Official Drugs Discussion Thread

First of all, there are threads dicussing the legality of drugs and the "which drugs have you taken" thread, but I would like to start a thread discussing legality, risks, effects, opinions, mixing drugs, etc.

Everything there is to talk about drugs.

First of all, some myth busting.

1. Ecstasy is a very risky drug

False, 7 per million per year are ecsasy related, and most of them are due to a mix with alcohol, one of the most dangerous drugs on the planet.

2. Ketamine is a legal drug

I didn't discover Ketamine until last year, but from what I know, it is not under the misuse of drugs act in the UK. However it is illegal to use without a prescription, as it is a medical drug.

3. Smoking Cannabis is 20 times worse than smoking Tobacco

Although smoking itself is bad, the reason tobacco smoke is bad is the tar it produces in your lungs.

When smoke of any kind enters your lungs, the body has natural defenses against it, and lesions form. These are what lead to cancer, however they naturally go away once the smoke does. However, the tar in the leaves prevent them from doing this, and that is the risk.

Most cannabis smokers smoke the bud of the plant. Cannabis bud has about 33% of the risk from tobacco leaves. Cannabis smokers, although taking longer puffs, smoke a lot less.

4. Cannabis, Heroin etc. can lead to sterility

There is no evidence that any reacreational drug can affect your fertiliy.

5. Heroin is incredibly addictive

1 dose of heroin won't get you hooked. Infact, alcohol and tobacco are more addictive. However, our bodies do tend to tolerate heroin forcing higher dosage.

6. Taking LSD will make you think you can fly

Never happened. I might as well add that LSD is one of the safest drugs.

7. Speed kills

50 deaths in the world over a 30 year period. Most of them were due to injection.

Well I'm a bit lethargic now, get through to discussion.

Originally posted by lord xyz
[b]5. Heroin is incredibly addictive

1 dose of heroin won't get you hooked. Infact, alcohol and tobacco are more addictive. However, our bodies do tend to tolerate heroin forcing higher dosage.[/B]

There's pretty much nothing that gets you "hooked" in one dose. That doesn't mean heroin doesn't deserve a reputation as being highly addictive and very hard to quit.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
There's pretty much nothing that gets you "hooked" in one dose. That doesn't mean heroin doesn't deserve a reputation as being highly addictive and very hard to quit.

why lying to children about drugs is a bad idea:

when they realize you are lying they go a little overboard.

For instance, with regard to K, recent research shows potential irreversible effects with only a single does.

because something is not as bad as the propaganda says does not mean it is safe. For instance, I wouldn't make statements that make E sound benign.

Originally posted by lord xyz
That is true. However, it's not as addictive as the media states. Once again, alcohol and tobacco are more addictive.

it is impossible to "rank" how "addictive" something is, as addiction is a symptom and entails many variables.

however, opiates are far more "addictive" as in, the chemical produces dependency, far more efficiently than alcohol. Nicotine, not tobacco, may match it, but is nowhere close when it comes to withdrawal effects.

Originally posted by inimalist
why lying to children about drugs is a bad idea:

when they realize you are lying they go a little overboard.

For instance, with regard to K, recent research shows potential irreversible effects with only a single does.

because something is not as bad as the propaganda says does not mean it is safe. For instance, I wouldn't make statements that make E sound benign.

it is impossible to "rank" how "addictive" something is, as addiction is a symptom and entails many variables.

however, opiates are far more "addictive" as in, the chemical produces dependency, far more efficiently than alcohol. Nicotine, not tobacco, may match it, but is nowhere close when it comes to withdrawal effects.

As for addiction, it really does depend on the person.

Originally posted by lord xyz
As for addiction, it really does depend on the person.

Thus it is safe for everyone to try!

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Thus it is safe for everyone to try!

There is a differance between user and abuser.

ANYTHING can be addictive.
Sugar is more addictive than cocaine.
Fast food is more addictive than heroin.

If used moderatly, anything can be enjoyed.

The problem lies in that dealers mix cocaine and heroine with all kinds of harmful shit, like washing powder, rat poison, flour, sugar and other legal drugs like painkillers, which can be leathel.

