In this week’s Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe and Kyle have a serious discussion about abuse in psychedelics, talk about upcoming conferences, and even cover some news. 

They’re both attending Wonderland this November 8-9th in Miami (and now both on panels too?), so they start the show by excitedly talking about that (use our affiliate link here to buy tickets to attend or stream at home).

But then things turn more serious, with discussion of the recent accusations of abuse against two prominent figures in this space by friend of the show, Will Hall – something you may have been wondering when we’d address (and which Joe wrote about in yesterday’s blog). They talk about the frustrations of not knowing what to do with stories people have confided in them, the complications of sexual energies coming out in psychedelic sessions, the cult-like mentality of protecting abusive facilitators, the politics of becoming a narc, the financial dangers of defamation, and how the best way to tremendously improve safety in psychedelic work would be to end the drug war.

And they cover some news: Bank of America canceling the account of the Scottsdale Research Institute likely due to their research of psychedelics; Prime Minister Boris Johnson considering legalizing psilocybin (which is actually pretty newsworthy); and legalization progress in Luxembourg, Switzerland, and East Hampton, Massachusetts.

Notable Quotes

“Going to bed at night knowing that I’m keeping my mouth quiet; is that complicity?” -Joe

“At a certain point, you will become that elder that you were seeking for guidance, given diligent effort and careful attention to detail and a lot of integrity. Those things can really add up to you becoming the elder that you were seeking in somebody else.” -Joe

“By doing this stuff, often, you are breaking the law and you expose yourself to a lot of legal risk. And by people inviting you into their world, they’re exposing themselves to tremendous amounts of legal risk. So there has to be this trust, and as soon as the trust is gone, what the fuck is left?” -Joe

“To feel good about yourself years later; the trick is to have integrity now, so you know you handled that situation to the best of your ability.” -Joe

“Don’t touch people without consent. If you’re going to do something where you’re touching people, make sure you have a lot of conversations (pre-dosing) about it. Maybe you need to totally re-vision how you’re doing underground intake. Maybe it needs to be a lot longer and you need to charge a little bit more to be able to allow for that kind of informed consent.  …Be very careful, please. Very, very careful — over the line with consent. Overboard with consent.” -Joe

Links

Buy Wonderland ticket here (use code: PSYCHEDELICSTODAY for 20% off)

Vote for us (once a day!) for the Microdose awards! 

Madinamerica.com: Ending The Silence Around Psychedelic Therapy Abuse

Medium.com/@willhall: Psychedelic Therapy Abuse: My Experience with Aharon Grossbard, Francoise Bourzat… and Their Lawyers

Crazywisefilm.com

Psychedelics Today: Matthew Remski – Cultic Mechanisms and After Effects of High Demand Group Life

Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town, by Jon Krakauer

Psychedelics Today: Dr. Daniela Peluso – Guidelines for the Awareness of Sexual Abuse in Ayahuasca Ceremony

Marijuanamoment.net: Bank Of America Cancels Account Of Marijuana And Psychedelics Research Institute Registered With DEA

Bbc.com: Boris Johnson to consider calls to legalise magic mushroom drug psilocybin

Hightimes.com: Luxembourg to Become First EU Country to Legalize Cannabis Cultivation and Consumption

Lenews.ch: Swiss government moves closer to legalising cannabis

Wbur.org: Easthampton is the fourth city in Mass. to vote to decriminalize psychedelics

Dreamshadow Webinar Series

Meetdelic.com

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Navigating Psychedelics

In this episode, Joe interviews Hadas Alterman, Serena Wu, and Adriana Kertzer: three lawyers who came together to form Plant Medicine Law Group, a law firm serving the cannabis and psychedelic space.  

They discuss their individual paths towards psychedelics and each other, who they hope to serve and work with through the firm, adversarial relationships within the psychedelic ecosystem, and what they’re most excited about in the future, ranging from bringing psychedelic knowledge to traditional Chinese frameworks to working on a Measure 110-inspired decriminalization plan for New York. 

They also talk about the problems with “manels” and “wanels” dominating the event circuit, Tina Fey, law accepting the concept of emotional harm, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the idea of using psychedelics for dispute resolution cases, and the issues with bringing new religious exercises and concepts to judges who came from traditions and viewpoints based only on the three major religions.  

