• • • low end theory

NLC: You found that people in Baker County felt that meth addicts were often “the people you would never expect.” Can you unpack this a bit for us? In particular, what anxieties undergird this sentiment? And, what does this perception reveal about contemporary American culture?

WG: This phrase, “the people you’d never expect,” was one I encountered frequently among adults when I asked about the local methamphetamine problem. The idea was that, what made meth different (and scary), was that it wasn’t those individuals who seemed naturally inclined to deviance that were the most likely users of meth, but, rather, the “people you’d never expect” — the “popular kids,” the athletes, the “good kids” from the “good families.” A psychologist who worked for both the local hospital and high school told me that if I wanted to see who the meth users were, I should go to a meeting of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes at the high school — a group composed entirely of the “good kids” from the “good families.”

The irony, of course, is that it was typically not these individuals who were the primary targets of police intervention beyond the random drug searches that took place at the school. Indeed, I asked the guidance counselor at the high school about the prospects of instituting a random drug testing program at the school and he stated it was an impossibility due to the high potential that the “wrong people” would be tested. The leader of a local citizens group said explicitly that, even though the typical user was imagined to be “the people you’d never suspect,” it was still only “the rednecks who go to jail,” by which she meant the poorer members of the community. This is part of a broader pattern with a deep history in the United States where anxieties over the vulnerability of middle class youth fuel the desire for a punitive response which focuses disproportionately on the poor and marginal.

“Narcopolitics is Everywhere:” An Interview with William Garriott