7 ms·

Psychedelics are not without risks, but the risks are for me a deal breaker when they are illegal. There are too many ‘designer drugs’ out there with unknown p

Psychedelics are not without risks, but the risks are for me a deal breaker when they are illegal. There are too many ‘designer drugs’ out there with unknown properties that are sold by misrepresenting what they are. LSD25, psilocybin, MDMA, DMT these are drugs with known risks and side effects, and there has been legitimate investigation into their benefits. It would be great if we could legally continue to gather data. So far, it seems these substances are arguably much less dangerous than many illegal substances. I would be in favor of legalizing all of them. Decriminalizing seems to be a necessary step in that direction, but it doesn’t allow for quality control. Legalization allows for real and enforceable disclosure about what I might be putting in my body. I hope we get there someday. Edit: and possibly less dangerous than some legal substances.

tcoff91 6y ago
People are getting hurt by the black market. We need to bring this into the light. I know someone who died from taking what he thought was LSD and was instead some kind of designer drug like 25I-NBOME.
- vmception 6y ago
  N-Bombs are messed up, there is one variant that gives instant permanent parkinson's disease! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPTP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPTP There is so much to learn from these things, the cure for natural parkison's is probably within that drug, but we need the whole supply chain regulated and the ability to study these things in the light. I absolutely hate the current status of the psychedelic community, full of anecdotes, invalidating victim's experiences, some straight up voodoo about how to "end trips early" with candy flipping. Dangerous. All because it relies on urban legends.
  - cwkoss 6y ago
    Pedantic quibble, MPTP is not an NBOMe: MPTP is opioid-adjacent. Though, your point stands: they are both certainly quite dangerous substances that are among the reasons that testing drugs is an important harm reduction measure.
  - jychang 6y ago
    > some straight up voodoo about how to "end trips early" The proper way to do it is to use a drug that's a 5-HT2a antagonist with a stronger affinity to that receptor than the psychedelic. Trazodone or Seroquel are commonly prescribed ones that have a pretty low side effect profile and can be found at any pharmacy.
- dguaraglia 6y ago
  Always. Test. Your shit. I wish there was more advocacy around this. DanceSafe [1] sells inexpensive kits that people can use to test against most of the bad stuff (like NBOMEs). [1] https://dancesafe.org/ https://dancesafe.org/
  - staticautomatic 6y ago
    How often does someone get killed by an up-market dealer? I have no doubt that it happens but most of the deaths I read about look like street drugs or maybe somebody who scored in the bathroom at a bar or club.
    - tayo42 6y ago
      Not totally sure what you mean by up market? Like not a sketchy street corner guy but someone that sells bulk? https://www.justice.gov/usao-ut/pr/shamo-sentenced-life-prison-after-conviction-organizing-directing-drug-trafficking https://www.justice.gov/usao-ut/pr/shamo-sentenced-life-pris...
      - staticautomatic 6y ago
        That guy was selling fentanyl-laced oxy. I’m asking about something along the lines of the likelihood that one of my rich bro friends gets killed by his regular coke dealer.
        grawprog 6y ago
        Depends how desperate your bro's regular coke dealer or his dealer gets. I've heard first hand tales of dealers ending up with bricks of straight filler, like no coke, and passing it off to their customers, even high end ones, because if they didn't they'd be out a whole bunch of money. Also another second hand anecdote, most coke you buy in America or Canada is probably not pure. Even when getting supposedly pure coke. I've heard what they have in south america and mexico in certain places is nothing like what they have up here. No speediness, you can sleep, no cravings or come down.
sep_field 6y ago
I generally agree with you, but I think decriminalizing is not only good first step, but does itself allow for a small amount of quality control. For instance if MDMA is decriminalized, but PMA (something you very much would prefer not to ingest but is nevertheless sometimes sold as MDMA) is not, then people holding PMA would still be at legal risk. Over time this should tilt the scales in favor of the decriminalized substances over counterfeits.
PragmaticPulp 6y ago
> and there has been legitimate investigation into their benefits. I'm pro-legalization and all for rigorous study of these compounds. That said, the recent headlines about psychedelic research have started to diverge from what the research actually says. For example, recent headlines claimed that MDMA was shown to be beneficial for certain types of therapy. However, the actually study wasn't designed to show if MDMA was helpful, it was only designed as a proof of concept to show that it wasn't harmful. The study protocol involved something like 20 therapy sessions, only 2 of which involved MDMA. Most of the measured benefit happened before any patients took any MDMA at all, and the data didn't show any measured boost around the MDMA sessions. They also gave MDMA to every study participant instead of only half, meaning it was impossible to determine if the MDMA made a difference relative to non-MDMA controls. The only thing they really measured was that MDMA didn't produce any immediately obvious problems, such as causing patients to withdraw from the program. Safety studies like this are an important first step, but they don't tell us if MDMA is actually helpful. However, all of the headlines around the study proclaimed "MDMA shown to help treat PTSD". All of the internet comment sections were filled with people wondering if they should take MDMA to treat their PTSD. Really, the only thing the study showed was that traditional therapy produces measurable improvements in the condition, and that MDMA didn't interrupt those improvements. I'm worried that the exuberance to paint psychedelic drugs as miracle cures is going to backfire in a few years if the eventual study data doesn't live up to the hype.
- sep_field 6y ago
  There have been a -lot- [0] of MDMA studies at this point, for PTSD and other issues. In particular a common finding is that the efficacy of MDMA+Therapy 1 year post-treatment is far higher than therapy alone (significant reduction in relapse of symptoms as well as severity of symptoms). I encourage you to look at the variety of studies conducted and their different designs and controls and not base your judgement on a single study (this is good advice for any medical research, not only MDMA, as well). [0] https://maps.org/research/mdma https://maps.org/research/mdma
  - PragmaticPulp 6y ago
jbob2000 6y ago
I did my fair share of psychedelics a few years ago. The community is very diverse and spans a lot of different backgrounds. One thing I repeatedly saw was those with weaker minds getting sucked into the "oneness spirituality psychic-plane we-are-just-vibrations" bullshit. I watched a smart young lady drop out of university to become a psychic. I watched an acquaintance get divorced because she realized she had sacred powers, saying "my husband drains my energy and he's why could never levitate". I'm struggling to pull my partner out of this hole after she has spent close to $10,000 on building a "vibration healing" business. I've done just as many drugs as these people, yet I never fell to these delusions. Sure, there are people who get sucked in to this stuff without the drugs, but I can't help but notice the correlation. My biggest concern with legalizing LSD and psilocybin is that we don't have a good way to combat these delusions when people take them on.
- thomastjeffery 6y ago
  > My biggest concern with legalizing LSD and psilocybin is that we don't have a good way to combat these delusions when people take them on. You are falling for the classic delusion that drug prohibition prevents drug use; even after illustrating multiple times how false that assertion is.
  - jbob2000 6y ago
    I'm not advocating for prohibition, just asking "what are we going to do with the next problem that comes after legalization?"
    - sep_field 6y ago
      We need a social context for how and when to take them (beyond "let's partee!"). If you look at cultures with a long history of psychedelic practice, the use tends to be very ritualized, with a lot of specific context as to when they are taken, how often, and for what purposes. There is also substantial effort taken to integrate the experiences. If you just take a bunch of stuff at a party and believe everything you experience is literally true, sure you are in a risky position. We need to push people towards communally-meaningful experiences with integration afterwards, and away from just blasting their minds into space willy-nilly. We can't do this while they are illegal though. Keeping them illegal encourages the worst kinds of uses, with no oversight or integration or cultural meaning.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

