8 ms·

MAPS Celebrates California Senate Passage of Psychedelic Reform Bill

306 points by pmoriarty 5y ago

pmoriarty 5y ago
The next step is passage of the bill in the California State Assembly. If you care about this issue and want this landmark bill[1] passed, contact your State Assembly representative: [2][3][4] Also, consider joining and supporting Decriminalize Nature.[5] [1] - https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB519 https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml... [2] - https://www.assembly.ca.gov/ https://www.assembly.ca.gov/ [3] - https://www.assembly.ca.gov/assemblymembers?order=field_member_district&sort=asc https://www.assembly.ca.gov/assemblymembers?order=field_memb... [4] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_State_Assembly_districts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_State_Assembly_dist... [5] - https://www.decriminalizenature.org/ https://www.decriminalizenature.org/
- gogopuppygogo 5y ago
  First, let me state that MAPS is such an important organization for advancing these substances from research to results legislatively. Incredible work once again. Second, if you want to contact your California assemblymembers office it pays to reach their staff. You can find that if you pay for http://www.GovBuddy.com http://www.GovBuddy.com and you can keep up to date with staff changes. I don’t know of any other way to find that.
- raylad 5y ago
  For those interested: http://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov/ http://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov/
- vmception 5y ago
  Seems like they removed Ketamine from the version that was passed, contrary to what the MAPS article says What is the source of truth? (I typically lean towards the legislature, but often times their websites are not updated most accurately for bills in progress)
  - akanet 5y ago
    The compromise to remove ketamine from the bill was struck after this MAPS press release was written.
adoxyz 5y ago
I was so confused as to why Google/Apple Maps would be celebrating this until I clicked the link. lol.
- vnchr 5y ago
  Scott Forstall may have been influenced by psychedelics during the period leading to the release of Apple Maps.
igravious 5y ago
title should read: M.A.P.S. Celebrates California Senate Passage of Psychedelic Reform Bill or just: MAPS Celebrates California Senate Passage of Psychedelic Reform Bill but not: Maps Celebrates California Senate Passage of Psychedelic Reform Bill
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  Thanks. Yeah, it was MAPS originally, but HN automatically changes words in the title from all caps to just having the first letter in the word capitalized. Usually I notice when it does this to my submissions and manually fix it, but this time I just submitted it and forgot to proofread the title afterwards. I wish HN just had a hands-off policy to titles and submissions, but they've never listened to me.
nanna 5y ago
I rember the day in the UK when you could no longer walk into the shop with alien shaped bongs in the window and come out with a bag full of Thai magic mushrooms. The politicians said they were a slippery slope to hard drugs. As if. Shrooms make you see the world in a different light, a very colourful and fluid one, they don't make you want to smoke a crack pipe. Idiots. Fifteen odd years of lost visions. When can we have them back, damnit.
- GordonS 5y ago
  Why would you buy Thai mushrooms? I grew up in rural Scotland, and in Autumn mushrooms were everywhere. Seriously, in any park, field of grass, or area given over to wilderness. We'd forage for only an hour or so, and come back laden with hundreds of them. I understood from friends down south that it was the same situation there.
  - pmoriarty 5y ago
    I know why I don't pick them: I'm afraid of getting poisoned. I don't buy them or grow them either: afraid of getting arrested. I suffer from debilitating depression, anxiety, burnout, social phobia, and suicidal ideation, and the many therapists I've gone to over the decades haven't helped. I look forward to when psychedelic therapy, which has evidence of being much more effective than conventional therapy for some conditions (like treatment-resistant depression) is legal and I don't have to risk getting thrown in jail, being poisoned by buying mystery drugs, or getting my life ruined with a felony conviction in order to get the healing that I desperately need. If psychedelics were legal all along maybe I could have gotten some effective treatment and maybe my life would not be as fucked up as it is right now.
    - pbk1 5y ago
      I don't know where you live but it's been decriminalized in plenty of places in the West, so even if it's not fully legalized the worst you face would be a nominal fine, not getting arrested.
AdmiralAsshat 5y ago
> Fifty years after the War on Drugs was officially declared and psychedelic substance prohibition began in contravention of evidence supporting therapeutic use, the California State Senate has taken the first Legislative step to dismantle psychedelic prohibition with a 21-16 vote on June 1, 2021, in favor of Senate Bill 519 Controlled substances: decriminalization of certain hallucinogenic substances sponsored by California State Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco). Just want to point out that if even Liberal Bastion California could only pass this with a 57% majority, it likely doesn't stand much chance of being passed anywhere else.
