Faced with an unprecedented crisis, America watched as an epidemic of drug abuse swept over the nation in the 1960s and 1970s. Citizens, educators, legislators, public health professionals - the greatest minds of a generation all wanted to know one thing. Who took the drugs?


My sheets of blotter acid! My gram of coke! My kilo of weed! They were all right here a minute ago, who took the drugs? Seriously though, it was a problem. Americans were abusing the heck out of regular normal drugs like alcohol and tobacco, and they were abusing illegal drugs like the stuff you'd see in a Freak Brothers comic book. It was time for community organizations to stand up and confront this menace. But how best to get that information out there? Well, taking their cue from the aforementioned Freak Brothers aesthetic, Madison Wisconsin's non-profit drug information resource center STASH, INC published this drug-taking-questioning informational comic book, apparently starring Sherlock Holmes, and cleverly disguised as one of those narcotics-positive underground comics.

So let's begin reading and maybe together we'll answer the question of Who Took Them Drugs.


It's the end of a weekend in America's mid-70s Midwest. A haze of cigarette smoke covers the nation from Cleveland to Kansas City, everything is beige, brick, or wood-paneled, and the only way we're going to get through another week is by knocking back a few at Joe's.


These American manufacturing jobs must have been pretty awful! See how they're driving the otherwise sober, abstemious people of Wisconsin - known for their clear-headed aversion to alcoholic beverages - to drink.


Some good friends, some fine conversation, some hearty ales, and a little mild drug dealing. Just another night at Joe's!


You think drugs are strictly for hippies, addicts, and overtime at the plant? Well, caffeine is a drug! Nicotine is a drug! Aspirin is a drug! Pepto-bismol is - what is Pepto-Bismol anyway? Is that a drug? Does it count? Does Tums count? How about Vicks Vapo-Rub? I'm in the weeds here. Anyway, think of a substance, and people will figure out how to abuse it.


Hey Betty, why are you so upset that Freddie almost ran you over with a forklift? Didn't you just say you wished someone would strike you?


Sure Freddie, you turkey, listen to the tiny bearded lunatic advising you to top off your speed bender with a few toots of blow. Great advice (cut to interior shot of Freddie's chest cavity, Freddie's heart says "that's it, I'm outta here!", puts on its hat and leaves, slamming the door as it exits Freddie's chest)


Remember kids, welding is a skilled, well-paying trade that both men and women can make a career out of. Welding! It's better than being a forklift-driving amphetamine freak.


"I wonder if my teenagers, attending American high school in 1978, have tried drugs?" I think it's safe to say you can wonder no more, Betty. Meanwhile in the lockers, it's time for a Coke and a smile, because it's the pause that refreshes, which adds life, and is also "it." Is advertising a drug?


A hundred dollars a gram is worth WAY more than the going rate for gold. Of course, gold usually doesn't instantly make you feel like the smartest, best-looking, wittiest fellow in any room. So there's that.


Wow, Freddie is not hungry? I wonder if it has anything to do with the powerful unlicensed stimulants he's been throwing into his body all morning.


"Gosh honey, we're absolutely surrounded by narcotics of every kind, what makes you think our teenaged children would ever become involved with them? I'll leave you to ponder that conundrum as I absent myself from these difficult conversations through the magic of my personal anti-drug - bowling."


Sometimes the captions in these comics are pretty much exactly what I'd write.


If coach catches us using any of those weirdos, he'll report us! So keep your weirdo-using on the "QT", as we 70s teens say!


"Sure, I wish I could help you with the parenting of our children. But you know me, I live to bowl, and bowl to live. You knew that when you married me."


What kind of communist nonsense are these schools shoveling into our children's brains? You can't abuse alcohol in the same way you abuse marijuana or cocaine! For one thing, the empties really start to pile up!


Here we have one educational lesson already delivered by this educational comic, which is, if you want to hide something from Mom, the sock drawer is NOT where you do it. Meanwhile Dad has reached the "beer frame" stage of the game, which means he sits down and reads an issue of the 1990s zine Beer Frame, a self-published magazine devoted to examining the quirks and details of everyday products. Beer Frame! Ask for it by name in any one of the two or three stores that still carry zines.


