My father was a lawyer and I grew up hearing this advice. But then we ended up living in Texas when I became a stoner teen. I can't quite explain what its like to be on the side of the interstate for literally hours undergoing constant questioning and various forms of psychological torture. Splitting everyone up, questioning everyone to try to find inconsistencies. Multiple times I remember telling a cop "no, you are not allowed to do this, am I being detained?" And they can just respond "yes I am, no you're not, can I look through your car now?" In central nowhere texas, the cops are elite at this. Just all of us pretty much sobbing on the side of the road from the stress, pleading and pleading with them...

But I would live through that everyday of my life if I knew I would never have to get to the sometimes next chapter of this kind of thing: jail in a small Texas town. There I learned about both physical and psychological torture. But its too much to get into.

And yes I tried to fight the most egregious event of torture, spent alot of time talking to lawyer, explaining what happened to me. My stop was unlawful even in that case. But I came in with a some fancy Austin lawyer to Brownwood, TX and they all but laughed us out of the courtroom.

And even after all that, don't even get me started on how they extract your money and sanity for years and years if your lucky like me to get probation for an eighth oz of mushrooms. I was a special case because I ended up going to grad school and it was easy for me to work the weekends to make the money I needed to pay them that wasnt covered by my stipend. I am also so grateful I kept a spreadsheet of my payments to them, it truly truly saved me from more years and money. They are really good with all their paperwork, except for anything to do with paying them money.

But very important to realize in all this: this is not at all exceptional, and I am a card-carrying privileged white man. This is just how it is.