TRIGGERnometry - Are We Being Told the Truth About Drugs? Dr Carl Hart

Episode Date: March 31, 2022

SPONSORS:  Ridge Wallet: Use Code “TRIGGER ” for 10% off your order at https://www.ridge.com/TRIGGER - Manscaped. Receive 20% off Manscaped products when you use the code Trigger20. Check out their products https://www.manscaped.com - Professor Carl Hart is a psychologist at Columbia University and has authored numerous scientific and popular articles in the area of neuropsychopharmacology, including his latest book - *Drug Use for Grown-Ups: Chasing Liberty in the Land of Fear* - available now. - Join our exclusive TRIGGERnometry community on Locals! https://triggernometry.locals.com/ OR Support TRIGGERnometry Here: https://www.subscribestar.com/triggernometry https://www.patreon.com/triggerpod Bitcoin: bc1qm6vvhduc6s3rvy8u76sllmrfpynfv94qw8p8d5 Buy Merch Here: https://www.triggerpod.co.uk/shop/​​​ Advertise on TRIGGERnometry: [e-mail] Join the Mailing List: https://www.triggerpod.co.uk/sign-up/​​​ Find TRIGGERnometry on Social Media:  https://twitter.com/triggerpod​​​ https://www.facebook.com/triggerpod​​​ https://www.instagram.com/triggerpod​​​ About TRIGGERnometry:  Stand-up comedians Konstantin Kisin (@konstantinkisin) and Francis Foster (@francisjfoster) make sense of politics, economics, free speech, AI, drug policy and WW3 with the help of presidential advisors, renowned economists, award-winning journalists, controversial writers, leading scientists and notorious comedians. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The drug war is one of the most successful jobs programs in the history of the world. Hello and welcome to Trigonometry. I'm Francis Foster. I'm Constantine Kissin. And this is a show for you if you want honest conversations with fascinating people. Our brilliant guest today is a psychologist and neuroscientist who is known particularly for his research into drug abuse and other things related to drugs. Dr. Carl Hart, a very warm welcome to Trigonometry. Thank you for having me. I'm happy to be here. It's a great pleasure to have you on the show. Listen for your well-known in the United States, less so here in the UK.

So tell everybody a little bit about who are you, how are you where you are? What has been your journey through life? Yeah, well, as you point out, I'm Carl Hart. I'm a researcher scientist professor at Columbia University. My expertise are in drugs, that is studying drugs and people trying to understand the effects of drugs, what they do, what they don't do. I came to this area because I was concerned about drugs destroying my community in the 1980s.

At least that's what we were told. In the 1980s, I was in the UK serving in the U.S. military and getting reports back from home where that crack cocaine was destroying communities like the one from which I came. And so I started to study psychology and neuroscience in order to have a better understanding how drugs affect the brain. I figured that if I could alter the way that drugs are like cocaine affect the brain, then I could probably develop some treatments. And then if I developed some treatments, then I could start to go a long way in solving the problems that I thought were caused by drugs in my community. problems like unemployment, violence, a wide range of problems that were attributed to drugs.

Some 30 years later, I have come to the conclusion that we all got hoodwinked, and I'm trying to help people to understand just how. And when you say hoodwinked, I mean, you've set up the interview beautifully because now everybody wants to hear what you have to say. What is it that you think has happened, and why does the official narrative in your opinion not represent the truth? Well, if anybody ever watched a television program, a movie about drugs, anything about drugs,

drugs are always scapegoated to be the problem. People who write movies don't have to even develop a character if we say that the person is a drug dealer. The public is already primed to think that the drug dealer is just a unidimensional bad person. There is no complexity to the person, which is nonsense. There's complexity to every human. And so I thought drugs were the problem in my community, for example, when in fact the problems are the same things that have always been a problem.

Things like unemployment, things like poor education, things like lack of health care. All of these issues have always been the problems long before drugs were ever. in various communities and long after drugs were in communities. These were always the problem, and they continue to be the problem. And we can talk about some of my research findings, some of the evidence that bring me to that conclusion. Well, let's talk about it. So what does bring you to that conclusion, Carl?

Let me give you one example. One of an important example is this. The vast majority of people who use drugs are not addicted. That is 80, 90 percent of people who use drugs never have a problem. In fact, they are middle to upper class people who are responsible. They take care of their families. They pay their bills. They pay their taxes.

In some cases, like in our cases in the United States, some of those people even become president of the United States. You can think about Bill Clinton. You can think about George Bush. You can think about Barack Obama. All three of those guys reported using drugs like America. marijuana and cocaine when they were younger, just like many people around the globe, and they never become addicted. The people who become addicted and have problems, they have those problems because of not drugs, primarily because of these other issues in their life.

Like they may have co-occurring psychiatric illnesses, co-occurring pain problems. They may have chronic unrealistic expectations heaped upon them. They may have other issues, but oftentimes we have to look beyond the drugs themselves and look at the person's environment, at the personal situation. But drugs are scapegoated, so we don't have to look at those more complex problems. And those are the kind of things I'm trying to share with people. Yeah, it's an interesting perspective, but isn't the problem, like with alcohol, which of course is legal almost everywhere in the world, is that 90% of people can have a glass,

of wine and then leave it there. But there is that small minority of people who do become addicted, whether that's genetic or whatever the cause of that is. And they are the ones, whether it's alcohol or other drugs, who are causing a lot of the problems in society, the violence, the crime, the burglaries, the whatever. And so, yes, most people don't get addicted, but the ones that do really have a terrible experience and they inflict a lot of damage on the rest of society. Yeah, you're making my point.