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  "if even Liberal Bastion California could only pass this with a 57% majority, it likely doesn't stand much chance of being passed anywhere else." Not right away, but never say never. Having lived through the nightmare prohibition of the 80's and 90's, I am constantly amazed that cannabis is effectively legal (not just for medical purposes but recreationally) in so many places around the US today. I never thought I'd see it in my lifetime. Now psychedelics are on their way to being legalized in some places, and Oregon has decriminalized all drugs. MDMA therapy is very close to being available on a prescription basis (if it isn't already), and that alone has the potential to signal a sea-change in the way the US and the rest of the world sees currently illegal drugs -- especially psychedelics. Psilocybin is next, and once the mainstream culture starts seeing seriously broken people start functioning again after undergoing psychedelic therapy when the traditional medical establishment has so often failed them, they're going to start changing their minds about these substances, just as they have about cannabis.
  - AdmiralAsshat 5y ago
    I'd love to be proven wrong, but I just don't think it's ever going to happen on a federal level, when half of the US Senate consists of people like this guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NY6UTnS6Z-A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NY6UTnS6Z-A And he's a "moderate".
    - 5y ago
unchocked 5y ago
Way to go MAPS. I’m continually impressed by the standard of ethical care and compassion they represent - and the effectiveness of their political advocacy.
vmception 5y ago
> The bill also decriminalizes substance analysis tools What does this mean, it was illegal to test our drugs in California? Or does it mean that research facilities don't have to operate in fear at least from California authorities
- deelowe 5y ago
  I think it means it was illegal. Geez. That's just dumb as hell... Reminds me of prohibition when the government poisoned illegal alcohol.
- dbt00 5y ago
  Yes it is illegal to test people's drugs to make sure they've not been substituted or adulterated.
  - prutschman 5y ago
    If you happen to know: Is it the performing the test itself that's illegal, or is it "merely" that to perform a test for someone you'd have to take possession of the substance, however briefly? (Bad for both harm reduction and liberty either way, I'm just curious which it is.)
  - pmoriarty 5y ago
    I've heard that the justification for this is that allowing testing would let illegal drug manufacturers to become more effective at making drugs. Of course allowing testing could save a lot of lives too, but that's apparently never been the true motivation of the War on Drugs.
  - vmception 5y ago
    But the tools themselves are just paraphernalia and legal? I guess maybe this is explicitly making them not useful as probable cause, and also making their use a defense or legal.
renewiltord 5y ago
A comprehensive win for personal liberty. Onward to more freedom. Church on Sundays was always good (for those in the Bay) but this should just be a storefront experience, not limited to those of us who treat it as religion.
alecfreud 5y ago
I went to a MAPS event in like 2012. It was at a children's science museum with Flying Lotus and Eoto + others performing. Everyone sloppy and spun out if their minds. It was hilarious. Several adults at a time chilling in a kids sand pit or doing the Ms Frizzle Magic School Bus interactive exhibit.
lifeisstillgood 5y ago
Is it just me, but ... The sort of people of today search out and take mushrooms and psychedelics and don't violently run amok, but sit down quietly going whee are the sort of people who when offered crack or just when perfectly sober, will also go whee and not shoot anyone. And the sort of people who when offered a pipe of crack today and then go on a shooting spree, are the sort of people who will rob a seven-11 on mushrooms or sober. Its not just personal responsibility - 99% of the latter group are going to correspond with abusive childhoods, poverty, mental health issues and so on. (So the difference between me and a Republican congressman is that I believe that if we solve all those issues, 99% of the latter group will also sit in a room and go whee.) Personal Responsibility matters, but it matters about as much as willpower does in dieting - its a lot more likely to work if there are no fatty sugary foods around. The 1940s had healthier thinner people because we were all on a government enforced diet.
- mekoka 5y ago
  The issue with psychedelic is not (so much) about personal responsibility. It's very much about the wrongful classification of the drugs themselves based on how they tend to alter cognition and behavior. I don't mean any offense, but by squeezing crack in the same bag as psychedelics, your comment exhibits the exact misunderstanding that led to the latter's prohibition. Good people on crack are more likely to do bad things over time. Bad people on mushrooms are much less likely to be worse than their usual selves (based on studies).
