High Price

the voices in the heads of schizophrenics and reduce their paranoia and agitation. The problem is that the older generation of these medications, the type that Louie was prescribed, block dopamine receptors so extensively that the brain compensates by increasing the density of dopamine receptors. The brain is now hypersensitive to dopamine, and after years of treatment, the person develops tardive dyskinesia and becomes even more susceptible to psychotic symptoms. In other words, the treatment for psychotic symptoms can actually cause these symptoms. It’s a trap.
    With each passing minute, Louie’s voice became background noise and I felt more and more grief and despair. I wondered how this could have happened but already knew the answer, because his story wasn’t unique. I had seen similar scenarios with other male loved ones. Virtually all had been initially caught up in the system via a drug charge while in their teens and early twenties, which began a vicious cycle from which they couldn’t escape. What’s worse is that the cycle wasn’t even new. One hundred years ago, on September 29, 1913, the New York Times printed an article that described how a white mob in Mississippi lynched and shot two black young men, one eighteen and the other twenty, because they were suspected of starting “a reign of terror” under the influence of cocaine. The following day the paper reported that the town’s two thousand black residents had been forced to walk past the bullet-riddled bodies of the two boys to view them; this, the article continued, “had a remarkably quieting effect on the negro population.” I would imagine it did.
    Of course, we no longer lynch people for violating drug laws. Today the damage is far less visible and starts more subtly. The educational and vocational skills that sustain people throughout life are usually obtained during young adulthood, from the late teens throughout the twenties. This is a critical period. I, for example, spent most of my young adult years in classrooms and labs learning how to think and write. These skills have allowed me to support my family financially, which gives me a sense of worth and manhood. As a result, I have a stake in this society and do my best to make a contribution to it. It doesn’t matter whether the contribution is in paying taxes or doing public service or takes some other form. The point is that society and I both benefit from me having a stake in it.
    In contrast, so many of the black boys with whom I grew up don’t have any stake in our society. They didn’t acquire the necessary skills and didn’t get the needed support during that critical period. Instead they were under the supervision of a system that doesn’t seem to understand or care about the importance of black men being invested in this society. Supporters of this system have an irrational focus on eliminating certain drugs and are preoccupied with those who violate drug laws, especially if they are black. Selective enforcement of drug laws seems to serve as a tool to marginalize black men and keep them in the vicious cycle of incarceration and isolation from mainstream society. I am not arguing that people shouldn’t be sanctioned for legal infractions. There are many cases in which sanctions are appropriate. However, the penalty should not be so severe that the penalized young person is unable to recover and stake a claim in society. In such cases, we all lose. The young person’s loss is obvious. The general public is deprived of the contribution that would have been made if the person were a stakeholder. With no real stake in the larger society, many of my friends and relatives feel they have nothing to lose. And as James Baldwin observed, “The most dangerous creation of any society is the man who has nothing to lose.” 1
    After speaking with my sisters, I could see that we were beginning to lose some of my nephews. They had already started to repeat the incarceration-isolation cycle. What could I tell them? Hell, I don’t even know what to tell my own son Tobias. He has spent time behind bars for a drug violation and doesn’t have a high school diploma; nor does he have an employment track record or any prospects for a legitimate job. I’d recently spoken with him on a previous visit and he caught me up on the current events in his life. I learned more about baby-mama drama than I cared to know. “Man, they always want some shit,” he complained about the