If cocaine were a perfume, it would be Chanel No.5: a timeless classic impervious to the flux of fashion and taste. It straddles all socio-economic divides, provided you can afford it. When I lived in Spain, cocaine was the recreational drug of choice because it was more widely available than other narcotics, and its grade was relatively pure. Cocaine is shipped from South America or Mexico directly to Iberia rather than transiting other points, where it is blended en route to its destination. Consequently, the reveller in Madrid vacuums up less talcum powder and household cleaning product than does his counterpart in London.
Here in the Home Counties, there is unquestionably cocaine use – notably among Baby Boomers who can point to St. Paul de Vence on a map
I have never witnessed, in anyone, the effect of cocaine producing greater charm, but that is not really the point. In fact, when mixed with alcohol, cocaine launches you into the rarified sphere of undiluted narcissism. Earlier this week, the ONS reported that cocaine has never been so popular. Although, not popular with the 1,118 who lost their lives due to cocaine-related misuse in 2023 – a rise of 30 per cent in fatalities since the previous year, and ten times higher than in 2011.
The percentage of men dying as a result of drug poisoning is double that of women. It is not because men are more vulnerable to organ failure, but rather they are engaging in narcotics abuse in significantly greater numbers. They are gannets. According to the ONS, drug misuse deaths continue to be highest in Generation X – those between the ages of 40 and 49. Gen Zers, their children, have one of the lowest incidences, but that is hardly surprising of a peer group characteristically eschewing the traditional rites of rebellion.
Imagine you are a Gen Zer child of progressive parents, who themselves snort the occasional line, plead to tag along to a Billie Eilish concert, and happily pay for the skin graft after you superglued your hand to a pylon in an eco-protest, how would you rebel? Ironing impeccable creases down the front of your jeans, perhaps?
In an age where inclusivity is fetishised, it is reassuring to learn that, even among habitual cocaine users, there is diversity. The greatest diversity is, of course, between men and women. What might explain this difference in cocaine use? The men I’ve met who take the drug tend to be self-supporting and in high-status occupations (although there are plenty of flush builders and plumbers who enjoy large quantities too). It is a stress-relieving relaxant while remaining cognitively functional enough to hold a flute glass. Many take cocaine in an attempt to break through their antisocial impulses.
Women, I’ve found, tend not to be all that interested in the disinhibiting aspects of cocaine, but instead hope to elevate themselves from a deeper despondency. In rehabilitation programmes, women often cite a specific underlying reason for cocaine use. This can be a dissatisfaction in their personal or work lives, or very commonly, depression.
Without wandering into the quicksand of generalisations, I wonder if these difference between men and women is reflective of other realms. The first male instinct on discovering the internet was not to trace a long-lost cousin in Perth, Australia; it was to use it as a masturbation aid. Women tend to be more circumspect and tend to approached such things as the internet with the primary question, ‘can it improve my life?’ And so the same with cocaine: women might typically take it for more pragmatic reasons, however misguided the quest.
Here in the Home Counties, where I have recently moved, there is unquestionably cocaine use – notably among Baby Boomers who can point to St. Paul de Vence on a map. In contrast, Gen Zers, their grandchildren, are the new temperance adherents, forswear immoderation like an army of Village of the Damned-style Greta Thunbergs.
I stopped taking cocaine after an incident at the fag-end of a party when deciding that, in me, was untapped potential to be the next Joaquín Cortés. Skidding into the room in a riot of terpsichore, arms held aloft in the pose of a toreador, locomotion sent me out onto a Juliet balcony, where I dangled over its railing. I was 52.
A friend has abstained, also. Not because she has arrived at the age of concessionary bus travel or come to her senses, but for a conscientious reason: it is impossible to know whether someone, somewhere, went through purgatory so that this Bolivian powder can be chopped and arranged on a mirror in leafy Barnes.
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