  - lifeisstillgood 5y ago
    There are (in my limited understanding) too many confounding issues to be able to say that its ok to get off your head regulars with drug X but not with drug Y. In my (again limited) understanding, saying "all these are bad for us long-term (to wildly varying degrees), but it seems likely that other factors (childhood, mental illness, social position, economic, family and social) all play as important if not more important roles. Lets unban them if they have some medicinal purposes, but lets not pretend that having mushrooms and amphetamines marketed by the same socially-minded people pushing Marlboros for decades is going to make the world a better place, and please lets not think that if we strike a blow for freedom, its ok to stop worrying about all those other confounding issues. (But I concede its a lot easier to legislatively fix banned psychedelics than to fix childhood abuse, poverty and mental health. But that's why we pay government the big taxes, to take on the big jobs. )
xor99 5y ago
One of the major impediments to widespread use of psychedelics is actually difficulty in finding or envisioning profit models. For this reason, I'm not really looking forward to psychedlic startups. In this sense decriminalisation may be a good resting point for this whole debate.
- rootsudo 5y ago
  Which is what I don't get, isn't there a profit motive in monopolizing or branding the PTSD/Depression sector of care, or is that high liability?
  - dylan604 5y ago
    Can you monopolize a plant? There's multiple reason the BigPharma have figured out ways to synthesize equivalent things to naturally occurring plants, but one of the reasons is they can patent their process and ensure they can keep that strangle hold in place.
    - jdavis703 5y ago
      You probably can’t monopolize a plant unless it’s GMO, patented, and much better than the competition. But it is possible to brand a plant. At the US chain grocery stores it can be hard to buy any strawberry that isn’t sold by Driscolls.
      - pmoriarty 5y ago
        This reminds me of utopian idealists who envisioned everyone growing their own cannabis once it was legal. What they didn't realize is that few people want to put in the effort to grow their own plants. It's so much quicker and easier just to go to a store and buy them. Another thing this reminds me of is ketamine, on which the patent expired long ago. So some profit-seeking corporation created esketamine, which is pretty much the same thing but patentable, and they got that approved for treatment of depression while cheap, generic ketamine still has to be used off-label (meaning that insurance companies won't cover that off-label treatment, while esketamine treatment for depression is covered). Something similar is being attempted with psilocybin, where some company's thought up a more efficient way of producing it and patented that, and made (or tried to make) that the only approved way of getting psilocybin. In both cases consumers aren't going to be making their own ketamine or psilocybin. They're going to have to rely on companies to sell it to them. Sure, they could theoretically grow or pick mushrooms but growing mushrooms is time and effort intensive, so it'll probably only ever be a hobby among a minority of users, and picking mushrooms can be dangerous and is also time consuming. So realistically most users will just be buying those too. My hope is that people will form cooperatives and non-profit organizations to provide these sacred and healing substances for people who need them, while making little or no profit but still keeping the process viable.
aleksandrm 5y ago
If anyone care to elaborate, does it only mean you will not be prosecuted if they find you in possession of psychedelics, or will this be fully legal where you can buy it from stores/dispensaries?
user3939382 5y ago
Psychedelics should be legal, and most people should stay away from them until we have high-quality research on them and someone with credentials in psychiatry or medicine instructs otherwise. These drugs are very powerful and can make permanent and potentially severe changes to your mind. I fear that the push for legalization might be interpreted by some as either encouragement to try them or a signal that they're not as serious as they are.
- foolfoolz 5y ago
  “acid used to be so much better back when it was illegal and people took it seriously” get off my lawn