Notable Quotes

“For me, being Chinese American, I don’t see a lot of Asians in the psychedelic space, and it was hard for me to come forward and be public about coming out with this law firm as well as coming out with my own story about my experiences. But the thing is, I thought: If I’m not saying something and I’m waiting for someone else to say it, then I can wait a very long time. So instead of waiting, why don’t I become that person that I’m hoping to model after or look up to?” -Serena

“If we’re not all here exchanging value within the market, for goodness sake, what are we doing?” -Hadas

“I really hope to see, one day, for certain types of disputes, psychedelic-assisted dispute resolution. I can see this working really well with certain types of family law. I would be very interested to see this in corporate settings, although I think we’re a ways off. I just feel like this basic underlying concept of oneness is inherently at odds with the traditional Western legal system because when it’s you against someone else, that’s bifurcated- that’s two. So what would the law look like if we weren’t two; if we were really treating each other as one?” -Hadas

“I’ve been compiling a list of references to psychedelics in contemporary television shows, movies, music, and fashion, and I think that we’re really seeing a moment in which, on the negative side, you have a mental health care crisis and real proof that the current medical system is failing us and that SSRIs are not the only answer; and on the other hand, you’re seeing cultural production that is normalizing or creating curiosity around psychedelics, such that a book like Michael Pollan’s [is] not landing on an empty table of cultural production. There’s a lot that’s happening, even in music videos, that makes it so that a book like that creates a tipping point (but it’s not the only thing that creates a tipping point) that then creates a kind of momentum that, in my opinion, creates legal change.” -Adrianna

Links

Plantmedicinelaw.com

Twitter: @law_plant

Adrianakertzer.com

Instagram: @womeninpsychedelics

Instagram: @jewwhotokes

Chacruna’s Community Forum Series: Why Religion Matters: The Need for Faith-Specific Psychedelic Ritual.com replay (the event happened in March)

NYMHA: New Yorkers for Mental Health Alternatives (previously Democratize Healing)

Psychedelic Bar Association

Summit at Sea

Tokerpoker.com

About Hadas Alterman, Adriana Kertzer, and Serena Wu

Hadas Alterman is an Israeli-American attorney, born in Jerusalem and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area. She has a J.D. from Berkeley Law and a B.A. in Community Studies/Agriculture & Social Justice from the University of California at Santa Cruz. Prior to founding Plant Medicine Law Group, she worked with a leading cannabis law firm in San Francisco. Hadas was the Policy Director of NYMHA, an organization that she co-founded that successfully lobbied for the introduction of a New York bill to decriminalize psilocybin by statute, and is a Board Member of the Psychedelic Bar Association. She also serves on the Equity Subcommittee of the Oregon Psilocybin Advisory Board.

Serena Wu is a Chinese-American lawyer, born in Hainan and raised in Los Angeles. She has a J.D. from Harvard University Law School and a B.A. in Media Studies from University of California, Berkeley. Serena began her legal career at Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP in New York City as a litigation associate, and is deeply committed to increasing equitable access to alternative healing, including psychedelic plant medicines. She is the founder of @womeninpsychedelics, an Instagram account that showcases the contributions, voices, and experiences of women in the psychedelics space, and Asian Psychedelics Society (“APS”), a group dedicated to discussions about psychedelics and mental health in the AAPI community.

Adriana Kertzer is a Brazilian-American attorney, born and raised in São Paulo. Adriana has a J.D. from the Georgetown University Law Center, a B.A. from Brown University in Judaic Studies and International Relations, and an M.A. from Parsons The New School for Design. She began her legal career as a corporate associate on Simpson Thacher & Bartlett’s Latin American capital markets team. She was Senior Advisor to the Senior Deputy Chairman at the National Endowment for the Arts under President Obama, is on the board of Doctors for Cannabis Regulation, and is the author of the book Favelization: The Imaginary Brazil in Contemporary Film, Fashion and Design. She is passionate about Jewish psychedelic culture, leads the interfaith working group Faith+Psychedelics, and founded @jewwhotokes, an Instagram account that explores relationships with cannabis and psychedelics in the Jewish community. 

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Navigating Psychedelics

In today’s Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe and Kyle sit down and discuss recent items in the news, including the passing of Tav Sparks; author, therapist, co-director of Grof Transpersonal Training, and creator of “Movie Yoga,” and scientist Jordi Riba; one of the early pioneers of ayahuasca research and one of the first ever to bring it into the lab. 

They discuss the ayahuasca episode of the new Netflix docuseries “Unwell,” and 2 articles from Marijuana Moment: psychedelic activists in Oakland creating a guideline for plant medicine healing ceremonies and the new initiative to allow for legal use in controlled settings, and 4 state attorney generals and 50 current and former law enforcement officials sending a letter to Congress endorsing a federal marijuana legalization bill after a recent poll showed that 62% of likely voters support it. As Joe says, “It’s about time… 20 years ago.”

And lastly, they discuss Bright Minds Biosciences’ recent tweet claiming that the future is in what they’re working on: modifying molecules in psilocybin to reduce trip times from 4-6 hours to 60-90 minutes. While this could be huge for people who can’t safely partake in longer trips, and more specifically for sufferers of cluster headaches, they wonder about intention: is this for the betterment of mankind or just for profit and headlines? Isn’t sitting with the trip part of the healing? Isn’t integration afterward even more important? Is this a new tool/solution, or a band-aid? Is it all of the above? 

