...we're gonna have to re-evaluate old concepts of free speech and democracy.
Everyone's on anti depressants/sleepers/speed, the chuds are blasting testosterone out their ears until they stroke, weed is everywhere and as potent as heroin.
Add the perfect dopamine delivery system, a political internet economy modeled on the addictive technology of vegas slot machines.
It's gonna have an effect on the national psyche.
Is it a partial explanation for Q?
Shout out to the divorced, biker, small business tyrant, dad...caught with test injectables and thc edibles, and guns, after the Capitol. Just the only man for the moment.
*removed externally hosted image*
edit: gotta step away for now. will come back to this. Feels like this post was misunderstood, or I just didn't make enough sense. Hope it won't make things awkward when i slide into selected PMs asking for a plug 😀
I can have little a figure of speech.
Shit is 30% THC compared to 10% in the sixties and we're finding ways to get higher daily.
On the macro level it's gonna have an effect.
Just the wildly increased availability is gonna have a societal effect.
It was much lower than 10% in the 1960s too, more like 1%
But THC at any concentration is not more potent than heroin, both because they have different effects & mechanisms of action but also because heroin is a semisynthetic & far more physically addictive & potentially deadly in small amounts
shit, that just adds to my point
it was a figure of speech, but when I'm fully couch locked the outward appearance is the same. Inward too probably.
the weed in the 1960s wasn't very potent, but that doesn't mean the weed now is more "dangerous", just better
no one has ever been recorded to overdose on THC in thousands of years, still... even with these 35% strains. the same is not true for heroin
heroin as a chemical today is not "better", because it's the same chemical first synthesized in the 1800s, but international cartels & global trade routes definitely increased the purity of street heroin since the "French Connection" period
it's good that cannabis today is stronger & more hybridization & selection has occurred, that means people are using these plants & getting benefits from them and human desire for aesthetics & finding new uses of the plant mean more potential for therapeutic breakthroughs.
opium poppy plants also have important uses, but making heroin is not one of them
angry afghan farmer noises
bhang & hashish are always potent because they are concentrated forms, but the average cannabis plant potency until the 1970s was less than 2%. Even in the mid-1990s, studies show that cannabis percentage was less than 4% on average in samples confiscated by the DEA
Indica strains from Afghanistan & Pakistan & elsewhere were more gooey and have other unique characteristics from sativa & ruderalis, but it wasn't until indoor growing & hybridization really took off in Northern CA & then in Holland in the 1990s that cannabis THC percentage skyrocketed, and much of that within the last 20 years
think you're missing the point. I never said dangerous, just massively more psychoactive, with all the good and bad that comes with that.....and people are smoking it erryday from age 15.
the point is that it's likely gonna have an effect on the national psyche that may be initially intangible, but, when mixed with other factors, could manifest as something like Qanon.
drugs aren't weapons or evil spirits. the drugs themselves can't be "good" or "bad", only the psychological reaction that individuals have... reactions which are largely individuated & dependent on personal & societal/cultural & many other factors
drugs can be triggers for psychopathologically predisposed individuals with these issues, but so can bad break ups or employment issues or physical health issues or family trauma.
we as individuals are reflected in these things just as much if not more than the drugs themselves. Much of the real "permanent" or lasting psychological impact on those who use drugs is just cultural baggage & stigma & personal input. we never step in the same river twice, and we take the grand total of our entire lives & impressions & assumptions into all of these experiences.
many nations have high usage rates of cannabis. people were having "freakouts" on the 1% cannabis of the 1960s too. psychological issues aren't skyrocketing in recreational marijuana states
i honestly think that more potent cannabis& more pure/safe drug use in general leads to psychologically and physically safer people.
in fact, much recent research has centered on evidence that cannabis use actually improves people's mental health & outlook & life satisfaction levels
https://www.apa.org/monitor/2018/12/marijuana
"These studies have found that the patients, who used cannabis to treat a range of medical problems including anxiety, had largely improved cognitive performance, reduced clinical symptoms and anxiety-related symptoms as well as a reduced use of conventional medications, including opioids, benzodiazepines, and other mood stabilizers and antidepressants."