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  "Psychedelics should be legal, and most people should stay away from them until we have high-quality research on them and someone with credentials in psychiatry or medicine instructs otherwise." I'm not convinced that having to have permission or advice from the medical community is the only legitimate way these substances should be used. There are strong cases to be made for their religious or spiritual use, and for simple cognitive liberty -- the right of everyone to alter their consciousness how they see fit, for any reason they like, without needing to get permission from anyone. On the religious/spiritual side, many of these substances are sacred to a lot of people who are otherwise healthy and who shouldn't need a doctor's permission to exercise their religion (in the widest sense of the term that is closer to "spirituality", not just in the narrow sense of being an organized religion similar to the Judeo-Christian faiths). There are already religious exemptions for religious use of peyote and ayahuasca, and I see no reason why every other psychedelic couldn't get similar exemptions. It's possible psychedelic mushrooms will be the next substance so exempted, though I'm unaware of any serious efforts currently under way to do that. "These drugs are very powerful and can make permanent and potentially severe changes to your mind." This is absolutely true (though usually the changes are temporary -- most people fall back in to old habits before long, even if they've had a very powerful experience). Everyone should definitely educate themselves as much as possible about any substance they take, and about how to do so as safely and constructively as possible (which is usually also the most enjoyable way to use them too). However, we should also acknowledge that driving a car can also make permanent and potentially severe changes in your mind (though, unlike psychedelics, such if such changes happen they're almost always negative). Yet people drive all the time, knowing they could get in to an accident and suffer brain damage or death, which many do. Skydiving, scuba diving, parachuting, pretty much every physical sport has a risk of brain damage, injury, or death associated with it, yet most people play all but the riskiest of these without giving them much thought. Despite occasional accidents and risks most people don't obsess over or try to ban participation in them. Instead we try to focus on ways to make them safer.
RayVR 5y ago
I don't know what the right thing(tm) is here but I do know I've seen people on psychedelics do things they never would have otherwise done. Just one example: Jumping from a third story balcony. He was lucky to only break both legs. The people that argue for decriminalizing/legalizing all of these drugs are usually the same people that argue firearms should be banned based on a bunch of arguments that could easily be used to argue against drugs. Ultimately, now that I have children, I can't imagine living in California. The decisions they make feel "progressive" but result in more harm and a decline in the quality of life for many people.
- s1artibartfast 5y ago
  The point is to transition the responsibility from the government to the parent and individual. My fairly libertarian perspective is that it is the job of the parent and induvial to educate themselves and make choices about risky behavior that only impacts themselves. If you want to take up base jumping, seeing how many hamburgers you can eat a day, or simply kill yourself, YOU should decide what your priorities are. Someone can make utilitarian arguments all day long about what laws would optimize the quality of life, but this ultimately places the needs of the society over the individual. Please teach your children about the risks of drugs, and not rely on the government to control their actions instead.
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  "I've seen people on psychedelics do things they never would have otherwise done. Just one example: Jumping from a third story balcony. He was lucky to only break both legs." People do stupid shit like that (and much worse) on alcohol all the time. Yet most people are rarely as worried about alcohol availability as they are about the availability of psychedelics... why is that?
  - stkdump 5y ago
    The argument I hear is that alcohol is an exception due to historical/cultural reasons. If alcohol would have started to become widely available/used as recently as most illegal drugs, if would probably be prohibited.
excalibur 5y ago
Why exclude peyote?
jcims 5y ago
Rick Doblin just on Lex Fridman’s podcast: https://youtu.be/2tUiLxtrLxk https://youtu.be/2tUiLxtrLxk
- partomniscient 5y ago
  Thanks for that. I'm hugely impressed by Rick's long term commitment and navigation of the political lanscape and like that he's more interested in how can we make the world a better place given the constraints we have approach makes him worth a lot more than the early wave noise makers like Leary and McKenna both of who kind of fostered the environment he grew in/threw. The fact he foresaw things and acted on them accordingly at a relatively young age is amazing. I think ultimately he'll have a larger lasting impact on the world than either of them, (but is also enabled by them) but possibly be less remembered? It also just highlights the problems with the capitalist approach to individual and global health. I think capitalism is just coming to terms with its problems as a result of profit motive rather than value or health motive. If you play out the scenarios: Do you want to live in a world where a few rich people have happy lives because the masses have unhappy lives (focus on profit over outcome) OR do you want to live in a world where focus on outcome over profit results in happy lives, but the people in power making the decisions don't get particularly rich? The best possibile lifestyle is in scenario 1, the best average lifestyle is in scenario 2. Help, help, I feel like I'm in a prisoners dilemma experiment.