This leads to Kyle sharing that a friend of his recently committed suicide, and the reminder that we all need to practice self-care- it’s never been more important than it is now in our current disconnected, online, fearful, COVID lives- even the smallest effects of what’s going on can take a big psychological toll. Remember to take care of yourselves, folks. 

Notable Quotes

“We just need more and more drugs, but we have to be able to see through this marketing junk so we know how to appropriately contextualize it, and not just fall prey to ‘Oh cool, this is the right drug. This is the best drug, it has the most research behind it.’ Subtext: this just had the most pharma dollars behind it.” -Joe

“Do we really need these fast solutions? I think, on one hand, yes, because some people are definitely going to kill themselves tomorrow. At least 22+ veterans are going to kill themselves tomorrow, which is horrible- and today, and yesterday and every day until we have some sort of good intervention, or the numbers go [down]. It’s really tough. But also, no. Are we just slapping a band-aid on and saying, ‘cool, go get sick again’?” -Joe

“When I think about these quick, band-aid-like substances, like, ‘Oh yes, you can just do your healing.’ Well, this is where the integration comes in. Do you have that support network? Are you living a life that feels like it’s in balance with how you want to live? Are you surrounded by good people? Are you surrounded by that community? Are you taking care of yourself?” -Kyle

“Scary shit, but as a species, we’ll get through it. Individual tragedies don’t usually slow down the machine of human progress. And we’re going to see a continually exciting series of events, I think, for the next 70 years. So I don’t think, you and I, in our lifetime, Kyle, are going to get bored. We might be horrified at times, we might be amazed at times, but we’re going to see slow progress.” -Joe

Links

Tav Sparks’ bio and obituary

Jordi Riba’s obituary

60 Minutes: Researchers experimenting with psychedelics to treat addiction, depression and anxiety

The dark side of wellness: behind a Netflix series on a murky industry

Daniel Moler’s Mothervine

Advocates Unveil Guide For Psychedelic Healing Ceremonies They Hope To Legalize In Oakland

Top State Cops Tell Congress To Legalize Marijuana As New Poll Shows Strong Voter Support

Bright Minds Biosciences’s tweet

brightmindsbio.com

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Navigating Psychedelics

In this episode, Kyle and Joe interview Mike Margolies of Psychedelic Seminars. In the show, they cover topics including guests and conversations from the Psychedelic Seminars, the decriminalization of all drugs, and the importance of allowing psychedelic use to be a part of training therapists for psychedelic therapy.

3 Key Points:

1. Psychedelic Seminars is an educational conversation series deepening awareness of the benefits, risks, and complexities of psychedelics.
2. There are large topics of decriminalizing psilocybin or the movements for ‘decriminalize nature’, but the conversation on decriminalization of all drugs is rare, which is what’s really important.
3. Some companies (MAPS for example) allow the option to use MDMA as a part of their therapist training program while other companies who are training therapists for psilocybin therapy, don’t have the option to use it. This leaves the question, “Should the psychedelic experience be part of the psychedelic therapy training?” 

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• Share us with your friends – favorite podcast, etc
• Join our Facebook group – Psychedelics Today group – Find the others and create community.

Navigating Psychedelics

Show Notes

About Mike

• Mike used to work as a chemical engineer in corporate America, and then he did Ayahuasca
  • When he returned, he thought to himself about what he wanted to do with the rest of his life
  • He took a look at the pulse of the country and looked at what it needed
  • There wasn’t anyone organized locally in Baltimore, so he started Psychedelic Seminars
• Now he is living in the Bay Area, doing events locally
• He has been interviewing people and putting the videos out globally

Psychedelic Seminars

• They will be having some Indigenous people at the seminar
  • It’s hard to get Indigenous people to seminars and conferences, because, what’s in it for them?
• The goal is to ramp up the project and do a seminar every month, where it usually takes place every few months
  • They are doing it all in a home, privately
  • The whole project is donation dependent, they are doing it all for free
  • You can support the mission here
• After Michael Pollan, they did one with Jim Fadiman
• He did another with Ayelet Waldman
  • The talks were on microdosing and the unknowns of microdosing
  • Just because there is no real harms taking a large dose of LSD, doesn’t mean there aren’t any harms taking a low (micro) dose of LSD frequently
  • Mike thinks that the term Jim Fadiman uses is its ‘sub-perceptual’, in that you have a noticeable effect on the mood, but no other way of noticing it

