The Joe Rogan Experience - #1593 - Dr. Carl Hart

Episode Date: January 12, 2021

Professor Carl Hart is an expert in the fields of neuropsychopharmacology and behavioral neuroscience. A longtime champion for evidence-based drug policies, Hart has written a number of influential books in the field. His newest is "Drug Use for Grown-Ups: Chasing Liberty in the Land of Fear".

Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out! The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night! All day! It's got, like, a lot of freedom. Like, their ethos here, the way they look at things. Like, they're not interested in the government telling them what to do. Like, I gotta tell you, you know, i was standing downtown and um i never saw homelessness here

i i saw people like working a lot of jobs but now i mean what i what i saw when i was downtown it's like i hadn't seen homelessness like this in texas ever no it's a new thing it's the the the government here changed the laws in terms of allowing people to camp out. And so they camp out under underpasses and all that kind of shit. Have you been to L.A. recently? Not recently. L.A. is insane. Yeah, but L.A. has always been that way.

Never like this, though. Never like this. I've never seen Texas like this. Oh, yeah. Texas has always seemed like they had jobs and people were working. I've never seen this before well the covid lockdowns affected everywhere and i think it affected here less than it affected la but i think the real thing is you know i mean it's it's mental health right that's

the real reason that's most of those folks are out there they really need care that's it and then you know you've got a lot of drug addicts, and you've got a lot of mental health, which brings up your book. Drug Use for Grownups. Drug Use for Grownups, man. First of all, it's great to see you again. It's been a while. How long has it been?

About five, six years, man. I didn't realize. The world keeps spinning. Yeah, you know, I didn't realize it was that long, man. Actually, I was trying not to just be in the public for the sake of being in the public. I always want to make sure I got something to say. But really, I miss you. I miss being here, and I really dig what you do and the people you bring on.

Some people don't like them, but I really, the space you created, thank you. My pleasure. Thank you. Yeah. Well, you know, it's a weird thing to be able to just talk to people, you know, and then the whole world listens. Like, what do you got to say? Yeah.

What's this person have to say? What's this about? You know what's remarkable for me is that you're a comedian, right? That's what you were. And the comedians have been our sort of saviors. You know, of all people in our society, that's who we look to, the comedians, because they can tell the truth.

So it's so nice to see Louis C.K. coming back, you know, and these people coming back. Bill Burr, I just love the shit that he's doing. I mean, you know, we're not for the comedians we really be fucked up no thank you there's a lot of scared people out there and i think the comedians aren't as scared there's a few that are scared i think a lot of them are scared i mean when it when that stuff happened to louis ck they they all kind of went quiet yeah and that was really stupid you know I mean um and I was expecting more of them to stand up and they didn't so well there was a bunch of different

narratives right and if Louis wasn't talking you know all Louis did was like release a statement but if you weren't talking to him you didn't get his version of it once I talked to him personally I got his version I'm like well this is a very different version than what you're hearing from from the public and from the people that are making the worst uh judgments on it like what what it was mostly was he's kind of a pervert and he asked if he could jerk off in front of them and he had already been flirting with these girls and he knew them and they'd this wasn't yeah they had made it seem like he was a monster. It was like cornering people and jerking off in front of them.

I mean, but even that's hard to like cancel somebody. It's like, you can just walk the fuck away. I don't understand this. Yeah, well, it was a man in power and this was post Matt Lauer and post Harvey Weinstein and there was all this. Yeah, the context. Yeah, the context is interesting. this was post Matt Lauer and post Harvey Weinstein and you know there was all this yeah yeah yeah the context is interesting it's like it's a it's good and bad right it's like good that people are like

Harvey Weinstein are held accountable but it's it's bad that people get scared and then it's also bad that you have crazy people who can just accuse someone of something and everyone says well hashtag believe all women exactly like are you sure all of them exactly because like let's slow down like you're gonna believe casey anthony you're gonna be like there's a lot like who you believe in but that's why we need the comedians to speak up yeah well it's uh it's a unique time in this world you know i mean we're experiencing uh like in many ways the deterioration of our appreciation for government deterioration for our our just civil society is is in danger right now it's crazy yeah you know that's one of the things that like really has forced me to seek residence in another country because you're saying you're in Switzerland

now huh yeah between Switzerland and New York it's just that we have to do a better job of treating people better I mean or caring for people or people who are not our family just other human beings even if you're not taking care of them uh you gotta at least care about people and it's okay to not care about people that's some fucked up shit and that's coming from the highest levels of government and it's like i don't like that ethos and so i don't want to be around it because i don't want to i don't want it to to to infect or poison me do you feel like it has affected or poisoned you of course it does you know it makes you it makes me you know angry um uh for people who like

support trump for example um they're all not racist of course and this sort of thing but i don't understand how people can support a guy who's so mean spirited and just uh just attacks other people i don't understand it and so when when my my good friends i have good friends who support trump uh it's hard for me to talk to them um because i don't want to be rude or angry with them but i just don't understand how you support people who are just mean to other people i don't understand that i just don't get it i understand yeah i think the people that support them there's there's people that i know that are military people that support them now i'm ex-military too now i was a cop in the military so i i know the military as well yeah their their take on it is just that he released the the shackles that the military had to go and take down isis and he released some of the restrictions that the military had under the

previous administration as far as engaging with terrorists they've shut down isis in like less than a year from Trump being in office. And when I talk to people that are active military, they said there was a night and day difference between the way the military was funded, the way, you know. I'm sorry, I don't know about that. I just don't know that.

Yeah. I don't know enough about that. But I agree with you in terms of like, one of the best things about someone like, well, see, we have to see what happens with biden because i can't imagine he's gonna last we were talking about this i just i feel like this is a i feel like it's it's yeah he's slight of hand he's the walking dead yeah i mean look come on yeah joe's been dead for some time but yeah but when when Obama was in office, Obama's a statesman, right?

He's an eloquent speaker. You hear him talk and you're like, well, that guy's definitely smarter than me. Yeah. It seems like a person that should be president. Yeah. What Trump did. Even though you might disagree with some of his policies. Yeah.

Yeah. But he certainly seems smarter. Presidential. He's presidential and not attacking people. Yeah. It seems smarter. Presidential. He's presidential and not attacking people. I think that what Trump represented to a lot of people was like this deviation from this system that never supported them, that never served them.

They felt like politicians were all full of shit. And finally, this guy's going to come in. And, you know, even his ideas like clean up the swamp, like this motto, like that. Oh, yeah, that's what we need. That's what we need. So they got behind it and then when they realized whenever there's an us versus them situation people oftentimes aren't thinking clearly they just pick a side i'm with you joe i feel you but when we think about uh trump um and the system um not for them let's just think about like fucking black america

when has the system been for black america you know so it's like it's always been that way in terms of black america and that's fine and you just work and you work and you work and you try and make the system work for you but you don't say that we're going to take our country down and burn this bitch down. I mean, you don't do that. Or you can't go hate other people because of that. And so when people say that the system is now not working for them, I get it. I feel the same way. And we should work together to see if we can make this thing work for us.

You don't isolate yourself and then isolate other people or attack other people. Because what happens is like i know those jobs went away in middle america those factory jobs i know that in the automobile industry in the paper mills all those they went away and people uh they're suffering i get it but the reason for their suffering they are misattributing them and and people like trump exploits that sort of thing and manipulates these people uses these people to do their bidding because trump doesn't give a fuck about those people as you know he doesn't give a fuck about them he despises those people

it's like i care more about those people than he does and that's the shit that just blows my mind yeah it's manipulative it's uh but that's what he had to do to get into office i know and he did he did it well he had to be a populist billionaire he did it what i know a populist billionaire that's the shit just blows my mind yeah i mean this recent thing where uh those folks went to the capitol when they were standing up on his behalf and then he throws them under the bus yeah he threw them all under the bus after it was over yeah it's crazy i watched a video of it i had not seen much video of it yeah i'd only seen like a couple of videos on instagram i was like what the i didn't want to get depressed and watch it but

today i said let's get depressed and i watched a bunch of it i i had no idea how bad it was yeah in terms of like the the sheer number of people like storming the gates and screaming and a small handful of cops that were supposed to protect it yeah and that one cop that got beaten there's like a video of them hitting the cop with flags and shit yeah it's like what the fuck like what how did that happen how did it deteriorate to that i know man it's um it's really sad to me that that that kind of thing happened and then you have these fucking cowards rudy giuliani uh ted cruz uh josh howley all these cowards they are allowed to stand on their pulpit and say these things like they're tough. But they're nowhere around to support these folks in the first place.

And they're sending them into the battle. And now they will comfortably join the ranks of their members of Congress while these other people are going to go to jail and have these charges, which they should have, of course. But these leaders who manipulated them, there's no consequences to them. I mean, I think that's the real crime. Yeah, well, we'll see if there's consequences because I have a feeling there will be for Trump. I think this is going to be the end. I really do. Because I think there's very little chance that he's going to run in 2024 after this because a lot of people were hoping for that a lot of his supporters were hoping for that but after this i don't i don't even think yeah i think the useful idiot is done i mean i think like the people like mitch mcconnell and those people they don't have no more use for

him so he's done i mean he's already he's done enough for them they're they're happy with what he's done he's delivered with the Supreme Court and so forth his time is over it's interesting to see you know we've always known that there's a certain faction of this country that's fairly simple looking not that sophisticated not very smart and they like thinking in like a real narrow box and this guy came along and was their guy you know and then we realized like oh like the assholes of this country were unrepresented and now all of a sudden they got represented like there was a lot of people like a lot of those folks that stormed the castle

that stormed capitol hill like if you see like when they get arrested and you find out who they are like guy living with his mom believe in q anon conspiracies thinks the fbi sending out pedophile codes that kind of like those guys didn't have a king before what do you realize how many of them there are but what about the guy who was i don't know a lieutenant a retired lieutenant lieutenant colonel from the army or the air force i mean so there are people there who also had education and they were plugged into society, right? There were a number of those people too, right? I'm sure there was a few, yeah.

Yeah, I mean, I think that, you know, I think most of us are simple people. And that's okay. I think you should be able to be simple and have a decent life and enjoy yourself. I think that there's no crime there. I think that's fine. The real problem is that we allow our leaders to lie and then you can manipulate. Even the most sophisticated among us can be manipulated. And I think that's the real crime. So it's like not that these people were simple it's okay to be simple maybe simple is the wrong word maybe assholes was the right word there's a lot of people that are assholes and there was never a guy who said it's okay to be an asshole but I'm

an asshole too do you think do you think that the majority of these people were assholes I think they could be assholes if they were led the right way but can't most of us be assholes i think at the worst moments of your life yeah yeah i think so but but you know i think that when you have i'm telling you man i'm putting this square on those people in washington trump is one of them of course but i'm talking about the ted cruz's and all of those people as well i mean those people in Washington. Trump is one of them, of course. But I'm talking about the Ted Cruzes and all of those people as well. I mean, those people,

they should face the criminal justice system for what they did. Because these folks who are out here, we all have the potential to be assholes. And then if you think that what you're doing is holding up the liberty that we we promise in this country that you are being a real patriot and you really believe that you've been manipulated to do that by these leaders they should pay the price and that's the thing that's really i'm really disturbed by is like yeah we'll we we

should get trump yep absolutely but we should go after those other people as well i don't know what what did ted cruz do that oh with the uh election um oh were you saying that the election fraud election fraud when he knew that he knew what time it was those guys um they know they were being dishonest i think it's a political ploy right there's politicians take stances based on where they think their constituents lean and you know stop the steal and all that was trending on all these social media sites yeah and i feel like for a prominent politician that's a manipulative person that looks at these things and goes yeah that's an angle that i can use yeah you're absolutely right joe uh you that's exactly what politicians do and we should expect more of

them and until we do they're going to continue to do that bullshit when they know that is bullshit and so you're right that's what politicians do so you think so what do you what do you think they were trying to do you think just posturing to try to get those people on their side for the future? That's right. I think that Ted Cruz and those folks were setting themselves up for a future presidential run or what have you and hoping that they get Trump, the kingmaker, to endorse them. Even though Trump called his wife ugly. I would have beat Trump's ass.

I mean, I'm telling you. I mean, it's like, what kind of man allows that to happen? You call him Lion Ted? Yeah, I mean, what kind of man allows another guy to call his wife ugly and not do anything? Didn't he also infer that he was a serial killer or something? His dad? His dad. Zodiac killer, that's right.

Yeah, his dad helped kill Kennedy or something, he said. Yeah. But what kind of man does that? I mean, allows that. I mean, I don't understand that. Well, what kind of man wants to be a senator? You know, it's a weird business. And you get deeply entrenched in that business,

and there's compromises that you make and a lot of weirdness. I understand, but, you know, like, what kind of person want to be president? That's fine. I don't want to do that, but I'm glad there are people that do it. And the thing is, I think we should require them to be more honorable than we do. We certainly should. And so when people are posturing politically, when they know opportunity there's no chance that this election can be overturned because there's no fraud i think they should pay a price i think that is just too

manipulative but and i think their position requires that they be more honest and until we do until we require them require them this of them then I think that they will continue. I think there's a style of behavior that lends itself to success, like business success and financial success. And it's like a speed style, like people that are into amphetamines and people that are into like getting ahead and pushing. And I think that there's a style of behavior that leads itself to be compassionate thinking more about community and i think that is more like a marijuana style or a mushroom style you think so yeah i do try

some of that i will cbd pineapple jalapeno drink no i think i think a lot of these people that are i mean i look i'm a big proponent of psychedelics use and a lot of times people think that that's uh frivolous that's a silly thing it's an escape thing i don't really think it is i think it seems silly and frivolous for people that have never engaged in it but i think that one of the things that could be the savior of this civilization, I really believe this, is the legalization of psychedelic drugs. Because I think if we had more people taking psychedelic drugs responsibly, and especially under the direction of real professionals, if we allowed there to be real professionals, of real professionals if we allowed there to be real professionals we would allow people to have these experiences that dissolve their ego and give them this feeling of community and compassion that i think a lot of those people that stormed capitol hill a lot of people like ted cruz a lot of people that run for government and manipulate people they have no experience in these things

they don't they don't know what that is they don't know what these things. They don't know what that is. They don't know what those feelings are. They've never had that kind of experience. Yeah. So when you say psychedelics, what drugs are you classifying? Because you know the classification can be misleading and also not consistent. So what drugs are you thinking of? I think mushrooms are a big one.

So psilocybin. Psilocybin. Even psilocybin, just microdosing, I think it'd save a lot of people's future and just alter the course of the way they behave. Well, check it out. I agree with you about drugs being useful and helpful for people to be certainly empathetic and understand other people to be certainly empathetic and understand other

people's plight. But I wouldn't limit it to what we call psychedelics. You know, like we think about something like MDMA. It's an amphetamine. Oh, it's true, right. Yeah. And we think about something like heroin. How is that an amphetamine though?

What is it? How does MDMA work? See this chemical structure here? Yeah. This is methamphetamine. what is it how does mdma work uh see this chemical structure here yeah this is methamphetamine is it really yeah and so if you want to make very few people like yourself walking around with meth shirts on i always say that one of the things about meth is there's no meth advocates well i guess i am so what if you want to make md, all you do is put another ring, a methylene-dioxi ring, and then that's MDMA. Really? So MDMA is called methylene-dioxi methamphetamine.

