Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
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Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
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Re: Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
#2[deleted]
Re: Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
#3TL; DR “While the medical profession had seen nothing wrong with tonics such as Coca-Cola advertising themselves to white, middle-class consumers for their aphrodisiac qualities, it became an entirely different matter when Black people used cocaine...
Candler fought back against the damage that cocaine’s declining reputation did to his brand’s reputation, arguing that the small quantity of coca extract in Coke was merely energizing...
But this strategy became less tenable in 1899, when the company expanded its sales of bottled coke to a national market. This meant that Coca-Cola was now available outside white soda fountains to anyone with a nickel to spare—including Black men.”
Re: Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
#4While framed as a "black and mixed-race working class vs white middle class" conflict, the remainder of the article suggests that burgeoning recreational use of the pure drug informed removal of that drug from a drink where it was included in sub-therapeutic doses (9mg/drink vs 50-75mg in a recreational "dose" [0]). It's unclear to me, as written, how race was causal and why it's included as in the article.
There are plenty of real problems, past and present, which we can point to as indicative of racial prejudice. The insistence on its insertion into other areas, lacking supporting evidence, is, imho, overtly harmful to discourse.
I have not read the book linked as the source of this article, so I'm happy to be shown to be wrong.
Re: Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
#5While framed as a "black and mixed-race working class vs white middle class" conflict, the remainder of the article suggests that burgeoning recreational use of the pure drug informed removal of that drug from a drink where it was included in sub-therapeutic doses (9mg/drink vs 50-75mg in a recreational "dose" [0]). It's unclear to me, as written, how race was causal and why it's included as in the article. There are…
It's an American trend to write history as if everything was invented just to spite one race or one group of people.
Re: Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
#6[deleted]
Re: Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
#7TL; DR “While the medical profession had seen nothing wrong with tonics such as Coca-Cola advertising themselves to white, middle-class consumers for their aphrodisiac qualities, it became an entirely different matter when Black people used cocaine... Candler fought back against the damage that cocaine’s declining reputation did to his brand’s reputation, arguing that the small quantity of coca extract in Coke was me…
>"The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people," former Nixon domestic policy chief John Ehrlichman told Harper's writer Dan Baum for the April cover story published Tuesday.
>"You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities," Ehrlichman said. "We could arrest their leaders. raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did."[1]
Good to know it's always been like that. Legalize and tax all drugs. Spend the taxes on rehab and clinics instead of the money that will be spent no matter what going to drug lords. It is illogical to have any other drug policy than complete legalization and regulation/taxation.
[1] https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2016/03/23/politics/john-ehrlichman-...
Re: Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
#8While framed as a "black and mixed-race working class vs white middle class" conflict, the remainder of the article suggests that burgeoning recreational use of the pure drug informed removal of that drug from a drink where it was included in sub-therapeutic doses (9mg/drink vs 50-75mg in a recreational "dose" [0]). It's unclear to me, as written, how race was causal and why it's included as in the article. There are…
It's an American trend to write history as if everything was invented just to spite one race or one group of people.
Tit-for-tat, it's also an American trend to write history as if racism didn't exist at all.
Re: Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
#9While framed as a "black and mixed-race working class vs white middle class" conflict, the remainder of the article suggests that burgeoning recreational use of the pure drug informed removal of that drug from a drink where it was included in sub-therapeutic doses (9mg/drink vs 50-75mg in a recreational "dose" [0]). It's unclear to me, as written, how race was causal and why it's included as in the article. There are…
I’m not an expert on the origins of Coke, but I do find it very plausible that white people in 1890’s Atlanta heard that “black people are doing it” and that was enough.
Plus the article mentions specific writing from the time which supports their view (quote from AJC).
It’s hard to overstate the level of anger white people had toward black people in post-reconstruction Georgia and how fundamental it was to their actions.
Re: Who Took the Cocaine Out of Coca-Cola?
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's an American trend to write history as if everything was invented just to spite one race or one group of people.
Tit-for-tat, it's also an American trend to write history as if racism didn't exist at all.
People who write histories often frame the past in order to impact how people think about the present.