off in the 1980s when Nancy Reagan said

those three little words...

Just say no.

(Adam) Soon, anti-drug messages

were showing up in commercials...

♪

...before arcade games, and even on TV shows.

Just some grass, a few uppers,

and a little nose candy.

No.

In public schools, the bright happy face

of zero tolerance

was Drug Abuse Resistance Education, or D.A.R.E.

What's the big deal?

I remember my D.A.R.E. Program.

It was fun. We did little skits.

Hey, Miss "A," what are some cool ways

to say "No" to a drug dealer?

No. Heck, no!

Sorry, I have sports to get to.

I'm not a chicken, you're a turkey.

And did any of those stop you from trying drugs?

(unconvincingly) Yeah.

Study after study found that

D.A.R.E. Had no effect on drug use at all.

In fact, one major study found that, for some kids,

it actually increased drug use.

Okay, why would that be?

I don't know, maybe because showing kids

a briefcase full of drugs

is a great way to cultivate

a hobbyist interest in drug varieties?

So, what's the difference

between Sour Diesel and OG Kush?

Well, both will kill ya.

But Kush is more of a warm hug feeling.

At its peak, D.A.R.E. Cost U.S. Taxpayers

up to $1.3 billion

even though it straight up did not work.

Well, maybe they just didn't know.

Oh, we totally did. Back in 1994,

a government-funded study

found that D.A.R.E. Did absolutely nothing.

Shut up!

But then D.A.R.E. Pressured us

into disavowing our own study.

(taser clicking)

Oh, uh, uh, D.A.R.E. Is good and cool.

But, the evidence is clear.

The zero tolerance approach does not work.

Watch your mouth before I make it barf!

Zero tolerance is the foundation

for the war on drugs,

and we are winning that war.

Sorry, you're wrong.

The war on drugs has been a massive failure.

And the harsh enforcement tactics

we've been using since the '80s

have only made the drug problem worse.

We have spent millions upon millions

raiding outdoor marijuana farms...

Come out and greet the sun, little guys.

...but that's just made growers switch

to hydroponic grow rooms

which helped create a much stronger product.

Thanks, war on drugs.

But now, drugs are harder to get.

Ha! No, again.

Since the drug war started,

the prices of cannabis, cocaine, and even heroin

have all plummeted.

Sale on smack, y'all!

80% off! Drug war discount!

Ooh, "bogo" sale! I'm a "smack-sanista."

Thanks, war on drugs.

But, we put the bad guys in jail.

Again, no.

We've locked up tons of non-violent drug offenders,

but the vicious kingpins at the top are still making bank.

The U.S. Illicit drug market is worth

an estimated $109 billion a year.

And the Sinaloa drug cartel

has as many as 150,000 employees.

That's more than Apple.

We are so proud of our record sales this year.

And one more thing...

more cocaine!

(cheers and applause)

Okay, okay, okay. How do you expect

these kids to believe you?

You're probably some pothead loser.

Well, I'm not.

Sir!

As you were, Officer.

Emily, Bruce, this is Sheriff John Urquhart

of King County, Washington.

Very nice to meet you.

You know, before I was sheriff,

I was a narcotics detective, and I fought

the war on drugs at the ground level.

Now, I've been in law enforcement for 40 years,

and it's become very obvious to me

that the war on drugs hasn't worked.

Now, ever the last few decades,

we've spent over $1 trillion

fighting the war on drugs, and this is

how much drug use has dropped in America.

No decline at all.

Drug addiction is a health issue.

But we've spent so much time

locking people up that we've ignored that.

We don't lock up people who need insulin shots.

Why should we lock up people for this disease?

And the war on drugs has been an abject failure.

No. No! No!

This is all I have to show for my life?

The war on drugs failed.

(retching)

I guess I was the... barf-boy all along.

Dude, this is sad.

(sobbing) That's okay, Bruce.

I'll give you a ride home.

(car doors opening, closing)

(car engine starting)

This sucks.

Is there no way to stop kids from using illegal drugs?

That's so scary.

But you know what's even scarier?

The legal drugs.

