In the 80s, the media was rampant with sensationalized stories about "crack babies," but the numbers didn’t add up.
The Lie: In the early 1970s, Richard Nixon declared the "war on drugs" to target and criminalize Black people, portraying them as violent addicts. Black mothers bore the brunt of these attacks. But according to federal data on drug use, most crack users were white or non-Black Hispanic, NOT Black.
The Law: Politicians rushed to enact strict laws intentionally designed to target poor and non-white people in urban areas. As a result, Black people were disproportionately arrested and imprisoned at a rate seven times higher than whites.
The Truth: And there was no such thing as a “crack baby epidemic.” Children born to mothers who used crack did not grow up to be drug-crazed burdens on society. The term “crack baby” originated in a 1985 article by pediatrician Ira Chasnoff. Now known to be a myth, it suggested a link between a pregnant person’s cocaine use and infant health. The 40 to 60% of Black children predicted to be born addicted to cocaine? It turned out to be only 2-3%.
Today, disparate sentencing for drug offenses continues. The narrative has changed with today’s opioid epidemic, which is primarily affecting whites. For them, opioid addiction is treated with compassion and as a public health crisis, not criminalized. We need to build a world where the response to Black people struggling is not criminalization but rehabilitation, care, and support.