I don’t know if Civil War Digital Digest or others are talking much about the subject of the negligent creation of a generation of opioid addicts in the wake of the American Civil War.
But if you know a smidge about generational archetypes (found in Strauss and Howe’s work), you can see their interplay in the Civil War-era opioid-addiction situation and dynamics that emerged post-war.
The bulk of CW soldiers– of (what would later be called) the Gilded generation — were the nation’s young adults. They were the Nomad archetype, which is the same archetype as today’s GenXers.
Young Nomads, particularly in childhood and in young adulthood, are see as a throw-away generation. (That’s part of their archetype’s life path and it serves them–and the nation!–later in life.)
The one’s looking down on these young soldiers with judgement, condemnation and a desire to punish them for their moral failings? That was the Missionary Generation, the nation’s dominant group in mid-life during the CW, and the generational archetype that today’s Boomers are as well. They were also the ones likely to hold most of the power positions–-the doctors, the legislators, the administrators in charge of veterans benefits.
That generation — the Boomer-like generation judgmental of Xer-like soldiers — were the ones that approved of and administered the wanton use of opioids for all sorts of injuries and issues. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers were left addicted in the aftermath … and judged for their addiction.
Sound familiar at all?
A nation of young adults jacked up on addictive opioid drugs, many of them first administered by the doctors and medical professionals one is supposed to trust has their best interests at heart?
The pattern is so clear if you know what it is: Oh, how the cycles continue.
Highly recommend the video: “Finding the Source: Opiate Usage in the Civil War Era with Dr. Jonathan Jones.”
Civil War
Soldiers = GenX-like, throw-aways, gladiators, fierce, self-reliant, considered uncouth and unmannered
Top military leaders – Boomer-like, principled, ruthless, values- and morals-fixated, despise young Xers for their market-focus
Finding the Source: Opiate Usage in the Civil War Era with Dr. Jonathan Jones
Then and Now: How Civil War-Era Doctors Responded to Their Own Opiate Epidemic
https://www.straightdope.com/21342478/did-the-u-s-civil-war-create-500-000-morphine-addicts
