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Title: The Life Changing Effects of Magic Mushrooms and Why the Government Keeps this from You
Source:
Free Thought Project
URL Source: http://thefreethoughtproject.com/li ... ts-magic-mushrooms-government/
Published: Jun 21, 2015
Author: Justin Gardner
Post Date: 2015-06-21 13:05:19 by Deckard
Keywords: None
Views: 9961
Comments: 52
The pursuit of knowledge and advancement of medical research are among the many victims of the War on Drugs. Just as marijuana prohibition is now being dismantled under the juggernaut of reason, so too will the prohibition of psychedelics. For thousands of years, cultures around the world have explored the mystical experience provided by psychedelic substances, using mescaline, ayahuasca, and magic mushrooms for religious ceremony and healing purposes. In the 1940s, western medicine began realizing the potential for psychedelics to treat addiction and psychiatric disorders. Tens of thousands of people were treated effectively, and psychedelic drugs were on the fast track to becoming mainstream medicine. But the beast of oppression reared its ugly head. In 1967 and 1970, the UK and US governments cast all psychedelic substances into the pit of prohibition. People were waking up to the fact that governments intended to keep the world in a state of war, and that governments were working to keep the populace sedated under a cloak of consumerism. The collective mind expansion of that era came to a screeching halt under the boot and truncheon. Now, as people share information globally, instantaneously, on a scale unstoppable by the state, we are resuming the advancement of medical research on psychedelic substances. Scientists are challenging the irrational classification of psychedelics as “class A” (UK) or “schedule 1” (US) substances, characterized as having no medical use and high potential for addiction. “But no evidence indicates that psychedelic drugs are habit forming; little evidence indicates that they are harmful in controlled settings; and much historical evidence shows that they could have use in common psychiatric disorders,” says James Rucker, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Neuroscience The hurdles created from the baseless Schedule 1, Class A prohibition make research extremely difficult. It can take two years to get the necessary license for trials, and everyone involved—the manufacturer, the hospital, the researcher—has to have this license. The drug must be locked in a safe and bolted to a wall in a locked room within another locked room, as if it’s some kind of dangerously toxic material. Prohibition also makes procurement ten times more expensive, making funding more difficult and pharmaceutical companies uninterested in making the precise products needed for study. Despite all this, modern research is showing once again that psychedelics can treat disorders such as depression, anxiety, and addiction. The drug of choice for clinical studies is psilocybin—the active ingredient in “magic mushrooms”—which is not as strong and long-lasting as LSD or mescaline. A clinical trial carried out by Tony Bossis and Stephen Ross at New York University in 2014 showed astounding results for advanced cancer patients suffering from anxiety. “According to Ross, cancer patients receiving just a single dose of psilocybin experienced immediate and dramatic reductions in anxiety and depression, improvements that were sustained for at least six months. {The patients} were saying things like ‘I understand love is the most powerful force on the planet,’ or ‘I had an encounter with my cancer, this black cloud of smoke.’ People who had been palpably scared of death—they lost their fear. The fact that a drug given once can have such an effect for so long is an unprecedented finding. We have never had anything like it in the psychiatric field.” Roland Griffiths and Katherine MacLean at Johns Hopkins carried out studies prior to this, finding that psilocybin brought about mystical experiences in subjects. The “completeness” of this experience (according to the Pahnke-Richards Mystical Experience Questionnaire) closely tracked improvements in personal well-being, life satisfaction, openness, and positive behavior change for up to 14 months after the experience. Griffiths also conducted a study using psilocybin to treat smoking addiction, with striking results. 80% of the subjects remained abstinent for six months after treatment, a far better success rate than any other existing nicotine-replacement therapy. One subject said, “Smoking seemed irrelevant, so I stopped.” An analysis of trials from the 60s and 70s showed that LSD helped people overcome alcohol addiction as successfully as any treatment to date. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is helping to understand the mechanisms of how psychedelics can treat addiction and depression. Stimulation of serotonin 2A receptors by psychedelics decreases activity in certain areas of the brain, especially the “default mode network” (DMN) which is involved in our ingrained thought patterns and behaviors. Decreasing DMN stimulation can allow people to break free from destructive brain patterns. An exhaustive survey carried out by Johns Hopkins Medicine supports the conclusions of clinical research, finding that “A history of psychedelic drug use is associated with less psychological distress and fewer suicidal thoughts, planning and attempts…” Fascinating research using fMRI shows that, under the influence of psilocybin, the brain enters a pattern of activity similar to the dream state. Primitive areas of the brain linked to emotions, memory and arousal become more synchronized, while higher-level thinking and the “sense of self” become unsynchronized. After 40 years, it appears that another brick in the wall of prohibition is beginning to crumble in the face of science and logic. Eminent schools of medicine, along with organizations like the Heffter Research Institute and the Beckley Foundation, are challenging oppression and bringing psychedelics back into mainstream medicine. 