That's what it's called. That's the name. And certainly people know about MDMA's reputation in terms of increasing empathy and understanding and all those things. So that, but it's not a psychedelic. It's an amphetamine. In the classic sense. Yeah. Same can happen with methamphetamine.

The same can happen with heroin. Depends on dose and all those sorts of things. And if you've been to places like Burning Man and those festivals, and so you see all of those people and they're caring they're sharing they're doing all of these kinds of things yeah um but those some of those same people go out into the world after that experience and they misbehave and they act like assholes yeah and so some of them some of them that's right no that's right some of it it doesn't have like a i think it has some effect on their thought process and their their understanding of

the range of experiences that human beings can have absolutely i'm a proponent yeah i'm like no i know you are i'm with you wrote a book on it yeah yeah drug use use for grownups. Chasing liberty in the land of fear. Yeah. No, absolutely, man. Unlike me, though, you're a doctor. You actually get respect. Yeah. It makes sense.

You know what you're talking about. We'll see if I get respect with this book, because in this book, I'm making the case that you're making. I'm saying that as grownups, you should fight for your right, your liberty to use drugs. Yes. For this reason that you're talking about, helping people to be more magnanimous, empathetic, giving, understanding, and all of these things. But I'm arguing that drugs like heroin should be included there, cocaine should be included there, should be included there along with the psychedelics

and so i agree with you but i also understand that it has a lot to do with context like where the drugs are being used with who you're using it with and it also has a lot to do with who's using the drugs so that the book is called drug use for grown-ups for a reason yeah you got to be a grown-up because you, and being a grownup, it's a difficult thing, as you know, you know, um, I have kids and I have these responsibilities and I got, I have to make sure that I'm a good model for them, uh, treat people well, trying to teach them to treat people well, um, treat people well. Um, a lot of people are not grownups. And so, uh, if you add a drug to the mix you're not gonna all of a

sudden have a grown-up right and so if people are responsible and grown-ups and empathetic oh drugs can really enhance all of those things and so I just want to be clear that you give a drug to an asshole, no matter what drug you give, you're still going to have an asshole there. You know what I'm saying? I think some drugs can scare the shit out of them, maybe really make them reconsider why they're an asshole. How do you like that pineapple jalapeno? Oh, it's good, man.

It's pretty good, right? Not bad. It's really good. Not bad. You know, you remind me of a joke that Neil Brennan had, you know, like comedians. That's who I listen to. I mean, I don't read. I listen to comedians, and that's how I get my knowledge, you know.

But Neil had a joke that said, like, you never hear anybody talking about, like, going to war after using cocaine or something like that. It was just a, I'm sorry sorry neil i fucked up your joke but but but he basically was saying you feel so good you don't hear these people going out saying that we should uh restrict uh abortion or something of that nature right and so there is something to that right when you're euphoric um you don't want to go out and you don't want to cause trouble. You don't want to be aggressive or get into a fight with many of these drugs. There is certainly something to that. And so, yeah, I agree with you.

I think there's a trend right now with people that are very ambitious to take amphetamines. It's a it's a current trend that's being accentuated by adderall um i know uh quite a few people that get adderall legally and they get it because of uh air quote fatigue or oh i have hdhd or adhd or whatever the fuck it is you just like speed you like being revved up all the time i get it you know and if you're on a controlled version of this where you're not taking too much, but you're taking just enough, they're remarkably productive. And also, they can justify taking it because they've got a doctor who told them that it's okay. They wrote it down on a piece of paper.

Look, this guy went to school. I got a little piece of paper. A little piece of paper says, I'm good to go. What's wrong with that? I'm sorry. Nothing wrong with that. But it's weird to me that those same people oftentimes would frown upon the use of anything that creates deep introspective thought. Yeah.

Like mushrooms or LSD or even mdma i feel you um but similarly people who do alcohol do the same sort of thing right it's a drug and um yeah mock other drugs right so it's hypocrisy but you also get people who do psychedelics who for example don't think they will besmirch something like PCP which is a psychedelic and but yet our proponents of ketamine and they are essentially the same drug they PCP is the same as ketamine really yeahetamine is made by modifying the PCP structure, basically. Same kind of drug, same effects for the most part. Really? Yeah.

PCP has the same effects as ketamine? Yep. I have no experience in either one of them, but I know people that have taken ketamine and having these crazy psychedelic trips. I know people that take ketamine for depression. There's a mist that a friend of mine gets and she pumps it into her nose it's recently approved a couple years ago for depression so that's PCP that's PCP you hear that Whitney you're on PCP and you and you know what we say about PCP and the cops lower about superhuman strength and all

that's bullshit. My friend was in a fight. He got his finger bitten off when he was on PCP. He has his toe welded to where his finger is now. His right hand, his index finger was bitten off and so now that's

his second toe on his foot. It's sewed in place and curved so that he could punch people joe you got some wild ass friends bro he was my boxing coach shout out to joe you know man do you you do the uh mma thing and that sort of thing um and that's sanctioned for example so people can go out and knock people's head off, but drug use is not sanctioned. Yeah, well, it's odd, right? Because obviously mixed martial arts is very dangerous.

It's a dangerous endeavor, as is BMX riding, as is fucking gymnastics, man. You want to do flips off a balance beam? Weird shit can go wrong. I've seen videos. But, you know, I think it's great that people have the skills and they train and they do that sort of thing. And it should be allowed. So I'm not saying that that should be restricted. I think that's a great thing.

People are allowed to do that. But the thing that I'm saying is that, wait a second. Right. We want to look at drugs in the same context. You know, why are drugs banned? Yeah. It's a good point. Because why is it legal to ride bulls?

But it's not legal to because why is it legal to ride bulls but it's not legal to do coke yeah yeah or or legal to hit somebody knock somebody's block off on the football field right yeah right very dangerous for both parties yeah yeah it's weird when we decide what you can and can't do yeah but there it's rational well there is a rationale to it. Yes. So when we think about drugs, let's just think about cocaine. You and I, we always have good cocaine conversations. We should probably do some cocaine and have a conversation. Some good cocaine, of course, not anything that's like. I've never done cocaine.

Are you serious? Yeah, never done it. Wait, no, I thought you got your start at the comedy store. I did. I thought that was cocaine central. There thought you got your start at the comedy store i did i thought that was cocaine central there's a lot of cocaine in the comedy store i avoided it when i was in high school my uh good friend had a cousin who was selling coke and him and his girlfriend all they did was do coke and hide they were they were in this fucking attic they were selling it and doing it and they were just like i'm not joking man they had an attic apartment they'd

hide in the attic and i saw him like wither away stopped eating shrunk he was just an addict he was just constantly doing coke and they were all weird they're all like nice nervous and sketchy this is high school yeah i was in high school he was a year or two maybe two years older than me so i believe this was i was probably 17 he was 19 at the time okay and he was just off his rocker on coke. And I remember thinking like, whatever that drug is, fuck that. Because it seemed like the people that did it, they got hooked so easy. It was so, they loved it so much.

And it was hard to get. And, you know, girls would do things to get it from guys. And it was just, there was a lot involved. Okay. I was afraid of drugs when I was young because I was very insecure. And I had this burning desire to be successful. Yeah, right on. And I felt like drugs were for losers and people that wanted to escape reality.

You and I, we share this belief, by the way, this view. I mean, so I agree. That's what I did. When what changed you? What changed me was years of evidence of watching people giving drugs to people in a lab and watching them get high and seeing predominantly positive effects. Now, this is now, I'm well into my 30s, 40s, and now 54. But over that long period of time, that's where I changed. I'm not like somebody who came to this from high school, always liked drugs and thought of drugs.

I was an athlete. I thought I was going to play professional basketball. So I'm like you. I was just like you. Like, nah, I don't want to be like those cats. You know what I'm saying? But then me actually giving drugs to people and studying their responses and then really checking out the history of why drugs are banned

and just seeing how I was misled and manipulated and lied to and now that i use all these drugs and think how uh i'm a better person for it my life has been enhanced because of it my connection to my loved ones are a lot better um but again i'm a responsible grown-up right i'm 54 years old and i know what i'm doing um so when we think about something like cocaine cocaine not the that people sell on the street that's been stepped on so like when you go to places like columbia and you go to the source and you get really good cocaine like colombia cocaine is about seven dollars a gram whereas in new york it could be anywhere from 60 to 100 a gram um and not as good as the product in colombia so you go to the source countries and you get good stuff um it could be a really

good evening with you and your significant other you know and um um uh all of these sort of stories of people being paranoid about the cops with cocaine there are reasons to be paranoid if you're doing something wrong there's so i get that i mean so you're also worried about being arrested that's what i'm talking about that's what exactly what i'm that's exactly what i mean so there's a reason to that's a rational sort of thing um but what's irrational is that we are arresting people for what they put in their bodies yes agreed yeah agreed wholeheartedly and i always point out that you can go to cvs and buy enough liquor to kill yourself absolutely 24 7 all day long absolutely it's so easy to do absolutely yeah so but when we think about cocaine and why it's illegal yeah um cocaine came to the united states uh in the pop for the

popular masses in the late 1800s and coca-cola this guy john pendleton i think his name was. He put it in Coca-Cola. Well, this product, a Coca-Wine. And he was out of Atlanta. And he put it in Coca-Wine in 1894. The next year, Atlanta banned alcohol. So before Prohibition, alcohol was banned in Atlanta. Prohibition. Just Atlanta. Just Atlanta. I mean, cities.

Interesting. Various cities banned this. Prohibition happened in 1920 nationwide. So since they banned alcohol in Atlanta, he had to come up with a new formulation.

So what he did was tuck the alcohol out, added carbonated water and sugar then you have coca-cola what that's this is how coca-cola this is how coca-cola was made and he put it in these soda fountains so he sold that pharmacies at these soda fountains and they were for whites only so cocaine was you was typically available only to white people at that time. But then in, I guess, maybe 1899, early 1900s, Coca-Cola began bottling the products. Now it's available to black people. And now you start to get the connection between violence and cocaine use among black people. And this sort of narrative grew and grew to the point where we banned cocaine effectively in 1914,

largely because of its association with black people using the drug. A similar thing happened with opium and the chinese that's the real reason that those drugs are banned not because of pharmacology you know what i'm saying yeah now that's not to say that people can't get in trouble with these drugs but people do you know just like they can get in trouble with alcohol that's right that's right but the only stories that we tell about cocaine is the one where people get in trouble yes but i gotta tell you uh recently i watched uh pete davison's movie what was that this the king of staten island i think it is the first time in a popular movie where the hero used cocaine and he was still a hero so you might remember the scene where Steve Buscemi and I think Bill

Byrd they was talking about didn't see the movie oh it was a great start it was great a great scene where they were talking about Pete's dad. And Pete's dad had used cocaine previously. And Pete didn't know this. But it was just a matter of fact. The guy used cocaine. He liked his cocaine. But he was still a good guy.

He was a fireman. He was a hero. He was all of these things. And they didn't besmirch him for using cocaine. It's one of the few times that you see in popular culture that somebody uses something like cocaine and they're not besmirched. They don't have they don't go down this path of becoming an addict and losing all of their possessions because of the drug. And so I thought, like, they're doing something here that's different and then that was really that was a great scene yeah most of the stereotypes about

cocaine in hollywood are you know people using people seedy people people that have no compassion for each other ruthlessly ambitious people doing coke and just all full of themselves and high on themselves and i'm gonna take over this fucking town ah that's what you you hear and see you know yeah um yeah i hope that changes man i know yeah well i mean uh i would try it with you yeah i would try it yeah all right especially listening to you and knowing you probably get the real shit yeah i just uh i avoid things that make me confident. I'm not interested in that. I'm confident enough.

I'm plenty confident. I like things that scare me. That's why I like marijuana so much. I do. People think I'm kidding. I'm not. I like the paranoia. I like freaking out because I always come out of it at the other end with some sort

of a lesson. Because I think sometimes we can shield ourselves from things that we're really worried about or shield ourselves from concerns that we have or even from ruthlessly introspective thoughts that come with high doses of marijuana. And that's the thing that freaks a lot of people out. I find very beneficial some of the best moments i've had personally or after some of the wildest trips where i was like boy this is rough and but at the end when it's over i come out feeling so much better i feel you i mean that's great i mean because you know um that's useful uh you feel like you're a better person that's cool but sometimes

you just want to be euphoric and just enjoy your significant other. Sure. I mean, you know what I'm saying? And so cocaine or some other drug might be useful for that. And so it's not like you have to have only that experience that frightens you and you become a better person at the end of it. I'm all for that. That's fine. You got that.

But I would just say broaden your repertoire. That's it. The problem is if it was legal, it would be great. Like you could get pure cocaine, and you knew what you were getting. But if you're getting cocaine in Austin, Texas, you're probably getting it from some sketchy dude who is also selling a bunch of other shit. getting cocaine in austin texas you're probably getting it from some sketchy dude yeah who uh is also selling a bunch of other shit and yeah i mean i'm imagining i've never tried to buy it

yeah but you know um two things here um we got the technology to put on the streets where people can just submit small samples of their drug 10 milligrams which is nothing and then they get a chem they get a readout of the chemical composition of their drug right we have that technology if the public would put pressure on their officials to make sure that it's available to people where they can submit their drugs small samples of their drugs free and anonymously uh and then they get this readout the problem is it's so taboo like if you even admit that you do cocaine people are like look at this guy ready to ruin his fucking life barely hanging on over there carl look at you doing cocaine this is why in the book i admit my heroin use my cocaine use all of my drug use so i'm trying to change that image

because i have met people all around the world some politicians and so forth and got high with these people uh of course i won't say who they are uh but um the vast majority of people who use these drugs are people who are responsible take care of their families they care about their communities they do all this sort of stuff but hollywood and the media and the mythology is so powerful in showing only this one image yes um and i'm trying to really disrupt that because it's it's so harmful to so many people it is and you know i've had these conversations i've never done heroin but i did one one time when i got my knee uh reconstructed they gave me this morphine drip and you had a button you could press that button and i'm trying

oh my god i kept hammering that button and i was in heaven yeah i mean my knee was fucked up and it was on this motion machine that's constantly extending and contracting my knee. Because it was post-surgery, and I had my ACL reconstructed, and they want you to move it a little bit. So I'm sitting there on this bed with this machine that's going, straight to me, and I'm just going, bang, bang, bang, bang. Woo! So you've done heroin. Yeah, I guess.

It was amazing. Because this chemical structure I took I showed you like morphine um with heroin all you do with morphine is just add to acid groups and that the acid groups don't have any pharmacological effect really um and then that's heroin so morphine is heroin morphine is heroin the bear Bayer Aspirin Company gave us heroin first. Really? So they marketed it as a cough suppressant. That's why they had to add these acetyl groups.

Now they have this new product, but really it's not a new product. It's morphine. Wow. So what about codeine? Codeine, it's also an opioid. So the opioid poppy contains three drugs mainly. Opium, codeine, and morphine. They're all in that poppy and they're all essentially the same drug.

But codeine is a lot less potent than morphine, meaning that you need to have more of it to have the effect. Is codeine what was in NyQuil, the old NyQuil? No, I don't recall codeine being in NyQuil. There's some very potent something or another that's in old NyQuil that— Not in our lifetime, at least. No. No. What do you think it is that was in there?