306 points by pmoriarty 5y ago

The next step is passage of the bill in the California State Assembly. If you care about this issue and want this landmark bill[1] passed, contact your State Assembly representative: [2][3][4] Also, consider joining and supporting Decriminalize Nature.[5] [1] - https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB519 https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml... [2] - https://www.assembly.ca.gov/ https://www.assembly.ca.gov/ [3] - https://www.assembly.ca.gov/assemblymembers?order=field_member_district&sort=asc https://www.assembly.ca.gov/assemblymembers?order=field_memb... [4] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_State_Assembly_districts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_State_Assembly_dist... [5] - https://www.decriminalizenature.org/ https://www.decriminalizenature.org/

gogopuppygogo 5y ago
First, let me state that MAPS is such an important organization for advancing these substances from research to results legislatively. Incredible work once again. Second, if you want to contact your California assemblymembers office it pays to reach their staff. You can find that if you pay for http://www.GovBuddy.com http://www.GovBuddy.com and you can keep up to date with staff changes. I don’t know of any other way to find that.
raylad 5y ago
For those interested: http://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov/ http://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov/
vmception 5y ago
Seems like they removed Ketamine from the version that was passed, contrary to what the MAPS article says What is the source of truth? (I typically lean towards the legislature, but often times their websites are not updated most accurately for bills in progress)
- akanet 5y ago
  The compromise to remove ketamine from the bill was struck after this MAPS press release was written.

adoxyz 5y ago

I was so confused as to why Google/Apple Maps would be celebrating this until I clicked the link. lol.

vnchr 5y ago
Scott Forstall may have been influenced by psychedelics during the period leading to the release of Apple Maps.

igravious 5y ago

title should read: M.A.P.S. Celebrates California Senate Passage of Psychedelic Reform Bill or just: MAPS Celebrates California Senate Passage of Psychedelic Reform Bill but not: Maps Celebrates California Senate Passage of Psychedelic Reform Bill

pmoriarty 5y ago
Thanks. Yeah, it was MAPS originally, but HN automatically changes words in the title from all caps to just having the first letter in the word capitalized. Usually I notice when it does this to my submissions and manually fix it, but this time I just submitted it and forgot to proofread the title afterwards. I wish HN just had a hands-off policy to titles and submissions, but they've never listened to me.

nanna 5y ago

I rember the day in the UK when you could no longer walk into the shop with alien shaped bongs in the window and come out with a bag full of Thai magic mushrooms. The politicians said they were a slippery slope to hard drugs. As if. Shrooms make you see the world in a different light, a very colourful and fluid one, they don't make you want to smoke a crack pipe. Idiots. Fifteen odd years of lost visions. When can we have them back, damnit.

GordonS 5y ago
Why would you buy Thai mushrooms? I grew up in rural Scotland, and in Autumn mushrooms were everywhere. Seriously, in any park, field of grass, or area given over to wilderness. We'd forage for only an hour or so, and come back laden with hundreds of them. I understood from friends down south that it was the same situation there.
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  I know why I don't pick them: I'm afraid of getting poisoned. I don't buy them or grow them either: afraid of getting arrested. I suffer from debilitating depression, anxiety, burnout, social phobia, and suicidal ideation, and the many therapists I've gone to over the decades haven't helped. I look forward to when psychedelic therapy, which has evidence of being much more effective than conventional therapy for some conditions (like treatment-resistant depression) is legal and I don't have to risk getting thrown in jail, being poisoned by buying mystery drugs, or getting my life ruined with a felony conviction in order to get the healing that I desperately need. If psychedelics were legal all along maybe I could have gotten some effective treatment and maybe my life would not be as fucked up as it is right now.
  - pbk1 5y ago
    I don't know where you live but it's been decriminalized in plenty of places in the West, so even if it's not fully legalized the worst you face would be a nominal fine, not getting arrested.