Decriminalization

• Drug Policy tends to stay in the realm of psychedelics only
  • There are large topics of decriminalizing psilocybin or the movements for ‘decriminalize nature’, but no one likes to talk about the decriminalization of all drugs, which is what’s really important
  • Poppy is not considered in decriminalize nature, which is selective nature decriminalization
• It’s not a real decriminalization, it’s just a low priority for law enforcement
• He’s been asking in his conversations, opinions on decriminalizing all drugs
• Different drugs have different risk profiles
• “Just because you’re not using criminal justice as your mechanism for reducing risks of drugs, doesn’t mean you do nothing. The last thing we want to do is add criminalization to those who are already suffering, this is why we should decriminalize all drugs” – Mike
• Laws should be written in terms of what are you not allowed to do, not what you’re allowed to do
  • He is allowed to walk down the sidewalk, but not punch someone he walks past, but the law shouldn’t be to get a license for walking down the street so long as you don’t punch someone
• The communities that are marginalized continue to be marginalized by the drug war

Psychedelic Therapy and Experience with Use

• With MAPS, there is an option to do MDMA as a part of the training
• With psilocybin, at least with Compass Pathways, there is not an option to use psilocybin. Mike says that’s a huge issue
• When you scale treatment, there is the risk of losing the quality of care
  • “We aren’t going to solve the problems of our future by mass distributing psychedelics” – Mike
• The fact that we have such mass amounts of widespread depression, means that we have a deeply ingrained systemic issue at hand
  • Psychedelics treat the symptoms, but we still need to fix the underlying cause
  • “If you are distributing psychedelics, but still exacerbating the same underlying issues, you now have the problem and solution in the same hefty package” – Mike
• “Psychedelic experience is intrinsically something spiritual. How can you guide someone in spiritual practice if you haven’t experienced it yourself?” – Mike
• “Inducing a state intentionally, and guiding someone through a process, its completely unethical to guide someone through a spiritual process that you haven’t been through yourself.” – Mike

New Economy

• Burning man is not a barter economy, it’s a gift economy, where things are given without an expectation of receiving something in return
  • We are far from that economy
• What if we had a world where instead of trying to extract value, we were trying to create value?

Links

Psychedelic Seminars Website

Psychedelic Seminars Patreon

About Mike Margolies

Since 2015, Mark has worked full-time in the psychedelic community, starting and contributing to a number of projects as an event and media producer, connector, and advisor. He is the Founder of Psychedelic Seminars, an educational conversation series deepening awareness of the benefits, risks, and complexities of psychedelics. On the PsychSems stage, he has interviewed a range of leaders including bestselling author Michael Pollan, Dr. James Fadiman and Ayelet Waldman on microdosing, and therapeutic ketamine expert Dr. Raquel Bennett. He started the project in 2015 after returning to his home city of Baltimore to build community for open and honest conversations about psychedelics. The project now operates primarily out of the San Francisco Bay Area and livestreams globally. Through his psychedelic community work in Baltimore, he seeded the Baltimore Psychedelic Society. He has sparked and mentored similar Psychedelic Societies around the world from Washington DC to San Francisco to Portugal. He helped start the Global Psychedelic Network to connect them.

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In this episode, Joe sits down with Kevin Matthews, Campaign Manager of Decriminalize Denver, the group looking to decriminalize magic mushrooms. During the show, they cover topics such as the Right to Try Act, therapeutic success and what it might look like to have Psilocybin decriminalized in Denver.

3 Key Points:

1. Decriminalize Denver’s efforts are aimed to decriminalize Psilocybin Mushrooms in the city of Denver, CO., and are currently getting signatures to be on the May 2019 ballot.
2. The Federal Right to Try Act allows a person with a life-threatening illness to use any substance that has passed phase one clinical trials.
3. There is so much research and data on the benefits of Psilocybin Mushrooms, and being in an age of social media sharing, people are waking up to the idea of mushroom decriminalization.

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• Patreon
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• Join our Facebook group – Psychedelics Today group – Find the others and create community.

Navigating Psychedelics

Show Notes

About Kevin

• Kevin is a part of the group, Decriminalize Denver
  • The group submitted the ballot initiative called the Denver Psilocybin Mushroom Decriminalization Initiative and they are getting signatures to make the May 2019 ballot
• Kevin became interested in mushrooms after leaving as a Cadet at the US Military Academy due to major depression
  • He was interested in Psilocybin Mushrooms impact on depression

Talking Publicly about Psilocybin Use

• “Self-healing from psychedelics” is something most people want to be careful talking about
  • Does it uninspire therapists?
  • Does it ruin the medical model?
• Kevin states that people are afraid to talk about it because they are a schedule 1 substance
  • Those who are willing to take the risk to talk about it are because they believe that mushrooms might have the best impact on them