Meaning strong weed helps people get off the other less helpful legal/illegal drugs
you can just smoke less of the strong stuff lol... that means less illegal/legal purchases & less smoke in your lungs & more use from the commodity
we also can't stigmatize people's consumption of these things, I don't agree that a heroin addict should turn to crime & violence to satiate their habit, but I also don't want to criminalize or demonize the individual stuck in that situation.
drugs don't cause QAnon. In fact I think a dose of some potent entactogen & a real struggle session is overdue for some of those people
safety, as in a Brave New World eutopia
Cannabis use is entirely consistent with neoliberal mindfulness, that's why it's BAD
we know that prohibition leads to no reductions in drug use & unsafe/impure drugs & increases in organized criminal elements violently cornering the market
cannabis use isn't anything about mindfulness lol, what are you talking about? seems like a bit hehe
cannabis use is over 5,000 years old
cannabis is just as vital to humans' agricultural history & future as any other cash crop or medicinal plant
You're focussing on a narrow point.
I'm talking about a much broader phenomenon, if I'm correct.
Recreationals are only part of the picture. For example, testosterone use is widespread among middle aged chuds now.
Test makes you more aggressive, energetic, irrational, unpredictable etc etc. Men that normally would chill out after forty are maybe much more likely to storm a Capitol when they're jacked on it.
Individually, it's not an issue, but when it reaches a critical mass in society it's gonna have unintended consequences.
Instead of the normal proportion of men in society behaving like 20 year olds because of high test, you now can add a large cohort of middle aged men to that proportion. Trump and all the other ancient ghouls too. It's what all the "anti aging"/vitality clinics prescribe.
cannabis use isn't the same as testosterone misuse.
testosterone misuse & illegal use of steroids isn't something I personally condone, but I am not going to call the substance itself evil. testosterone is just a hormone, it's inert on its own. and not all juice heads are violent. CTE & brain injuries are more correlated with that
When we're talking about psychoactive drug use, then we should talk about the legal drugs first. Caffeine & alcohol and nicotine are all drugs & all have marked effect on temperament & produce addiction in varying degrees. Yet they are completely accepted today within the culture, and newer methods are found all the time to repackage & resell the same old drugs. We have to look at the cultural context here and see that individuals are influenced by inculcated "demands" & "wants" that are transmitted from society
"Low T" in America is a marketing ploy lol, and I think a lot of these boomers just aren't culturally or emotionally equipped to go peacefully into their golden years, because our maddening & self-deluded consumer society prevents this.
The cultural context around stigmatizing& prohibiting cannabis & psychedelic drugs is a 180degree about face from how things like Testosterone & Oxycodone & Paxil & thalidomide other "legal" drugs were pushed on Americans
much more potent and available recreational psychoactive drugs + widespread test use + widespread SSRI use + endemic ONLINE political dopamine addiction + LSC alienation + white status anxiety + plummeting education levels
add these together and it may be an explanation for the crazy quick adoption of Qanon by the chuds.
thats the point.
not whether weed is "evil."
I just included information that said that cannabis use has been linked to reductions of benzodiazepine & SSRI & opioid misuse
IMO the explanation for the adoption of Qanon by chuds has little to nothing to do with psychoactive drugs, it's much more to do with the last few things you listed there.
There are material/socioeconomic reasons, as well as cultural/sociological/misapplied identitarian reasons, but there is also just the nature of mass media & internet addiction, like you said. Remember, the trigger for these latent mental pathologies& cultural "crazes" can be anything... Trump-led Millennarianism has plenty on its face to keep these weird chuds high on their own supply of self-delusion. It's no wonder there are wild eyed tweakers in the bunch too
But weed being legal in specific states & becoming stronger and more available as a result didn't cause QAnon, or even contribute to it.