tcoff91 6y ago

People are getting hurt by the black market. We need to bring this into the light. I know someone who died from taking what he thought was LSD and was instead some kind of designer drug like 25I-NBOME.

vmception 6y ago
N-Bombs are messed up, there is one variant that gives instant permanent parkinson's disease! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPTP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPTP There is so much to learn from these things, the cure for natural parkison's is probably within that drug, but we need the whole supply chain regulated and the ability to study these things in the light. I absolutely hate the current status of the psychedelic community, full of anecdotes, invalidating victim's experiences, some straight up voodoo about how to "end trips early" with candy flipping. Dangerous. All because it relies on urban legends.
- cwkoss 6y ago
  Pedantic quibble, MPTP is not an NBOMe: MPTP is opioid-adjacent. Though, your point stands: they are both certainly quite dangerous substances that are among the reasons that testing drugs is an important harm reduction measure.
- jychang 6y ago
  > some straight up voodoo about how to "end trips early" The proper way to do it is to use a drug that's a 5-HT2a antagonist with a stronger affinity to that receptor than the psychedelic. Trazodone or Seroquel are commonly prescribed ones that have a pretty low side effect profile and can be found at any pharmacy.
dguaraglia 6y ago
Always. Test. Your shit. I wish there was more advocacy around this. DanceSafe [1] sells inexpensive kits that people can use to test against most of the bad stuff (like NBOMEs). [1] https://dancesafe.org/ https://dancesafe.org/
- staticautomatic 6y ago
  How often does someone get killed by an up-market dealer? I have no doubt that it happens but most of the deaths I read about look like street drugs or maybe somebody who scored in the bathroom at a bar or club.
  - tayo42 6y ago
    Not totally sure what you mean by up market? Like not a sketchy street corner guy but someone that sells bulk? https://www.justice.gov/usao-ut/pr/shamo-sentenced-life-prison-after-conviction-organizing-directing-drug-trafficking https://www.justice.gov/usao-ut/pr/shamo-sentenced-life-pris...
    - staticautomatic 6y ago
      That guy was selling fentanyl-laced oxy. I’m asking about something along the lines of the likelihood that one of my rich bro friends gets killed by his regular coke dealer.
      - grawprog 6y ago
        Depends how desperate your bro's regular coke dealer or his dealer gets. I've heard first hand tales of dealers ending up with bricks of straight filler, like no coke, and passing it off to their customers, even high end ones, because if they didn't they'd be out a whole bunch of money. Also another second hand anecdote, most coke you buy in America or Canada is probably not pure. Even when getting supposedly pure coke. I've heard what they have in south america and mexico in certain places is nothing like what they have up here. No speediness, you can sleep, no cravings or come down.

