Assignment 5

For his research for The Cocaine Kids, Terry Williams conducted an ethnographic study.  In this type of study, a researcher will spend a long period of time immersed in the culture with the people that they are studying, interacting with the participants in the culture for an extended period of time.  In this case, Williams spent two hours a day three days a week from 1982 to 1986 with the eight “Cocaine Kids,” as he dubbed them (page ix).  During this time, he would follow the Kids around in their daily activities, take brief notes about his observations, go home, and record detailed entries about events and conversations from the day.  He would do this so as to not make the Kids’ customers nervous, to keep his notes as accurate as possible, and to protect himself from the hazardous surroundings he was in (page 3).  Before beginning his studies, Williams had to earn the trust of the Kids.  Williams met Max through a mutual friend, and earned his trust by being honest and by keeping Max’s secrets (page 16).  Max then opened Williams to the world of the cocaine trade, and it is through Max that Williams met the other Kids, who worked for Max.  Over time, he gained the trust of all of the Kids, and not only watched daily business, but was also able to get an insight into the thoughts, feelings, hopes, and dreams of all of the Kids, which he recorded as a part of his study.

            The first thing that I thought was interesting was that the drug trade seemed to be a never-ending cycle, even after most of the Kids left the trade.  Most of the Kids moved on with their lives from selling cocaine, but Williams walked through the streets and neighborhoods they had dealt at for old times’ sake.  There, new teenagers were out selling the drugs, and it can almost be said that they have replaced the Kids who had left the trade (page 132).  I thought that this was interesting because I think that it provided a new look at how the drug culture works.  We often see that new generations take on the drug trade, but we don’t often think that a lot of the generation from the previous drug era moved on to bigger and better things in life.  They grow up, and seem to grow out of dealing.  I feel I don’t often look at the drug dealing as a cycle from generation to generation, with one replacing the other as they grow weary of the lifestyle, but this study definitely made me realize that, almost seeming to give the drug trade culture a life of its own.

            A second thing that surprised me was how intelligent all of the Kids were.  Often, we think of drug dealers as uneducated bums who turn to drug dealing as a quick, easy paycheck.  However, in reality, drug dealing seemed to be hard, and took a lot of cunning to be successful.  The Kids must know market prices, first of all, which were constantly fluctuating, in order to make a profit (page 7).  The Kids would have to know the market well enough to know how to manipulate it to make a profit for the sellers, suppliers, and distributors, while still keeping repeat customers.  They would use clever tricks such as “cutting” (adding impurities to the drug to increase the amount of cocaine to be distributed) to increase their profits, or even to keep some extra cocaine for themselves.  There is also a considerable amount of strategizing by the supplier, Max.  He decides who to hire as a seller, how much cocaine to give each of the Kids, and how much to have them sell it for.  He must be clever enough to know to trust them, as well as to develop a system, with the intricacies of the market in mind, to make a profit and get his money back (page 36).  Through all of this, the Kids must be clever enough to keep their illegal activity hidden from the police.  Overall, I found all of this required knowledge and cunning in the cocaine-dealing world to be very interesting and surprising, and I definitely think that it uproots the common stereotype that drug dealers are uneducated and not intelligent.  Clearly, brains and wit are required to succeed in this field.

            The final thing that I thought was surprising about the drug trade was the etiquette that goes into the cocaine culture.  Normally, I’d think that a transaction would be done as quickly as possible; the customer would state how much they want and pay for the requested amount.  However, this does not seem to be the case most of the time.  First off, before a transaction, it is expected that the seller provide a free sample, or “taste,” or the cocaine (page 29).  After sampling the cocaine and chatting for a bit, the transaction is made, and both the seller and the buyer go on their way.  Breaching this tasting ritual does indeed elicit complaints from the customers.  Another bit of etiquette that I thought was interesting was that dealers would go to after-hour bars to give out “C-C,” or calling-card cocaine (page 97).  Giving out this free cocaine not only increase the prestige of the dealers (it gives off the illusion that they have cocaine that they can spare to bar patrons for free), but it also attracts new customers (page 98).  I think that it is interesting that the cocaine culture has these etiquettes.  It shows that taking the drug is not only a hobby, but it is a lifestyle that molds into creating a culture for all of those who participate.

            Williams’ observations relate to this class in many ways.  First of all, his study covers the illicit trade of cocaine, and we learned that the trade of illicit drugs is a huge industry.  His study also seems to indicate that there is an entire culture and lifestyle revolving around cocaine.  In class we learned that drugs have been used throughout history, and indeed are often integral parts of a culture.  However, this usage isn’t always illegal recreational usage, which is the type of usage that the Kids participated in.  Williams also covered the darker side of drug usage that we learned about.  Although the Kids seem to enjoy taking the drug recreationally, they sometimes seem to be slightly addicted to the drug.  Addiction is a topic that we covered in class, and unfortunately, because cocaine was everywhere in their daily lives, it seemed quite easy for the Kids to get addicted.  Indeed, Hector got addicted to freebasing (page 122), which was looked down upon in disgust by the Kids, much like much of society looks down upon drug users as a whole.  However, the Kids did seem to embody a lot of the stereotypes used to demonize drugs.  They were minority youths who were sucked into selling drugs because they were poor and, for the most part, didn’t have a higher education.  However, much unlike what we studied, most of them seemed to break free from the trading of drugs and were able to move forward from the drug trade and build their lives up.

            In conclusion, I thought that The Cocaine Kids was a very good read which provided a very unique and interesting insight into the cocaine drug trade.  I think that it shows that people don’t exactly understand the depth of illicit drug trades, and I think that they deserve more study so that the public understands the cultures a bit more.