Right to Try Act

• Kevin knows someone with PTSD and tumors who is prescribed to Psilocybin under the Federal Right to Try Act
  • Anyone who has a life-threatening illness can use any substance that has passed phase one under clinical trials
  • His psychiatrist said that the psilocybin has been nothing short of miraculous in its effects
  • He takes 1.5-2 grams of dried mushrooms every 7-10 days
    It puts him in control of his own protocol
  • Trump just signed the Federal Right to Try Act this summer, Colorado has had their own since 2014

Generational Mushroom Use

• Joe says that the media landscape has really changed in the past few years and so much more research and information is becoming accessible to everyone
• Veterans for Natural Rights group is supporting this mushroom movement
• After the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, a lot of people went underground with their use
  • 30 million people in the country have used psychedelics in the last decade
  • More young people now are using psychedelics than the same age group used psychedelics in the 60’s

Decriminalize Denver

• The goal of the group is to decriminalize the personal use and personal possession of Psilocybin mushrooms, including the propagation of mushrooms for personal use
• “Our main goal with this is to keep individuals out of prison, help our vets, and help our loved ones who suffer from these traumas” – Kevin

Colorado Always Making Progress

• Right now, Colorado state legislature is looking at safe injection sites and different kinds of penalty such as rehab instead of incarceration
  • Joe says Denver is a kind of microcosm of the whole nation, it has an interest in both sides of an issue, instead of just one sided
• “Mushrooms help, in a very profound way. And opening that door is the first step to changing people’s minds, both metaphorically and physically.” – Kevin
  • The medical applications of Psilocybin are huge such as for a stutter, autoimmune issues, anxiety and depression

Talking about Psilocybin

• Kevin says you can’t have a conversation without two opposing sides
  • He is excited for when the conversation starts because there is a ton of points on why Psilocybin is proven to be effective
  • John’s Hopkins said that Psilocybin should at a minimum be a Schedule 4 (same level as prescription sleep aids) source
• Schedule 1 means “no medical value and high risk of abuse”
  • From the clinical research and population studies alone on Psilocybin, we know that’s false

Decriminalize Denver’s Current Focus

• Getting all 5,000 signatures (2,000 so far) by January 7th
• Coalition building, doing some fundraising
• Getting volunteers activated
• After getting all the signatures, then they will be on the ballot. Once on the ballot, the campaign and outreach starts

Using Psilocybin for Therapy

• Joe brings up a story about his teacher Lenny Gibson who had multiple bouts of cancer and is a psychedelic scholar. Lenny was incredibly mad at Tim Leary because he was in cancer support groups and imagines how many more options cancer patients would have for pain if drugs were not made illegal
• Looking at decreasing suffering, it would be special for the Denver population to find relief in anxiety and depression before going into a life-threatening surgery, etc.
• If this turns into a regulatory medical paradigm, licensure is important
  • How do we create the paradigm to open the work in a professional therapeutic manner?

Grand Rounds

• Doctors will get together around a case study and share it within the medical community
  • It’s a way to share and practice case studies organically and internally
• With social media alone 30,000 people can be reached a month
  • Typing in to Google “benefits of mushrooms” brings up a ton of research
• When people hear about John Hopkins, NYU, Harvard, UCLA Medical Center, and all of these companies that have already been doing the research they become more interested
  • Medicalization does not equal rescheduling
  • Carl Hart
• It takes the breaking up of a family after prison time of a drug offense, 7 generations to recover
  • Joe knows of a case where someone in Colorado who got busted for having mushrooms only ended up serving 2 weeks and didn’t get a felony for it
• In 2005 New Mexico Court of Appeal said that cultivation of psilocybin mushrooms does not qualify as the manufacture of a controlled substance, as long as they aren’t dried

Mushrooms are Beneficial, Not Harmful

• How do we ruin fewer lives by legalizing mushrooms and keeping people out from behind bars?
• Mushrooms can put you in touch with yourself and help connect yourself to others

Feedback

• Most of the responses are, “Hell yeah I’m going to sign this!” or “This saved my life”
  • Kevin says when someone says no, it’s all about educating them
• They had 45% support it and 20% maybes

Working with the City

• The bill would include a Psilocybin Mushroom Policy Review Panel, a city level committee made up of health professionals, Police, Denver Sheriff’s office, city attorneys, etc

Final Thoughts

• Kevin wants as many people as possible willing to participate to volunteer
• They will be starting public Q&A twice a month (and live streaming them)

Links

Website
Facebook
Instagram

Check out our online course, “Introduction to Psychedelics”

About Kevin

Kevin Matthews is leading the decriminalization of Psilocybin mushrooms in Denver, Colorado. He and his group of dedicated volunteers are currently collecting signatures to make the May 2019 Ballot.