Maybe Ashli Babbitt was spiraling on some drug binge when she got hooked on Q, but a lot of these QAnon boomers just seem to be jingoistic evangelical ultranationalist losers& wannabe fascists who use Trump as their conduit to God & absolution. The pseudoreligious element, something fundamental to American political & popular culture, can't go unexamined here
It's a good point. The religious grifters have only attached themselves recently though, in the last 9 months or so. It originated as a chan intelligence conspiracy type larp, and that's still the core imo.
There's still a widespread disbelief, on all sides, at how quickly it's metastasized.
Leaving aside the weed, since you're so touchy about it lol, I think the other factors + drugs I mentioned (forgot to mention ritalin too) have created a perfect storm. Something new.
Something that may change the way we view the concept of free speech and maybe democracy. It's like another virus.
Germany took action to prevent the virus of Ur-Fascism rising again after WW2, maybe similar action will be taken with Qanon.
I just don't think that sensationalism & blaming drugs for social ills like "Reefer Madness" has the same punch you think it does lol
The religious grifters are fundamental to all of this. America is a fundamentalist religious nation at its core, and that goes a long way to explaining the kneejerk dogmatic way these QAnon dupes cling to their ill-conceived stories
Also, overprescription of pharmaceuticals is legal, and I agree it contributes to dependence & chemical imbalances(things that cannabis appears to alleviate) but it doesn't explain QAnon.
South Korea had a similar issue in the last few years with entirely-too-online right-wingers thinking the government are pedophile evil elites who eat children. It plays out in much the same way as QAnon and resulted in those ya-hoos storming the parliament in Seoul. Which leads me to believe there are larger forces at play in both instances
https://thediplomat.com/2019/12/protesters-storm-national-assembly-capping-off-a-divisive-year-for-korean-politics/
it's not because of drug use, it's because of internet & mass media & misinformation being specifically tailored to tap into this deeply troubling part of the brain in those who are politically illiterate
West Germany after WWII had lots of issues with fascism, because many of the Nazis retained posts in the government and larger European rebuilding efforts
Someone like Cleveland Grover Meredith, from my OP, probably wouldn't have had the punch, at his age, to travel armed to the Capitol without his Test (and possibly ritalin). Scale that up and you've got a new societal problem.
Was aware of the Cho scandal but didn't realise they stormed the parliament and slapped around the MPs. Based lol. Appreciate the link.
Yeah, knew about the lingering Nazism in Germany after WW2. My point was that they recognised fascism as something like a virus and at least passed legislation to prevent it rising the same way again. The anti hate speech laws for example. Although recent discoveries in the police and military aren't good.
Sorry, but that idiot Meredith isn't representative of the drug habits & personal proclivities of most of the other nutballs, who I am sure are themselves given over to idiocy in their own right. Whether an individual does drugs isn't reason to paint an entire group as drug addicts, nor is drug addiction an excuse to write people off or make them into pariahs. That's literally the US Drug War's conceptual "justification". Pass laws and arrest Black political activists & LGBT & Indigenous & Chicanos & socialists for drug possession, because their political awareness is threatening the status quo
Drugs are not the primary crux of the QAnon issue, kind of weird you keep trying to make that clunky argument. Internet-based misinformation & obsessiveness & fanaticism stoked by political & economic tensions is
No, it's not based what the right-wingers did in South Korea, it's similar to the situation with QAnon, they literally try to trace the 2014 ferry drownings with insane conspiratorial notions (based in reality & based in fantasy) to trying to storm the legislature just as the right-wingers in DC did
The German anti hate speech laws online weren't really put in place until a few years ago, and I definitely wouldn't call them effective as they largely rely on civilians ratting one another out & filing reports against others...
There are more Merediths than people realize. Every second ad on Fox is for test boosters. Jones flogs his own ffs.
As per the OP it’s gonna have an effect on the national psyche and may be a partial explanation for the Qanon issue.
Based was a joke. That's why I wrote lol.
The first law against Holocaust denial was passed in 1960.
Testosterone & Meredith are not the reason Q gained popularity
It's not an explanation really at all, because plenty of apolitical & liberals also take these supplements
QAnon is silly but it's not blatant Holocaust denial
Again, I said they are part of a piece, not the sole reasons, as per many posts.
