Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Ethan Edelman, and this is Psychoactive, a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio and Protozoa Pictures. Psychoactive is the
Speaker 1: show where we talk about all things drugs. But any
Speaker 1: views expressed here do not represent those of I Heart Media,
Speaker 1: Protozoa Pictures, or their executives and employees. Indeed, heed, as
Speaker 1: an inveterate contrarian, I can tell you they may not
Speaker 1: even represent my own. And nothing contained in this show
Speaker 1: should be used as medical advice or encouragement to use
Speaker 1: any type of drugs. Hello, Psychoactive listeners. Well, before I
Speaker 1: introduced today's guest, I just wanna bring you up to
Speaker 1: date on a little actually disappointing news for me, which
Speaker 1: is that, uh, this first version of Psychoactive will unfortunately
Speaker 1: come to an end uh in late January when we
Speaker 1: complete two seasons. And I have to say, I mean, basically,
Speaker 1: what's happened is that the two key backers of Psychoactive,
Speaker 1: which is I Heart and Darren Aronovski's company Protozoa, UM,
Speaker 1: you know, I have done it, have made really made
Speaker 1: a wonderful investment in this uh and the audience has
Speaker 1: been growing, the reviews have been fantastic, But unfortunately, and
Speaker 1: I understand this and empathize with it, the the numbers
Speaker 1: of listeners is not yet significant enough to justify a
Speaker 1: continue investment. So we'll likely be taking a break at
Speaker 1: the end of January and trying to figure out how
Speaker 1: to bring Psychoactive back in some similar but slightly different
Speaker 1: form with different backers. So at this point, what I'd
Speaker 1: like to say to you is that if you've been
Speaker 1: enjoying the podcast, UM, please poster your comments, put them
Speaker 1: up on where you know, whether it's Apple or Spotify
Speaker 1: or I Heart or Google, wherever you listen to your podcasts.
Speaker 1: So I hope to keep Psychoactive going into the future.
Speaker 1: I've really love doing it and I've got a wonderful
Speaker 1: feedback UM, but part of its future will depend upon you,
Speaker 1: the listeners, and how much you can you know, not
Speaker 1: just send your positive feedback, but spread the word, encourage others,
Speaker 1: Pierre's friends, students, teachers, whatever to listen so that we
Speaker 1: can build this audience as big as possible. Okay, Well
Speaker 1: that said, let me introduce today's guest. He's Professor Neil Carrier.
Speaker 1: He's a professor of social anthropology at the University of
Speaker 1: Bristol in the United Kingdom, and he is one of
Speaker 1: the really leading experts in the world, both about drugs
Speaker 1: in Africa and more specifically about a drug called cot
Speaker 1: spelled k h A T or q a T. And
Speaker 1: I'm delighted to have him on Psychoactive today. So Neil,
Speaker 1: thanks so much for joining me and my listeners on
Speaker 1: Psychoactive Pleasure. Ethan then, yeah, thank you very happening to me
Speaker 1: me on the podcast. So now I realized that many
Speaker 1: of you may never have heard of cod. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've been fascinated by it because I've been studying drugs
Speaker 1: for many decades, and it doesn't pop up much in
Speaker 1: the news in the United States, and occasionally you read
Speaker 1: about a bust by the d e A or local authorities,
Speaker 1: typically directed at as Somali or Ethiopian immigrant communities living
Speaker 1: in the United States, or maybe at a transshipment that
Speaker 1: gets caught at a port um. But it's got a
Speaker 1: long and rich history, and I wanted to discuss with
Speaker 1: Neil today, both not just about cod and its unusual history,
Speaker 1: but also how thinking about cod in relationship to other drugs,
Speaker 1: like like coffee, like tobacco, like coca like, opium like
Speaker 1: even cava. I mean, how we think about these drugs
Speaker 1: comparatively in terms of their indigenous uses, in terms of
Speaker 1: their modernization, in terms of international markets and all of that. So, Neil,
Speaker 1: why don't we just start off if you could explain
Speaker 1: to our listeners what exactly is cat? What does it
Speaker 1: come from, what does it do? How far back does
Speaker 1: it does its history? Go, start us off with it
Speaker 1: with the answers to those questions. Sure, thank you, Ethan. Yes, well,
Speaker 1: basically cat comes from either a shrub or a tree.