AdmiralAsshat 5y ago

> Fifty years after the War on Drugs was officially declared and psychedelic substance prohibition began in contravention of evidence supporting therapeutic use, the California State Senate has taken the first Legislative step to dismantle psychedelic prohibition with a 21-16 vote on June 1, 2021, in favor of Senate Bill 519 Controlled substances: decriminalization of certain hallucinogenic substances sponsored by California State Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco). Just want to point out that if even Liberal Bastion California could only pass this with a 57% majority, it likely doesn't stand much chance of being passed anywhere else.

pmoriarty 5y ago
"if even Liberal Bastion California could only pass this with a 57% majority, it likely doesn't stand much chance of being passed anywhere else." Not right away, but never say never. Having lived through the nightmare prohibition of the 80's and 90's, I am constantly amazed that cannabis is effectively legal (not just for medical purposes but recreationally) in so many places around the US today. I never thought I'd see it in my lifetime. Now psychedelics are on their way to being legalized in some places, and Oregon has decriminalized all drugs. MDMA therapy is very close to being available on a prescription basis (if it isn't already), and that alone has the potential to signal a sea-change in the way the US and the rest of the world sees currently illegal drugs -- especially psychedelics. Psilocybin is next, and once the mainstream culture starts seeing seriously broken people start functioning again after undergoing psychedelic therapy when the traditional medical establishment has so often failed them, they're going to start changing their minds about these substances, just as they have about cannabis.
- AdmiralAsshat 5y ago
  I'd love to be proven wrong, but I just don't think it's ever going to happen on a federal level, when half of the US Senate consists of people like this guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NY6UTnS6Z-A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NY6UTnS6Z-A And he's a "moderate".
  - 5y ago

unchocked 5y ago

Way to go MAPS. I’m continually impressed by the standard of ethical care and compassion they represent - and the effectiveness of their political advocacy.

vmception 5y ago

> The bill also decriminalizes substance analysis tools What does this mean, it was illegal to test our drugs in California? Or does it mean that research facilities don't have to operate in fear at least from California authorities

deelowe 5y ago
I think it means it was illegal. Geez. That's just dumb as hell... Reminds me of prohibition when the government poisoned illegal alcohol.
dbt00 5y ago
Yes it is illegal to test people's drugs to make sure they've not been substituted or adulterated.
- prutschman 5y ago
  If you happen to know: Is it the performing the test itself that's illegal, or is it "merely" that to perform a test for someone you'd have to take possession of the substance, however briefly? (Bad for both harm reduction and liberty either way, I'm just curious which it is.)
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  I've heard that the justification for this is that allowing testing would let illegal drug manufacturers to become more effective at making drugs. Of course allowing testing could save a lot of lives too, but that's apparently never been the true motivation of the War on Drugs.
- vmception 5y ago
  But the tools themselves are just paraphernalia and legal? I guess maybe this is explicitly making them not useful as probable cause, and also making their use a defense or legal.

renewiltord 5y ago

A comprehensive win for personal liberty. Onward to more freedom. Church on Sundays was always good (for those in the Bay) but this should just be a storefront experience, not limited to those of us who treat it as religion.

alecfreud 5y ago

I went to a MAPS event in like 2012. It was at a children's science museum with Flying Lotus and Eoto + others performing. Everyone sloppy and spun out if their minds. It was hilarious. Several adults at a time chilling in a kids sand pit or doing the Ms Frizzle Magic School Bus interactive exhibit.

lifeisstillgood 5y ago

Is it just me, but ... The sort of people of today search out and take mushrooms and psychedelics and don't violently run amok, but sit down quietly going whee are the sort of people who when offered crack or just when perfectly sober, will also go whee and not shoot anyone. And the sort of people who when offered a pipe of crack today and then go on a shooting spree, are the sort of people who will rob a seven-11 on mushrooms or sober. Its not just personal responsibility - 99% of the latter group are going to correspond with abusive childhoods, poverty, mental health issues and so on. (So the difference between me and a Republican congressman is that I believe that if we solve all those issues, 99% of the latter group will also sit in a room and go whee.) Personal Responsibility matters, but it matters about as much as willpower does in dieting - its a lot more likely to work if there are no fatty sugary foods around. The 1940s had healthier thinner people because we were all on a government enforced diet.

