Denver To Vote On Decriminalizing Psychedelic Mushrooms In May

[JacksinPA]

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/denver-psychedelic-mushrooms_us_5c54c01fe4b09293b2041e3d

The city could become the first to ease up on psilocybin mushroom use.

Denver voters are about to go on the trip of a lifetime.

In May, they’ll get a chance to decriminalize psilocybin mushrooms within the city with a vote, according to the Denver Channel. And they apparently really want the vote: The Denver Elections Division certified a petition Friday from activists that got more than 5,500 signatures.
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This could be a first in this country or in this hemisphere for that matter.

In my youth I experienced several different hallucinogenic substances, dried Psilocybe mushrooms being one of them. The psychoactive ingredients are psilocin & psilocybin. These mushrooms were originally found in Mexico.

The interesting thing about the psilocybin/psilocin 'high' is that you see visual patterns that are geometric & similar to the motifs found in Aztec building, art & designs. It makes you wonder which came first, the mushrooms or the Aztec culture.

 

[phattonez]

The slippery slope argument isn't a fallacy if there's really a slippery slope.

 

[Praxas]

The slippery slope argument isn't a fallacy if there's really a slippery slope.

Yeah how dare people are able to do what they want to their body. :roll:

The drug war has been a failure.

 

[JacksinPA]

The slippery slope argument isn't a fallacy if there's really a slippery slope.

So it's pot > 'shrooms > OxyContin > heroin/fentanyl? I don't see any compelling logic here to support this progression. Psychedelics to shooting up opioids does not necessarily follow.

 

[JMR]

Denver has a very large homeless population living in parks and camps, many of them high on weed. Don't know how this will progress if they begin tripping. Two issues coming to a meeting point.

 

[JacksinPA]

Denver has a very large homeless population living in parks and camps, many of them high on weed. Don't know how this will progress if they begin tripping. Two issues coming to a meeting point.

I believe there is a growing recreational drug tourism industry in the Denver-Boulder-Estes Park areas. B&B there means 'bong & board'.

See https://www.coloradopotguide.com/

 

[phattonez]

So it's pot > 'shrooms > OxyContin > heroin/fentanyl? I don't see any compelling logic here to support this progression. Psychedelics to shooting up opioids does not necessarily follow.

Oxycontin is already legal and has lead to a massive number of heroin addictions.

I'm just making the point that when it came to pot legalization, people made the slippery slope argument. Ultimate conclusions aside, they were right. We're now moving on to other drugs.

 

[lurchadams]

So it's pot > 'shrooms > OxyContin > heroin/fentanyl? I don't see any compelling logic here to support this progression. Psychedelics to shooting up opioids does not necessarily follow.

I'm still in the "pot" stage (have been for over 30 years). I feel like a boy scout who will never be anything but a tenderfoot

 

[JacksinPA]

Oxycontin is already legal and has lead to a massive number of heroin addictions.

I'm just making the point that when it came to pot legalization, people made the slippery slope argument. Ultimate conclusions aside, they were right. We're now moving on to other drugs.

I'm not aware of anyone having died from either pot or psilocybin. Steady & repeated use of either will, however, develop a tolerance in the user, so there is a tendency to try new or different things to make up for the loss in effect. Same phenomenon holds true for opioids: the regular users get less of a kick so they choose to buy from the sources that add a dash of the much more potent synthetic opioid, fentanyl. But then you are skating on a very thin line between having a good time nodding off or killing yourself, dying with the needle still in your vein.

 

[Skeptic Bob]

Denver has a very large homeless population living in parks and camps, many of them high on weed. Don't know how this will progress if they begin tripping. Two issues coming to a meeting point.

You'll have less people doing shrooms on a regular basis than weed. While not recommended, you can use weed every day all day. You won't get much done, but there are plenty of "wake and bake" people out there.