Those are actually much worse!

(chuckling)

You are such a...

Not at school, Emily. Nope.

Save it for the drive home.

(Adam) Ever wonder why?

Ever wonder why we put Q-tips in our ears?

(scoffing) Me, too.

Because if you look at a box of Q-Tips,

they have an explicit instruction--

That's right, Q-tips literally warns us

not to use their product

in the exact way everyone uses them.

That's like if we were all eating

those "Do Not Eat" dehydration packs

that came in beef jerky.

I gotta have my "dehydro packs," man.

Oh, yeah. That's the stuff.

In fact, when Q-tips were invented,

they weren't designed to be used in ears at all.

When they came out in 1923,

they were marketed as swabs for babies

and were known as Baby Gays. Aww!

Wait, what were they called?

Baby Gays!

And there's a very good reason

that they tell us not to put Q-tips in our ears.

When you swab your ear canal,

you're actually pushing some ear wax deeper in

instead of taking it out.

This can induce hearing loss,

and, if you push in too deeply,

can even rupture your ear drum.

Aah!

And the fact is,

we don't need to remove ear wax in the first place.

We think wax is dirty, but in fact, it's necessary

to protect your ears from dirt...

and, yes, even from little bugs.

At last, we have him. Charge!

But when you use a Q-tip to remove wax from your ears,

it leaves you vulnerable.

So, no matter how good it feels, please, listen to me

and to the people who make the dang things.

Do not put Q-tips in your ears!

Finally, Conover, you're my...

Wait, no! No, don't go back to the show!

Noooo!

♪

Miss Axford, are you getting a divorce?

Whenever an adult is sad,

I assume they're getting a divorce.

Yeah, I can do a kick-flip, cheer you up,

or like a sick grind?

It's okay, I'm fine, I just get this way

whenever Adam shows up.

Wait, hold on.

There's no way that legal drugs could be bad, right?

I mean, they're prescribed by doctors.

Hate to break it to you, but some prescription drugs

are almost identical to street drugs.

Kids across America take the prescription drug Adderall,

which is an amphetamine.

But you know what else is an amphetamine?

Meth.

I'm gonna need to confiscate that.

Oh, boy, I've got a lot of drugs.

The chemical composition of the two drugs

is nearly identical, and in one study,

people who took both couldn't even tell the difference.

So, I should stop taking Adderall?

No, Adderall still helps a lot of people.

But the fact remains, we're giving kids

essentially the same drug we make scary TV shows about.

I am the one who concentrates.

And the line gets blurrier. Uh...

But there are no prescription drugs

as bad as, like, heroin.

Actually, heroin was first marketed and sold

by the drug company Bayer.

You know, the aspirin people.

(coughing)

Mm, cough, eh?

Well, take two heroin and call me in the morning.

Wait, so anyone could just go into a store

and buy heroin?

Yep, they even gave it to kids.

(coughing)

You little rascal.

Now, back to the coal mines with ya!

Heroin was considered so safe, one medical journal

even claimed that there was no danger

of acquiring a habit.

Well, now, we know better.

I mean, doctors don't prescribe drugs like that anymore.

Yeah, they do. All the time.

Heroin is an opioid, so when it was banned,

scientists just invented new opioids

that act on the exact same receptors in the brain.

Heroin's illegal.

Well, this isn't heroin, it's... OxyContin.

Let's advertise the (bleep) out of it.

And so, they did.

In the '90s, drugmaker Purdue

started marketing OxyContin like crazy,

producing weird swag like plush toys,

golf balls, and even a swing CD.

And OxyContin's popularity soared.

My elbow really hurts, Doc.

Yeah, well, take two Oxy and call me in the morning.

This led to a surge in painkiller abuse

and overdoses.

It's just that it really hurts,

and it's probably gonna hurt for a long time.

So, if you could just scribble, scribble, scribble!

(laughing)

This was great for Purdue.

By 2016, OxyContin alone had made us 31 billion dollars.

I am very glad we made that swing CD.

(scatting)

Purdue even issued an internal memo

encouraging sales people to push higher doses

in exchange for bonuses,

and this disgusting greed caused a lot of harm.