So if 90% of the people who use alcohol don't have a problem, then you can't blame alcohol. I know you just said maybe it's genetics and so forth. But it'd be nice if we have some evidence to show that it's genetic, which we don't. I know people, they sometimes say, well, we have this association, but association is not correlation. And like I said, those problems become all the things I talked about, co-occurring psychiatric illnesses, chronic unrealistic expectations. Sometimes people were somebody in their community. They now lost gainful employment and they have no sort of prospects of regaining their previous status.

All of these issues are far more important than the alcohol itself. But we act as if alcohol is the problem because it doesn't require us to look any deeper. It's a, any stupid person could say, well, it's genetics without having any information that it is genetics. And so what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to help people to look deeper so the rest of us can continue to enjoy our substances. And then the rest of us can maybe help solve what is the problem with those people who are having problems. So do you think the path to having a better drug policy is decriminalization, and medicalization of this problem? Emphatically no.

So we have to explain the difference between decriminalization and drug legal regulation. So decriminalization simply says that you're not going to arrest people for personal use of the substance. Selling of the substance remains illegal. That means that the people who are using substances still have to interact with a black market. And there are problems with the black market, like you don't have quality control. Your substance might be tainted. In the United States, between 1920 and 1933, we had alcohol prohibition. In effect, it was kind of like a decriminalization, such that some people could get alcohol and not have to worry about being arrested.

But the quality controls weren't there. And so tens of thousands of Americans were maimed or killed because of tainted alcohol, because of having to interact with the black market. And so, no, I'm not a proponent of decriminalization, maybe as an intermediary step on the way to legal regulation. But legal regulation, you can sell it legally and you have just quality control such that people can be sure of what they're getting.

So what do you think needs to be done? If you were in charge of the government's drug policy, what laws and what regulations would you implement or would you go for a completely libertarian approach? Well, please, let's not talk about a political party or a political position because I'm a scientist. And so when we start to talk about libertarian, conservatives, what have you, and then people start to join camps

like they are on a fucking football team. Just saying that this is much more complicated than that. Because you may have to dip into all of these camps in order to come to some solution that actually work. So what I think where I start is this. Most countries around the world have some sort of in their constitutions something about people's right to liberty, people's right to freedom. And part of that right to liberty deals with having the right to put in your body what you choose as an adult. And so when I think about these substances, people should have the right to put what they like in their bodies, particularly when substances are actually make them feel better and happier, increasing the likelihood that they will treat other people better. That's a good thing.

And so my job then as a public official will be how do we do this in a way that keeps people safe and healthier and make sure we do. don't have problems with the substances. And so I would legally regulate the drugs that people are seeking, cocaine, the opioids, MDMA. I would make sure that our unit dose, that is the amount that is in a dose that's in a package, is not enough to where someone can kill themselves. I would make sure that the route of administration that is available would not be, for example, intravenience. I would make sure that the route could be in a form that one could easily digest, whether it's orally, whether it's putting underneath their tongue in a way that does not cause problems like intravenous use can cause some problems. And there's no reason for intervening issues unless there

is poor quality of drug. And so I would use my knowledge in pharmacology to make sure that that the way that we make these drugs available enhance the safety, just like we do when we give drugs in the laboratory as part of my research. And so we can use the knowledge that we already have obtained. Are you tired of using bulky old wallets giving you a bulge where you don't want it to be? My old wallet was massive, so it brought all the ladies to the yard, which was a huge distraction. and got in the way of my esteemed work on Trigonometry.

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Ridge are so confident in the quality of their product. They will give you 45 days to test drive their wallets. That means you can get the wallet, use it, and if you don't like it, you can return it within 45 days. Because Ridge are such great guys, they're going to give you 10% off and free worldwide shipping and returns. To take advantage of this incredible offer, go to ridge.com forward slash trigger. That's ridge.com forward. slash trigger and use our special code, which is, of course, trigger. Can I ask you something just sort of coming back to addiction and also picking up on what you

said about how when people take drugs, they feel good and therefore they treat other people well. And by the way, I'm playing devil's advocate and sort of good cop, bad cop going on, because we've got to stress test some of the things you're saying, but it's all said with the curiosity and respect, which I hope you know. But when you say the people feel better when they take drugs and they treat other people better. I mean, I think that's true of marijuana, certainly my experience. I don't know that I think that that's true of cocaine and alcohol, for example, right? Well, you know, we don't have the guess about this. You're talking to a person who has given thousands of doses of cocaine to people in the laboratory and carefully studied

their effects. I've given thousands of doses of methamphetamine and other drugs to people and carefully studied their effects. Other people have given thousands of... thousands of doses of things like heroin to people and carefully study the effects. So, no, it's absolutely true. The data's there. The evidence is there. It's in the scientific literature. We don't have to guess about this.