Drugs like shrooms and LSD, however, aren't very conducive to regular use. They tend to be self limiting. First, tolerance builds really quickly, forcing one to take breaks in order for them to remain effective. And unlike alcohol and weed, psychedelics aren't drugs one takes to escape the stress of their lives as psychedelics are mood enhancers. My guess is a shroom trip, of any sizeable dose, would be a nightmare for most homeless people or people going through hard times. I enjoy shrooms, but I ONLY eat them when absolutely everything in my life is going well. If I am stressed over anything the shrooms will take that stressor and turn it into my own personal hell for the duration of the trip. It won't kill ya, but it might make you WISH you were dead. That is lesson one learns really quickly.

That said, first time users who don't know what they are getting into might get in over their head out of ignorance. Somebody on a bad shroom trip won't likely hurt themselves or others intentionally, but if you have a bad trip in public it could result in an accident. "Look at the pretty lights, I want to hug them. Oops, that was an oncoming bus." However, if it were legalized then the places that sold it could educate people on the proper amounts to take.

Some of the most profound, life changing and beneficial experiences I have ever had in my life were on shrooms. And the most hellish, torturous, scary experience of my life was on shrooms. They aren't physically harmful, but they can put your psyche through the ringer.

 

[phattonez]

Some of the most profound, life changing and beneficial experiences I have ever had in my life were on shrooms.

Sounds terrible. The best moments of your life came only when you pharmacologically altered your brain? How do you deal with real life?

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

There will never be an addiction problem with psilocybin mushrooms. Humans and animals alike have been ingesting them both on purpose and by accident for as long as mammalia have existed. Ancient aboriginals on this continent have cultivated and used them for thousands of years, and like pointed out above, it is self limiting because once the user has the experience enough times, they no longer feel much need to ingest more on a rotating and regular basis.

Psilocybin mushrooms create a spiritual and divinatory experience. Put simply, once a person has learned how to take part in the spiritual and divinatory experience with the aid of psilocybin mushrooms, the mind assumes the ability all by itself after a while and repeated use is no longer necessary.
It is more than just a real-time mind altering experience, it invokes lasting perceptual changes, not in your body or brain, but in your mind.

It has proven extremely useful in treating depression, PTSD, some forms of autism spectrum disorders, and more.

 

[Skeptic Bob]

Sounds terrible. The best moments of your life came only when you pharmacologically altered your brain? How do you deal with real life?

I said "some of". One of the best moments of my life was also SCUBA diving in the Cayman Islands, but that doesn't mean that is the only way I can enjoy myself either.

I am not recommending anyone use these substances. All I can do is speak for myself. For me, life is about collecting experiences. And substances like shrooms, LSD, DMT and, to a MUCH lesser extent weed, can allow you to view things from a different state of consciousness. It can be like thinking with someone else's brain for a short period of time. It can break your thought process out of its normal well worn paths and take you down brand new roads. You can't hide from yourself on a psychedelic trip and you might be forced to confront the worst parts of yourself and either come to terms with it or change. And of course I am trying to put something into words that can't actually be put into words.

 

[JMR]

You'll have less people doing shrooms on a regular basis than weed. While not recommended, you can use weed every day all day. You won't get much done, but there are plenty of "wake and bake" people out there.

Drugs like shrooms and LSD, however, aren't very conducive to regular use. They tend to be self limiting. First, tolerance builds really quickly, forcing one to take breaks in order for them to remain effective. And unlike alcohol and weed, psychedelics aren't drugs one takes to escape the stress of their lives as psychedelics are mood enhancers. My guess is a shroom trip, of any sizeable dose, would be a nightmare for most homeless people or people going through hard times. I enjoy shrooms, but I ONLY eat them when absolutely everything in my life is going well. If I am stressed over anything the shrooms will take that stressor and turn it into my own personal hell for the duration of the trip. It won't kill ya, but it might make you WISH you were dead. That is lesson one learns really quickly.

That said, first time users who don't know what they are getting into might get in over their head out of ignorance. Somebody on a bad shroom trip won't likely hurt themselves or others intentionally, but if you have a bad trip in public it could result in an accident. "Look at the pretty lights, I want to hug them. Oops, that was an oncoming bus." However, if it were legalized then the places that sold it could educate people on the proper amounts to take.