Speaker 1: Cat comes from the kata julius plant, which which can
Speaker 1: grow is quite a small shrub or can grow into
Speaker 1: something quite a bit a bit larger into a full
Speaker 1: blown tree, depending on on how it's how it is
Speaker 1: produced and cultivated. And basically it is the the the
Speaker 1: product that is sold of the young stems and leaves
Speaker 1: that shoot up from the main branches of the of
Speaker 1: the shrub of of the tree. And these have have
Speaker 1: stimulating properties mainly due to some compounds that resemble amphetamine
Speaker 1: in the in how they how they work on the
Speaker 1: on the central nervous system. Those compounds are cathinone and
Speaker 1: and catheine those are the two key elements, and cathinone
Speaker 1: is basically a sort of cousin of the amphetamine was
Speaker 1: somewhat similar effects. That's right, and it's quite interesting, I
Speaker 1: think pharmacologically there has been quite a quite a bit
Speaker 1: of work done on all the different types of compounds. So,
Speaker 1: as you know, with a lot of these plants, including
Speaker 1: cannabis and the like, people tend to focus on particular
Speaker 1: compounds TH, HC or or what have you. And it's
Speaker 1: quite similar with cat as well. So a lot of
Speaker 1: the focus pharmacologically is on this substance calvin one, but
Speaker 1: there are a lot of other compounds within within cat
Speaker 1: that you know have been researched in immoral or less detail.
Speaker 1: But basically it is these these leaves and stems are
Speaker 1: consumed by by chewing um, and people build up a
Speaker 1: wad of cat in their in their cheeks and chew
Speaker 1: often often for quite a few hours at least for
Speaker 1: for a time, constantly building up this ward in the
Speaker 1: in the cheek, so maybe a little bit like like
Speaker 1: chewing tobacco or chewing coca. So this one is constantly
Speaker 1: replenished and this is what gives releases the stimulating properties
Speaker 1: of the of the substance m so similar in the
Speaker 1: same way that's say indigenous people's oblivia Peru, Columbia elsewhere,
Speaker 1: will chew the coca leaf and and slowly a slow
Speaker 1: drip of cocaine gets released, or in some cases people
Speaker 1: will chew tobacco and the nicotine gets released. Similarly, people
Speaker 1: will be chewing the cart and the catino and eventually
Speaker 1: the cassine will get released, and that's what provides the
Speaker 1: pleasant feeling I guess of of engaging in this. That's right,
Speaker 1: and I think it's key like. The way it's consumed
Speaker 1: is quite a key aspect of cat like like with
Speaker 1: coca and chewing coca, because it is actually put it
Speaker 1: a more measured release rather than taking a pure compound
Speaker 1: in in one go, it's kind of released over the
Speaker 1: hours of the of the chewing session, which is a
Speaker 1: more gentle effect. Really then then would be say taking
Speaker 1: the isolated cabin on. A friend of mine actually had
Speaker 1: a really really nice way of explaining the or describing
Speaker 1: the effects of cat as being something that if you
Speaker 1: if you sit down in an armchair and you're not
Speaker 1: quite comfortable, but then suddenly you just shift your body
Speaker 1: and you find that place where you know your body
Speaker 1: is completely comfortable. Cat seems to be a little bit
Speaker 1: like that. It is quite a quite a subtle effect,
Speaker 1: you know, the way it makes you makes you feel
Speaker 1: but it but you know, it is quite a quite
Speaker 1: a pleasant substance. And the history, I mean, does this
Speaker 1: go back millennia? Does it go back a thousand years?
Speaker 1: Does it have a history somewhere at the coffee or
Speaker 1: to old bi Um or what would you compare it to?
Speaker 1: And well, it it does go back a long time.