In 2014 alone, prescription opioids

caused almost 19,000 overdose deaths,

double the number from heroin.

(glass breaking) Oh!

Holy cow.

Well, thank goodness it's such a pain

to get prescription drugs now.

I mean, the pharmacist always gives me a guilt trip.

Yep, realizing there was a big problem,

lawmakers made prescription opioids

way harder to get.

Well... good.

No, not good.

Because thanks to the war on drugs,

there was a ton of heroin in the streets,

and it was really cheap.

Might I interest you in some heroin?

Same high, 80% off.

I'm a "smack-sanista."

Since the government cracked down on painkillers,

heroin deaths have skyrocketed.

Between 2010 and 2015, they more than tripled,

and some studies found that 80% of new heroin users

got started on prescription opioids.

And now, people are getting hooked

on something even worse--

Fentanyl.

It's a highly addictive prescription opioid

that's up to 50 times stronger than heroin,

and it's killing people like crazy.

Look, for decades, our government told us

that weed was a gateway drug,

while the real gateway drug was being legally prescribed

by doctors all across America.

And because we ignored that fact,

we now have a prescription drug epidemic

and a heroin epidemic.

So, what am I supposed to do?

How am I supposed to get people to stop using drugs?

Honestly, I don't think you can.

Throughout human history, people have made drugs,

other people have taken those drugs,

and some of them have gotten addicted.

Doing drugs is just something humans do.

There's no way to stop it completely.

In the desk behind you

there's a bottle of Xanax, would you...

Of course.

(man on PA) Attention, students.

Please report to the all-purpose room

for Miss Axford's anti-drug assembly.

(scoffs) The assembly, ugh!

What's the point? All my students

are gonna do drugs and die, and there's no hope.

Emily, there's always hope.

And there's a lot we can do to help drug users.

And I'll tell you about it using the art of the theater!

Is that a leotard?

Yeah, could you zip me up?

I am fear. I whisper lies,

lies like weed is deadly and all drug users

should be punished.

I am the law and I am flawed.

I am... a law flaw.

I am the truth, and the truth is this.

We will never eradicate drug use,

but we can reduce the harm drugs cause.

Get to the point before everyone pulls out their phones.

Right. I present to thee

Donald MacPherson, executive director

of the Canadian Drug Policy Coalition.

(applause)

Donald, would you tell Emily and our audience

about Vancouver's approach to harm reduction?

Okay, Adam. Well, in Vancouver,

we learned that addiction is really a health issue.

So, we opened a health facility

called Insite, where people can come

and inject their drugs under medical supervision,

without fear of arrest or of dying from an overdose.

Wait, so people just use drugs openly?

I mean, doesn't that encourage drug use?

Well, Emily, people are using these drugs

whether we like it or not.

And places like Insite prevents them

from dying unnecessarily.

On Thanksgiving weekend last year,

33 people overdosed at Insite on Fentanyl,

and none of them died because there were people there to help.

Sadly, down the street, a young woman injected alone

in a hotel room, and she died.

These deaths are preventable.

(Adam) Injections sites like Insite have operated

across the world for decades,

and in that time, there has not been

a single death in any facility.

(applause) You know what?

This actually makes a lot of sense.

We need to accept that drug use is a fact of life.

So, instead of demonizing weed for no reason,

or pushing zero tolerance,

or throwing drug addicts in jail,

we should use harm reduction so we can actually help people

and save lives.

So, how 'bout this? Instead of "Just say no,"

just say, "Go research harm reduction strategies

for your community!"

Sorry, slogans are tough for complex issues.

(applause)

Whoo!

Whoa! Drugs in a school?

Young lady, you're going away for a long time.

It's not what it looks like, I was just holding them

for a friend. Adam! Let's go!

You need to fix this!

I will, and it'll be a great opportunity

to teach you about everything that's wrong

with the prison system.

No, no, no, you're going to do it this episode,

or I will lose my...

(sighs deeply)

(mumbling) Adam Conover and his stupid TV show.

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