Some of the most profound, life changing and beneficial experiences I have ever had in my life were on shrooms. And the most hellish, torturous, scary experience of my life was on shrooms. They aren't physically harmful, but they can put your psyche through the ringer.

Thanks for the information. I have never been the least tempted by psychedelics, so have no idea what the experience is like.

 

[Skeptic Bob]

 

[TheGoverness]

View attachment 67249723

Gave him a different kind of power-up. Yahoo! :lol:

 

[Praxas]

Oxycontin is already legal and has lead to a massive number of heroin addictions.

I'm just making the point that when it came to pot legalization, people made the slippery slope argument. Ultimate conclusions aside, they were right. We're now moving on to other drugs.

No, you are trying to say because pot is legal that more people are going to use other drugs. Sorry there is no connection to that. Oxy was legal long before weed was and there is an oxy problem. That has nothing to do with weed.

 

[beefheart]

I'm still in the "pot" stage (have been for over 30 years). I feel like a boy scout who will never be anything but a tenderfoot

Same here! Once every 3-4 weeks, at most.

 

[phattonez]

No, you are trying to say because pot is legal that more people are going to use other drugs. Sorry there is no connection to that. Oxy was legal long before weed was and there is an oxy problem. That has nothing to do with weed.

It sure seems like legalization leads to increased use.

 

[Praxas]

It sure seems like legalization leads to increased use.

Correlation does not automatically equate to causation. Surely you realize that.

 

[Thoreau72]

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/denver-psychedelic-mushrooms_us_5c54c01fe4b09293b2041e3d

The city could become the first to ease up on psilocybin mushroom use.

Denver voters are about to go on the trip of a lifetime.

In May, they’ll get a chance to decriminalize psilocybin mushrooms within the city with a vote, according to the Denver Channel. And they apparently really want the vote: The Denver Elections Division certified a petition Friday from activists that got more than 5,500 signatures.
============================================================
This could be a first in this country or in this hemisphere for that matter.

In my youth I experienced several different hallucinogenic substances, dried Psilocybe mushrooms being one of them. The psychoactive ingredients are psilocin & psilocybin. These mushrooms were originally found in Mexico.

The interesting thing about the psilocybin/psilocin 'high' is that you see visual patterns that are geometric & similar to the motifs found in Aztec building, art & designs. It makes you wonder which came first, the mushrooms or the Aztec culture.

If you haven't already, you might consider reading a few of Carlos Castaneda's books regarding those phenomena and experiences.

Another interesting thing is that another psychedelic drug named LSD actually had a rather extensive clinical history, as numerous clinical trials were conducted with that drug, all well documented.

Part of it was follow up questionnaires, and one of the questions asked years later was "Was your experience with this drug a positive effect in your life, or a negative one?" 85% of respondents considered the experience to have been a positive one.

 

[Mr Person]

Sounds terrible. The best moments of your life came only when you pharmacologically altered your brain? How do you deal with real life?

You don't realize how painfully obvious it is that you are just fear mongering on a subject about which you know little, do you?

 

[JacksinPA]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_Psilocybin_Project

Interesting overview of the work at Harvard with psiliocybin that was purchased legally from Sandoz, the Swiss pharma company that had discovered it. Involved famed (or infamous) Dr. Timothy Leary.

 

[Mr Person]

Thanks for the information. I have never been the least tempted by psychedelics, so have no idea what the experience is like.

A sense of profundity mixed with a feeling that the world has come alive with magic. A feeling like being a kid in an endless amusement park slash candy store. Entire sequences of thought occurring within a second. A sense of overwhelming hilarity in the absurdity of doing mundane things, like tying your shoelaces (and having trouble with it) or, say taking a dump and reflecting on absurdity of living creatures having to do such a thing. And depending on the amount taken, some truly impressive hallucinatory experiences.



Then again, some people can't handle them. I never came close to having a problem.

Anyway, the drug itself is absurdly safe. The only danger is when someone perhaps mentally unstable in the wrong direction eats a whole bunch in the wrong atmosphere....