Television is seldom brave enough to offer anything but a heavily sanitised depiction of drugs and drug users. Drug use is commonplace amongst the majority of young people and a continuing lifestyle choice for many others, and yet television barely reflects the thriving drug subculture of middle England or questions why so many choose to consume substances the Government classifies as illegal. Drug users on TV are invariably social losers, about to get their comeuppance under a tidal wave of negative consequences. In contrast, Channel 4 has always prided itself on accurately reflecting the lives of its viewers, including a more rounded picture of the role that drugs play in their lives. The channel has never shied away from telling truths about the disastrous repercussions of misuse for some individuals and the wider impact on society. But in dramas like Skins and Shameless, it has also realistically depicted the pleasures derived and how so many people manage to accommodate regular social drug use within the normal, everyday processes of living.
In This Chapter
- Introduction
- Heroin: the Global Lie by Nick Davies
- Skunk: the Dirty Great Profit by Horatio Clare
- Pottering About by Melvyn Bragg
- Traffik by Simon Moore
- Gallery
Chapter Gallery