Qanon is a pipeline, it's part of a cohort of beliefs that commonly include white supremacy and holocaust denial.
Drugs & overprescription of testosterone have little if anything to do with the nature & the spread of QAnon
Bone-deep irrational religious fervor & the deterioration of social bonds & overall outlook in America are the key points imo
QAnon would lead someone to other harebrained right-wing conspiracy theories, but as such doesn't really touch on Holocaust denial... though I agree there are tacit "white nationalist" underpinnings
from another post: Say one in a thousand people have an adverse behavioural reaction to a psychoactive medication. If that medication is prescribed on an indusrial scale, even overprescribed, you then have a lot of those people in society that may be more suggestible, more volatile, more irrational. Then consider poly drug scenarios, for psychoactive drugs taken daily, and the effect that might have on a wider, macro, societal level. There are examples, but I don’t want to trigger anyone. I mean, caffeine has been proven to make people more suggestible.
I’m suggesting that this may be one factor contributing to the rapid rise of Qanon.
Agree that they are major factors, but in light of widespread disbelief and confusion at the rise of Qanaon, I'm suggesting that the pharmacologisization (©️ 2021) of society is another major, perhaps unnoticed, factor.
Have had Qanon people extremely close to me. Holocaust denial comes up in their suggestions overtly and covertly. The message is absolutely connected imo.
The drugs are an insignificant factor in this, if they're even a factor at all. These people whether they're overmedicated or not are more likely to believe QAnon for other reasons, because plenty on the left & those who are apolitical are also taking illegal & far too many legal drugs. Misuse of drugs is not a partisan phenomenon. QAnon's spread has to do with confused politics/insular worldview & regionalism & urban/suburban/rural class divides far more than it does with "Drugs Bad" specifically. Please stop trying to blame drugs for the fault of right-wing individuals & the cynical propagandists purposely misleading them lol.
I would even say that drugs have nothing to do with the individual QAnon believer's willingness and devotion to these lies. It's much more to do with a lack of proper historical & political education coupled with mass media and Internet misinformation centering around anonymous online message boards and their supposed "alt-tech" novelty.
There is no evidence that pharmacology created QAnon, it's just political excuses made by people who are both cowed by conservative obstinacy as well as by American civil religion and evangelical self-delusion
Individual QAnon believers may hold these beliefs as well, but the QAnon mythos itself has little if anything to do with Holocaust denial. Although I will say its anti-elitism & "blood libel" rhetoric does border on anti-Semitic tropes.
Again x100, I'm saying it's likely an under-considered factor, not the sole reason.
Absolutely. Have been following it from the start. Have direct experience of people radicalized by it. 5 years ago they would have been aghast at holocaust denial. Now they are watching videos about it and "just asking questions." Asking me about bitchute. You know the rest.
Drugs are not a contributing factor for why QAnon believers are compelled to believe & act on these things. I do not think Ashli Babbitt was on testosterone or illegal drugs when she stormed the capitol and was shot, though if you can find information proving otherwise I would be glad to walk that back.
QAnon wasn't around 5 years ago, it wasn't formulated until 2017.
Saying that your personal anecdotal experience with people close to you is applicable to the entire phenomenon or to objective reality is just subjective bias & group attribution error on your part.
Feels like quite a disingenous point. Of course Babbit wasn't on test, and likely not on illegal drugs.
It is undeniable that psychoactive drugs, used daily in poly drug scenarios, will have adverse behavioural effects on a small minority of people. A small minority of 70 million Trump voters is a lot of people. This modern phenomenon is now extremely common. This could be one factor in the rapid rise of Qanon.
I'm well aware. The the online radicalization began before Q imo.
Yet you bring up Babbit.
To try and universalize Meredith's personal proclivities and say it is representative or an explanation for the movement generally is a similarly disingenuous point, so I am glad you noticed that point.