I mean, people take these psychoactive substances because they make them feel better or they alter their consciousness in such a way that is desirable for that person. And so that's not a mystery. I mean, why else would people take these substances? No, no, sure. I'm sorry. I do understand that in our media, we have this nonsense where they say, oh, the drug has a grip on that person. That's, that's TV. That's drama. That's not reality. No, no, that's not what I'm saying. But I think what I do genuinely, and this isn't playing devil's addict,

but what I do genuinely disagree with is the idea that people who take cocaine treat other people better necessarily, or the same with alcohol. Like, I don't think cocaine makes people nicer people in my experience. Well, follow me here for a second, please. Sure. If you feel better as a person, whatever, you feel good, it increases the likelihood that you treat other people better. That's not controversial.

And now what you're saying about cocaine, please tell me what you're saying. You probably will say some anecdote that you have about some awful person who took cocaine and treated someone poorly. That's certainly possible. But in general, when people take cocaine, they feel better. Just like anyone else who feel better, you're more likely to treat others better.

That's just a general statement that is, I don't know how one can argue with that. And Carl, what would you say to the argument of that, look, right, let's say you legalize all these drugs. You therefore make them more prevalent. And once they become more prevalent, more people are likely to take them, therefore, more people are likely to get addicted? Yeah. So, as I pointed out earlier, when we think about drug addiction, the vast majority of people who take any drug are not addicted. So we can't blame the drug for addiction. So yeah, if we want to make sure that our society is that people are not getting addicted, the way you guard against

that sort of thing is that you make sure you have a healthier society, make sure that people have employment opportunities. I mean, real employment opportunity, not just these sort of gig economies where they don't have much support. I mean, real economic opportunities, you make sure you have health care in your system. You make sure you have a healthier society. That's the thing that guards against having a society with fewer numbers of addiction. But let's not get it twisted. Any activity that's worth doing in this human endeavor, there is some risk attached to it, whether it's driving an automobile, whether it's flying in an airplane, whatever it is, there is some risks attached to it. And so humans who are looking for an activity with no risk,

well, I'm not the person to talk to because that's not the world I want to be in. The activities in which I engage, there is some risk. And then because the, there is also potential payoffs. That's life. And those people who are looking for no risk, well, that's a pipe dream. And I don't really deal in pipe dreams. Yeah, that's a good point.

I was going to say, do you think part of the problem with this entire debate is that no one ever looks at the substances objectively? You've got people on one extreme of the spectrum going, ah, if you touch weed, it's a gateway drug. And then by the end of the day, you're going to have a heroin needle in your eyeball, when you're going to be mainlining it in. And you've got people on the other side who are like,

no, it's absolutely fine. It's a gateway. The doors of perception, William Blake, etc., etc. The fact is we don't have a sensible and rational discussion. Absolutely. You know, my book is called drug use for grownups, right? This is a conversation for grownups. And I want to have a conversation with grownups. So when we have those people on those extremes, I don't have time for that. I'm now, 55 years old. I probably have fewer years left than I've already been here. And so I'm trying to enjoy my life and I'm trying to get at what's really important and trying to leave a mark where people who are suffering and from those types of extremities. They can have something to read that I've written and where they don't feel like they're alone. But yeah, I don't, I try

to spend, I try not to spend my time with people who don't play by the rules. of evidence. Life is too short. And coming to your research, which is really the reason that we're really interested to speak with you, I guess the basic question I would have for you is why do people take drugs? It's a question that's like, why do people have sex? I mean, and beyond that sort of religious sort of nonsense reason that people give. I mean, if sex feels good, people like to alter their consciousness, taking drugs, alters your consciousness, helps people

feel better in some cases, helps people be more empathetic or more magnanimous. A wide range of reasons is why people take drugs. In some cases, people take drugs. In curiosity, particularly young people. But here, I'm talking about adults

who kind of know something about drugs. I mean, to connect with a loved one at a level, a deeper level, they take drugs for a variety. reasons. And what about, I think Yohan Harry talks about a lot about the fact that drug addiction or drug use is often a way to deal with trauma and pain. Yeah, Johann Harry talks about trauma. Gabar Motei, he talks about trauma. Yeah, there are people, for example, who are experiencing

trauma, PTSD, post-traumatic stress syndrome, who are, who see things like MDMA is beneficial for that kind of trauma, and that is true. But, you know, one of the things I try to do in my latest book, Drug Youth and Grownups, is to get away from the pathological frame. So, you know, so like when we talk about drugs, we oftentimes talk about it from that pathological frame, like, oh, these people are suffering. That's why they're taking drugs or these people are addicted. That's a small percentage of people.