mekoka 5y ago
The issue with psychedelic is not (so much) about personal responsibility. It's very much about the wrongful classification of the drugs themselves based on how they tend to alter cognition and behavior. I don't mean any offense, but by squeezing crack in the same bag as psychedelics, your comment exhibits the exact misunderstanding that led to the latter's prohibition. Good people on crack are more likely to do bad things over time. Bad people on mushrooms are much less likely to be worse than their usual selves (based on studies).
- lifeisstillgood 5y ago
  There are (in my limited understanding) too many confounding issues to be able to say that its ok to get off your head regulars with drug X but not with drug Y. In my (again limited) understanding, saying "all these are bad for us long-term (to wildly varying degrees), but it seems likely that other factors (childhood, mental illness, social position, economic, family and social) all play as important if not more important roles. Lets unban them if they have some medicinal purposes, but lets not pretend that having mushrooms and amphetamines marketed by the same socially-minded people pushing Marlboros for decades is going to make the world a better place, and please lets not think that if we strike a blow for freedom, its ok to stop worrying about all those other confounding issues. (But I concede its a lot easier to legislatively fix banned psychedelics than to fix childhood abuse, poverty and mental health. But that's why we pay government the big taxes, to take on the big jobs. )

xor99 5y ago

One of the major impediments to widespread use of psychedelics is actually difficulty in finding or envisioning profit models. For this reason, I'm not really looking forward to psychedlic startups. In this sense decriminalisation may be a good resting point for this whole debate.

rootsudo 5y ago
Which is what I don't get, isn't there a profit motive in monopolizing or branding the PTSD/Depression sector of care, or is that high liability?
- dylan604 5y ago
  Can you monopolize a plant? There's multiple reason the BigPharma have figured out ways to synthesize equivalent things to naturally occurring plants, but one of the reasons is they can patent their process and ensure they can keep that strangle hold in place.
  - jdavis703 5y ago
    You probably can’t monopolize a plant unless it’s GMO, patented, and much better than the competition. But it is possible to brand a plant. At the US chain grocery stores it can be hard to buy any strawberry that isn’t sold by Driscolls.
    - pmoriarty 5y ago
      This reminds me of utopian idealists who envisioned everyone growing their own cannabis once it was legal. What they didn't realize is that few people want to put in the effort to grow their own plants. It's so much quicker and easier just to go to a store and buy them. Another thing this reminds me of is ketamine, on which the patent expired long ago. So some profit-seeking corporation created esketamine, which is pretty much the same thing but patentable, and they got that approved for treatment of depression while cheap, generic ketamine still has to be used off-label (meaning that insurance companies won't cover that off-label treatment, while esketamine treatment for depression is covered). Something similar is being attempted with psilocybin, where some company's thought up a more efficient way of producing it and patented that, and made (or tried to make) that the only approved way of getting psilocybin. In both cases consumers aren't going to be making their own ketamine or psilocybin. They're going to have to rely on companies to sell it to them. Sure, they could theoretically grow or pick mushrooms but growing mushrooms is time and effort intensive, so it'll probably only ever be a hobby among a minority of users, and picking mushrooms can be dangerous and is also time consuming. So realistically most users will just be buying those too. My hope is that people will form cooperatives and non-profit organizations to provide these sacred and healing substances for people who need them, while making little or no profit but still keeping the process viable.

aleksandrm 5y ago

If anyone care to elaborate, does it only mean you will not be prosecuted if they find you in possession of psychedelics, or will this be fully legal where you can buy it from stores/dispensaries?

user3939382 5y ago

Psychedelics should be legal, and most people should stay away from them until we have high-quality research on them and someone with credentials in psychiatry or medicine instructs otherwise. These drugs are very powerful and can make permanent and potentially severe changes to your mind. I fear that the push for legalization might be interpreted by some as either encouragement to try them or a signal that they're not as serious as they are.

