Students against the drink Cocaine effectively blocked the Las Vegas company?s trademark application for the energy drink sold under the name of the illegal stimulant.
And Americans For Drug Free Youth launched a national anti-Meth Coffee campaign Tuesday, asking Congress to introduce and pass a law that would stop the use of immoral and scandalous trademarks when marketing a product. Meth Coffee is a San Francisco-based product containing coffee beans and the stimulant yerba mate.
The association, with a group of students from Cleveland, successfully opposed the trademarking of Cocaine, an energy drink marketed as “the legal alternative” by Redux Beverages LLC in Las Vegas.
“To market a drink campaign like ?drink Cocaine? may do … damage to the drug prevention side of things,” said Steven Steiner, founder of Americans for Drug Free Youth.
Steiner, who lost his 19-year-old son to a drug overdose, said the drug promotion and legalization effort “is out there,” in the form of lobbying groups and drug-inspired marketing of everything from cars to electric razors.
“They?re glorifying drug use in this country,” he said.
While the companies peddling Cocaine and Meth Coffee are banking on the controversy to boost their sales, drug addictions experts say it?s not a simple business matter.
“It?s not just an innocent thing,” said Christopher Welsh, assistant professor of psychiatry with the University of Maryland School of Medicine. “The name itself, to a vulnerable subgroup of young people, really does have an impact.”
Marketing a soda called Cocaine is no different from selling marijuana-flavored hemp lollipops or drug pipes disguised as magic markers, said Michael Gimbel, drug addictions educator for Sheppard Pratt Health Systems in Baltimore.
“It?s the same message as the Cocaine drink or Meth Coffee,” he said.
Steiner said the students? action against Cocaine is only the beginning.
“It is clear now we must have a federal law that stops these immoral and scandalous names from being used in any fashion,” he said. A petition letter supporting the organization?s campaign is available through their Web site: www.americansfordrugfreeyouth.org.
It could be tough to make such a law stick, Welsh said. “I don?t know, with our Constitution, if it?s something that can stand up.”