Speaker 1: I think in records it's probably about them one millennium
Speaker 1: where we have records, especially in the region of Ethiopia
Speaker 1: and Yemen. There's a lot of early early records that
Speaker 1: text your records from that kind of region. Um. And
Speaker 1: it's it's similar to coffee actually, so probably about the
Speaker 1: about a similar timeline to two coffee and associated I
Speaker 1: mean with coffee is associated. You know. Part of it
Speaker 1: is both the frisky goat story of realizing that this
Speaker 1: thing could wake up in the morning and also then
Speaker 1: beginning to use in order to help staying awake for
Speaker 1: the early morning prayers in in Islam. Um is there
Speaker 1: something similar? I mean, is is more associated with Muslims
Speaker 1: than with Christians or or our Animist or other types
Speaker 1: of religions. Oh, it very much is um And sometimes
Speaker 1: there's an explanation given that for Muslim people without with
Speaker 1: restrictions on alcohol, that something like a cat can kind
Speaker 1: of fulfill that social social role um uh that alcohol
Speaker 1: does the man for many of the society. So there
Speaker 1: is that kind of argument. But it it does link
Speaker 1: with especially um uh forms of Islam again kind of
Speaker 1: more in the Ethiopian region, if there are links with
Speaker 1: all night prayer session in Sufi Islam, and and in
Speaker 1: northern Kenya, where I've done quite a bit of work,
Speaker 1: you do get it's it's consumption associated with things like
Speaker 1: spirit possession sessions, which do tend to involve kind of
Speaker 1: all night sessions. So you know something there is like
Speaker 1: a functional aspect to it, you know, something that's quite
Speaker 1: useful for keeping people going in these these kind of
Speaker 1: religious religious settings. But it's not it's not psychedelic in
Speaker 1: a sense of people using a peyote or using ebogo
Speaker 1: or things like that. Right, people aren't hall loosening the
Speaker 1: influence of this. They're more getting into a slightly modified
Speaker 1: state of consciousness. That's right. I mean, it's it's not
Speaker 1: a direct psychedelic in that that way. I think, like
Speaker 1: a lot of these things, and the way contexts plays
Speaker 1: a role on how the effects have felt though, um,
Speaker 1: you know, perhaps in those kind of consumption contexts, um
Speaker 1: it might have a you know, be able to generate
Speaker 1: some sorts of altered aches, you know, along with the
Speaker 1: kind of music that would be going on, the drumming,
Speaker 1: this kind of thing. So context can maybe give it
Speaker 1: a slight effect like that, But generally no, it's it
Speaker 1: is a fairly gentle form of amphetamin. Now, Neil, if
Speaker 1: we look in at the current time, I mean, if
Speaker 1: you look in the countries in the Horn of Africa
Speaker 1: as well as in the emigrant communities throughout the world, Um,
Speaker 1: I mean, how many people are probably chewing cut on
Speaker 1: any one day? I mean today are there are there
Speaker 1: probably ten million or five million or twenty five million
Speaker 1: people in the world chewing cut? And is it? Is
Speaker 1: it over is it overwhelmingly? And Yemen and then in
Speaker 1: Somali and ken you how does it break out to
Speaker 1: be honest that there really isn't the the evidence yet
Speaker 1: to state with precision, I think how many how many
Speaker 1: people would be consuming over any one day, but it's
Speaker 1: certainly consumed over a vast area. So all the way
Speaker 1: from Yemen like you like you say, all the way
Speaker 1: actually down to the Eastern Cape in the South Africa,
Speaker 1: Southern Africa, you do get cat cat growing wild all
Speaker 1: the way down that region. So even in the Eastern
Speaker 1: Cape there's people who do consume it. And it's also
Speaker 1: imported into South Africa from places like like Kenya and
Speaker 1: Madagascar as well. Actually as A is a place principally
Speaker 1: with the influence of Yemenis who settled in northern Madagascar
Speaker 1: centuries ago. But Northern Madagascar as well as another place
Speaker 1: where we're quite a bit of cats is consumed um.
Speaker 1: But the other sections of society where it's very very
Speaker 1: very popular. It's become very popular principally again for this
Speaker 1: funk more functional used by people like truck drivers, people
Speaker 1: like night watchman either even students studying for for exams.
Speaker 1: And culturally as well, it's become quite associated in places
Speaker 1: like Kenny with with quite a youth culture, so they
Speaker 1: very popular amongst them a few youth as well, so
Speaker 1: it kind of cuts across a lot of different social
Speaker 1: categories in a place like like Kenya, and most of
Speaker 1: these countries primarily used still by men and relatively infrequently
Speaker 1: by women generally speaking, that that does seem seem to
Speaker 1: be the case. But but there is is consumption by
Speaker 1: by women. And again the proportions are probably higher in
Speaker 1: places like like Yemen, Um debouty, places like this, and
Speaker 1: in somewhere somewhere like can you were mostly seen as
Speaker 1: more a male a male pursuit mm hmm. And it
Speaker 1: listen for those listeners of a poor sense of geography,
Speaker 1: it's useful to pull out a map at some point,
Speaker 1: but basically the Horn of Africa is that kind of
Speaker 1: northeastern part of of Africa, sort of below Egypt and
Speaker 1: Sudan and then sort of running down the eastern eastern
Speaker 1: side of Africa and then just directly across from Yemen
Speaker 1: and Saudi Arabia. And in fact, the youth even extends
Speaker 1: into the neighboring regions of Saudi Arabia as well, as
Speaker 1: I realized when I was doing the research um on this.