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Today in the show, Joe talks to Maria Carvalho and Helena Valente, founding members of Kosmicare, a drug testing, and harm reduction service at the Portugal Festival, Boom. Joe talks to Maria and Helena on their personal backgrounds, how they got into Boom, research on recreational use, what harm reduction looks like, and what populations are underserved. Drug use is decriminalized in Portugal, and the focus of risk minimization has been useful in getting the population served versus putting people in prison.

3 Key Points:

1. Kosmicare is a harm reduction and psychedelic emergency service starting at Boom music festival in Portugal. Working to support other events in Europe.
2. Boom is in Portugal, where drugs are decriminalized and drug testing is legal. Drug policy has directly affected the number of emergencies that Boom has had.
3. The Portuguese drug policy has resulted in fewer overdoses, drug-related deaths, and HIV infection. Other countries like the US should consider a drug reform with the current opioid crisis.

Support the show

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• Leave us a review on iTunes
• Share us with your friends – favorite podcast, etc
• Join our Facebook group – Psychedelics Today group – Find the others and create community.

Navigating Psychedelics

Show Notes

About Kosmicare

• Kosmicare is a non-profit organization that looks to transform nightlife culture through humanistic, comprehensive and evidence-based policies and interventions
• They work toward a world where drugs can be used with liberty and wisdom
• Making festivals safe in Europe

About Maria

• Psychologist, graduated in 1999 at University of Porto
• She started working in the field of problematic drug use
  • Growing up in a difficult neighborhood was her purpose for getting into studying psychology and drug use
  • She began focusing on recreational use
  • Her younger brother was into the Electronic Dance scene and positioning himself with using substances
  • She was interested in studying other motivations to use drugs than just using drugs to feed a problem
• She heard an announcement by MAPS in 2008 recruiting volunteers to do work in psychedelic emergency at Boom
  • It was the perfect match considering her interest in psychology and drug use in recreational environments

About Helena

• Helena is a Psychologist who was interested in drug use
• She wanted to have field experience, and she volunteered in a needle exchange program
  • She began working for a harm reduction project to work in recreational settings that needed volunteers
  • She became interested in the potential that drug checking has in the harm reduction strategy
• They are working toward a ‘drop-in’ where people can show up to a permanent space for drug checking and harm reduction

The Numbers

• Over 20,000 people showed up to Kosmicare’s information session
• This year for the first time, Kosmicare had an HPLC (High Performance Liquid Chromatography) to identify LSD and pills
  • They tested over 700 drug samples in 6 days
• Maria says half of the Boom population gets in contact with Kosmicare
  • They serve 1% of the Boom population for psychedelic emergency (about 350 cases out of 35,000 attendees)
  • The episodes usually have to do with psycho-spiritual situations versus just an emergency about the drug taken

Psychedelic Emergencies

• Boom is a transformational festival that hosts attendees from over 50 countries
• Boom is different from Burning Man in that Boom is in Portugal which has a much more legal framework which helps with the services that can be offered
  • Drug policy has directly affected the number of emergencies that Boom has
  • Joe states that there are numbers of regulatory police at Burning Man
  • Kosmicare is included in the entire setup of Boom, which helps reduce the number of scenarios that would cause an emergency at the festival, such as providing shaded areas all over
  • It gets up to 43 degrees Celcius (108 Fahrenheit)
  • But there is a water element so people can refresh themselves
• In the largest dance areas at the festival, they included medical emergency Teepees so attendees could be helped as quickly as possible

Recreational Drug Use

• They did a survey on recreational drug use and most of the respondents said they use drugs in a beneficial way that doesn’t interrupt their lives in a bad way
  • Similarly with Boom attendees, most of them want to use harm reduction techniques so they have positive experiences and don’t develop problems with their drug use
  • Mat Southwell “drug users are calculated risk takers”
  • “The legal framework has a terrible influence on people’s relationship with drugs” – Helena

Lessons Learned

• Maria says they have had many groundbreaking challenges
• In 2016 they had someone die on them while having a psychedelic emergency
  • It made her really question why she was doing this
  • Her first impression was that she was doing this work to save the inexperienced user
  • She was caught off guard by the person who died because they were an experienced user and didn’t taking unadulterated substances
  • “People may go over the top for a wide variety of reasons, it was the biggest lesson I learned working for the Psychedelic Emergency services” – Maria
  • It’s hard to determine people’s ability to calculate risks
  • If the person had collapsed in front of an urban hospital in the city, the Hospital couldn’t have done anything more than what they did at Kosmicare

Collaborations

• Kosmicare has a collaborative relationship with Zendo
• MAPS was hired by Boom to direct the harm reduction services
• They use a lot of Stan Grof techniques for transpersonal psychology
• They are partnered with many other organizations in Europe that are trying to deliver the same type of psychedelic emergency and harm reduction services

