Hello and welcome to the History of Japan podcast, episode 420, A History of Drugs in Japan.

Okay, look, I'll level with you all.

I did have some plans for elevated and intellectual discussions for the next two episodes

about things like the history of race as an idea in Japan or the evolution of art styles in modern Japanese

history, all that good stuff. But then I realized I was working on episode 420, and well,

today we're going to do a history of illegal drugs in Japan, and if you don't get the reference,

go ask your parents, but don't tell them I sent you.

So first, as always, we should be clear on our terminology.

What do we mean when we say drugs?

The common definition is a chemical or substance that alters human physiology in some way when we ingest it,

rather than providing nutrition when we ingest it since that would make it food.

Of course, the thing is, that definition is very broad.

With a few exceptions, the vast majority of illegal drugs are also what we call recreational.

They're specifically psychoactive in some way, altering consciousness, causing pleasure, that sort of thing. But not all recreational drugs are illegal.

Alcohol is a great example of a legally sanctioned, if restricted by age, recreational drug.

So what separates, say, alcohol from other recreational drugs that don't have that level of social

acceptance or which are flat out illegal? Frankly, that's a very complicated question to answer. Often it

depends a great deal on the history of the specific compound in question. Some compounds that are

now illegal were once medicinal or even over-the-counter

substances. Cocaine and opium are the two most obvious examples. There are cases where specific

compounds were made illegal due to a high likelihood of harm or addiction. Again, cocaine and

opium are great examples. They're extremely addictive,

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