The vast majority of people who take drugs are just, like the vast majority of people who take alcohol. I mean, like when someone is at the pub, hanging out on a Friday evening, we don't think, oh, yep, that person's had some trauma. That's why they're at the pub. We think about them celebrating with their mates and having a good time. The same is true with most people who take drugs. And that's not a mystery. It only becomes a mystery because we've been so dishonest about this conversation. And we have been dishonest about this conversation. It's such a good point. And we seem to have a really dishonest attitude to psychedelics, particularly when you look at something like mushrooms, which I think was made

illegal in this country in 2005, I don't think a single person has died from an overdose of mushrooms. Why is it we don't have an honest relationship with drugs in general, but particularly with psychedelics? Well, I think psychedelic in general, the psychedelics have enjoyed a rehabilitation of their reputation, particularly here in the past decade, in part because the writers, our reporters, people in the media, the opinion makers, enjoy psychedelics like psilocybin, like LSD, like ketamine, a number of these drugs writers our opinion makers enjoy these drugs. My concern there is that they treat psychedelics as if they are some special class of drugs. Like they are somehow different or the users of those drugs or somehow seeking something different than the users of, say, heroin or cocaine or some other drug.

And so I don't think of psychedelics as being special as it's being elevated today. in our society. In fact, I think that's dangerous. And then that's the thing that's one of the things I write about in a new book. Psychedelics are not special. But I agree they certainly should be available to people who find them helpful, useful, or enjoy them. They certainly should be available. But my concern is that we have started to pivot to say, this drug is okay, but this drug is not. Let me give you an example, a real-life example. PCP and ketamine are chemical cousins. They are nearly identical. In fact, ketamine is made from modifying the PCP structure. They exert similar effects, but they have wildly different reputations. PCP in the U.S.,

our police have told these nonsense stories about how PCP helps people to develop superhuman strengths. And so if someone's on PCP, they've said, you have to, shoot them like 16, 18, 20-some times before you can subdue them. Whereas ketamine has a reputation, it's actually approved in the United States for treating depression. It has a more favorable reputation. Now, how this plays out in the United States. Police oftentimes use PCP as an excuse to kill people. In fact, last week, a Chicago ex-police officer, recently.

got out of jail after serving three years for shooting and killing a 17-year-old kid. 16 times he shot him, even when the kid was on the ground. And the public virtually said nothing, in part because PCP was in the kid's system. And you look at the video, the kid was running away from the police, not coming towards the police. But the problem is, is the reputation of these drugs have these wildly different. sort of narratives associated with them. And so that's why I am a little concerned when we try to act like

ketamine or psychedelics are somehow unique when in fact they are not. Because, but there's been quite a lot of research, Cole, in showing the, and we had Dr. David Nutt, who's heading up this particular type of research, telling us about the wonderful effects that psilocybin is having on treating depression, anxiety, trauma, So are you very much in that camp that they can be used, but they're not a panacea is what you're arguing, to treat these types of conditions? Yeah, I mean, I published papers showing that psilocybin can be used to help treat something like cocaine addiction. I published paper with MDMA showing how beneficial that drug can be under some condition. MDMA is considered a psychedelic, but really it's an emphetamine.

It's not as a psychedelic. an emphetamine. But it's been, I guess, given honorary status in the psychedelic camp because these folks enjoy MDMA. All I'm saying is that if we're going to talk about these drugs in that way, then mention the fact that the infatomine to have been useful for all of these sort of things, like even methamphetamine, is FDA approved in the United States to treat obesity, to treat attention deficit disorder. So just bring all of these drugs and don't act as if there's just this special category. That's my concern. Some people would say to that, though, that some drugs are worse than others. And by the way, where I certainly I think would agree is that actually many of the drugs

that we are legally allowed to consume are far worse than some of the drugs that are currently illegal. But isn't it, wouldn't it be true that something like crack cocaine, heroin, meth, are far worse and damaging to you, and alcohol, by the way, than something like marijuana, for example. So shouldn't we look at things differently on a case-by-case basis? Yeah, I think we should. I think that's a good point. But like the assumption that, for example, meth is far more damaging to you or heroin, it's far more damaging to you. That's, we have to think about what's the comparison and how we, what are we saying? So when we think about something like heroin.

One of the things that we're seeing is when we think about how damaging it is, we're thinking about intravenous use, for example, for some people. And we don't need to use heroin intravenously. You can make heroin, you can use it, you can have it be available sublingally, underneath the tongue, or or interleus, some other route that probably won't have as many problems associated with it. So it depends on the route of administration. Then we think about methamphetamine. Methamphetamine is just like deemphetamine. These drugs have been used in the United States forever, for at least 100 years now, and they've been fine. They're used in medicine, but they're taken

orally in those cases. And so when we're talking about people making illicit methamphetamine, you smoking it or shooting it, then you might start to see some problems. But the problem aren't necessarily the drugs themselves, but it could be the conditions under which the drug is taken. So when we think about taking drugs, it's important to talk about Rotter administration, the environment that drug use is occurring. All of these things are so important.

That is a really good point. And I actually, I'm glad you made it because I think, and this is again the point you've made earlier already about how we see things shown in the media and movies, etc. When I was saying, well, heroin and meth and whatever, so much more dangerous, really what I'm saying is the image in my head of a meth addict is worse than the image in my head of a chain smoker, right?