Probably something like promethazine. You know, that's an antihistamine. It's one of the older ones. You know, the purple drink, they call it. Yeah. And so that's currently in codeine cough syrup. It's codeine, promethazine, and I think acetaminophen, which is Tylenol. And so it probably was promethazine because it'll put you to sleep.

It made me feel so relaxed. I remember I had a cold. This had to be the 90s because I usually don't take anything. I don't take aspirin. I don't take Tylenol. I rarely take non-steroidal anti-inflammatories. Why? I don't.

Non-steroidal anti-inflammatories are bad for your gut. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I don't take those. And I generally look at pain like it's an opportunity to just relax and just accept the sensation of pain and not want to just dull everything. Yeah. Obviously, it was different when I had surgery. And that was also 92, something like that, 93. But I was sick, and so I took some NyQuil.

And I remember just like my bed was just like giving me a hug. Like I remember like, God god this stuff feels so good i think you're just so good to be on the anahistamine that's what that's all it is yeah but anahistamines that's they they're no jokes i mean you know like when we think of the opioid crisis i think a lot of people are dying because of anahistamines too that's the main that's one of the main things that's going on really anahistamines they're's the main that's one of the main things that's going on really antihistamines they're particularly the older ones they they knock you out they're um so you know the antipsychotic medications things like the orzine or halidon i don't know if you

heard of those but antihistamines were the antipsychotic medications were made originally from like uh modifying and antihistamine structure really yeah so antihistamines are no they're no joke see i thought of antihistamines as something that just stops you from like sneezing and makes your nose stop running yeah so too will uh antipsychotic medication and and it'll stop you from vomiting as well it does that too yeah see the term antipsychotic is immediately, oh my God, you're taking antipsychotic medication. You must be psychotic. Like there's a problem, right? Yeah.

There's an association problem. Yeah, I know. It's kind of a misnomer to call these things antipsychotics, antidepressants, because they're not really that sort of thing. That's just what the pharmaceutical companies have labeled them yeah and and that has allowed them to really get over yeah um portland is in the middle of an interesting experiment experiment right like portland has essentially decriminalized everything they've basically they've decided to treat people like grown-ups

and say, we're not going to arrest you for anything. And I'm very curious to see where that goes, because we know what happened in Portugal. Portugal did that, and they had a drastic decrease in crimes, drastic decrease in addictions, and it really opened up a lot of people's eyes. They were like, oh, Jesus Christ, maybe we're doing this the wrong way. And demonizing these substances and also infantilizing people.

Yeah. That's the big one, is another grown adult telling you that you can't do something, that you can't handle it, you shouldn't be able to. But also making this distinction just with drugs, but not with other things that are illegal, like bull riding or BMX riding or MMA fighting or a lot of other dangerous things that people enjoy doing including drinking right now you know and it's it's the problem is our perception we have this ingrained perception of what's acceptable what's not acceptable and you will see people at a bar with a cigarette in one hand or drinking the other say I don't do drugs I mean we have this really looney tunes version of what drugs are and what a person shouldn't should not be doing with their life

and if you see someone who's out there hey i'm gonna go do coke you want to do coke like right now like mike is losing his mind right on but you know i mean even i experienced that with pot the people go you smoke pot i thought you were like it's got your shit together and you're into being successful like yeah i do i just did not they're not related well well joe that's why i'm glad you got me here man so we can yeah try and change this shit let's try to change this shit but you know let's think of when we think about portugal you you said portugal they decriminalized about 20 years ago, right? Everything. But we don't talk about Spain.

Spain never banned drugs, right? And so Spain has always had a decriminalization policy. And there are other countries like Colombia has decriminalization. A number of countries that people just don't know, Portugal was just really good at marketing. And so the world knows about Portugal. But really, it's time to move on. Portugal should legally regulate everything. It should be legal in Portugal and around the world.

It should be legal because even with decriminalization, the thing that I worry about with drugs more than anything is the contaminants that people can put in the drugs. Right. They're far more dangerous or they can potentially be more dangerous than the drugs themselves. And decriminalization does nothing for that. Right. But if you regulate it like we have done with alcohol what we're doing with cannabis now in 15 states or so you now at least have some quality control yeah and that's where the problems come when you have tainted substances uh if we think about prohibition the period between 1920 and 1933 in this country we had a number of people dying and being maimed from tainted alcohol we legalized alcohol in 1933 at the end of 1933

those problems went away the quality control issues they all went away and so that's where i'm hoping society goes legally regulate these other things so we have this quality control. Right. So you can buy actual substances and not these stepped on versions of them, like whether it's heroin or whether it's cocaine. Absolutely. The problem is perception, right? Is that so many people do have these deeply ingrained societal perceptions of what these drugs are and what it means to do those drugs. I know, man, but we need more dudes like you wearing meth shirts.

Yeah, well... When I wear them, people don't know what it is. Well, people don't know that this is a dimethyltryptamine molecule either. Oh, yeah. That's what that is. I didn't even notice it, actually. Yeah. Yeah. You know, i have to wear these shirts so like when i go through the airports like when i'm in places outside of the united states people fuck with you because you're a dread and you're

traveling and so forth you know they want you to go through customs and so forth so i wear these shirts and i tell people you know like i'm a doctor and say oh is that a chemical structure and then i lie and say yeah this is in your brain or your body and then i start explaining in great detail and then they just be like all right just get the fuck out of here so that's why i wear wear these shirts oh that's that's interesting you wear these shirts to stop people from fucking with you and it's actually math yeah or. Or something else. It could be MDMA or something else. Right, right, right. Yeah.

But yeah, so perception. We have changed perception in our society before. We certainly have with cannabis. Yeah, exactly. And so I think we can do it with heroin. With heroin. But we need people to know the facts and the information, and that's why I wrote the new book.

Well, I know many people that have had problems with opiates, particularly pills. Why is it that that seems to be so addictive? Why are these pills so addictive? You've got to give me a little more than that joe because i know far more people who haven't had problems with these pills because you you know they're a lot like you you had the pump that's beyond the pill that's even you had the morphine they don't give me that for a day though exactly but but the thing about it you weren't going out there tricking to get some more of the pump right right i mean because you didn't have enough time to get addicted to it but they did give me pills that i hated um i do not remember

what it was i believe it was vicodins or percocets i don't remember which one but i remember taking it and for whatever it was for me the reaction was i felt so stupid yeah they made me feel so dumb my mind was so dull that i just got rid of him and i sold it to some dude who uh was at the pool hall was that he goes you got those i'll buy those off you and i gave them to him like take them these fucking things away from me yeah but you know uh there are people who have problems let's just yes let's just have a good buddy of mine who got his nose broken let's get his nose operated on after his nose was broken doctor gave him pills four months later he's still taking the pills and finally his friend said hey man you got to stop taking those fucking pills yeah and they

took him away from him and then he went through withdrawal and he he was okay after that but he found himself in the clutch so if he went through withdrawal right somebody uh was being irresponsible with his sort of prescribing the doses that they prescribe, you know, because in a new book I describe just just just a little bit. I describe putting myself through withdrawal intentionally, heroin withdrawal and opioid withdrawal, just so I could show people that this is not life threatening. And it was not pleasant, but it wasn't life threatening. not life-threatening and it was not pleasant but it wasn't life-threatening and what was it like um it was like you've talked about it before you said like the flu that's right that's what i said but it was the thing that i wasn't expecting was i had this abdominal pain that i had never experienced before like just the touch of my skin it just radiated through my body

it lasted for about 12 hours really and um and but um my dependence was not that deep it was only like several weeks i did this for like several weeks it wasn't. And I was over it within 24 hours. And it was just to make a point, really. So this friend of yours, if he's going through withdrawal, the people who were prescribing his medications weren't watching him, right? They weren't. And their doses that they were giving him were probably excessive. I don't know. But they weren't being responsible, and that shouldn't have happened, right? And if that's the problem that he had, he was going through withdrawal, no problem. Just taper him off, and so he'll be fine.

He'll get back to his life without having these disruptions to have to go out and try and get something else so he's not experiencing withdrawal. It's not a big deal to deal with can i ask you this like how do you uh taper off to avoid withdrawals what is what is well you just slowly decrease the dose and you can avoid withdrawals entirely yeah so like if you take if you're taking antidepressants um and then you're going to come off of them your physician will taper you off because antidepressants antidepressant medications will get will you will experience withdrawal if you

abruptly discontinue them and so people know this withdrawal is not a big deal to deal with now if he was having other problems like he just wanted to seek opioids then i you know there may be he liked the effects um and if he was still meeting all of his obligations and doing and they weren't disruptive what's wrong with that what's wrong i think there's a lot of people out there there are taking it most of the time okay i mean I mean, that's the wrong way to describe it. I think there's a lot of people that are taking opiates on a regular basis and are just doing normal shit in life. And many people don't even know. Yeah.

I think that's an honest statement. Yeah. I mean, I've been one of those people at point periods in my life when I can get some good opioids, particularly like some good Afghanistan heroin. I mean, I'm one of them. And how do you take it? Snort it. Is that the way to go? For me, because I don't, you know, I'm vain.

I don't want to have track marks or anything. And the effects of taking a drug intranasally they Hit you rapidly enough and I'm good. I don't need to shoot anything the Afghan heroin connection is so bizarre You know, we've talked about this on the podcast before there's a really weird video from the early days of the Afghan war where Geraldo Rivera is on Fox News and he's showing u.s soldiers guarding poppy fields and uh that they're guarding the poppy fields so that the poppy growers will help them out and you know and and rat out the taliban and we're watching this going what the fuck are you talking about like the united states army is guarding poppy fields again where

is that heroin going who's selling it how's it getting out of there where is it how's it getting to america because it is getting to america and if the soldiers are guarding it what else are they doing yeah so like much of our heroin in the united states comes from South America now. It used to come from Afghanistan, but most of it comes from South America. But again, your major point is why are we gardening opium poppy fields? Right. Because it's a lucrative market,

market market. And, well, we're finally using our military for something worthwhile. well, we're finally using our military for something worthwhile. You know, but to think about opioids seriously, because the country thinks that we're in an opioid crisis and all of this nonsense that's going on. I get these emails from parents.

I don't know if you know ASAP, the ASAP group, the ASAP mob folks, ASAP Rocky. Do you know that group? I don't know them personally, but I know who they are. Yeah, so the founder of the group, ASAP Yams, Stephen Rodriguez is his name he died and his death was attributed to an opioid overdose I met his mom as a result of this and I looked at his toxicology and we had great conversations I mean i consider her a friend now and so uh i take this seriously about the opioids and when i look at how and why he died he most likely died from um ignorance that is he didn't realize that if you mix something like oxycodone that that's what he had, oxycodone.

He had promethazine, which is an antihistamine, alcohol, benzodiazepine, a number of things in his system. And those things combine to increase the likelihood of respiratory depression. That's what i think now if he was simply seeking an opioid high uh he would have been fine uh if he would only have taken the oxycodone but people don't realize that they shouldn't mix the opioid with an antihistamine with alcohol with a benzodiazepine because that increases the likelihood of you having respiratory depression so many of these deaths are caused by this type of ignorance and um and in other cases we don't know why people are dying. Like, for example, two, three weeks ago, I got an email from another woman who lost her son.

And what they told her was that the son died from an opioid cocaine-related death. She sent me to toxicology. I looked at the levels of the opioid in his system. sent me to toxicology. I looked at the levels of the opioid in his system. The level, this particular guy had fentanyl in his system and he had cocaine in his system. Fentanyl is an opioid, which is far more potent than heroin. And we worry about that when people take fentanyl and thinking that it's heroin because they may take too much and die. And cocaine was in his system. But both of these drugs, the levels that were in his system, for example, the cocaine was five times lower than the cocaine levels that we typically see in a lab when we're giving the drug and people are having

a good time. And the fentanyl level in his system was also really low. So this poor guy probably didn't die as a result of fentanyl or cocaine. But that's what the cause of death is listed as on his death certificate. What do you think he died from? Some substance that they didn't test for, maybe, or something else else i don't know but i don't possible that it was just an extreme reaction to the fentanyl and cocaine this particular kid

um i'm calling him a kid he i'm a kid but he's a 30 some years old um had a history of using these drugs. So he would have definitely had tolerance to both opioids and cocaine. So I don't think it was some strange reaction because these were his drugs of choice. But my point is, is that people who are doing death investigations, medical examiners and coroners, are allowed to get away with saying that someone died from an opioid-related death simply because the drug is in the system. But when you start to really look at these levels, it's like, this wouldn't have killed the person.

And then they don't have to do their job anymore. And I asked her about an autopsy, and she said they didn't do one and um so that really worries me now um i understand that people can get in trouble uh with tainted drugs like heroin tainted with fentanyl. That's a concern. We have to deal with that. But I'm also concerned that we have bought into this story about the opioid crises, and we are letting people off the hook in terms of informing the public about what's really going on. in terms of informing the public about what's really going on. Now, when you say that you think it's nonsense, like the opioid crisis is nonsense, I mean, there's a lot of people out there that are addicted to opioids.

Do you deny that? No, I don't deny that. A lot of people that seek refuge in pills, right? They're just trying to avoid... So let's just make sure we have our language. So when we say addicted we're talking about they meet criteria for this sort of substance use disorder that we've defined in medicine right yeah okay so the vast majority of people who use these drugs are not addicted okay but a lot of people who use these drugs are addicted. Some, a small percentage, are addicted. This is true.

Do you think that it's a side effect of life problems? Like they're avoiding their life and trying to seek pleasure in these things, and so they're blaming the opioids on this sort of behavior pattern? Exactly. So let's think about the towns where we see these that's being ravaged by the opioid crisis.

West Virginia, Ohio, some parts of Michigan. All of these places, what do they call them, rust belters, places where we had these factories, we had gainful employment. All of these people were doing fairly well factories are all gone these people had been middle class they're no longer middle class and their work now they're being offered bullshit jobs with bullshit salaries they can't take care of their families and they now they use opioids too right i mean we won't talk about their alcohol use we won't talk about

all the rest of these other problems that they have but opioids are an easy sort of scapegoat and politicians get currency from this because they say we're going to pump money into the opioid crises we're going to open up treatment centers it's like the fuck you don't need treatment centers you need jobs you need people you need people here to have gainful employment that's what you need i mean and so as long as you're not talking about employing these people as long as you're not talking about making sure that they're not getting tainted drugs you're going to have these problems. So it's mostly people that have problems with their life and then they seek refuge in these drugs. But it's not really an opioid crisis.

It's more of a life crisis. I would bet big money that they're using more alcohol than they are using opioids because alcohol is just more accessible. But the opioid thing is just more sexy for the politician to focus on. And the politician can come in and be the hero because they got a certain amount of money allocated for this region because of the opioid crises.

Opioids are being scapegoated here. And this is not to say people aren't having real problems because I know they are. I mean, I've been out to the rust belt in these places and um i get these phone calls from these parents and and so i i know this is a real thing what do you tell them like if if a parent calls you up and says that they have a kid that's addicted to opioids what should i do yeah. I have gotten a number of parents who have done that sort of thing. One woman has lost like three girls as a result of this kind of thing. The thing is, I try to make sure that they are not judgmental and that they make sure that they

can get their child a safe supply of drug first that's number one because the real danger for me is when they start to get tainted drugs um as you may know i mean they say that prince had died from a fentanyl related overdose yeah he thought he had percocet and he had fentanyl um That's the real concern that I have at first. So it's like, let's keep them alive first. And then we can work on the stuff that is driving them to engage in maybe drug use that's disruptive to their sort of normal functioning. Yeah, I think that was Tom Petty as well. I think he died from the same situation.