sep_field 6y ago

I generally agree with you, but I think decriminalizing is not only good first step, but does itself allow for a small amount of quality control. For instance if MDMA is decriminalized, but PMA (something you very much would prefer not to ingest but is nevertheless sometimes sold as MDMA) is not, then people holding PMA would still be at legal risk. Over time this should tilt the scales in favor of the decriminalized substances over counterfeits.

PragmaticPulp 6y ago

> and there has been legitimate investigation into their benefits. I'm pro-legalization and all for rigorous study of these compounds. That said, the recent headlines about psychedelic research have started to diverge from what the research actually says. For example, recent headlines claimed that MDMA was shown to be beneficial for certain types of therapy. However, the actually study wasn't designed to show if MDMA was helpful, it was only designed as a proof of concept to show that it wasn't harmful. The study protocol involved something like 20 therapy sessions, only 2 of which involved MDMA. Most of the measured benefit happened before any patients took any MDMA at all, and the data didn't show any measured boost around the MDMA sessions. They also gave MDMA to every study participant instead of only half, meaning it was impossible to determine if the MDMA made a difference relative to non-MDMA controls. The only thing they really measured was that MDMA didn't produce any immediately obvious problems, such as causing patients to withdraw from the program. Safety studies like this are an important first step, but they don't tell us if MDMA is actually helpful. However, all of the headlines around the study proclaimed "MDMA shown to help treat PTSD". All of the internet comment sections were filled with people wondering if they should take MDMA to treat their PTSD. Really, the only thing the study showed was that traditional therapy produces measurable improvements in the condition, and that MDMA didn't interrupt those improvements. I'm worried that the exuberance to paint psychedelic drugs as miracle cures is going to backfire in a few years if the eventual study data doesn't live up to the hype.

sep_field 6y ago
There have been a -lot- [0] of MDMA studies at this point, for PTSD and other issues. In particular a common finding is that the efficacy of MDMA+Therapy 1 year post-treatment is far higher than therapy alone (significant reduction in relapse of symptoms as well as severity of symptoms). I encourage you to look at the variety of studies conducted and their different designs and controls and not base your judgement on a single study (this is good advice for any medical research, not only MDMA, as well). [0] https://maps.org/research/mdma https://maps.org/research/mdma
- PragmaticPulp 6y ago

jbob2000 6y ago

I did my fair share of psychedelics a few years ago. The community is very diverse and spans a lot of different backgrounds. One thing I repeatedly saw was those with weaker minds getting sucked into the "oneness spirituality psychic-plane we-are-just-vibrations" bullshit. I watched a smart young lady drop out of university to become a psychic. I watched an acquaintance get divorced because she realized she had sacred powers, saying "my husband drains my energy and he's why could never levitate". I'm struggling to pull my partner out of this hole after she has spent close to $10,000 on building a "vibration healing" business. I've done just as many drugs as these people, yet I never fell to these delusions. Sure, there are people who get sucked in to this stuff without the drugs, but I can't help but notice the correlation. My biggest concern with legalizing LSD and psilocybin is that we don't have a good way to combat these delusions when people take them on.

thomastjeffery 6y ago
> My biggest concern with legalizing LSD and psilocybin is that we don't have a good way to combat these delusions when people take them on. You are falling for the classic delusion that drug prohibition prevents drug use; even after illustrating multiple times how false that assertion is.
- jbob2000 6y ago
  I'm not advocating for prohibition, just asking "what are we going to do with the next problem that comes after legalization?"
  - sep_field 6y ago
    We need a social context for how and when to take them (beyond "let's partee!"). If you look at cultures with a long history of psychedelic practice, the use tends to be very ritualized, with a lot of specific context as to when they are taken, how often, and for what purposes. There is also substantial effort taken to integrate the experiences. If you just take a bunch of stuff at a party and believe everything you experience is literally true, sure you are in a risky position. We need to push people towards communally-meaningful experiences with integration afterwards, and away from just blasting their minds into space willy-nilly. We can't do this while they are illegal though. Keeping them illegal encourages the worst kinds of uses, with no oversight or integration or cultural meaning.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]