Absolutely, absolutely. That's that image has been reinforced with the media. Well, partly it's reinforced, but partly it's also, as you point out, it's a product of the fact that these drugs are criminalized, right? people wouldn't be shooting up heroin intravenously if it was illegal because it would be available otherwise you wouldn't have as many overdoses you wouldn't have people ending up you know in this kind of infectious situation where HIV is getting passed on through needles etc that's a really interesting point to think about so uh i know this this question gets asked a lot but other

examples of countries that have decriminalized all drugs or so not decriminalized legalized all drugs as you would, where it's working out well? No, because of international conventions, countries have not legally regulated drugs. Instead of what countries do, they move to decriminalize drugs, and they have some sort of, or they have some de facto decriminalization, where they're just not prosecuting or arresting people for drugs, certainly not in the levels that we are in the United States. And so I don't think that you'll get drug legal regulation until you start to see more movement in the United States.

Case and point, the United States started to various states on an individual level started to legalize cannabis, legally regulate cannabis. Now we have at least two countries they have legally regulated cannabis, Canada and Uruguay. in Germany, it has said that they're planning to legalize cannabis as well. These kind of things are happening in part because in the United States, we have about 20 states that have legally regulated cannabis for adult use. And so as the United States goes, so goes the world. And Carl, you talk a lot, and you wrote this open letter, which I read, which I thought was fascinating.

You were talking about the politics of respect. respectability, particularly when it comes to the politics of respectability around drug laws. Would you be able to talk about, first of all, explain to our viewers and listeners what is the politics of respectability and number two, how it affects drug laws? Yeah, so when we think about drug laws in the United States especially, people think that drugs are banned because of pharmacology, because of the sort of unique dangers that some particular drug poses based on its pharmacology. And that's just simply not true.

When you go back to drug regulation in the United States, the first federal regulations were in 1914. We regulated or banned drugs like cocaine and opioid drugs. And we did so because of our fear of black people taking cocaine. And there were media reports people testifying before Congress who were say things like when black people smoke cocaine or use cocaine, they became impervious to 32 caliber bullets and such that you, if you unloaded your six shooter into a black person's heart on cocaine, that person would not stop. They would continue to come at you. They were more murderous and they were better marksmen. These were the stories that we told. And these stories were the primary

reason that we banned or regulated cocaine at a federal level. We told similar stories about Chinese people who had come over to the United States and related to opioids. And then with cannabis, when we banned cannabis, we told stories about Mexican Americans in that way. And so these are the reasons why these drugs are banned, not because of pharmacology. Now when we think about politics of respectability, now we think like, okay, that's racism, classism and so forth, that participated, and that's the reason that these drugs are a ban. But our racism is not limited to the dominant white culture. Our racism also occurs within those groups. So you have black people who were equally sort of going at the cocaine or saying this nonsense about

cocaine, repeating this nonsense, and trying to distance themselves from other black people, trying to show the larger white population that we're not like them, we're better. That's the politics of respectability. In fact, they even try to police the behavior of members of their group in this way, such that they don't use cocaine. So that's what I mean when I say politics of respectability, policing the behavior of members of your group in the way that you show the dominant culture, hey, I'm deserving. I'm like you. I'm not like those other bad black people. And so that's what I mean

when I say politics of respectability. And that being the case, do you think we still, that still operates even now? Because you talked about the crack. Emphatically, yes, that's operates. Now, turn on your television. You could think about hip-hop music. You could think about a number of these sort of cultural promoters of information. Hip hop disparages drugs, and they talk about the horrors of crack. They participated in getting these awful laws

passed by telling these stories that had no foundations in reality. Yeah, this happens all throughout society. Just watch a movie, anything, you'll see it. But hang on, but also rap celebrated the use of smoking weed, you know, smoking blunts, etc, etc. So it's not, so they didn't just demonize one drug. They also celebrated another. You know, you look at the chronic, literally had a marijuana leaf on the cover. That's right. They celebrate the safe drug, the easy choice.

Cannabis now is legal. And for most Americans, it's legal. That's not edgy. I know it pretends to be edgy, but that's a, it will celebrate cannabis on the one hand and vilify everything else. On the other hand, no foundations in reality. Yeah, like you turn on your television now, the stories about cannabis are a lot more realistic than they were, say, 20 years ago, say 30 years ago, a lot more realistic 40 years ago. The only thing you saw in the U.S. about cannabis was Cheech and Chon Chon.

And now we look at that and we cringe because it was so awful. And so, and it had little bases in reality, but people thought that was reality and they laughed and they tolerated that nonsense. And so cannabis is, it's not edgy. That's not, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, you have been allowed to say, okay, this is the way that you can act up. you can express some sort of disagreement with the general population. I mean, that's the only way and that's the sort of sanctioned way. That's not, you get no cool points for that. I mean, you get cool points for like following the evidence and being the only person saying that

or because the evidence leads you to say that. That's real cool. The rest of that shit, no. I wish we lived in that world, Carl, where following the evidence made you cool. I'm afraid we haven't lived in that world for some time, my friend. I'm telling you, man, we are. This is where I am at. You know, that's exactly how I've always lived my life, and that's how I'm living my life. And so I don't know anyone cooler than me.