The Risks of Drug Policy

• Joe points out that there are so many festivals happening without these services
  • The Rave Act prevents companies from attending festivals because it “harbors” drug use
• In Portugal, the fact that drug use is decriminalized, it opened up a legal framework around harm reduction
  • Portugal is one of the few countries where drug checking is allowed by law
  • The Portuguese drug policy has resulted in fewer overdoses, drug-related deaths, HIV infection, tuberculosis and other things
• Helena says that the US should rethink their drug policy considering the opioid epidemic
  • In Portugal, there were only 12 overdose cases with heroin and opioids

Portugal before the Drug Policy

• In the 80’s, there was a heroin epidemic, which had an epidemic of high infection rates and HIV. This motivated the policy change
  • It was evident that prohibition was not working
• Usually when it affects only poor people, no one cares, but the fentanyl crisis is affecting all sorts of populations

Links

Website
Facebook

Check out this FREE online course, “Introduction to Psychedelics”

About Maria

Maria Carmo Carvalho, Kosmicare Manager, Boom Festival, Portugal, is a Lecturer at the Faculty of Education and Psychology at the Catholic University of Portugal. She researches if the field of psychoactive substance use and has completed a MSc and a PhD at the University of Porto on the field of psychoactive substance use, youth and recreational environments. She is Vice-President of ICEERS and Kosmicare Boom Festival manager since 2012.

About Helena

Helena Valente began working with people that use drugs in 2004, focusing in nightlife settings. Helena has a vast experience in coordinating national and European projects in the drug field. At the moment she is a researcher and PhD. Candidate at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences of the Porto University and founding member of Kosmicare Association.

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During this episode of Psychedelics Today, your host Kyle Buller interviews Stefanie Jones, the Director of Audience Development at the Drug Policy Alliance.

• There are risks and benefits to all drug use.
• Ultimately, you don’t want your teenager to use drugs, but if they do, you want to keep them safe and give them the right information.
• The festival community needs to be so much more aware of opioid overdose and drug checking.

Show Notes

• About Stefanie Jones
  • In her role, she oversees communication and outreach to specific communities on drug use and drug policy topics.
  • Personally runs the DPA music fan program.
  • She works on the Safer Partying program which has four goals:
    • Ending stigma against people who use drugs at festivals, concerts, and clubs.
    • Amending the illicit drug anti-proliferation act – aka The Rave Act.
    • Making drug checking happen in as many places and forms as possible.
    • Stopping the criminalization of party-goers.
    • The DPA is launching a pilot study at a school in Brooklyn with more honest and accurate information about drugs.
  • She’s been working for the Drug Policy Alliance for almost 13 years.
    • Stefanie Jones develops materials that bring us closer to drug policy reform.
  • She works with two different audiences:
    • Parents and educators
    • Drug users at events and concerts.
• Drug education for teenagers and parents goes back a long way at DPA.
  • Marsha Rosenbaum wrote a very famous letter to her son who was about to go into school.
    • She wrote a booklet called “Safety First.” A reality-based approach to teens and drugs.
  • Stefanie Jones put together a harm reduction-based curriculum to be taught in schools.

• How does Safety First differ from DARE?
  • DARE is more of an abstinence-only policy and doesn’t talk about what happens if you do use drugs.
  • Safety First gives abstinence as an option but also gives options to reduce risk if you do choose to use drugs.
    • The program is designed for 14-year-olds, but it makes things like dose information tricky
    • The class introduces the concept of dose and dosage.
  • It talks about drug classes with a lesson specifically devoted to psychedelics.
    • They talk about reagent drug checking.
      • How this works and how it can help you reduce harm.
  • They’re about to do a pilot of Safety First in a school in New York.
    • The program is in multiple sessions- 14 sessions long.
• How was pitching Safety First to the school?
  • They were open to it and looking for something different.
• DPA wanted to put something together that’s not dependent on them, it will be taught by the health teacher.
  • She hopes it replaces DARE.
• How do you think parents will take it?
  • The parents at Bard high school were very into it.
  • There was one parent who didn’t speak up in the meeting but came up to us afterwards.
  • Their curriculum wants to measure critical thinking skills, concrete strategies, etc.
• Some drugs tend to have a lot of positive feelings around them.
  • For example, marijuana and psychedelics.
  • In the psychedelics lesson, they had to talk about the different kinds of mushrooms and what you need to know.
• Which drug classes do you go over?
  • Depressants
  • Stimulants
  • Opioids
  • Psychedelics
  • Marijuana
• There’s material that she uses at festivals that are great.
  • The tripsit chart
  • She started doing safer partying work first.
  • This community doesn’t get a lot of outreach, a lot of what they do isn’t problematic.
  • Stefanie Jones partners with Insomniac (EDC and other similar events)
    • The idea is to have a place where someone can get drug information and sexual information.
  • There are young people who are trained to walk the space and identify medical issues.
• What’s one main concern you’ve been seeing in the festival scene?
  • With Project #OpenTalk, the kids are so young going to their first festival.
    • They’ve had little or crappy drug education.
  • The festival community needs to be so much more aware of opioid overdose and drug checking.
  • One of the goals is addressing the stigma around drug use.
  • Another goal is providing accurate, honest information regarding harm reduction.
  • The third goal is having drug checking available and accessible.
  • The fourth goal is around policy reform.
  • De-criminalizing drugs will fix a lot of problems.
• DPA wants to create supervised consumption spaces along with drug checking.
• How do you talk to parents about harm reduction?
  • The founder goes first to the issue of safety.
  • Ultimately, you don’t want your teenager to use drugs, but if they do, you want to keep them safe and give them the right information.
• Is there anything exciting coming up with DPA?
  • Make revisions of the Safety-First program based on data.
  • Will be testing it in the fall with a school in the Bay area.
  • Hoping to expand information about psychedelics into the party arena.
  • Doing a week-long trip to Portugal to see what decriminalization works.
• Any last thoughts to throw out?