foolfoolz 5y ago
“acid used to be so much better back when it was illegal and people took it seriously” get off my lawn
pmoriarty 5y ago
"Psychedelics should be legal, and most people should stay away from them until we have high-quality research on them and someone with credentials in psychiatry or medicine instructs otherwise." I'm not convinced that having to have permission or advice from the medical community is the only legitimate way these substances should be used. There are strong cases to be made for their religious or spiritual use, and for simple cognitive liberty -- the right of everyone to alter their consciousness how they see fit, for any reason they like, without needing to get permission from anyone. On the religious/spiritual side, many of these substances are sacred to a lot of people who are otherwise healthy and who shouldn't need a doctor's permission to exercise their religion (in the widest sense of the term that is closer to "spirituality", not just in the narrow sense of being an organized religion similar to the Judeo-Christian faiths). There are already religious exemptions for religious use of peyote and ayahuasca, and I see no reason why every other psychedelic couldn't get similar exemptions. It's possible psychedelic mushrooms will be the next substance so exempted, though I'm unaware of any serious efforts currently under way to do that. "These drugs are very powerful and can make permanent and potentially severe changes to your mind." This is absolutely true (though usually the changes are temporary -- most people fall back in to old habits before long, even if they've had a very powerful experience). Everyone should definitely educate themselves as much as possible about any substance they take, and about how to do so as safely and constructively as possible (which is usually also the most enjoyable way to use them too). However, we should also acknowledge that driving a car can also make permanent and potentially severe changes in your mind (though, unlike psychedelics, such if such changes happen they're almost always negative). Yet people drive all the time, knowing they could get in to an accident and suffer brain damage or death, which many do. Skydiving, scuba diving, parachuting, pretty much every physical sport has a risk of brain damage, injury, or death associated with it, yet most people play all but the riskiest of these without giving them much thought. Despite occasional accidents and risks most people don't obsess over or try to ban participation in them. Instead we try to focus on ways to make them safer.

RayVR 5y ago

I don't know what the right thing(tm) is here but I do know I've seen people on psychedelics do things they never would have otherwise done. Just one example: Jumping from a third story balcony. He was lucky to only break both legs. The people that argue for decriminalizing/legalizing all of these drugs are usually the same people that argue firearms should be banned based on a bunch of arguments that could easily be used to argue against drugs. Ultimately, now that I have children, I can't imagine living in California. The decisions they make feel "progressive" but result in more harm and a decline in the quality of life for many people.

s1artibartfast 5y ago
The point is to transition the responsibility from the government to the parent and individual. My fairly libertarian perspective is that it is the job of the parent and induvial to educate themselves and make choices about risky behavior that only impacts themselves. If you want to take up base jumping, seeing how many hamburgers you can eat a day, or simply kill yourself, YOU should decide what your priorities are. Someone can make utilitarian arguments all day long about what laws would optimize the quality of life, but this ultimately places the needs of the society over the individual. Please teach your children about the risks of drugs, and not rely on the government to control their actions instead.
pmoriarty 5y ago
"I've seen people on psychedelics do things they never would have otherwise done. Just one example: Jumping from a third story balcony. He was lucky to only break both legs." People do stupid shit like that (and much worse) on alcohol all the time. Yet most people are rarely as worried about alcohol availability as they are about the availability of psychedelics... why is that?
- stkdump 5y ago
  The argument I hear is that alcohol is an exception due to historical/cultural reasons. If alcohol would have started to become widely available/used as recently as most illegal drugs, if would probably be prohibited.

excalibur 5y ago

Why exclude peyote?

jcims 5y ago

Rick Doblin just on Lex Fridman’s podcast: https://youtu.be/2tUiLxtrLxk https://youtu.be/2tUiLxtrLxk

partomniscient 5y ago
Thanks for that. I'm hugely impressed by Rick's long term commitment and navigation of the political lanscape and like that he's more interested in how can we make the world a better place given the constraints we have approach makes him worth a lot more than the early wave noise makers like Leary and McKenna both of who kind of fostered the environment he grew in/threw. The fact he foresaw things and acted on them accordingly at a relatively young age is amazing. I think ultimately he'll have a larger lasting impact on the world than either of them, (but is also enabled by them) but possibly be less remembered? It also just highlights the problems with the capitalist approach to individual and global health. I think capitalism is just coming to terms with its problems as a result of profit motive rather than value or health motive. If you play out the scenarios: Do you want to live in a world where a few rich people have happy lives because the masses have unhappy lives (focus on profit over outcome) OR do you want to live in a world where focus on outcome over profit results in happy lives, but the people in power making the decisions don't get particularly rich? The best possibile lifestyle is in scenario 1, the best average lifestyle is in scenario 2. Help, help, I feel like I'm in a prisoners dilemma experiment.