If you watch the video, the imagery is a stunning artistic representation of the side-effects of medications Chris — and thousands of people — take, and what they experience while taking them. The movements, the haunting visuals echo the deaths — suicides — of people in the public and private eye who were on medications for psychiatric issues. While there is no simple answer, the myopic “drugs’re bad, m’kay” attitudes are beginning to bleed over into prescriptions, but only just.

Interestingly, illegal drugs are abused and used because they work, and if we remove the moral-value judgement on them, imagine how we could harness their potential if they were regulated, made available, and were safe(r)? They work for depression, emotional pain, and anxiety. But while they remain illegal, they can be used, abused, and risky.

Not advocating for legalizing drugs, here — sorry, the digression is simply advocating for out-of-the-box thinking re: Chris Cornell’s death, and the deaths of other musicians and artists, celebrities, the climbing suicide rates that coincide with, among other things, prescription drug use.

I wonder why are we so quick to reduce it all down to “genius/mental illness/addiction/tragic/suicide?” What if we added “legal medications” used treat these “illnesses” to that narrative, medications that claim — without prejudice — “suicide” as a known side-effect?

I mean…Occam’s razor much?