Follow @musicfandpa on Twitter.

Resources Mentioned

• Psychedelicstoday.teachable.com
• Bluebird Botanicals
• TRIPSIT Chart
• DPA Website
  • Safety First
  • Safer Partying 

Stefanie Jones

Stefanie Jones is director of audience development at the Drug Policy Alliance, based in New York. In this role she oversees communication and outreach to specific communities on drug use and drug policy topics, including on novel psychoactive substances (NPS) and DPA’s youth drug education work.  She personally runs the Music Fan program, which introduces harm reduction principles and drug policy alternatives to partygoers, public health officials and city nightlife regulators across the U.S.

In her prior role within the organization as an event manager, she produced four progressively larger editions of the biennial International Drug Policy Reform Conference, as well as numerous local policy conferences, fundraisers and coalition-building meetings.

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It is the week of the 4th of July. That means the United States is celebrating the signing of the Declaration of Independence, breaking free from the British Empire, and becoming an independent nation.  With the holiday underway, it seems like a great time to reflect on the concept of freedom (including cognitive liberty) and what it means to each and every one of us.

In honor of Independence Day and the Declaration of Independence, here is a quote by Terence McKenna:

In this episode, Joe and Kyle reflect on the concept of personal freedom, cognitive liberty, and the impact that the War on Drugs has on the American people. It seems to be the consensus that the War on Drugs is failing. The policy has huge negative consequences on people across the globe, and significantly marginalizes minority groups and people of color.

Cognitive Liberty

As psychedelic research continues to progress in the academic and scientific realm, many people are still subjected to arrest and imprisonment because of this failed policy. Kyle and Joe share their thoughts about the pursuit for cognitive liberty and personal freedom.

The unexamined life is not worth living – Socrates

Do you think that exploring one’s own consciousness, whether through plants or other drugs, be illegal? Why should a person have to “ask permission” to have an experience with their own body, mind, and spirit?

Let us know your thoughts about this topic.

Joe and Kyle also talk about their new upcoming course, Navigating Psychedelics: Lessons on Self-Care & Integration. Be sure to check out this course and sign up TODAY!

We are giving away a SPECIAL offer just for the 4th of July! Receive 10% off our Earl-Bird special with the coupon code “freedom” when you check out. You do not want to miss this offer!

Show Links

• Cacao Ceremonies 
• Center for Cognitive Liberty & Ethics 
• Kids for Cash
• The Road to Eleusis: Unveiling the Secret of the Mysteries
• The Big Chew Podcast – Psychedelics, Healing, and Transformation
• Confessions of an Economic Hitman
• United Nations and World Health Organisation call for drugs to be decriminalised
• Tennessee man, woman charged after getting lost while high on magic mushrooms, calling 911
• Ohio 3-Strike Penalty Proposal 
• Burning Man Drug Testing
• Gabor Maté M.D.- The Body Says No 
• Bessel van der Kolk M.D. – The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma 
• Carl Hart – High Price: A Neuroscientist’s Journey of Self-Discovery That Challenges Everything You Know About Drugs and Society (P.S.)
• New York’s “Stop & Frisk” Policy
• Flakka 
  • PVP (‘‘flakka’’): a new synthetic cathinone invades the drug arena
• Psychedelic Experience 

Geoffery Schwartz presents: Cognitive Liberty and Entheogenic Freedom for ERIE