From: Eugen Leitl (eugen@leitl.org)
Date: Sat Oct 19 2002 - 16:12:55 MDT
On Sat, 19 Oct 2002, Samantha Atkins wrote:
> Nonsense. Some of the drugs on the list, like pot and various
> psychedelics, don't kill, aren't addicting and have really
This cannot be repeated often enough. Those of us who are occasional,
informed users (I do enjoy my occasional dosage of psychedelics and
designer drugs) know how far the party line deviates from reality.
What kills in practice is usage of unknown drugs of unknown potency by
uninformed users. The current idiotic 'drug war' policy thus results in
palpable casualties in the trenches, by creating a society of uninformed
users exposed to an array of unknown drugs of random potency. Thanks a
lot, drug warriors. I hope you won't see the results of your policy on
some of your own children.
> important therapeutic uses. The case against them was grossly
I wouldn't make such a strong case, though e.g. THC appears to be
unexpectedly, surprisingly effective for chronical pain cases.
> inflated from "Reefer Madness" on.
>
> Most of the kids in the US as well as we aging children of the
> 60s knows that you cannot trust government sponsored reports
> about currently illegal drugs. We've been lied to too many times.
The results in fact completely backfire: having been lied to in small
matters, the users blanket reject the official information sources even
when those offer accurate, valuable information. This is not mere
conjecture. I'm paraphrasing actual opinions from the trenches.
> No, drugs are not "usually" bad. Society is based on many
> things, not much of it so "rational". Psychedelics do not
> destroy rationality but they do take you, for a while, to what
> is beyond what you thought was the border of the rational and
> beyond the rational itself. Does that leave only "irrational".
While I consider this most just as advanced entertainment, some of the
more disruptive aspects can be useful to break routine, and to gain a
fresh perspective on matters.
> Nope, I found there are other possibilities. There is the
> post-rational. I spent quite a bit of time in my arguably
> misspent youth finding out both personally and through working
> switchboards and clinics and observing others. I have also read
> quite a bit on the subject.
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