Do you know what? Present company accepted, obviously. You know what? If I said that, it sound ridiculous and cringe-worthy. When you said that, I went, correct. But let's talk about marijuana weed, whatever you want to call it. I don't think we're having an honest discussion about it, Cole, and I'll tell you why, because to me, we talk about marijuana,

and skunk is a completely different drug, isn't it? Skunk is far more powerful, far more potent, far more likely to addict you, is far more likely to create mental health problems, push back it if I'm talking rubbish, because this is what I've read. I love the smile in a space. to get destroyed with facts and logic. Okay, come on destroy me, Carl. Yeah, no, I just want to, I mean, you're absolutely right about, like, we have these higher quality

of cannabis, so the THC level, the major active ingredient in some, like skunk, is higher than something like ditch weed or some nonsense that some people smoke. So you're absolutely right that we have these different potencies. Now, there's notion that it's more likely to come. you to become addicted. There is no evidence to support that. I know people say that. In fact, if you have a higher T.AC concentration cigarette, you're more likely to take fewer hits off of that joint, which is a better thing if you're smoking, because then you're not inhaling as much burning weeds down your throat, which is a good thing. And so, and this notion about more

likely to cause you psychiatric problems. Now, if a novice smokes something like a skunk the first time and they have like no experience, yeah, that can cause them to have more anxiety, more paranoia, and that can cause them to have some problems. But the vast majority of people, they should just chill and relax and the drug will float away from the receptor. And those effects will subside, subside, even if it's hours later. Now, like all of these leaps that people are making into more addiction, into more psychiatric problems, that's not, I mean, long-term psychiatric problem, that hasn't been demonstrated. And that's not necessarily even a logical conclusion. The most expedient conclusion is that just think about if you drink, if you have two drinks, you have

a stiff drink with 151 rum, and then you have a drink with some, a lager. You're going to drink those differently. If you don't drink those differently, you're going to have some wildly different effect. If you drink your 151 rum, the same way you drink your lager, that's not a good thing. And you only need to do that one time, and you know that that's not a good thing. And so most people, who have just a small degree of intelligence know that. And so these people who are predicting these horrible outcomes are just taking, divorcing what humans really do. They are acting as if humans don't learn from these things.

But our education can help people too. That's one of the things that has helped when you know the amount of TAC in your substance. Like in the US where we have legal cannabis, you can purchase cannabis cigarettes with varying degrees of THC in it. And if you are a novice, you know not the purchased one with the most amount of THC, because that's stupid. Hey, KK, do you believe in spring cleaning? Yes, but only when my wife does it. In Russia, men who cleaner executed for not being real men, which is correct. Well, for those men who are living in the 21st century, Manscaped has an incredible offer for you.

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It's time to throw out all your old hygiene habits and upgrade your life. Carl, why is it that I'm having to ask you these questions and my own media is misinforming me? I read about the effects of skunk and I've read it in a variety of different publications. They're all very reputable. This is not some, you know, bizarre site I've got to do. on the internet. Why is it that our own media and the sources of information are not being honest with us when it comes to this subject? Well, you hit on the major reason that we have this thing

we call the drug war, these restrictions. Because the drug war is one of the most successful jobs programs in the history of the world. Now, when we think about the media, you can write reports articles on drugs, you can write movies, you can write a number of stories about drugs, and you can really increase the drama. And you don't have to have factual information. Well, information that has been vetted. You don't have to have it. You only need to have information that makes contact with people's stereotypes about the drug. And so the quality of the control of the information in the media is not vetted as heavily as, say, when you're talking about a politician's position on some issue. It has to be heavily vetted. The vetting of drug information, it doesn't. It just

has to be in line with the current, so, your, stereotype view of the drug. And that's the problem. And it gets, it's easier for the writer to get their articles published. That's the real concern. So when we think about the war on drugs, we oftentimes think about police benefiting, prison officials benefiting, and we never talk about the writers, the lazy writers who benefit from this nonsense. I mean, just watch any movie related to drugs,

and you'll see what I'm saying. When drugs are involved, we don't have to develop the character in the same way we would have to develop other characters. And you have this unidimensional sort of view of the drug characters compared with other characters. And I was thinking about like the Sopranos. I love watching The Sopranos shows like that.

On a show like the Sopranos, Tony Soprano is the mob boss who kills people. His nephew, Christopher, had a drug problem. And they treated Christopher like he was a pariah, like he was the worst thing on the planet. Now, these people who were treating Christopher like this, mind you, now, they kill people on a regular basis, but they were looking at him as he was a horrible person for taking heroin, but not for killing people.

That's the kind of shit that we accept as viewers as if that's okay. That's remarkable. You know, when you put it like that, it is remarkable. and it leads me to the question I was going to ask you, which is, why are some drugs more equal than others? Because this argument could also apply to theoretically, at least to alcohol and tobacco. But we don't seem to demonize those. And look, I'm a former smoker.

I think tobacco is one of the worst drugs ever. It's fucking useless and it's bad for you at the same time. If you're going to take a drug, take something that's going to make you feel good, at least, which tobacco really doesn't. But we allow those drugs. We allow alcohol. And like you were, you served in the UK, as you mentioned. So you would have seen the drinking culture, right?

