Podcast Assingment-Woody Carrington

The podcast discusses the crack cocaine epidemic in the 1980s and the racial biases and disparities related to it. The rock form of crack cocaine was mainly used in lower class and minority areas, while the powder form was more prevalent in white communities. Media coverage heavily influenced public perception and led to criminalization rather than treatment. This is in contrast to the opioid crisis, which is seen as a white drug and is focused on health and care rather than criminalization. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 contributed to the over-policing and over-criminalization of crack cocaine. The long-term effects include mass incarceration of African-Americans and the perpetuation of drug use. Media coverage and attaching racial identity to addiction have significant implications. And welcome to WPC, the Woody Carrington Podcast, where today we have an interesting discussion of addiction and racial biases and disparities relating to addiction, specifically we'll be discussing the crack cocaine epidemic that persisted in the United States throughout the 1980s, but the long-term effects and implications are still present. We'll begin with a brief overview of the topic related to what the addiction is and how it was defined. So crack cocaine is cocaine use in its rock form, it's cheaper than the powder form, which is a key differential that will be discussed further later, but a few key things about this epidemic, it began in the 1980s and media coverage and societal factors heavily influenced how this addiction and epidemic was perceived and thus treated. Just to get started on the numbers aspect of this podcast segment, reaching 1987, the number of cocaine users in the United States was approximately 5.8 million. This major surge in specifically major cities throughout the United States had widespread social consequences, especially in urban areas. I wanted to specifically discuss racial disparities related to the treatment and framing of this epidemic. First of all, the disparity between usage among powder and the crack rock form in the United States was typically seen that the rock form was mainly used in lower class and predominantly minority areas in contrast with the powder form which was mainly seen in predominantly white communities as it was more expensive. In a study from Public Health Post about war on words and how media coverage severely affected public perception about this epidemic relating to a racial bias, so when looking at the top ten words associated with the crack cocaine epidemic and media coverage, we see the top five being drug, cocaine, police, drugs, crack. Later down the list we see abuse, law, enforcement, crime. These words heavily influenced the perception and mainly the way that society responded to this epidemic and that response, especially related to law enforcement, was a response of focusing on criminalization rather than treatment. When we look comparatively at the opioid crisis, which is perceived as a white drug of much less criminalized, we see the top ten words being health, drug, opioid, people, care, Trump, drugs, public, law, abuse. There is no focus specifically on criminalization and this is due to racial disparities in the way that an identity was attached to the crack cocaine epidemic and that identity was one of a lower socioeconomic standing and one of a minority racial basis. And in the Crack vs. Heroin project that examines the racial double standard in drug laws that still persist today, we see the focus on criminalization as opposed to treatment with regards to the powder form and this is because of racial bias specifically. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 featured a 100 to 1 powder cocaine to crack disparity. Furthermore, this abuse act dedicated three quarters of $1.7 billion in federal funds to law enforcement and incarceration. There are many long-term effects of this act and societal characterization of the crack cocaine epidemic as an African-American problem. The study expanded to show that even though heroin and prescription opioids are more deadly, even in 2016, there were more than nearly four times the amount of arrests for cocaine and opioid drugs and this is due to long-term implications of over-policing and over-criminalization of crack cocaine which was seen throughout the 1980s. In wrapping up, because we're running out of time for this segment, I wanted to hit on the conclusions and takeaways of this racial identity being attached to an addiction epidemic. First, the mass incarceration of African-Americans still has long-term effects persisting today as single-parent households are more likely to have a child or more than one child fall into drug use and addiction as well as major implications of media coverage and attaching an identity to either an illness, addiction, or any other public health policy. Thank you folks, but that is all that we have time for today. I hope you enjoyed this segment of WPC, the Woody Gingrich Podcast.