It is not undeniable that psychoactive drugs are a significant underlying explanation for the fertility & immense growth of QAnon mythos. Drug use is not a significant factor in QAnon's rise.
I brought up Babbitt because you brought up Meredith trying to say he is representative of the entire movement & its motivations. Neither of these people's personal drug habits are representative or sufficient explanations of the entire movement & its motivations.
I was using Meredith as an amusing example of a wider modern phenomenon. All my points have been extremely broad, you have been attempting to narrow the discussion.
That's not what I said, and you're making an assertion.
Again, it is undeniable that psychoactive drugs, used daily in poly drug scenarios, will have adverse behavioural effects on a small minority of people. A small minority of 70 million Trump voters is a lot of people. This modern phenomenon (the poly drug scenario) is now extremely common. This could be one factor in the rapid rise of Qanon.
This discussion has reached a productive end imo, I won't be replying unless you come up with something new.
This is a narrow discussion about QAnon and its causes, it's not about general rates of drug use, or poly drug use, or trying to stigmatize drug users as right-wingers & conspiracy loons. Polydrug use and whether it has behavior effects on a small minority is not the cause of QAnon, or a significant factor in the least
Plenty of apolitical & moderate & left wing people are poly drug users and want nothing to do with QAnon. The two are not correlated.
Polydrug use is also not a significant explanation for the "small minority" of Trump voters who showed up at the capitol based on QAnon-related sensationalism, many of whom do not engage in such behavior.
You haven't come up with anything new, you keep doubling down on this personal assumption you're making. Drug use and polydrug use are not even contributing factors or partial explanations for the rabid QAnon conspiracy explosion, you're just trying to blame QAnon on polydrug use that you appear to have a personal aversion to.
The differences between Morphine, Diamorphine (heroin), Oxycodone, Hydromorphone, Oxymorphone, etc is all very very minuscule. Once they get into the bloodstream they cross the BBB and bind to mostly mu (but also delta and kappa) opioid receptors, and activate them. Do enough of this activity by any means and they will downregulate, temporarily disabling themselves, which both (A) makes the user's "baseline" increase, which is why they go into withdrawals if they stop using, and (B) requires more of the drug to achieve the same amount of activity, which is how tolerance increases. This is simply the body attempting to keep homeostasis. After a long enough period of abstinence, the receptors with upregulate and turn themselves back on, causing withdrawals to cease and tolerance to drop back to zero (Which is why so many users die after periods of non-use: They think they can instantly go back to their old dose)
There are several "weird" opioids out there like Buprenorphine which has an odd profile that gives it a ceiling, and I'm not including fentanyl and its derivatives because of the extremely reduced half-lives.
But the point I'm making is that all opioids are fundamentally the same thing, none are more "evil" than others. Its mostly the social stigma and black market's choice of product that makes diamorphine users fall so hard into the dark side of addiction. If it was prescribed in hospitals and no longer popular on the black market, (And indeed some countries have diamorphine as a standard pain reliever for acute severe trauma), it would have the same reputation as "medical" opioids rather than "street opioids"
That's why Purdue has to pay some $8,000,000,000. They knew oxycodone would have the exact same effects as anything else with that profile of receptor activation, but instead pretended it somehow has far less to none of the addiction potential of prior pain relievers in that class. If any pharm claims they've found an opioid pain reliever with no potential for abuse, ask them how it prevents receptor downregulation. Because even subutex (buprenorphine) has the potential for abuse if your tolerance is below its ceiling dose, its just much safer because that ceiling is usually well below the LD50 even in opiate naive people.
I don't think any of these opioids are "evil", but marketing tactics & regimes of perverse incentives for doctors & manufacturers and lawmakers ensure there is overprescription& overconsumption
TBH I have been a little skeptical ever since my friends in HS said "it makes them better at video games" and then all I wanted to do was scream, die, and eat 10 thanksgiving dinners
the hash oil used in dabbing can apparently reach 90%
exactly. it's never been used this frequently, at these strengths, so widely before. we the guinea pigs.
it's been shown to have an effect on teenage cognitive development, right?