If you drink fucking 50 pints on a Saturday night, you're a legend. Absolutely right. And if you're doing something that's illegal, then you're a criminal and you're the worst thing in the world. Why are some drugs allowed and some are not? And by the way, why are the shitty ones allowed and some of the better ones not? Well, you just said what I say, damn near every Friday. night when my wife and I were seeking some substances. Like, why is alcohol allowed it and not MDMA? That's a great question. But it's simple. In our capitalistic societies, those drugs have a foothole and people are

making a lot of money off of them. In the United States, for example, when we were making drug legislation, every major drug legislation that regulates drug has in it, alcohol and tobacco are exempt. And they get exemptions in large part because they had well-established lobbies. And their lobbies ensured that their drugs were exempt. Even when we had discovered that the tobacco companies, for example, was misleading the public about the safety of their product. By that time, their lobbies had so much money, they could still withstand this truth coming out. So it's really about the money and the influence that those industries have in our society.

So it's entrenched interest. But a question, I suppose, I would ask, is why, if you were a massive alcohol company, surely the thing that would make the most sense is you encourage the legalization of other drugs and then get into that business yourself because you've already got the infrastructure to distribute it. Why aren't they lobbying for that, Carl? Well, because they are going with public opinion, just like politicians, and what they try to do is to say that our substance is not like those other drugs. In fact, we're not really a drug.

I mean, these are they try to convince the public that they're not even a drug, which is nonsense. And so that's where they have put their efforts. Like, well, and tobacco goes a step further and say, we are an agricultural product. You know, all of these drugs, all of these drugs we're talking about are agricultural products. But you don't hear folks using that kind of language because, but the tobacco companies have, years of experience with this. Carl, why do we look at people who take drugs, people who sell drugs,

but mainly people who take drugs, and in fact drug taking as a whole, as a moral issue? We tend to look at people who take drugs as immoral. Why do we do that? We have convinced the public, the regular, common person in the public, that your value is attached to your ability to your ability to abstain from these pleasures,

this sort of Protestant work ethic is we are, you resist, you abstain, and you work hard, and you don't have these unearned pleasures, unearned pleasures. And so we've convinced the common person of this nonsense. And so the common person can say, well, at least I don't use drugs, you know. I may not have the job that I want. I may be a horrible person that treat my significant others poorly,

but I don't use drugs. I mean, you can see this. one of the things that used to make me laugh in the 1980s is that some hip hop artists, they do these public service announcements about staying off drugs. Back in the 80s, I was a DJ, and I did some shows with Run DMC, and we got high together at a show, like smoking some weed, some little lightweight stuff. And then, like, a few weeks later, I see Run DMC in a public service announcement saying something like, What's up? We're running DMC.

And our raps about something which is no doubt. When it comes to drugs, just say no. We've teamed up with the Drug Enforcement Administration and millions of people who won't fool with drugs. Not now, not ever. Who wants to be involved with something that can rob you of your job, your future, your self-respect, your family, even your life. Nobody does.

That's why, where drugs are concerned, the only thing to do is just say no. Kids stay off drugs. Don't do drugs. And meanwhile, some of these folks are doing horrible things, but you're excused if you say, stay off drugs. And so drugs have been that sort of activity that people can use and say, at least I don't do drugs. I may be a horrible person, but I don't do drugs.

What do you think about the conspiracy theorist position, Cole, which I've migrated to more and more over the pandemic, just with everything? Yeah, it's because I've been smoking a lot of work. Right. But what do you think of the conspiracy theorist position that the reason that they've banned psychedelics, the reason that they've banned all of these drugs is because they get you to see the world in a different way. And if you see the world in a different way, then you start questioning things. And once you start questioning things, you stop being, you know, a good worker drone, as it were.

Well, you know, when we figure out how to make money off of these drugs in a way that we're figuring out how to make money off cannabis, I think that some of them will become more available, particularly the psychedelics. I think the almighty pound or dollar is what really drives these things. I mean, right now it's just so much money in restricting drugs. And that's the main driver. It's just that everybody's making money off of the current legal scheme. And so when we discover how to make even more money off of legally regulating it, I think it'll be legally regulated. So I try to just follow the money because, frankly, I don't think they're smart enough to think through this kind of thing about, you see the world differently. I think many of these people actually believe that you take a drug like heroin, MDMA, cocaine, that you have some problems.

I don't think they're smart enough, frankly. There you go, Franz. I think what Dr. Hart is saying is stay off the weed, mate. You've been smoking too much. But, Carl, before we wrap up the show, one of the things we haven't really touched on, you were talking about what people call the crack epidemic. And basically, I think one of the things you're talking about there is the impact of the criminalization of drugs on communities. And the way I feel about this and the reason we talk to people like you is I remember reading a lot about what's happening in Mexico. And this is a country to us on the far side of the world.

You know, I don't know many Mexican people. It's not a country to which I've been. I don't feel a connection. But when I read about tens of thousands of people who are being but, you know, every year when I read about some of the horrific atrocities that are happening, that's when I start to go, well, look, I appreciate that I think legalizing drugs will have certain negative tradeoffs, but at least it will take away these billions of dollars that are currently going to some of the worst human beings in the world only because there's a profit to be made and that

profit is only able to be made because these drugs are illegal. Yeah, I mean, when we think about horrible people in the world, you should probably look at some of the people who are leading our countries, yours, mine, other countries. I think those people are equally horrible. But the problem is that they have these media machines that don't show them in the negative light that we see a so-called drug cartel leaders are shown. And so I think we should be careful about what we think. Well, hold on. So what do you mean so-called drug? Are you saying there's no drug cartel?

