I noticed that in Vice's documentary on Mitt Romney's polygamist relatives in Mexico that those relatives openly consumed alcohol at bars, in that very documentary. In the Book of Mormon there is a story about how a spiritual leader becomes corrupt, replacing his priests with wicked men who would support his wicked polygamy and alcohol consumption. This brought the curse of alcohol onto his people as they struggled to cope with the adverse social consequences of their leader's abuse of women, as seen in Mosiah Chapter 11:
"14 And it came to pass that he placed his heart upon his riches, and he spent his time in riotous living with his wives and his concubines; and so did also his priests spend their time with harlots.
15 And it came to pass that he planted vineyards round about in the land; and he built wine-presses, and made wine in abundance; and therefore he became a wine-bibber, and also his people.”
- Level of intoxication from the substance, how much judgement is impaired by using it.
- How serious the withdrawals are from the substance.
- How addictive the substance is.
- Long term health consequences.
Contrary to popular belief, even today alcohol is the worst drug you can use. I am not saying to avoid using vanilla in cooking or a sip of wine in a religious communion ceremony, but in any mount strong enough to give you any kind of buzz, alcohol damages all of the soft tissues of your body, reducing your brain volume, damaging your heart (never helping it,) and liver, and shooting your cancer risk up as much as tobacco or asbestos. Alcohol more so than other drugs leads to bad life choices and dangerous accidents while under it's influence. And on top of all that, alcohol has the most deadly withdrawals of any drug:
Alcohol is clearly than far more dangerous than cannabis, tobacco and coffee, since withdrawals from those drugs amount to irritability that lasts for several days, the health consequences are far less severe, and the behavioral problems caused by the drugs are not nearly as extreme as alcohol. But what about the opiates, opium and laudanum, are they not more addictive, are the withdrawals not as serious? Well as per the video above, no, opiate withdrawals are NOT as bad as alcohol withdrawal, alcohol withdrawal is far more dangerous.
While it's true that opiates may be more addictive than alcohol to some people, this is also true of tobacco for all people, and not the only consideration in how "hard" a drug is. What gives opiates a bad name in today's world is we are dealing with highly concentrated forms such as heroin and fentanyl that are very easy to accidentally fatally overdose on. Smoking opium or measuring out laudanum one drop at a time is a much less concentrated form of opiate that is a lot harder to overdose on. Other than that, the long term health consequences of opiate use though definitely not good for you, are relatively harmless compared to the universal soft tissue damage that alcohol does to your body.
So that's it, the hardest drug of the Old West was definitely distilled spirits, especially whiskey. As a Latter-Day Saint I have been disappointed a number of times by people living in Utah who have a care-free attitude when it comes to the consumption of alcohol, because it is against our religion. In general I have found them quite ignorant of the harmful effects of alcohol, and just how hard of a drug it was that Brigham Young was peddling in Utah as he owned a Whiskey facility. The Lord said in Doctrine and Covenants chapter 89 verses 3-5:
"...to the ...weakest of all ...who ...can be called saints... thus saith the Lord unto you: In consequence of evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring men in the last days, I have warned you, and forewarn you... That inasmuch as any man drinketh wine or strong drink among you, behold it is not good, neither meet in the sight of your Father..."
Brigham Young owning a Whiskey distillery, according the the Lord, would then qualify Brigham as someone who was less than "the weakest of all who could be called saints," and that Brigham Young was a "conspiring man" who hand "evils and designs existing in his heart." Of course as an active, faithful, mainstream Latter-Day Saint I realize this is not "The Church of the Prophets of Latter Day Saints," and that in the above D&C quote the Lord "forewarned" us about Brigham Young. This is instead "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints," where we all strive to develop our own individual relationship with God rather than on gambling on reliability of Church administrators:
