We're starting to see the beginning of the backlash that the psychedelic community has been dreading since the start of the so-called Psychedelic Renaissance ab

We're starting to see the beginning of the backlash that the psychedelic community has been dreading since the start of the so-called Psychedelic Renaissance about a decade ago. Everyone in the field knows that there'll inevitably be some adverse effects among some (as far as we know, small minority) of participants in these studies and users of psychedelics as a whole. We also know that both the media and many media consumers love sensationalism and mud-throwing, whatever the facts may be. So far the overwhelming majority of psychedelic studies have been enormously positive, but we also know that can't last forever and realistically speaking there are bound to be some negative effects. This was crystal clear long before the Psychedelic Renaissance even started. We've been lucky that since the beginning of the Psychedelic Renaissance the media attention has been almost completely positive and curious. But that too will likely change. These Cover Story podcasts are a recent example of the start of this change. The question is whether such negative media attention will derail the Psychelic Renaissance and whether we'll go back to the dark ages of complete prohibition and mainstream terror at the prospect of using psychedelics. At this point that doesn't seem likely, and stories like this will probably just cause the scientists and organizations involved to get more serious about safety and the general public to stop (erroneously) regarding psychedelics and the people involved in the scene as panaceas that can do no wrong. At the same time, I don't think we're at the peak of the hype curve, and as more people try psychedelics there'll be a lot more influencers and true believers who'll hype them to the sky. We might even get another Timothy Leary or Ken Kesey.