No, no, no, there are drug cartels, but the ones who we prop up as the evil folks. I mean, I'm not defending them. This is more an indictment of people like your leader, Boris Johnson and Biden. No argument, that. What I'm saying is that these people are equally horrible in terms of having people killed and that's what I'm saying. Now, when we think about legalizing drugs so that, you know, you're not. you take away the black market. Yeah, you certainly will take away that black market.

But it's frankly naive to think that we're going to take away black markets in general. Because as long as there are people who are suffering and they are not allowed to participate in the sort of mainstream economy, people will seek alternatives. I think about in places like Brazil, I spend a lot of time in Brazil. There are a lot of people who've been shut out of the mainstream economy. And some of those people are in drug trafficking, but drug trafficking is not only what they do. These organizations do a wide range of things. And so when we focus our attention only on the drug sort of trade, again, we're missing the mark. And we are following that easy story.

It's a lot more complicated than that. So you don't think if we legalized, you know, the drugs, cocaine, et cetera, et cetera. Would it, in your opinion, would it fundamentally change the black markets in Mexico? Or do you think these people will then just go work in other black markets because they've been ostracized from society? They're already in other black markets. I mean, there's notion like, there's a notion that they are just drug traffickers, that's

nonsense. I mean, just like the tobacco companies, when we really started to put the pressure on the tobacco companies in the 1950s and 60s, the thing they did. did was that they diversified your cereals, your sugars, all of these sort of things. They're owned by the tobacco companies. They just diversified. They're in these other sort of markets. Any smart business has diversified. And that's what these folks have done. And so when we focus on just the drug markets, that's not very smart. And Cole, what do you think the future holds now for drugs? Do you think it's going to be a steady case of, you know, legalizing

and we're going to have a far more sensible approach to it? Or do you think we're going to carry on with this quite infantile way of discussing a very serious subject? I think we're going to continue with our infancy with some drugs, most of the drugs, cannabis will be moved out. And we will continue to see growing legal regulation around the world as governments and think that they can make money off of that one. But these other drugs, I don't see the stupidity stopping in any way,

which is unfortunate. That means that a lot of people are going to unnecessarily die. That's not a good note to end on. So before we ask you a couple of questions from our supporters on locals, let me ask you a final question, which is always the same. What is the one thing that we're not talking about as a society that we really should be? So in my latest book, drug use for grown up chasing liberty in the land of fear, I started out to write a book, a love story about love and how drugs have these tremendous beneficial effects

and how it enhanced drugs can enhance your sort of understanding, empathy of other people. And it was a book about love. And you can never talk about love when you're talking about drugs because everybody wants to talk about addiction and these problems that are a minority of drug effects. It's like saying, hey, let's talk about, I want to talk about cars. I want to, you know, I'm a car enthusiast. And then the audience only wants to talk about car crashes. And so we're not talking about love. We're not talking about the empathy and the sort of generosity that occurs when people are in these states.

And I think that's what we should be talking about more. And I try to do that. But invariably, I get, I have to go. I'm a university professor, but I'm always asked to teach elementary students, primary school of students and it's maddening because I want to teach university at the university level. Carl, it's a very good point. I don't know if you know this, but you know we had a massive problem of hooliganism, football hooliganism or soccer hooliganism in the 1980s in this country. And there's, and there was lots of, you know, legislation brought in and we prosecuted people.

And it kind of ebbed away. But actually, a lot of people have said that the reason that the football hooliganism kind of died out was because all the football hooligans got into ecstasy at the time of the ecstasy boom in the late 80s, early 90s. So actually, all the, all the hooligans were off their face on the inner rave. Well, I don't know about that. You know, the acute effects of MDMA, they're great. It helps you to be more understanding of other people's perspective. It helps you to kind of look outside of yourself. That's a great thing. And sometimes, you know, you have this ather globe.

Like, these effects can last several days later, which is a lovely thing, and even months later. So, but I don't have any evidence about the football hooligans. But if it actually happened and they got into MDMA use, I hope they're safe and more power to them. All right. Well, our producer is an angry football fan, so maybe we'll know how to deal with it. with them now. Yeah, we'll put it in his teeth. Yeah, there may be no scientific evidence, but we're going to give it a shot anyway. Dr. Carl Hart, thank you so much for coming on. I recommend people check out your book. Is there somewhere for people to follow you online,

to keep in touch with your work? Yeah, DR. I'm on Twitter. D.R. Carl Hart, I'm everywhere on Twitter. I mean, I don't do Twitter every day because, yeah, it's too much hate on Twitter. So I have to step back, and I'm trying to be, I'm trying love, not hate. Well, we'll do a couple of quick questions for our locals, but in the meantime, thank you so much for joining us, and thank you guys for watching and listening. We'll see you very soon with another brilliant episode like this one,

or Rorscho, all of them go out at 7pm UK time. And for those of you who like your trigonometry on the go, it's also available as a podcast. Take care and see you soon, guys. Dr. Hart, what good exactly do you think you were doing with your drug advocacy? Um, wow. This episode is brought to you by Netflix's remarkably bright creatures.

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