A tainted drug situation. Yeah. No way this should happen in a civilized society. You go to a place like Spain, you go to Austria, you go to Colombia, you go to the Netherlands. All of these places have these drug testing centers so you can take a small sample of your drug and they will give you a chemical printout of what you have and so you will know if your substance is tainted and we don't in this country yeah we have to change our attitudes about these drugs and what do you think the best way

other than these kind of conversations and putting these conversations out in the public, what's the best way to get people to reconsider their preconceived notions? Popular culture. You know, we think about comedians. Let's think about comedians. You know, the cheap, there's always a cheap joke. You can say some stupid shit about crack. People laugh. They like it. Let's think about comedians. You know, the cheap, there's, it's always a cheap joke. You can say some stupid shit about crack. People laugh.

They like it. It's not true. But it keeps the narrative going. That's one. I watched the late night shows with Colbert, Seth Meyers. I love what those guys do. Colbert doing this COVID situation always has like a stiff drink with him now and then he's drinking his alcohol then he's besmirching something like weed or something else

it's like come on you're a smart guy you know better than that but the same thing with steph steph meyers they um besmirch other drugs i I mean, so you have to, they have to stop that. They need to, because as long as they're doing that, it continues the narrative. Our movies, when politicians say stupid shit about drugs, we have to check them. When your family members say stupid shit about drugs and drug users, when you talk about a typical drug user, look at me. I'm accomplished. I do all of these things. I'm productive, but I'm a drug user.

How often are you using drugs? How often? Probably every day. I use something psychoactive every day. Every day. I mean, every day. Not just like caffeine. I don't do caffeine.

I don't do caffeine and I don't do alcohol you know those that's hilarious no i can't do those things i mean it's like if you're gonna do a drug do a drug really you know like if like a man well that's how you said do a drug like a man come on have a fucking drink of whiskey have some heroin well you know is it i understand check it out man like alcohol as i get older i can't do it it's not you know uh i have to listen to my body heroin is a lot more gentle on my body than alcohol is interesting yeah i mean i just can't do it i can't do alcohol really yeah so for you to relax like a little sniff of heroin is a relaxing thing. Oh, it's heaven.

I mean, I'm chilled. It's great. I mean, I can be forgiving and take the other person's perspective, understanding. I want to be a better citizen, a better person. That's so interesting because that is not how people think of heroin. They think of heroin as someone lying there with a rubber band strapped around their arm, like half out of it, needle poking out of their vein, life falling apart. I know.

You don't think of someone becoming more compassionate, more interested in hearing someone's thoughts and ideas putting yourself in their position absolutely yeah no i know man that's you know it's like uh the heroin user that we see in public culture it's some poor soul who has taken too much typically intravenously and is nodding or doing something that if people are nodding when they're doing their opioid that means they've taken too much and that means that they they're wasting their high you know it's like you want to be up for this did i ever tell you a story about the pool hustler who used to do heroin no there's a guy named uh he had two different nicknames

one of them was buffalo bill because he had this crazy mustache the other one was water dog and he was this dude in connecticut and he was a top flight professional pool player and he would gamble for big money but he had to do heroin first so i used to play at this place called executive billiards in white plains new york and it was an unusual place at the time where there's a lot of action i mean a lot of guys came there from all over the country to gamble because they knew they'd get games there because there was a lot of gamblers in that in that that that particular pool hall and it was open till like five six o'clock in the morning but the people who worked there all encouraged gambling my friend Guy Guy Azzariti he's no longer with us but he actually owned the place and so uh he he loved he loved the whole gambling aspect of it well this guy would go to the bathroom he would shoot up and he would come out he would sit on a

stool like this just sit like motionless like his lids would be heavy and his arms would be like like t-rex just like hanging there he would sit there for like 20, 30 minutes. And then he would get out of it and then he wouldn't miss. It was crazy. It was crazy. Because he would play this guy George the Greek. And George the Greek was this like real gruff New York character that talked like this all the time.

This motherfucker can't miss. He gets his shit and he can't fucking miss. He would be so angry because you couldn't rattle him you couldn't get it like like there's a misconception the term pool shark yeah they think it's a guy who comes in is really good at pool sharking someone means to distract them while they're playing that's what sharking means like like if a guy is gonna make a shot you move and you you try to do something to take his right you could do everything to him you could yell while he was playing he didn't see it he was gone he would have like gerbil eyes and just fucking shoot those balls right into the heart of the pocket and they were gambling for a lot of money and he was really frustrated but i'll never

forget that this guy would do heroin and just couldn't fucking miss yeah and their thought was that he was had burned his nerves off that somehow or another like when he would do the heroin like he had no more nerves like he wouldn't he had no anxiety no nothing like you know they didn't they weren't heroin users so they had all these ideas like i don't know what about it was i mean he was clearly he had he had an addiction but clearly he was also like a top of the food chain pool player yeah it was very weird to see that these guys would come up with all these excuses why this guy could do heroin and beat everybody yeah well yeah um you know um i i guess my i have a personal story it's kind of close, I guess as close as I can get.

One of the things that I love to do is the day after doing heroin and then like doing an interview or something or doing something, a talk, I am at my best the day after. Because all of those worries are gone gone and you are just focused on what you have to at least i am i'm just focused on what i have to do and the world is all right with me all this minor petty bullshit not bothering me you know and so you would you do it like say if you had some very important conversation on television or something like that would you do heroin the day before purposely oh i have done it and i do you know when i um i did like a ted talk i do these kind of things i marked them by like what a drug like my ted talk was on methamphetamine. And then, you know, or some interview the day before I did heroin or something.

Just so I know in my head. And it just goes against all of these sort of stereotypes. And it's what I do to feel better and to be a better person. That's an interesting thing that people would never believe, right? That you do heroin and these drugs to be a better person. That flies in the face of conventional thinking. I mean, as a comedian, I think about getting on that stage and then you have to have, your job is to make people laugh. And it's a hard thing. All of us, we try to be funny in our life and we're not funny.

Right. And in our hands, it's not funny. I think about all the pressure that like the top comedians have and when they get on that stage and then you are expected to do it again and again in this Internet age to put new material. How do you do that um i'm thinking about like john john john mulaney uh recently recently his recent troubles yeah guy hosted saturday night live twice in the past year i mean that, that's a big fucking honor. And you had to show all of this pressure. You need something in order to do these kind of things and also to feel better and be upbeat and be excited to see these audiences when you are exhausted from putting this together i mean you are just exhausted it's a hard thing and we don't have this conversation

in society what we do what the conversation we can have in our society is oh yeah that comic he was out of control and drugs did that to him that's the only conversation we're allowed to have. Like John Mulaney. Yeah. The only thing we're allowed to do is have that conversation. Yeah. And it's like, wait, wait, hold up. This guy accomplished all of this shit.

And I don't know this guy personally, and I apologize. I don't mean to say anything negative about him because I think he's really funny. But the point is, is that I know drugs were not his problem. I don't know what else is going on in his life, but I know something's going on if he checked in. that this guy's accomplishments are just inconsistent with somebody who is addicted to drugs. That's just inconsistent.

I think, well, I don't know John well. I've met him. He's a very nice guy. And I think, I agree with you, he's very funny. Being a prominent national level comedian like he is, is stressful. I can speak to that. I it it's stressful i think the the discussion is that he sought out drugs because i think he had been clean before and then he he started using again during the pandemic. A lot of people are stressed out, believe it or not, about not being able to perform.

Yeah. Not being able to, because their identity. I get it. I understand. Me too. I get this. Yeah. Their identity is wrapped up in that.

Yeah. But I agree with you that it's a psychological issue that's probably going on more than a cocaine issue. And some people it's very difficult for them to adjust right like there's things taken away from them they feel like there's a hole in their life because they can't do stand-up yeah and and then maybe they try to alleviate some pressure or alleviate some anxiety with drugs and they decide that they've they've gone too far and they're using it too much. You think it's a psychological issue, though, more than a chemical substance issue. Here's what I think, and this is pure conjecture.

I think that maybe something happened in the poor guy's life. And then somebody knew that he did cocaine. And it was easy to scapegoat cocaine as opposed to what's really going on. Right. That's what I think happened. And you bust into a hotel room and John's naked with 15 hookers. You're like, I got to stop doing coke. You know, the specifics of the story, I don't know what happened.

I'm just joking. John, I hope you hear this. Yeah, but I don't think it's cocaine. I don't know. You know, I don't know. I do know guys that, like my friend Jim Norton, he's been clean since he was 19. Let's think about that statement for a second. Yeah.

Let's think about it because he's 53 I think yeah let's just think about that he's been clean since he's 19 at 19 you're still a fucking chow and so it's like what are you clean from well he was doing a lot of drugs at 19 I know

and he was probably doing a lot of other shit that he was fucking up I mean whether it's from sex driving a car whatever it is he was probably doing a lot of other shit that he was fucking up i mean whether it's from sex driving a car whatever it is he was probably doing a lot of other shit that he was fucking up in and he's probably doing those things better now because he's grown up but yet we tell this story about him being clean at 19 that's some stupid shit that we say that what do you feel about alcoholics though because there are people that just can't drink.

Or at least they say they can't drink. If they drink, they just go off the deep end. Yeah, I don't believe that. I mean, that's just... You know, people, if they feel like I'm a better person, I don't drink, great. That's great for you. But to say there's this general principle where people can't drink, that's not true. That to say like there's this general principle where people can't drink that's not true that's just not there's no evidence for that no no evidence at

all so do you think that's just a common cultural cultural narrative that you know there's people that can't drink it's a common cultural myth yeah but that's okay if it's keeping you away from trouble in your mind. That's fine. That's your thing. But do not act like that's a real thing. So when a person is an alcoholic and they drink all the time, one thing that is true is that people, like alcohol is one of the interesting drugs in that it's commonly available and it's one of the rare ones where getting off of it will kill you. Right? Like if you are addicted to drugs, and they think that's what happened to amy winehouse unfortunately yes

yes yeah alcohol if you just go cold turkey yes your body why is that what is what's the process yeah it's a dangerous thing and we don't we don't talk enough about this in society because people say i'm gonna kick it i'm gonna cold turkey. Don't go cold turkey with alcohol, please. Because alcohol, what happens is that if you've been drinking for a long time in your life, it suppresses neural activity. So it's really good at increasing this neurotransmitter called GABA. And GABA inhibits other neurotransmitter called GABA that and GABA inhibits other neurotransmitters and so your brain it slows down the activity of these neurons right so they it

suppresses these other these neurons in the brain and now if you abruptly discontinue alcohol use now the neurons fire wide wildly and and and and so um what happens is that when the neurons fire wildly you have a seizure and the seizure is the thing that kills you interesting yeah so that's why you want to tell people, go see a physician and slowly titrate, take something like a benzodiazepine, and then it will slowly bring the neurons back around. Hmm. Interesting. So did they have to wean off of it? Yes slowly yeah but you won't be weaning off of alcohol instead you'll be weaning off of a benzodiazepine which has a similar effect of alcohol as at least on these neurons and so you would stop alcohol cold turkey but go on the benzodiazepine yeah and then slowly work your way off yeah yeah um my friend jordan peterson had a problem with benzodiazepines i don't know if you've heard that i have yeah what did you think of that um i understand why he would have a problem because he got he blew up you know just

all of a sudden and then he had all these people who hated him and loved him and so i understand people having problems and psychologically yeah and i understand using benzos and because benzos help some people to relax. There are better drugs for that. But I understand. I get that. So, yeah, I get it. What are you asking? He had a really hard time getting off of them and had some serious withdrawal problems getting off of benzodiazepines.

His body didn't react very well. I don't want to speak on it because all I know is what I've read. I haven't even talked to him personally about it. Yeah, my question is, well, why is he getting off of them? I mean, why was he trying to get off them? That's the question that I want to know. Like, do you not want to take them anymore? I don to know. Like, do you not want to take him anymore? I don't know.

I don't know what the, I mean, I'm assuming there was some sort of a negative reaction. Or maybe he decided he needed to be sober. Yeah, this is the thing. So, like, we have to ask that first question. It's like, wait, you enjoy this and you're good. You're working and you're taking care of your family and so why do you want to stop you know like what's going on um that's the that's the question if people are putting pressure on you now that's a sort of morality issue maybe i don't know but

that's we have to ask that question um um i mean jordan seemed to be productive in all the rest of those things. He seemed to be doing what society would have people do. Prolific and working a lot. What do Benzos do? Benzos, just think of them like alcohol. A longer-lasting alcohol. Really? Yeah.

So it suppresses your anxiety? That's what they're treating. Relaxes you? They're used to treat anxiety. That's their primary use. And would it also act as a social lubricant the same way? Oh, absolutely. Yeah?

Absolutely, yeah. Is there withdrawal symptoms associated with getting off of benzos yes yeah so just like alcohol um just think of benzos and the older barbiturates remember the barbiturates and alcohol you think of those as the same class of drugs and all three of those sort of classes you can't abruptly discontinue because you might run the risk of killing yourself wow that doesn't sound good that sounds like a reason to not do benzos just to avoid killing yourself well you know they're just better drugs too for those kind of things uh like opioids i'm telling you if people had a safe supply, not like Percocets or Vicodin,

you know, you and I have talked about this in the past about Percocets and Vicodin. The concern that I have with them is that they have Tylenol or acetaminophen in them. Large doses of acetaminophen are in Percocet and just a small amount of opioid. The acetaminophen is the thing that's going to really harm you in that case. So we need to take the acetaminophen out of that. So if you're going to do an opioid, don't do that formulation. Just do the opioid. So ideally, if the world was a perfect place you would be able to get pure heroin yeah you you will be able to get heroin pure heroin or even morphine they're essentially the same and you can do your

thing you understand just like with alcohol, these drugs are capable of producing dependence such that you might go through a withdrawal. If you're taking large doses every day for several months, that may not be a good thing. Like we have alcohol in this society and most people don't do a large amount of alcohol every day right so you would do an opioid in a similar way and when you say this like the the dependence what is the physical dependence like what is happening to someone when they get dependent upon opioids like what's the the mechanism in the body yeah so one of the things that happens opioids do a lot one of the things that they do just to take one function is that they slow down the motility of the gut so you you don't pass things as quickly you get constipated right

they hear about that with pills yeah so you get with heroin and all of these, you get constipated, right? I hear about that with pills. Yeah. So you get heroin and all of these opioids, you get constipated because it slows down the motility. So what the body does is try to counteract what's going on because you have these compensatory mechanisms, these mechanisms that try to maintain homostasis. Now, those forces are activated. And when you have, when you've been taking these drugs

for a long period of time, those forces are ramped up. And now you just abruptly discontinue the use of these drugs. Those forces are still ramped up. And now the opioid is not there so it's you're going to get like this uh over effect this super effect of so you'll get this tremendous amount of diarrhea as a result because those forces are ramped up to get your stuff never a good statement when you

ever hear tremendous amount of diarrhea yeah so. So that's what happens. And that's one of the things that can happen. And that's not good. So it's basically your body's compensation for the opioids and that opioids are removed. So the compensation exists, but there's nothing to battle against. That's right. So you so you get just over compensation and so really you have to slowly wean it so your body comes to recognize that it doesn't need to compensate as much and then over time you can sort of ease off like step off the skateboard absolutely and if people do that shouldn't have any problems. And this is something that you would, I would think that if it was legal and we had legitimate professional places where a person could get these things.

Yeah. don't necessarily have a good understanding of the physical response to the body, to these opiates. But if you had a place where you could get it from and they could explain it to you, this is why you have to be careful getting off of this. This is what's going on in your body, and this is how you avoid. This is how you mitigate these real problems that can be associated with just stopping cold turkey yeah we get we can do that we should do this for all drugs just in our regular general drug education but in our zeal to vilify these drugs uh we only talk about the negative effects yeah no that's all you ever hear yeah especially when you're talking about heroin meth these kind of drugs you don't ever

hear a person like you educated intelligent good-looking guy saying nice things yeah well thank you for all of that but you don't hear that though right yeah no no absolutely man um it it it's really troubling because you know i have kids my kids now my youngest just turned 20 and so my kids are in this sort of drug using potential stage at this age right and so uh i was faced a long time ago with this sort of uh this this this this issue uh my kids will be in the drug using age at some at some point so what do i want them to know and so that's what i that really drives me to be like all right let's get all this shit on the table because if you're faced with this and you use you will know how to stay safe and you'll know how to keep your friends safe you know so it's like

no moralism here right all i care about is that you're a good person and that you're safe that's all i care about well that's a very unique environment right like you don't have the the normal scare tactics or the normal fear that parents have of the kids getting hooked on drugs that's all you hear hooked you know, and losing their lives. Their lives fall apart because they got hooked on drugs. Yeah, I see that. You raise a really good point here, man. I'm glad you bring this point because when we talk about why we have this narrative about drugs,

because there are a number of constituencies who are benefiting from this narrative and parents are a constituency that are benefiting from this narrative because if you just say you don't do drugs that's one less thing that the parents have to actually teach about to their children so they're in on this too um i think they believe it though for the most part most of the parents that are saying don't do drugs you get hooked on drugs they believe and they're worried wait wait don't get me wrong just because you believe it doesn't mean that you're not in on it and you're not benefiting from it so i think that i think they they they do believe it but they need to understand that they're also in on it they are part of the

problem and they have to and they they're benefiting because um they think that it is making their job easier no as a parent you have to do your work and that's part of your work and so that's why we tell parents uh things like well, you know, it can happen to anyone. It can. That's not really true. There are things we can do, things you can do as a parent. But we have let parents off the hook. And I'm not putting this on parents.

I think a lot of us have played a role here. But the parents have to understand that they, too, have a role that they played here. Now, what do you think about rehab centers? Put it this way. If I had a loved one who had a drug problem, a drug problem, air quotes, I wouldn't know where to send them. I would probably send them to switzerland and i'm being i'm dead serious i would not uh because what we classify as drug problems in this country oftentimes are not drug problems there are other issues but we scapegoat drugs do you remember celebrity rehab dr drew yeah fucking

idiot yep whoa yep yeah what what's your thoughts on that i don't think he knows anything about drugs but it was doesn't he run like a drug addiction and treatment center i don't think he knows anything about drugs really uh In terms of personal experiences? I did Anderson Cooper with him one night, and we were talking off-camera, and it was clear to me he knows nothing about drugs. In what way? What drugs do, why people do drugs, anything. Those people are charlatans.

And I'm, you know, they, again, you know, I'm trying to be a better person. And I'm trying to be compassionate. But I have little compassion for people who are benefiting off of other people's suffering. And there are a number of them out here and they shouldn't be allowed to do that. Well, they don't do that celebrity rehab show anymore. But I remember watching it thinking this has got to be the worst environment for psychological health where you're on a reality show showing the world all your problems like if if i wanted someone to be psychologically healthy the last thing i would do is put them on a reality show and say hey definitely read the comments yeah

definitely go on twitter afterwards and see all the shit that people are saying about you because that's definitely going to fuck your head up. And that's what's good for you. That's the last thing I would say. I know. I would say what you need is silence. You need some personal reflection. Find out what your problem is.

But you need also some productive things to distract yourself with. Like maybe you should take up yoga. Take up meditation. Start exercising. Do some positive things for your health if you think your life is in a bad a bad place and you're in a downward spiral whether it's because of the drugs or because of behavior patterns you find yourself in or just because of the fact that you're avoiding something in your life that's disturbing you you need positive reinforcement you need good things in

your life let's think about this I. Just like you're saying. These people are at a low point and they're having problems. And then we say we're going to bring in cameras and exploit that for the drama. There's no way that's good. I know. I know. I know. And that's why this is what I'm saying. If you have a medical degree and you think that that's okay

something's very wrong there very wrong it's exploitation yeah it is exploitation that's exactly it and um it shows that you don't care about those people that you're supposedly treating. And that's the thing that really, it really irritates me when we get these experts on TV with their patients on TV. That's just, that is not healthy for anybody involved. Just not healthy. No. But that guy, Dr. Drew, doesn't know anything about drugs. Nothing about drugs.

That's crazy that, well, it doesn't exist anymore, right? But it is crazy that they thought that was a good idea. And to take celebrities who are famous who have drug problems. My favorite one was Dennis Rodman because all he did was work out. Like, he seemed fine. He's on a treadmill running. I never saw the show, but I'm sure he probably was fine. But they thought that it would increase the ratings.

You know how these things work. Just a side story. So when we were talking off camera, Anderson Cooper was asking a serious question of both of us, really me, about MDMA. Considering using MDMA and was wanting to know, like, the real deal. And I was trying to, like, help him understand, you know, all of the sort of, tried to give him a comprehensive understanding in a quick time period. And this Dr. Drew idiot was chiming in and the way he was describing what MDMA does, just let me know that he knew nothing about MDMA and that he was just an idiot. and that he was just an idiot.

Because, you know, if you don't know, when you're in the presence of an expert on something, most adults shut the fuck up because they might be able to learn something, right? He didn't. And then that really told me a lot about him as a person. You know, like if I'm in the presence, if somebody is asking me about how do I increase my subscriber base to my podcast, you know, and you're there or something. And then I would shut up. I mean, or somebody asked me about being a comedian.

I mean, I would like to be funny, but I know I'm not a comedian. I would shut up when i'm in the presence of an expert of people who know but he didn't and so he is a doctor right i mean what is that does he does he understand i mean is does he have uh wait wait wait hold up let's be clear okay he has a medical degree yeah right and so he's taken a class of two in pharmacology with drugs study of drugs that's it i mean whereas you are an actual expert yeah this is what i this is what i do i study and the literature that he's reading about how these things work is from the papers that i wrote the papers that i you know so that's, that's the difference. And so like, uh, think of it like, um, uh,

in terms of, uh, like I'm producing and he's the consumer. So, uh, this is my, my product. And I know more about my product and he's the consumer and he's, and he's telling people as a, as a a marketing agent if you will about my product that i produced i understand and was his thoughts on it is this uh common misconceptions i don't know the shit was so stupid i was just i stopped listening and and i told him that it was stupid and so i was trying to like really help anderson because he asked a serious question i wanted to make sure he was good anderson was trying to party safely that's right and i wanted

to make sure he was good yeah and and i was just like can you shut the fuck up please yeah you're such a nice guy when you get upset about something like this i know it's real yeah yeah because you know i'm really trying hard man i'm trying to be a better person it's like uh i'm 54 and i'm trying to be like um i'm trying to help other people live better too man i don't i don't want to be angry i don't like that it's just not not good you know yeah but i can't tolerate i don't tolerate fools i don't do that yeah i understand what you're saying um and it is unfortunate that someone like anderson can't ask that on the air you know he can't say hey listen like like you and i are talking about cocaine like i've never done cocaine but i do cocaine with you yeah you know like like

okay i've never done heroin other than the the drip at the surgery center but uh i'll do a little bit of i'd snuff sniff a little heroin with you tell me what's cool don't worry about it man when we get out of this pandemic we're gonna bring and we're gonna bring afghanistan here and colombian we'll be back now when you go to colombia you can just buy it in colombia is that how it works i don't buy drugs man you can't give it to you yeah Yeah, I don't. I don't. I don't. You know, I'm out here. You know, me being a drug user. I don't put myself in situations where people could arrest you. Yeah, don't do the compromising thing. I don't do that. Isn't that unfortunate?

It's very unfortunate, man, because I have to be paranoid about who's around me. I hate that shit. Do you have to be paranoid because of your public profile because you're an ardent drug supporter yeah yeah that's right man can you imagine it you know it's like columbia professor bought i mean caught buying drugs you know it's like i mean i wouldn't i wouldn't do that to the university i wouldn't i would never do that has that ever been a problem with the university that you have this uh stance on drugs, although very educated and obviously you know what you're talking about? But is it?

I don't I haven't felt it as a problem, you know, so. So I don't know what the university feels about that, but check it out. This is my perspective. If anybody knows anything about the Declaration of Independence, it's a beautiful document. It guarantees all of us at least three birthrights, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness but we talk about those things in this jingoistic way as opposed to really unpacking it it's like life liberty

that means that i can live my life however i see fit as long as i don't stop others from doing the same. And I can pursue happiness as I see fit. The Declaration guarantees me that. It doesn't guarantee me happiness. It guarantees me the pursuit of happiness. And I use drugs in my pursuit of happiness. And so if I get pushback and that sort of thing um i'm i'm willing to deal with it i mean i'm i'm willing to go to jail for the for using drugs um and that's the thing i had to think about for myself is like if you really believe this are you willing to go to jail for it absolutely i'm i'm i'm willing to

risk these things just like other people who reminded the country about its promise life liberty and the pursuit of happiness and how the how the promise or the practice doesn't match the promise you know and that's what and so when i think of rosa parks sitting on that bus seat um she was doing that i think about all of these sort of people who we now revere um who i revere it's like what kind of man am i if i can't it's like what kind of man am i if i can't like live uh in the way that i know uh is right right and so that's that's so when i think of the university and i think about pushback what people uh say i i don't care as long as i am treating people well and i'm not abusing or mistreating people as long that's that's all I I will worry if I'm mistreating people because that's not right but if I'm treating people well and people are

bothering me about this issue bring it on that's a very it's very confident and it's very admirable that you have that position because a lot of people when faced with public scrutiny right like this is like there's a conventional idea of what drugs are who drug users are and they would immediately like most people like yeah i feel differently but i don't want the hassle i don't want to i don't want to experience it i don't want to feel it i don't want i don't want the criticism i don't want to have to debate it i don't want to argue with people i'll just do my thing no i know those people and many of them hang out with me or used to hang out with me and i've decided that there are so many people catching hell for being identified as a drug user that it's not right

for us who are privileged and we can be in the closet when other people can't because they've been identified or whatever. So I think that it is dishonoring those people. And so I don't want to hang out with people who want to use drugs and be in the closet and not think about those other people who are catching hell. the closet and not think about those other people who are catching hell so i i i decided only recently you know i'm writing this book it's like i'm not hanging out with people like that anymore or in the closet when other people are catching hell yeah this is wrong i mean it's just fucking wrong that you that we are putting people in jail for what they put in their bodies it's just wrong it's just flat out wrong i couldn't agree more i think it is it is wrong and it's it's one of the weirder aspects of modern

society that we do make these distinctions between different types of drugs that are acceptable and not acceptable and oftentimes the ones that are far like cannabis far safer than the acceptable ones certainly can be far safer uh but you, it could be also dangerous for some people. Sure, yeah. Well, I had Alex Berenson on the podcast who used to write for the New York Times and he wrote a book called Tell Your Children. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, and one of the conversations that we had were about people that have had bad reactions to high doses of marijuana and they have these schizophrenic breaks well Alex plays kind of fast and loose with the evidence right Alex over interprets that fine that sort of thing um there are people who use high doses of marijuana and get really paranoid and anxious and all of those things but they don't become schizophrenic so do you think the people that have these schizophrenic breaks were already schizophrenic absolutely that's what the evidence shows right and but alex is saying like uh presented like marijuana is causing schizophrenia and that's the problem um and um and the evidence is not with him there now that's not to say that uh likeice, you don't, you know, you're new to marijuana and then you're smoking large doses or you're taking large oral doses.

Yeah, you might have some paranoia and that shit might last for a day or two, you know. But the thing that you have to remember, those people, is that the drug will eventually float away from the receptor and you'll you'll come back to your normal self and so the best therapy for people is to have others just simply talk them down make sure that they're chilled they understand that don't worry this is temporary because if they think that oh shit i'm gonna be fucked up forever and that causes them even more anxiety and they do something dangerous and so the downward spiral exactly and so people like alex are are those people who are causing more harm in terms of how i think how he talks about this. And so, yeah, he's always trying to goat me on Twitter to get into these conversations.

You know, it's a real bitch move, you know? Yeah. But anyway. Twitter's a weird place, man. It's so not real life. But yet it's human beings communicating with human beings. But it's in a but yet it's human beings communicating with human beings. But it's in a way that it's not.

It's all of the normal social contracts are abandoned. All the normal protocol, the normal compassion for talking. The way people talk to a person in front. It's the way people talk to people on Twitter. If they talk to people like that in real life, there'd be brawls in the street. Every day would be like an assault on Capitol Hill. It would be like an assault on capitol hill well it would be madness it wouldn't be because those people as you know they're cowards and they wouldn't do that so that shit would just stop immediately right you know and so um um yeah but it's just so strange that it's such a prominent form of communication with human beings this complete unnatural way of communicating in text

and communicating in a very insulting way oftentimes i know i know and um you know one-way communication like you're typing at your community your computer it's always so fraught with potential uh misunderstanding yeah you know even when you're talking to a loved one um so um um it'd be nice if people remember that yeah well if if we really reinforce that and make that like a like a core tenant of of behavior and have let people know like i'd i'd like talking to people like this. Yeah. This is the best way.

Well, I hope. Sitting there face to face and you rarely have, I mean, it rarely gets ugly. I hope you continue to do this here show. I know I've seen you talk to people like, I was really interested in one show particularly. You had the cat on. He's a comedian.

He's from my generation. He has a podcast. He'sian new york kind of person he might be from boston nick dipolo nick yeah yeah so like you were talking and nick is a trump supporter and you were asking him i think about uh like what don't you think that trump sometimes uh um gives misinformation uh you were saying something like that and he was basically saying he wouldn't go i don't know it was some deflection it was some deflection i was really interested in in that conversation i was glad that you were having that conversation with him actually because um um i only really i he's from my generation is comics you know i i love comedy that's one of the few things that i go out and support live shows i went out and

supported him my wife and i went out just you know do you try and support people and we stood up front always and he just attacked us you know uh really and i'm always you know always there trying to cheer people on uh because i understand how hard it is and i never been so angry like at a comedian um and i kind of hung around afterwards to like have a word with him but he never came out and i don't know what the fuck was going on with him and i was there to support him you know just support people uh doing their craft and uh so like this sort of face-to-face conversation that's what i wanted to have with him it's like what was he attacking you about i don't know we were interracial couple and it was something like that it was uh uh wasn't just poking fun having a good time it was mean man you know we stood up front always and comedians always poke fun at us and that's a good thing you know this was like an attack this was mean

just really mean and um uh so i was i wanted to have a conversation with him like yo what the fuck is up you know um but maybe he was having a bad night or something i don't know the crowd was not laughing with him and he he was like. Where was this? New York. It was. Carolines? No, it was one of the smaller places. And a lot of no-name comics were there.

And the crowd was feeling them. He came out. They weren't really feeling him. So he just kind of turned on the crowd. I think that's what happened. That can happen. Yeah. I've seen it trust me i know and i know it's a tough gig and that's why you know i try to support comics because it's a fucking tough gig yeah it is a tough gig that's unfortunate though i uh yeah i don't want to say. No, there's nothing to say.

I mean, I was just happy that you had him on the show and you were like talking to him. I've known him forever. Yeah. You were talking to him about this difficult conversation. And I wanted to see how he dealt with it, you know. And he kind of avoided it or tried to avoid it. Yeah. I don't exactly remember what we said. You were talking about Trump being a spreader of disinformation or misinformation more so than other politicians.

And he wouldn't acknowledge that. And he was just basically saying all politicians do that and you were like well don't you think he does it more i wonder how people are going to feel about trump after this is over like i wonder when the dust settles what the the perception is going to be you know because perceptions change like when bush was in office initially people hated him and then 9-11 came around and people started to love him because he represented like he had a very high approval rating post 9-11 because it seemed like someone's going to take care of us and make us safe again. And then towards the end of his administration, people hated him again. Yeah.

Like you haven't done shit like this. You've got to listen to these wars. There was no weapons of mass destruction. But now as time has gone on, people go, well, I mean, that's one thing you could say about the difference between Bush and Trump, is that Bush, in hindsight, is a far more reasonable person. And the way he looks at things is like, you know, even the way he looks at people that have different opinions on things, the way he looks at Supreme Court rulings, the way

he looked at all those things was very much more presidential yeah well so let's be clear like all presidents kind of get a bump after they went to war right yeah and so that's he he enjoyed that bump right that's cool and then people start to say wait a second you lied to us about going to war and they start to see him for what he was. But through it all, through all these eight years, Bush is a decent human being. And so I think now we have a person who's not a decent human being, who makes fun of other people people who bullies other people who incites other people to do bad things um so when you compare bush to that sort of thing

bush is still a decent person do you remember when they found uh there was a a famous photograph of him sitting there with a taco bowl. He's eating a taco bowl. And it was like, right after he'd said something about Mexicans being rapists and shit, he's like, I love Hispanics. Like eating a taco bowl. I don't.

Well, behind him was a drawer. And in that drawer, the drawer was open and there was a bunch of Sudafed, but there was the European Sudafed. It's apparently. Yeah. With the real Sudafedrin in it.

Yes. But there was like a large supply of this shit. What does that stuff do for you? So. Do you remember the picture? Did you see the picture? No, no, no. Pull the picture up so you could see it. But you asked what the Sudafed do for you.

Sudafed is like an amphetamine. It's one of the building blocks to this structure there it is so that box there oh wow oh yeah uh again uh why would is that the real one that's like uh people did the math to figure out so that one there that's not the real one it doesn't have pseudofit. That one there has phenylephrine in it. That's the replacement for Sudafed. So that has Tylenol, caffeine, and Sudafed replacement. That's what they said?

It's not the real one? Yeah. So there was incorrect speculation that it was the european version of it is that what it was because i remember reading that people had speculated that it was a european version of it which was more potent and they were saying it's uh pseudo fed is pseudo ephedrine yeah right that's right and pseudo ephedrine is from fedrin and the fedrin is like a building block to the amphetamine. So I don't know why Donald Trump would need that when he can just get prescribed amphetamines like other presidents and like our military.

And so I suspect he does take a stimulant. I suspect he also has a sedative to sleep at night and those sorts of things. And that would be reasonable. Yeah. I think that has always been the case, right? Yeah. I mean, that was Dr. Feelgood back in the Kennedy days. Absolutely. Yeah.

Absolutely. I mean, I know if I have that job, I better have an ample supply of substances. I mean, you have to. I mean, you have to be up and you got to make sure you get sleep as well yeah the up part is interesting because he's obviously not fit and he's 74 years old and meanwhile the guy got covid and then after covid he had all this energy and he's talking all this craziness on twitter and law and order and all this and but that is like and that's stimulant type of chatter, right? Like many, many, many posts and tweets.

He can go on the campaign trail and have all this energy. It could be, Joe. You know, certainly as a president, I suspect he has a stimulant. And that would be normal. But, you know, he probably has some cognitive stuff going on too and he slurs sometimes yeah and to me that says stroke or something may have happened I think the slur it seemed to me more like he was coming down off of something or he was on some sort of sedative that he over prescribed or over overdosed. You know, you've seen that where he's like struggling.

It seems like he's exhausted. That's not a sedative, man. I don't. You're really fucked up, though. If like you take something and you're really kind of drowsy, but you're trying to keep it together for your speech. And God bless America. Like you barely can get the words out because your mouth is failing you.

I don't know. I'm only speculating here. I don't really know, but... That's how people talk when they're drunk. Yeah. But why would he be on a sedative when he's doing a talk? maybe he got all ramped up and wanted to calm himself down and maybe he's like on this constant up and down sort of could

be saw certainly possible that's certainly possible but i i don't know i thought maybe given his physical condition i thought maybe he might have had some minor sort of strokes or something going on. While he was having a speech? No, no, no. Just that this is something that has happened. And it shows up every now and then. Just the blood flow to these certain regions maybe being obstructed or something. Really?

I assumed it was a substance thing. I don't know. This behavior is just so strange, man. I think it's something else. I think it's, yeah, drugs be like, yo, don't blame us for that shit. I had an idea for a show. It was kind of a joke,

but called Ex-Presidents on Mushrooms, where you just get ex-presidents and you make them do a mushroom ceremony, like a real four to five gram dose. Do you know Rick Doblin? Yes. Yeah, I've had Rick on a few times. That's great, man, because this is what Rick thought, too. I think his undergraduate thesis was to get all these world leaders on MDMA, though.

Oh, yeah. Well, he's done a lot of research with MDMA, with soldiers in particular, to combat PTSD. He had the same idea. Great man. He really is. And that's who I'm trying to be like, actually. Because Rick is always so forgiving and generous. But I guess if I had a supply of mdma i'd be okay too

that's the thing right it's like you can't get it even if you're a proponent of it and you're a responsible user and but meanwhile i i've only had one mdma experience it was very positive it was very positive uh you've only had one mMA experience. It was very positive. It was very positive. You've only had one MDMA experience? Yeah. God damn, man. No, I'm just starting to feel badly for you. That's like a guy who's only been laid once.

Yeah, exactly. I got laid once. It was great. Yeah, yeah. No, I've only had one. Yeah. Fuck, man. That's remarkable. No, I mean, you're married too you know so it's like it's a great thing to do with your with your partner oh my god yeah yeah yeah it should be

something that you can just get right you know especially like a pure form of it so you know exactly i got an idea man you have an idea. We should take your show on the road. To where? Spain. Oh, somewhere illegal. Spain, Colombia, and all of these places where they test the substances. And we'll do a tour of these substances. And do a tour of substances.

That's something we could do. We could do a different show, like a different kind of show. Like do a tour of substances like that's something we could do we could do a different show like a different kind of show like do a specific series yeah because you know these things just experience things that i haven't experienced before yeah yeah because you know all of these people know you and um so it'll be a big it'll be big fanfare yeah you're doing it but we should we should actually do that man well we could do that post pandemic once everything sort of lightens up yeah i've done a lot of shows high obviously i've done a lot of shows drunk i've done a couple shows on mushrooms you know

and you were cool you at the words at the words i mean you look at it you'd be like oh yeah that's that's that's yeah man me and post malone did one on mushrooms that was fun we were silly but that was just it just got really silly it was one of those shows it was very happy it was a very happy show but it was very very silly and how were the viewers were they like oh yeah we had a good time yeah i think we're honest about it on the show too i think we talked about yeah i think we had a good time. Yeah. I think we were honest about it on the show, too. I think we talked about. Yeah. I think if we do it, don't tell anybody what we're on or that we're on anything. Oh, okay. And then you just see what people say.

Yes. Because we want to see if they even notice. Right. Maybe we can call the show Guess What We're notice. Right. Like maybe we can call the show, Guess What We're On. Yeah. And placebo might be, placebo is a possibility.

Sure. We could do some shows straight. Yeah. Yeah. We'll do a tour of like six different places. Man, that would be great. It's not a bad idea. And that would go a long way to uh

alleviating misconceptions yeah or preconceived notions that people have about uh what things do and what they don't do yeah that would be that'll be a motherfucking community service that really would be it would be in a way right yeah um what do you think about iboga and ibogaine um because that's something that a lot of people turn to yeah i i um um i really like the enthusiasm because they're trying to like help people and it worked for a lot of the proponents and so i like that enthusiasm and and so i'm all for it i support what they're trying to do uh on the one hand but on the other hand um i just don't um believe and based on the evidence that there is a magic bullet for like because people use it to cure drug addiction. Yeah. And there's no simple magic bullet like that. But if people think so and they're not harming anybody, fine.

Why not? I think it's ruthlessly introspective, right? And I think that's one of the things about uh ibogaine that people talk about and i think that when people get to examine their life and examine the whys like as you were saying before that maybe it's not really the substance maybe it's something that they're trying to squash in their past or something they're they're they haven't really come to terms with i I think you're right. We think about ayahuasca from this perspective.

Some people feel that way. Mushrooms as well. Mushrooms, of course. Of course, mushrooms, yeah. And that's a good thing. That's a good thing. And some of us are just introspective anyway. We live in our heads.

And so and other people need a little more help to get there. But it's a good thing. It's a good thing to do it. So I'm for it. Yeah, I think that is oftentimes the case with people that I've talked to that have used mushrooms to quit things. Like I know people use mushrooms and quit cigarettes yeah and where they smoke cigarettes their whole life and then they did mushrooms once and they're like what am i doing with my body and and why am i so distracted that why am i distracting myself with this unhealthy stuff and like what is this

about this behavior pattern that i've sort of fallen into grips with no i i mean i know people who have done mdma to stop using alcohol you know and that sort of thing and it's like um yeah it helps people to have a different perspective um it helps them to see uh sometimes the inferiority of the compound that they've been abusing um yeah i think it's all good man see that's um what i wanted to get to you about with uh rehab centers because like for for people that talk about drugs much of the discussion is about people where the drugs get away from them or they're they're they find themselves in a situation where they find themselves addicted to these drugs. And it is rare that we discuss the real root cause psychologically of what's leading them into these self-destructive behavior patterns.

That's right. And Ibogaine seems to help that, but there's no ibogaine rehab centers in america it's illegal here unfortunately also the people now the people who are proponents um they too are very important in this whole mix um they wouldn't have cameras there doing that sort of stuff and they are trying to understand and help people understand what's really going on in their life so that's really important the therapist those therapists are really important or guides or whatever people call them they're really important they can play a really important role understanding that it's not just the drug that you are dealing with there are some other

deeper issues and i think if people are starting from there thinking about those deeper issues then they have a chance uh but too often our sort of treatment centers man they're in it for the loot for the money and um and one shoe fits all and that's um i don't think that's very helpful for for many people yeah and it's just i don't i've never been to rehab i've never needed to go to rehab but the people that i know that have been they go they it takes a long time they're they're often there for months and they come out and many of them start using again yes oh you probably know wealthy people if it takes a long time so we want to keep them there so make sure that we milk their insurance is that what it is well i mean i did some training in hazelden you know hazelden no it's like the treatment center it's in minnesota um it's um betty ford

kind of issue heard that yeah um so uh yeah it's uh you have these long treatment stays and um can't let you go you might start using again yeah that's right that's right all of that sort of not ready to leave yet carl don't know if you should be hanging out with your friends anymore particularly the ones who got a brain they might be telling you what we're doing here you know that kind of thing um um i what's the science behind it like i'm sure you've examined this like so what are they when when you go to a rehab center what does it take to run a rehabilitation center? How much knowledge do you have to have about these drugs and what to do and how to get someone clean?

That's a damn good question. So typically they may have a psychiatrist or psychologist who are trained in substance use disorders. And then the staff, they don't have much training typically. And then the staff, they don't have much training typically. And our training in substance use disorder at the medical, like physicians and psychologists, that training is not very good. And so when you say not very good in what way? um uh for example we are not really trained to think about uh if somebody is smoking crack and they have a crack addiction so we focus a lot on crack as opposed to like um oh this guy is from somewhere ohio where they lost all of their jobs and his wife left him and his children no

longer speaks to him um um so it's like crack is not the problem but we're getting paid because you have a crack use disorder and so it has to be the problem and and and my specialty is looking at crack not looking at employment and what employment does to a male in modern american society who had been accustomed to being the number one breadwinner in his home. None of that is in the training of these people who are providing therapy. And so that's what I mean. They're not very well trained. They're only focusing on the substance.

That's it. Because that's all we're trained about. If you ask them, like, what does dopamine, I i mean what does cocaine do to dopamine oh they can tell you that inside out you know but um what about what kind of what the what are the impacts of a white male in his mid-40s uh losing his job that paid $150,000, and now the best job he can get pays about $12 an hour. They don't know that. And that's the far more important question. Right. Yeah. How do you manage to get your mind right without just drowning your sorrows? get your mind right without just drowning your sorrows absolutely well just uh if i'm gonna provide treatment in that context with that person the first thing i'm trying to do is how

the hell do we help this guy get a job that he can feel like he's a productive member of our society again. That's where we start. Right. So they have self-esteem again. They feel like they're on the right path. They don't feel the need to just try to escape. Absolutely. Just so they feel like they are human again.

I have a friend whose significant other had a substance abuse problem multiple times. And she kept going into rehab and then getting out and cleaning up for a while and then going in again. And eventually he couldn't take it anymore. And, you know, he had great things to say about her. She's a great girl, but she kept falling apart. And he didn't know what to do. He wasn't a guy who's had problems like that himself. What do you say to a person like that who has a loved one who just keeps falling apart? She would fall apart.

Apparently, I don't know her, but according to his description, she would fall apart. Just start using like crazy and fuck up everything in her life. Yeah, you know what relationships. You and I both know um you can be in a relationship with a person for a number of years and not really be honest with each other um and so like that dynamic i don't know uh but if i had this woman alone and try and figure out like what's really going on that's that's different because i don't know what kind of mistrust and how much damage has happened over the years in that

relationship uh and i don't know how honest and open they are with each other we because you know people can be together for 30 years and not be open and honest. It isn't also the issue that sometimes people aren't honest with themselves about why they're using. They certainly I think people are honest with themselves. They just don't share it with you. You can't get away from yourself. You really can't. You can try. And I see what you're saying.

Yeah. Yeah. They're just not I see what you're saying. Yeah. Yeah, they're just not expressing themselves honestly to other people. Yeah, and some are more convincing than others. And being a human, a decent human, it's a complicated thing. And the thing is, is that we sometimes fail. but it doesn't mean that we're bad people. And that's where we have a real problem because it's like that kind of nuance we're not equipped to deal with in our society, in our relationships. Right. Yeah.

But it's just that's always the narrative, right? Like, oh, he started doing coke and then the relationship fell apart oh he started oh they got hooked on like that's how a lot of people view drugs because society has allowed them to right ma'am like uh if you have a problem that you can't explain throw it into the drug waste bin that explains it away and then you get sympathy and people say yeah I understand you need to leave that motherfucker yeah I get it yeah and then it's like you're not a bad person your drugs have functioned in that role for our society and I'm trying to take it

out of that waste bin hmm yeah and that's but it's maybe a way that we can look at things more clearly is to say look at all the people that use drugs and don't have a problem yeah how come they don't get that yeah because people are in the closet man yeah yeah yeah you know like all of these successful people are in the closet and it allows this caricature caricature of drug users as being this irresponsible degenerate. Because you're not looking at Barack Obama who use cocaine. Right. You're not looking at him as a cocaine user. Instead, you're looking at some guy on the corner who's ruined his life. Right. And it's like, wait a second. Drugs didn't ruin Barack Obama and he used cocaine. How do you balance out these ideas, like your perceptions and your thoughts on these ideas versus the common narrative?

Are you trying to convince people? Are you trying to just express yourself in a way that you know is going to be controversial, but let me just do my best to explain the way i think about things are you actively trying to sort of persuade people i'm trying to persuade people but this is one of the reasons man i have so much respect for comedians so you can tell people some really difficult shit if you have a punch line yeah you know um uh then they're able to hear it yeah so as a scientist how can you do the same thing how can you tell narratives and stories and teach at the same time and and that's what i'm trying to do and i learned that I only recently learned this, that you have to be an artist. And that's what artists do. And so I'm still learning how to do that.

So I'm trying to use other people's stories. But in this book, I'm using my story. I'm saying, this is what I do. You know, I use heroin. I also publish a lot of scientific articles, scientific papers in scientific journals. I have more than 100 of those papers, and they're hard to publish. I publish several books.

I lecture all around the world. I do all of these kind of things, but I'm a drug user. So I'm trying to use my own stories to show people that what you've been told about drugs is wrong. And what you think of a drug user, the image of a drug user that you have is wrong. The typical drug user look like, looks like me, except they're white, but they look like me um and so if we if i can do that with my book i hope um i hope uh it goes a long way in changing people's views do you feel like in academia you're on your own like is are there other people like you that are out there that are so bold and open about it like so completely uh out of the closet as it were no and i could need nobody's out of

the closet they're weird um academe is a weird ass place i don't know if you know it very well but it's a weird place um you know uh i don't feel at home and act in an academe in some areas but in other areas i do i mean i love like getting high and reading you know or or that's what i do or uh going through the literature in 1897 to find out what they were saying about this this is what i so in terms of academe i feel at home and because there are a lot of people like that in academe and when you say getting high like what do you get high on when you do that oh uh certainly amphetamines or if i want to do heroin too i can do that or just anything um if i'm alone and I have all these ideas racing. And so I have to go back and read things that other people said to see if somebody else was saying.

And typically somebody else was saying it. And it's not an original thought. But it's nice to know who said it and who published it. So in academe, I feel very much at home there. But being in my skin and being who I am out front about these things and being direct, I don't feel at home in academe. But it's okay. It's a nice living and I get access to smart kids who are enthusiastic, who want to change the world. And I get to help them and they teach me shit all the time. So it's a great place in that respect. But the people who like my colleagues,

that's not so great a lot of times, but you deal with it. That's just how. Do you have colleges that are curious, like that maybe don't have a lot of experiences with drugs, but they see you like, how is he guy? How's this guy keeping it together?

Maybe I do have a misconceived idea about what drugs do to people. You get them dancing around the idea. Like Anderson Cooper is asking about MBMA. Do you have other colleagues that are pulling you aside? Like, say, Carl. Yeah, it's a lot more indirect. Give him a little bit of cocaine. No, they don't say that.

They're not that direct, but they are beating around the bush to try and figure out uh what's what um and then there are other ones who are using drugs and they're in the closet um and um but even those folks who are in the closet and using they're not really my people either um they're not very courageous that's another thing that marks academe there's a lot of sort of cowardly squirmy behavior stab you in the back behavior that happens that's that's disturbing about academia then that you hear from people that are professors that there is a lot of stab you in the back behavior yeah and that you would think that also with an occupation that has tenure, which is one of the weirdest things ever, weirdest positions ever, you can't get fired. Like, unless you do something horrible. Yeah. You would think like, boy, that would encourage people to be courageous. academe a lot of these people were considered nerds i mean not the sort of popular nerds where people put on a pair of glasses and say that they're nerd these people were like really

alone in with their books and they weren't very popular um and they got picked on um and so um and they learned how to fight in a different way. They learn how to fight with their words or with some other sort of clever, indirect method that could not be identified with them. So their footprints are not on it. And so, you know, all of this, so it's what you would expect. It's how they fight it's not like like i'm accustomed to having grown up in the hoods like if you have a beef you deal with it straight on you know you get in a fight and then it's settled you lose sometimes you win sometimes but it's settled and it's the beef. Whereas at academe, you don't even know sometimes that people have a beef with you. And next thing you know, you're not getting this or you're having this taken away.

You don't even know what happened. So it is what it is. That's one of the really unfortunate aspects about not being socially accepted when you're younger is that for a lot of those guys it kind of sticks in their craw yeah that's right that's that's the thing that's really harmful where it's like yeah you were abused i mean people picked on you as a child that that was wrong but you can't undo it by doing it to somebody else yes that is a problem. And that's one of the things that I find most distasteful about social media. I see some people that I know personally on social media, and I know that they did not have a good social upbringing.

I know that they were picked on. I know that they were abused, even comedians. And then I see them being mean and shitty and piling on and acting like bullies yeah and just diving i'm saying the most ruthless shit about people and i know that they're doing it because someone did it to them yeah and they still feel like they haven't they haven't balanced their account as it were you know in terms of like what the world did to them versus what they want to do to the people that they think represent what the world did to them. No, absolutely. And that's the thing that I find abhorrent as well. And we have a lot of that in

academia. And I was recently the chair of my department. And one of the reasons i took the job was so that i could maybe shape the environment and shape the ethos boy was i wrong they kicked my ass i mean just straight up you know it's like uh they were just a lot more sophisticated than me in in that game they were a lot more sophisticated well you weren't trying to play the game at all you were just being yourself right yeah and i was i thought you know i had good motives i thought that i was a good guy all that sort of thing no but they they kicked my What was it about? What were the conflicts? You know, trying to hire people, for example. Trying to make our university more diverse, racially diverse.

I mean, we're in Harlem. Columbia's in Harlem. We have 4% black faculty in Harlem. Harlem Black USA. black faculty in harlem harlem black usa um so just trying to bring in for example more black faculty um and everybody's on board with this uh publicly everybody's on your side you know and then you want to bring in people who are senior and independent and they will they have minds of their own and then they they don't necessarily do what i want them to do because they can think for themselves that's a no-no that is a no-no no you you bring in people who are going to play along

and um who will keep the status quo and um anyway, I thought I was doing what people wanted because they said that's what they wanted. But again, that's my own stupidity. That's on me. That's really on me. So it's the social game. The social game was confusing to you because you come from a different place in terms of like, that's not how you approach people.

You know, I think about just an example about what happened in the country with the insurrection and Trump egging the people on. So when I think about that in terms of academe, the people in academe, like people say Trump is like a gangster. It's like, like no he's not the people in academe are like gangsters because they do shit like that they have their these people do these horrible acts and their fingerprints are nowhere on it you know what i'm saying so you can't trace it back to them because they know how to do this sort of thing and that's where they beat me at that game it's like that's that's some real gangster shit and they and they showed me that I wasn't a gangster either so it's uh it's an interesting world in that a lot

of people that enter into the world of academia go straight from school yeah they go straight from college they they they go to the university get their phd they are they're already involved in working in the school and then their ultimate goal is to transition from being a student to being a teacher without any world experience. That's right. Without ever escaping the bubble of academia. Man. It's a weird place. That's a great, that's an astute observation, man, because if we think about just what I do as a drug scientist, right,

that's what I did. Here it is. I go and study to get a PhD in drugs. I got my PhD in 96. and studied to get a PhD in drugs. I got my PhD in 96. And I thought I was going to solve the crack crises or whatever. The only world experience I had was I did four years in the military.

And again, I was only 17 to 21. Not really any world experience because I had the cocoon of the military protecting me. So no real world experience. And now I'm this like big drug researcher. And no real world experience about how these things work in the real world. But I'm considered an expert and i published all of these papers and i've done this sort of stuff in terms of the scientific community and then it took me i i didn't realize i really didn't know anything about drugs until after i was 40 years old although i had already had i had already published dozens of papers gotten multi-million dollar grants other types of awards

and i'm considered just expert but like you said we go from college basically into the academy and you now you're the scientist or whatever no really no world experience that's what we have in our sort of the cadre of experts in in many of our sort of spaces certainly in the world of drug addiction yeah it seems to be a prerequisite. I just would think I would like in a perfect world, for people that are telling me about whatever it is. I have a joke where I say the people that hate marijuana the most need it the most. And it's really true. There's a lot of experts that really don't understand the effects.

Absolutely. If they did, they would go, like, what do you think happens? Exactly. What I want to say to people, what do you think happens when people smoke pot? Do you think it just, like, makes you crazy? What do you think? It ruins your life? Why do you think so many people enjoy it then?

Like, what is going on? And they can talk about it from a pharmacological perspective, from a biophysical perspective, but they really don't have real world experience. An experiential sort of perspective. You're absolutely right. One of the things that happened to me as a result of traveling all over the world is that I met this schizophrenia researcher. His name is Paul Fletetcher he's at cambridge um and he wanted to experience like schizophrenia he's treating these people and he wanted to really know because of this critique that you just laid out and um he's the only person who i know in that area who's done this you know so he

he did like ketamine to try and reproduce the experience because he heard that that was like reproducing they would reproduce the experience of course it doesn't uh but this is what people have said our animal models use ketamine for that reason but it doesn't um but he was curious enough to try to figure out what schizophrenia people who are diagnosed with schizophrenia he tried to figure out what they were experiencing um i don't know if he figured that out from this sort of experiential perspective. But what I do know is that if I ever had a relative who had schizophrenia, I would send them to Paul Fletcher because his perspective on it, it really respects the person who has this diagnosis. And it offers them the greatest amount of hope that i have seen in that area and

it would be good if other scientists in these areas drugs whatever it is would also seek to try to figure out the experience that their paper their patients are going through yeah it'd be almost like learning martial arts without ever sparring yeah yeah or coaching basketball without really playing yeah yeah under pressure do you is there anything that mimics schizophrenia that that that someone that is there like a commonly thought of substance that mimics schizophrenia um they have suggested large doses of amphetamines over periods of time with sleep deprivation can mimic paranoid schizophrenia but i don't know if it really does i mean all of this stuff uh i am now questioning so i i don't know i mean at one. I mean, all of this stuff I am now questioning.

So I don't know. I mean, at one time, if you would ask me that question maybe five years ago, I would have said amphetamines, but I don't know now. Schizophrenia is an odd one too, right? Because doesn't it affect somewhere in the neighborhood of 1% of the population? Yeah. That's a lot of people. It's a lot of people.

But I have a lot more hope about schizophrenia after having met paul fletcher just in terms of um i i don't want to bastardize his sort of model of thinking about it and so i may not have all the details right but i would just say to simply try and explain about like you and i we go through the world everybody we have these theories about how the world works like um like you smile i have a theory about what that means right and so uh oh joe likes me or he's happy today whatever and then i'm right because you tell me that whatever somebody Somebody who's diagnosed with schizophrenia, they also have these models that they're testing out.

And so their model might be like, when you smile, they think that you're angry or whatever. Or you're plotting against them. Yes. And their model is just wrong. I mean, it's just like they're just getting,

they just have, they're bumping up bumping up against uh these wrong answers and then when they get they get more wrong answers it's even it causes even more stress and that's very anxiety provoking and then all of that is playing into this it's like first of all your models are off and now you're just getting this increased anxiety and so i think that's how his model sees it so that that means that it's okay as long as we let people understand that don't worry if your model is getting it wrong um it doesn't mean that that something's wrong with you it could be be maybe we have it wrong in our society, and you might have a better way of thinking about this.

So it's like, as opposed to it being one way, there might be multiple ways of thinking about solving these problems that humans solve throughout their day. And that's how, I think that's how he thinks of it um and it's a it's a it's a model of hope for me because you lessen the anxiety among the patients and many of the much of the problems deals with this anxiety of people telling them that they're incompetent. And you know how that is, how that feels. That's an adult, somebody telling you that you're incompetent.

It's like, how can you tell me I'm incompetent? So it exacerbates whatever problems that I initially have. It makes them far worse. Exactly. Yeah, there's also a thing that seems to have, I've only known a few people that are schizophrenic, but it's a disturbing thing when they think that everybody's against them and they feel like they're on their own but by virtue of everyone being against them they feel they feel isolated yes and then they're whatever paranoia they have it's like throwing dry sticks on it just rages into a fire

and it gets even worse because they think that people are plotting against them and everyone's against them and they don't have anybody comforting them yes and we need that we all need that absolutely you know and i think particularly people with like a slippery version of reality probably need that more than most yeah when you say reality it might be multiple realities and that's the thing that we need people to understand or that it's like it's okay um it might be your reality just might be different from theirs but not to the point where you have a different reality and then you're allowed to abuse people not so i want to be clear because i know there are some people out here saying something about alternative facts not i don't mean it like where you manipulate people i mean it for people who are struggling uh like these people with schizophrenia um just to help lessen their anxiety yeah so with in terms of marijuana particularly like high doses of marijuana

um particularly edible marijuana could really seriously exacerbate someone who has who's kind of hanging on barely anyway and then boom you eat an edible absolutely you're fucked so someone like alex would say that person's schizophrenia was brought on by marijuana whereas i think you and i would probably agree they were more likely inclined towards schizophrenia anyway. And the high dose of marijuana pushed them over the edge. And then, you know, every... Well, all the evidence says what you just said. I mean, so when you look at the evidence where people have done all of these studies, folks who didn't have these predispositions,

have these predispositions. Marijuana doesn't cause people to be schizophrenic or have a psychotic disorder. But it certainly can precipitate or exacerbate psychosis in people who are predisposed. So what I was going to get to was, do you think that maybe for people that have this predisposition towards schizophrenia, they should probably avoid psychoactive substances or avoid something that radically perturbs their version of reality? They probably should avoid cannabis, right? i don't want to say avoid everything because um is there anything yeah i mean so like they could maybe use that maybe would help them yeah so i spend a little time working in a heroin clinic in geneva and so they give out heroin to these patients twice a day how do they

every day intravenous or oral however the patient wants it but a lot of intravenous heroin users and it's all you know sanitized setting hospital setting or clinic setting twice a day many of these people um have psychotic disorders like diagnosed with schizophrenia and heroin helps many of them yeah with many of these symptoms and they feel better um even more so in some cases than the anti-ychotic. Really? Yeah, I talk about this in the new book, in fact. But yeah, this is, so I don't want to have this blanket statement that they should avoid psychoactive substances because some might actually be helpful. And some other people have tried other drugs.

