How badly do you really want that "A"?

So, I read about it in the new Maclean's, and now on BBC News. According to BBC though, the stats are that up to 20% of adults might be using them. If it's 6am and you're reading this, you might just be one of them.

Here's the quote from BBC that knocked my socks off: "Professor Sahakian's own work shows 17% of students in some US universities admit to using the stimulant Ritalin (methylphenidate) - a drug designed to treat hyperactive children - to maximise their learning power."
Seriously, guys? You're doing this? I've had dumbass stoner friends that have done snorted, smoked and swallowed anything and who "would've injected vitamin c if they'd made it illegal." (bonus point to anyone who knows that reference). But someone else's prescription drugs to do homework?

And, don't get me wrong,I'm not playing the judgment card, I've done the whole 15 cans of coke and some trucker's choice caffeine pills thing before. But Ritalin and the like? If I'm going to effin' bother to go to all the trouble to get a drug that isn't precribed to me, you can bet it isn't going to be Ritalin.

What was more interesting was in the Maclean's article, they were talking about one day REQUIRING workers in office jobs to take brain enhancing drugs. Now, I can sit in my little castle and judge the kids taking ritalin and finishing that last essay for being idiots, but at least they're free willed idiots.

Here's what Maclean says: "Now a report entitled "When the Boss Turns Pusher" in last month's issue of the Journal of Medical Ethics warns that some employers may soon pressure workers to take brain boosters as a way to improve their performance. The report argues legislation is urgently needed to protect workers' rights before the practice of healthy people using smart drugs becomes more common. "I'm a strong supporter of individual autonomy and I think people should be able to enhance themselves all they want," Dr. Jacob Appel, a bioethics lecturer at Brown University in Rhode Island and the report's author, told Maclean's. "But my concern is that employers will try to compel individuals to do that."


That of course just turned me into my 17 year old self, feeling an intense need to put on a 1984-inspired t-shirt that says "big brother is watching you" and running for my five hundred copies of Huxley's Brave New World and talking about conspiracy theories and "the man."

Like, holy fuck, man.