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 52.
#2. To: Deckard (#0)
I own my body, you own yours. What we do to ourselves is not my neighbors business, even less so the business of government at any level. That applies to starving yourself to death, living in a tent, putting a bullet in your brain, or taking a drug for pleasure of curative effect.
Then why is the government involved in treating and rehabilitating drug users, along with providing medical care, housing, food and other benefits to them? Legalizing drugs in this environment would simply increase the burden on the rest of us. Perhaps the first thing we should do is to stop making this the government's business. THEN we can talk about legalizing drugs. Yes?
Are you in favor of the socialist state?
You never answered my question. Do you favor getting rid of all the government support programs for drug users I mentioned before we start discussing drug legalization?
No I don't favor getting rid of government support for drug users before laws are repealed. For one, this is a back door way of law enforcement. Two, all people must be treated the same, be they tobacco users, fatties, water skiers, even astronauts. The policy should be that the Federal government does not spend any money not specifically within the confines of strict interpretation of the Constitution. The States can do what they please. When the spigot of "free federal money" is cut off, they will find out that they are not so liberal.
But you said it's not the government's business. I guess you meant the decision to use drugs is not the government's business, but taking care of the drug user when he f**ks up is. If that's your proposal, then I, as a taxpayer, reject it. Why should I vote for legalization when it's going to cost me money?
The point is, socialism is never going away. Your way is a back door to total control. Since it costs the taxpayer money, the government can require control over tobacco, food, education, land usage, religion, water, agriculture, health care, automobile manufacture................EVERYTHING. You either support freedom within the constructs of a Constitutional Republic, or you fight a battle on every single front for your and my rights every day. That is not Liberty, it is an ever tightening vise on our personal freedoms every day. It empowers the political class, because we need them. Because we need them, they will pander to the people with the most power. THAT is the complete opposite of the very basis of our founding. Government should be practically invisible on the Federal level. It exists for specific functions. To set rules equally for all, collect taxes, regulate import exports, run a defense/war and set up courts. Fabian socialism, which is what we have gives a "gift" of welfare, then uses the need to control the cost as a reason to control US.
What is? The taxes I pay to support everyone else's freedom? I agree. If the government is spending taxpayer dollars, I EXPECT them to regulate and control the conditions under which that money is available. You don't want to be controlled? You want freedom? Then don't suck on the government's teat.
It makes no difference what I do. The only way to quit paying is to QUIT PAYING. THAT will make a difference. If you and I do not draw from the "mothers milk" of state socialism, it leaves more for those that do, and the government beast grows still.
whiteys logic means there is NOTHING the government cannot do to its serfs. They just need to frame it correctly so his fellow sheep can understand why the shaft is at the ready.
There are no replies to Comment # 52. End Trace Mode for Comment # 52.
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#7. To: jeremiad (#2)
"What we do to ourselves is not my neighbors business, even less so the business of government at any level."
#39. To: misterwhite (#7)
#42. To: jeremiad (#39)
"Are you in favor of the socialist state?"
#47. To: misterwhite (#42)
#48. To: jeremiad (#47)
"No I don't favor getting rid of government support for drug users before laws are repealed."
#49. To: misterwhite (#48)
#50. To: jeremiad (#49)
"it is an ever tightening vise on our personal freedoms every day."
#51. To: misterwhite (#50)
You want freedom? Then don't suck on the government's teat.
#52. To: jeremiad, misterwhite (#51)
Replies to Comment # 52.
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