One psychiatrist in the Netherlands gave his patients amphetamines, and he swears that it works. But that has to be researched out, but we'll see. But I know cannabis for sure. I wouldn't do that one. you wouldn't do cannabis and perhaps maybe not high levels of amphetamines as well either right because i i don't know you know i will i would have to um um slowly titrate and see whether or not it worked or whether or not people felt better so this really sort of highlights the need uh for not just like long-term study

of drugs and drug use but also a place where someone can go where they can get real expert advice yeah and maybe even a real source a pure source of these drugs and if that happened do you think that the world would have just a totally different understanding of what drugs are and do and what their potentials are yes i do uh i think a lot of people around the world have a different understanding outside of the united states outside of the united states it's just that we have such a big microphone yeah that we influence a lot of countries um and their perspectives and their education of their physicians and psychiatrists um and so um but that's what i'm trying to do i'm trying to change it i'm trying to open up minds in my field and abroad um another

problem with things being illegal is that it props up organized crime. Right. And this is a giant problem with the fact that, look, that's what they had in Prohibition. It propped up the mob. I mean, that's really what brought up the mafia is the fact that they made so much money off of selling booze. Yeah. And now we're dealing with a situation where it's really just organized crime it's bringing these drugs into the country yep yep um so um i have a friend who was a big time

uh dealer um back in the 70s and the 80s and so he talks a lot about how the dealers had this sort of pride in their products. And then when the sort of real gangsters got in the field, they didn't really care about the quality of their product. They just wanted to move weight like a Walmart. They just like cheap products. You know, the quality doesn't really matter. Just move product and so for me that's the bigger concern that when the big guys get involved in this sort of feel the quality goes down and that means that the consumer is getting is being put at greater risk.

I don't mind people making money illegally. That's fine. I mean, you do what you do to take care of your family, especially if you're making people happy with your product. If you're if you have some pride in the quality, that's fine. and pride and equality that's fine um so i'm not upset per se that we have these cartels uh controlling the market i'm more upset that they don't care about the quality i get it it's a funny perspective you know all these problems these cartels not the violence and the murder and all the money and the the fucking narco songs while they're holding gold-plated AK-47s. The problem is they don't have any pride in their meth. Well, Joe, you know you say it like that.

But you know the violence and the crime goes away when you take away the intensity of the law enforcement. Yes. All that goes away. Yeah, it does. And so we are the intensity of the law enforcement. Yes. All that goes away. Yeah, it does. And so we are the cause of the violence. We certainly are in regards to Mexico. Yeah, it's us, the folks who are saying, more law enforcement, more law enforcement.

All you're doing is putting law enforcement at risk and also other people at risk. It's like, all right right let's control this market yeah yeah um there's a show called trafficked and how do you say maria's last name from trafficked jamie what's the correct pronunciation van zeller van zeller um she's brilliant and she um runs a show where she went to columbia went with the people that were making the cocaine like literally saw them make it asked them about it walked with them when they carried it on their back walked with them and she's trying to like

find out like how all these things are made and where all these things come from. And when you see it from the source and you see the dangers these people have to go through in order to get this stuff to America, and you realize how everything is being made, and that all of this is just because it's illegal in the United States. All of it. All of it. And if it was legal in the United States,

there would be a legitimate business running it. They would have standards and unions. It would be just like a Budweiser plant. Remember Laverne and Shirley used to work at the Schatz Brewery? Yep, yep, yep. Yeah, I mean, that was a drug den. Trust me, I know. They were making drugs, but it was so wholesome and American.

That's right. So normal. Look at them there just making a little beer. No big deal. They're getting people fucked up. Those guys are out there beating their wives. I mean, that is... Wait, wait, wait.

Hold on. I'm joking around. I'm joking. I enjoy a beer and I don't beat my wife. But this is the way we have these preconceived notions about legality versus illegality. Like if something's legal, it must be good. If something's illegal, it must be good. If something's illegal, it must be bad. And the fact that the use and the demand has not gone down

because of illegalization. That's right. No, it's as high as it's ever been. People are doing plenty of coke. Absolutely. And they're getting it in in weird, sneaky ways, and people's putting their lives at risk, and the people that are being victimized are the people that are so poor

that they have to work as mules, and they have to put their lives at risk. And the people that are being victimized are the people that are so poor that they have to work as mules. And they have to put their lives in danger and try to sneak across the border with backpacks full of coke. And it's really crazy. Absolutely. It's crazy. That's right. And the people who are getting caught are the low-level people, while the people who are really making the money, they're not putting themselves at that kind of risk. So, absolutely.

It's really, really fascinating how this problem has persisted for so many decades and yet there's no real solutions and there's no real progress. Oh, there are solutions. But I mean, solutions that are being implemented. Yeah, I know. I know because too many people are benefiting. And so when we think about this sort of drug war,

if you will, law enforcement benefits, we spend $40 billion a year on this kind of thing. Most of the money goes to law enforcement, prison industry, the sort of businesses that have been built up around that, like phone companies, all of them, they make a lot of money from this. like phone companies, all of them, they make a lot of money from this. Politicians, they look like they are really serving their population because they're bringing law enforcement jobs or whatever. They're all benefiting. And then the big players in the drug game, they're benefiting because the more regulation,

the less likely their competition will be able to get in the game, so they keep the game locked down. There are a number of people who are benefiting. Parents don't have to educate their kids about drugs. That's one less thing they have to do. So they feel like they're benefiting. Me as a scientist, I have to think about my own role. I got multimillion-dollar grants to study the drug problem. I benefited from this whole thing. So a lot of people are benefiting. That's why we continue it. And we oftentimes don't talk about all of us who have benefited from this. Yeah, it's a weird, weird conundrum

that doesn't seem to have a way out. There's a way out? I know, but I'm saying, like, no one's proposed this way out. No one's implementing this way out. It's just, you know, if you were in law enforcement, if you worked for the DEA and you're looking at this, you're like, Jesus Christ, this is not going away.

I'm not putting a dent in this thing. Well, I don't think you're looking at it like this you're looking at like jesus christ i got a lot of overtime this week that's how i think you're looking at it i don't want to believe that well i'm sorry well i santa claus ain't really listen that show traffic showed to me one of the things she did was uh she um she found out that a lot of the guns that are coming in to Mexico from the United States were being supplied by Los Angeles Police Department. There was a guy who worked for the Los Angeles Police Department was selling guns to this guy who was trafficking them,

bringing them across the border. Because you can go to Mexico easily. The show is fantastic. It's called Trafficked. It's on Science Channel. You've got to pull up a page of it so we can see trafficked it's on a science channel you got to pull up a page of it so we can see it it's on regular tv yes oh it's she's so nat geo i'll check it out because you know i have tried i have avoided these shows because they glorify police action too often in these things? Mariana Van Zeller.

I don't know why I always fuck up her name. It's too exotic for my stupid mouth. But that lady right there is so badass. I'll check it out. Watching the show made my hands sweat. I was like, Jesus Christ. I will check it out. She's

so courageous. They look into all sorts of things being trafficked in the in in whether it's cocaine steroids guns all these different things but the the disturbing part of the guns thing was knowing how easy it is to bring something into mexico because there's no real border checks to go through you just go through they don't care if you're going into mexico just coming out they're just filling up their trunk with ak-47s and guns and all kinds of ammo and they're just bringing it over to mexico yeah see i wasn't aware of this yeah it's the show is nuts but the the her mariana going to colombia like literally going to the actual labs in the jungle where they make the cocaine watching them make the

cocaine seeing them process it with all these chemicals yeah and then put it in backpacks and then she hikes out with them it takes like a day to hike it out yeah she hiked out with them with the coke yeah put her life in danger to do this yeah no that's um yeah that's quite courageous of her, but she's also doing it for her ratings, too. Well, she's a journalist. She's an investigative journalist. You could be cynical and say she's doing it for her ratings, and she certainly is. But she's also doing it to tell a real story. She exposed the OxyContin business in Florida.

She exposed the OxyContin business in Florida. She had a show a long time ago called the OxyContin Express, where they show that they have these pain management centers that are connected to a pharmacy. So there's a doctor in the pain management center that goes, well, you know, you need OxyContin. Good thing for you, there's an OxyContin store right next door. And so they'd give them a prescription that's all they prescribed, and they would go right next door to the pain management center, they would get their oxys no I get it and Florida was known for that I get it and what they have done and they have made it difficult for people who are in legitimate pain to now get oxycontin or

any other opioid based pain medication based on the behavior bad behavior of a few individuals and so I mean I mean, I get it. I mean, I understand, like, yep, those people were misbehaving. My concern is that now they have ruined it for all of these people who are in legitimate pain, based on this sort of extreme outlier. So that's just, that worries me. But I will check it out. I'll check out. I understand what you're saying, yeah.

There was a problem getting pills in Massachusetts, and a lot of people were turning to straight heroin, what they thought was straight heroin, but a lot of the heroin was cut with fentanyl. That seems to be a real problem. Yeah, that's a real problem. I mean, I worry about the heroin one was uh cut with fentanyl yeah that that seems to be a real problem yeah that's a real problem i mean i worry about the heroin supply in the united states for that reason like in new york it's almost impossible to get heroin without fentanyl these days really yeah so uh because it's cheaper is that what it is yeah it's uh you, think about the bulk of bringing cannabis into the country versus bringing cocaine.

You know, the same sort of thing. Now you don't have to have as much product and it's a lot more potent. So that's just it's easier for the traffickers to do. Has any politician ever brought you in for a legitimate discussion about the potential methods that they could legalize these drugs? I have not really talked to any politicians about drugs in the United States, but in Brazil and other countries, absolutely. But what do they say when you tell them that things should be legal? absolutely but what do they say when you tell them that things should be legal um they agree um and um they talk about the difficulties of changing public opinion because as you know politicians don't lead they just kind of follow um so the work is really done on the ground convincing the population um like with cannabis

it's not the politicians who is who are leading with legalizing cannabis it's the people so we have to do the work with the constituents and so uh that's what i'm trying to do. But not one American politician has talked to me about drugs. Not one. Not one. I find that quite incredible. Like when I go to other countries, former president of Switzerland

for example, she's a dear friend. Talk to her about drug policies all the time. she agrees with my drug policy and the fact that she's been out front trying to change drug policy so do you think it's just too radioactive politically in america right now they're like people too many people have this preconceived notion of drugs being bad addiction being a real problem opiate scourge ruining the country that if you offer an alternative narrative, not enough people are going to buy it because too

many people have already subscribed to what we just described. And so it would be bad for you politically. It certainly would be bad for you politically as a politician. Yes. And so you don't have to necessarily be out there saying that as a politician, what you do is just try to get the best answers privately. And then you figure out because you have staff and you know how to move the population, you figure out how to do these things without um potentially committing political suicide yeah but they don't even do that they because it's really not in their best interest i mean the opioid crisis is like a political wet dream to these people um because they can offer solutions they can talk about it. It's earnesty. They really care. We have to do something.

I'm here to help. That's right. And then they don't have to talk about the fact that all those factories that left Ohio, those factories that left Maine, those factories that left West Virginia, they don't have to talk about that. Right. They can talk about the opioids. Absolutely. Yeah. And that's the real problem. All of those factories that left. One thing I think you are doing though, is because you're so brave about this and you're upfront and so honest about it. And also obviously like you have a deep knowledge of the subject

is you're getting this narrative out there. And then more people are going to hear this and they're going to say to their friends, you know, I was listening to Dr. Carl Hart and he has a different perspective. You should listen to this. You know what he's saying? He does heroin sometimes.

I'm like, what? He does heroin? These conversations are going to happen. Whereas that used to be the thing with pot like people would say you smoke Oh, do you a loser like no just cuz some losers smoke pot doesn't mean pot makes you a loser Yeah, yeah, that's good. That's a good SAT question Yeah, does pot make you a loser or do some losers smoke pot a or B? Yeah, I mean it's um there's not a lot of people like you out there i really

appreciate you i appreciate your your courage you know i appreciate what you do man and i really appreciate you like uh giving me a place to like come and find my people the first time i came on the podcast cas you said uh yeah you like one of us and then i was like i really understand what that means after having traveled around the world and people come up to me and say yeah i heard you on the joe rogan podcast then it's like okay i'm at home i guess all right i'm good i'm good you are a reasonable person that's willing to discuss things for what they are that's what i mean you're and you even though you're an academic you got these long dreads you're a cool guy i feel like i can hang out with you there's a lot of academics i have on the show i'm like nice to

talk to you thank you bye but because i mean they're great to talk to you but they're they're they're in their world and that's where they live whereas i feel you because i'm i'm there i mean at work you know um that's my life yeah that, that is your life. But you're doing a great thing. You really are because this could go on forever without someone like you. It really could. I mean, the narrative that we all have bought into, including me, you know, someone who hasn't done coke, hasn't done heroin, you get it in your head that everyone who uses it must be ruining their life.

And then you talk to you and you're like, no, it's wonderful. And they're like, wait a minute. And everybody who's listening to this right now is probably a lot of people are like me. When you first exposed me to these thoughts, I was like, hmm, okay, I have to rethink heroin use, which I never really thought I had to do before. Yeah. No, I'm glad you did, man. I'm so happy you did. And I hope other people

do the same sort of thing. And, you know, it's a lovely thing for me. It's really good pressure because I'm out here as a heroin user and all other kinds of drug user. So it means that I have to make sure that I am particularly responsible because any negative thing that i do will be attributed to drugs you know and so that's the kind i like that kind of pressure you know it makes me produce it uh makes sure i'm a better person all of those kinds of things so do you often have debates with people about these kind of things no man i don't do that kind of shit. I mean, I don't, you know, I don't like that whole performance thing. I mean, when I first came on this show,

I remember I was talking really fast. He was like, yo, this ain't like that five minute that you get on those shows. Those CNN shows. Yeah, you can chill, man. Those are the worst. Yeah, I know. So that's how I feel about debates you know

so it's like yeah rather just like uh if i'm gonna do something on drugs i don't want to be there with some other idiot i don't want to do it um um if you give each of us 30 minutes to make a presentation or something cool but like us going back and forth i'm not doing that i understand yeah i understand yeah yeah well you don't have to you know just get your word out the the marketplace of ideas will decide whether or not people appreciate what you're saying but i do i do very much so and uh your book's available right now ladies did you do an audio version of it i did it man i did it myself beautiful i'm glad you did it i hate when people hire an actor or voice actor to do an audio version of their book when someone has

no connection to the material but i gotta tell you some difficult shit i wrote every word in there and it was really hard to like get the feel and the mood because when i was writing i always have music you know and that always like gets me to the place or some psychoactive substance so it gets me to the place but reading i was just reading and then um and and then a lot of the book too is emotional and then you're in the studio with somebody you don't know right and i want to cry and i am crying because some of the material is deeply personal and then you got this person in the studio who's like okay you did

that one wrong and don't understand that this is like my dog died or this happened to my son you know yeah that's gotta be weird right some producer guy Carl can we do that one again

please yeah yeah it's like carl you went off script a little bit you mispronounce some word which i do and it's like also i try to have a little flavor in my voice it's like i'm sorry you didn't say that word right or whatever it's like what that's how i pronounce it well that's uh the yeah that's the problem with the other person having the script What it really should be is You're the only one with the script You know like if that person didn't have it The producer if you just said

I'd like to get a copy of this Carl so I can Read along no no no no Sorry it's only one script don't worry I'll check myself You just turn that recording button on And we're good But listen the book's out now, Drug Use for Grownups, Chasing Liberty in the Land of Fear, Dr. Carl Hart.

Thank you, Joe. Thank you, brother. I appreciate you very much. Thank you. Thanks for being here. Go get it, folks. I'm sure it's awesome. Thank you.