If drugs were clean, deaths statistics would look a lot different.

Originally posted by lil bitchiness
Sugar is more addictive than cocaine.
Fast food is more addictive than heroin.

I'd like to see any sort of basis for that.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
I'd like to see any sort of basis for that.

The other two are probably socially addictive though.

Originally posted by lord xyz
how many people are regular users of sugar and fast food versus heroin and coke.

That's not an argument for anything being addictive. Lots of people drink water too.

Everyone's looking at this from completely the wrong angle. Heroin's damage isn't caused from it's initial addictiveness. It's caused from what those peope who ARE addicted to it but cannot afford it. Social damage from drugs far outweighs the personal damage done to the user. The proof is in the fact that there are many people who function perfectly normal lives despite a heroin addiction but they can actually afford it off their own money. It's those who cannot that cause the damage and so commit crimes to feed their addiction.

If drugs were clean, deaths statistics would look a lot different.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
I'd like to see any sort of basis for that.

Perhaps take some interest in researching?

[W]hen rats were allowed to choose mutually-exclusively between water sweetened with saccharin-an intense calorie-free sweetener-and intravenous cocaine-a highly addictive and harmful substance-the large majority of animals (94%) preferred the sweet taste of saccharin. The preference for saccharin was not attributable to its unnatural ability to induce sweetness without calories because the same preference was also observed with sucrose, a natural sugar. Finally, the preference for saccharin was not surmountable by increasing doses of cocaine and was observed despite either cocaine intoxication, sensitization or intake escalation-the latter being a hallmark of drug addiction.

Our findings clearly demonstrate that intense sweetness can surpass cocaine reward, even in drug-sensitized and -addicted individuals.

-researchers at the University of Bordeaux, France

Read it here - http://www.plosone.org/home.action

Oh and here, BBC says fast food is AS addictive as heroin.
Hmmm...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2707143.stm

Originally posted by jaden101
Actually, a lot more deaths result from so called "clean" doses than from those with large amounts of impurities. Drugs like heroin and cocaine firstly get cheaper drugs added to them that mimic the effects of the main drug. In the case of cocaine it's things like caffine. It is then bulked with what is usually inert substances. So to say it's the other addiditves that are causing the deaths is actually false because unusually pure drugs mean a lot more people have overdoses because they are used to their old "unclean" dose. Dealers don't want to kill off their market so they don't generally add hugely harmful additives to bulk out their drug supply. The alleged rat poison stories tend to be urban legends (i know because i now test street sample drugs via gas chromatography-mass spectrometry for a living). It's far more likely to be things like cheap strawberry angel delight (makes the so called "pink champagne" version of cocaine). These things don't cause fatalities as much as pure drugs do.

A lot more deaths? Really?

Because unless you run a huge drug ring and are at the top, or you pick your own cocaine in the fields, access to pure cocaine is not only ridiculously difficult to access, but incomparably expensive.

On top of that, before it reaches you in England or me in Canada, cocaine has already gone through at least 2, if not more cuts.

Its ridiculous to claim that more deaths come from pure drugs which are so inaccessible to many users and abusers.

Originally posted by lil bitchiness
Perhaps take some interest in researching?

[W]hen rats were allowed to choose mutually-exclusively between water sweetened with saccharin-an intense calorie-free sweetener-and intravenous cocaine-a highly addictive and harmful substance-the large majority of animals (94%) preferred the sweet taste of saccharin. The preference for saccharin was not attributable to its unnatural ability to induce sweetness without calories because the same preference was also observed with sucrose, a natural sugar. Finally, the preference for saccharin was not surmountable by increasing doses of cocaine and was observed despite either cocaine intoxication, sensitization or intake escalation-the latter being a hallmark of drug addiction.

Our findings clearly demonstrate that intense sweetness can surpass cocaine reward, even in drug-sensitized and -addicted individuals.

-researchers at the University of Bordeaux, France

Read it here - http://www.plosone.org/home.action

In rats, mind you they even note that proper research on how rodents process cocaine as compared to primates was no conducted. Just to high light how important that can be chipmunks can drink like 15 times as much alcohol as human beings can.

Also:
Whether this effect results from a genuine preference for intense sweetness or other factors (e.g., use of a suboptimal dose of cocaine and/or lack of cocaine dependence) has not been established yet, however.

Finally the fact that some things are more addictive does not make cocaine (or anything else) less addictive.

Originally posted by lord xyz
Some of my friends were in a K hole, and they're no different than before.

thats not really what I'm saying

Originally posted by lord xyz
As for addiction, it really does depend on the person.

it depends on a lot of things

Originally posted by lil bitchiness
Perhaps take some interest in researching?

[W]hen rats were allowed to choose mutually-exclusively between water sweetened with saccharin-an intense calorie-free sweetener-and intravenous cocaine-a highly addictive and harmful substance-the large majority of animals (94%) preferred the sweet taste of saccharin. The preference for saccharin was not attributable to its unnatural ability to induce sweetness without calories because the same preference was also observed with sucrose, a natural sugar. Finally, the preference for saccharin was not surmountable by increasing doses of cocaine and was observed despite either cocaine intoxication, sensitization or intake escalation-the latter being a hallmark of drug addiction.

Our findings clearly demonstrate that intense sweetness can surpass cocaine reward, even in drug-sensitized and -addicted individuals.

-researchers at the University of Bordeaux, France

Read it here - http://www.plosone.org/home.action

Oh and here, BBC says fast food is AS addictive as heroin.
Hmmm...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2707143.stm

A lot more deaths? Really?

Because unless you run a huge drug ring and are at the top, or you pick your own cocaine in the fields, access to pure cocaine is not only ridiculously difficult to access, but incomparably expensive.

On top of that, before it reaches you in England or me in Canada, cocaine has already gone through at least 2, if not more cuts.

Its ridiculous to claim that more deaths come from pure drugs which are so inaccessible to many users and abusers.

It doesn't have to be pure though. It just has to be a cleaner sample than what is normally around. This actually happens a lot and is responsible for most heroin overdoses because people prepare their hit in terms of what they are used to taking. If the quantity is the same but the drug is more concentrated then that's when they have an overdose.

examples

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,900989,00.html?promoid=googlep

http://www.heroinaddiction2.com/user-news.htm?id=45

"The heroin is heading our way and we have to be prepared for it," warned Tom Wood, former deputy chief constable at Lothian and Borders Police and now chairman of the Edinburgh Drugs and Alcohol Action Team. "It will be getting cheaper. If enough comes in, then supply will outstrip demand. "The bigger concern is that it will become more powerful. We're talking about extra strong, pure heroin. If it is pure it will be more dangerous.'

from

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/cheap-pure-heroin-set-to-flood-britain-say-police-472972.html

Granted though. If heroin addicts were to be given pure heroin initially supervised and so got used to a pure supply, there would eventually be less deaths because of the physiologically damaging adulterants would no longer be present. But if heroin was to because practically pure over night and users were to continue to take the doses they are used to in terms of quantity then there would be a massive number of heroin deaths.

Oh and by the way. I'm in Scotland...Not England.

never tried heroin ...think thats the popular one I would not care to even try...though one that has always made me wonder is peyote...seen a couple people come back from the renaissance festival and they seemed to be like the others who were on lsd and shrooms as far as how they acted...I think...though I was innocent ahemm I never did shrooms that night I swear 😇 but just curious how much more intense is it than say lsd or shrooms? (provided you remove the center which I heard was stryctnine) ....anyone know?

Originally posted by inimalist
thats not really what I'm saying

it depends on a lot of things

Originally posted by lord xyz
I'm saying I'm not seeing these irreversible effects.

I assume you ran your friends on controlled tests followed by fMRI or other brain activity measuring readings?

You are actually articulating my main point in my first post. You have realized that adults were lying to you, so now you think everything is ok because it isn't instantly destructive.

Originally posted by inimalist
I assume you ran your friends on controlled tests followed by fMRI or other brain activity measuring readings?

You are actually articulating my main point in my first post. You have realized that adults were lying to you, so now you think everything is ok because it isn't instantly destructive.

But they are absolutelty no different. Yeah, I don't know how well their lymphatic system works, but in terms of attitude and behaviour, nothing's changed.