At some point isnât the sane path forward legalizing the original substances? Marijuana doesnât cause traumatic brain injury . That poor kid should have been able to just smoke a joint if she wanted to experiment. Donât even get me started on bathsalt zombies. The Nixon era war on drugs needs to finally end.
Some one stop this! They arenât paying any taxes on these drugs! Stick to tobacco and alcohol, kids!
Goodness me, Ban Ki!
Iâm so glad that the UN has done such a bang-up job at âpeaceâ and âhuman rightsâ and âpreventable childhood diseasesâ that it now has time to fret about the fact that novel psychoactives donât have an âinternational frameworkâ of their very ownâŚ
Seriously guys, try a sense of perspective, it might help depress you about the correct things.
I hope someone is keeping track of how nasty cannabis derivative use declines as states legalize pot.
Hurray for the inevitable outcome of the war on drugs. I sure am glad we have spent so much money to increase drug use and violence. Smashing success. 
The War on Drugs has failed on every measure imaginable, save one: funding.
As far as law enforcement is concerned, that is the only metric that counts 
Turns out the war on drugs was the first startup.
Iâm curious about the real risks of these new substances. What if we could invent a âsafe alcoholâ that doesnât impact your health and can be turned off for your drive home? People are working on this.
Both of the stories you link feel like the standard drug warfare propaganda. They lack evidence.
Still best to steer clear of experimental substances though, given the uncertainties involved.
What total and utter dog shit. Why does the market have nasty substances floating around it? Because the law has made it so. You could kill the vast majority of drug abuse overnight. Step 1, allow recreational drugs. Step 2, test recreational drugs for safety and chemical addictiveness, ban the most vile, and (this is the really important step) allow the oneâs that are pose minimal risks, and cover them with safety labels that describe the real risks (if any). Step 3, watch as the war on drugs essentially ends and human suffering rapidly declines.
Will some out there go do crystal meth over something that gets you high, cost loss, is safer, but doesnât fry you as badly? Probably, but they will be in the vast minority, in the same way most people donât go to bootleggers, but they still do technically exist. You would free police up to fight the truly nasty stuff and far more importantly, give illegal drugs competition.
Illegal drugs exist in a world without competition from anything other than alcohol. If you want to go have a nice trip, there is literally no alternative to illegal drugs. The result is that illegal drugs, which are horribly overpriced, win out. The real cost of of a trip is a buck or two. The street cost for a serving of some harmless shrooms is something more like $30.
Legalize recreational drugs so that people can test them and work on safe alternatives. Keep even mildly dangerous drugs legal so that people stop dying of impurities, which are, by far, the most common reason for drug deaths. Starve criminals of their funding. Watch as the world gets better.
That, or go fight another worthless war on synthetic drugs. I bet you will totally win it this time.
There are a few horror stories, such as the discovery of MTPT - a drug that selectively kills dopaminergenic neurons and induces Parkinsonâs symptoms, which is an impurity created in bad synthesis of MPPP, a drug like heroin. Itâs fascinating that certain MAO-I antidepressants protect against the toxic effects of MPTP, but itâs not the kind of thing that I want to be a guinea pig for.
We have relatively safe recreational drugs with low risks of physical dependency, e.g. cannabis, MDMA. Except for fringe psychonauts, thereâs little reason to experiment with taking the Sigma Aldrich back catalog. The classification and proscription of drugs should be made on the basis of the medical harm they cause. Strongly addictive opiates probably need to stay illegal, because we shouldnât have products that create physical dependency. but cannabis and MDMA could be policed through confiscation on discovery, or civil fines - the old maxim, donât get caught would do just fine. Itâs not in the interests of society to stuff jails with people convicted of trivial drugs offences. It is in the interests of the prison service and the police, because to them itâs just business.
These 300 odd new drugs are the direct result of an overly zealous drug policy, theyâre arguably more hazardous (we just donât know what theyâll do, if theyâre carcinogens, etc) than the relatively safe drugs the government outlaws today.
I expect thereâll be new discoveries along the lines of Parkinsons caused by MTPT from the botched synthesis and the novel compounds being brought in as novel recreational drugs.
Star Trekâs âSynthaholâ Sure, Iâd go for it, after testing and from regulated sources.
We arenât talking about pharma grade chemistry here, more likely some guy mixing up batches in his garage using whatever chemicals happen to be cheapest at the autoparts and industrial cleaning supply stores. The lack of quality control, accurate labeling, and difficulties extant in human testing are going to mean any evidence gathered is from incidents such as those I pointed out.
Iâm not sure what evidence you are looking for? The bathsalt zombie phenom is fairly well known at this point, as are adverse reactions to synthetic marijuana.
Are you aware of any incidents in which a person has smoked a bong bowl and received a massive brain injury? Problems associated with cocaine and amphetamines are well documented, but I would still recommend a young person who is determined to experiment with them go with the real deal rather than bathsalts, wouldnât you?
Pretty pills.
So, Iâm wondering what percentage of these might actually be harmful, and what percentage might be interesting and entertaining as all hell.
Inquiring minds want to know.
LARPing on the rise as a result.
This isnât a thing btw.
- Erowid
- Silk Road
The only one Iâve had that would classify as such was 2ci and that was entirely fun and for me without any negative side effects. Like âcalm acidâ I guess.
Rather than the current treadmill of laws, they could just solve the problem in one fell swoop by banning euphoria. Program those ubiquitous security cams to recognize smiles.
I understand that but casual use like that ends up misinforming the general publicâs opinion, especially considering it turns out that in all the âzombieâ episodes the perp had not consumed anything marketed as bath salts, or they had consumed them in combination with handfuls of other traditional illicit drugs and had not slept in days.
Itâs the same as âIf you take LSD youâll jump off a building because youâll think you can flyâ stereotype. Not informative, potentially based on an event that didnât occur and likely to shape the opinion of those who are too lazy to go read for themselves (most people).