Let's sit down with our beer and cigarettes and indulge in a little moral panic about the weed our kids are smoking. Don't bring your Consumer Reports (?!) facts into this bitch session, Steve!


"We've fed them a line about how terrible marijuana is and now they won't believe anything we say about drugs" is a fairly cogent description of real-world events.


Real "Don't take the car, you'll kill yourself!" energy here


Way to go Dad, your post-bowling calm acknowledgement of your failure has really focused the family in this crisis.


"Sir, you have called the Drug Help Line, not the No Shit, Sherlock line. Because OBVIOUSLY that's grass, dummy."


Just for once I wish the parents would say "Yeah, we were snooping, okay?! Everybody does it! It's cool!"


Jeff isn't even sure if he wants to go to college, he can go to art school instead. Maybe afterwards he can get a good job illustrating a drug education comic about a boy, somewhat like himself, who might use marijuana as a way to, say, get through the tedium of high school.


I wanna say that in the years 1974-1982, attendance at any party required guests to swallow at least one "'lude." Hey, I don't make the rules! And speaking of rules, didn't we all agree to strict usage of the precise term "Angel Dust (PCP)" - never just "PCP"?


"Almost" doesn't count, Betty. But cheer up, today's a new day and anything can happen. Right, Freddie?

Freddie? How you doing, Freddie? You OK?


At that very moment Freddie demonstrates his love of foreign film by re-enacting the climax of one of his favorites, the fine German cinema of "Staplerfahrer Klaus." Look it up, it's on YouTube!


What we got here is a combination freak out, wipe out, black out shenanigan situation. Seen it hundreds of times.


The boss is "comical smoke shoots from pipe" mad. He's "coffee spilling" mad. He's even "speed lines from slamming fist are getting mixed up with wall paneling woodgrain lines" mad!


And thus was born the hilarious "The Firings Will Continue Until Conditions Improve" wall plaque!


Aw snap, he said the magic word, that magic word is "union." Sure, it's magic. Give it a try, wander around your job tomorrow casually mentioning things like "unions" and see what happens!


Freddie really does need to call the Drug Help Line; clearly he needs help with how he's taking these drugs. Like the first thing they're going to say is "not while you're driving a forklift at work, stupid!"


SIGH. With the sullen force of a million black holes sucking the life out of everything within a fifty mile radius, Jeff drags himself away from that "Gilligan's Island" rerun.


Say, I didn't know nicotine was a stimulant. I must have been using it wrong this whole time!

Now I know this one's a long one and I know you're all wondering about some really important things, like for instance when are we going to get to Sherlock Holmes like we were promised on the cover? Huh?


See, Jeff says pot isn't so bad. While Betty says there are better things to do than getting high all the time. And you know what, you're both right.


Betty is taking Freddie to the Drug Help Center and she is NOT taking "no" for an answer! It helps that Freddie is still concussed and can't physically stop her.


Looking for information on the effects of marijuana? Well, you can look at these pamphlets, or you can check out these books, or you can take a few bong hits, get all the information you need right there, man


"Firing people" or "helping personnel with their drug problems" are your only two options? Really? Have you thought about how industrial robots don't have drug problems or take sick days or vacations or need pensions or health insurance? Hm?


Sure, five million alcoholics are costing American industry a billion dollars a year. But just think about how much money these five million alcoholics are spending every year on booze! What goes around comes around, is what I'm saying!


Let's have the experts train some of our foremen to... AND THERE HE IS, there's Sherlock Holmes. Did somebody realize this comic book is nearly over and they forgot all about the Sherlock Holmes they put on the cover? Or maybe they were just high on drugs?


Now that Sherlock is on the case, the company can get back to doing whatever it is they do that involves welding and forklifts, and Freddie gets to keep on forkliftin', and we all need to get back to work. So get back to work, you.


If YOU have questions about drugs or alcohol or narcotics or hallucinogens or stimulants or depressants of any kind, you can get the straight dope from STASH, the non-profit alternative drug information resource center that believes well-informed individuals will make the best decisions about their bodies and their health and well-being, and who also is starting to maybe believe that perhaps "STASH" wasn't the best name if this organization wanted to be taken seriously.

But of course you have one question, we have one question, that question is Who Took The Drugs. And it's us, we took the drugs, we took them all. After covering this comic, do you blame us?

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