Speaker 1: But you know, if you think about I mean, Yemen's
Speaker 1: got a population of thirty million, but if consumption there,
Speaker 1: I mean that could be. What I mean, that's probably
Speaker 1: where the highest percentage of the population lives. So it's
Speaker 1: quite likely you have many, many millions of people. Uh.
Speaker 1: You know in Yemen. Somalia has got sixteen million people
Speaker 1: and so presumably got a few million there. Kenya's got
Speaker 1: fifty three million population, um, so even a small percentage
Speaker 1: there is gonna add up. In Ethiopia, you know, it's
Speaker 1: the second most populous country in Africa after Nigeria, over
Speaker 1: a hundred million people. So I'm guessing that must be
Speaker 1: in the tens of millions, in addition to the emigrant
Speaker 1: communities living in Europe and Australia and the UK, Canada
Speaker 1: and elsewhere around the world. I mean, does that seem
Speaker 1: like a reasonable estimate? That seems like a really really
Speaker 1: reasonable way to to estimate it. And I think the
Speaker 1: other sense of the scale is how much production has
Speaker 1: boomed in places like Ethiopia and ken Near as well,
Speaker 1: um even moving beyond kind of traditional communities that are
Speaker 1: associated with its consumption and moving beyond places where it
Speaker 1: was usually associated as an item of cultivation as well. Um.
Speaker 1: So I think from that you can certainly get a
Speaker 1: sense of growing numbers of people chewing chewing cap because
Speaker 1: you know, they wouldn't be the this real growth in
Speaker 1: cultivation and trade if it if it weren't for increasing
Speaker 1: demand alongside that, I see. And so the problem you
Speaker 1: have that there's most of it then has growing in
Speaker 1: Kenya and growing Ethiopia. Does that mean that the Yemen
Speaker 1: and Somalia and some of the other places are mostly
Speaker 1: importing the stuff that they choo? Somalia mostly imports, but
Speaker 1: Yemen does it does produce a lot of its own
Speaker 1: its own cat mmmm. Now one interesting thing about cut
Speaker 1: is that the key ingredient, right the catherine know, you
Speaker 1: know what the equivalent to cocaine and coca or th
Speaker 1: ch in cannabis, it actually degrades very quickly once the
Speaker 1: leaves are picked. Um, and I thought one of the
Speaker 1: articles I think you're always called the need for speed.
Speaker 1: So just talk about that and the implications of that.
Speaker 1: That's right, well, very much does have a real real
Speaker 1: implications for the way the trade is conducted in in cats,
Speaker 1: and especially in terms of the transportation. So as you say,
Speaker 1: Calvin owned is generally thought of as as degrading quite
Speaker 1: rapidly into this other compounded cabine, which is a lot
Speaker 1: less potent. So there is this idea that because of this,
Speaker 1: consumers really do want to get their cat as fresh
Speaker 1: as possible to to consume and get the most effects
Speaker 1: from the substance. I think that needs to be nuanced
Speaker 1: a little bit because, UM, I think a lot a
Speaker 1: lot of the reason why consumers prefer fresh cat is
Speaker 1: it it just is much more pleasant to chew, you know,
Speaker 1: rather than cat that's dried a little bit as as well.
Speaker 1: And I think some research shows that it's UM this
Speaker 1: compound it can be more or less stable in some
Speaker 1: varieties of cats as well, So it's I think quite
Speaker 1: quite interesting pharmacologically there. But there's certainly this idea that
Speaker 1: there's this need for speed, you know that um, there
Speaker 1: is this sense that people want want the freshest the
Speaker 1: cat possible. UM. And the implications in places like ken
Speaker 1: you really are very much about how fast that the
Speaker 1: trade has to operate, because especially where where it's produced.
Speaker 1: In Kenya is a region called mary Mery County which
Speaker 1: is just northeast of the Mount Kenya, and this is
Speaker 1: where most of the Kenyan crop of the cat is
Speaker 1: is grown. And it's notorious if you're driving anywhere in
Speaker 1: that region that you'll be you'll be driving along and
Speaker 1: suddenly you'll be pushed off a road by some speeding
Speaker 1: truck with sacks of cats. And this is quite a
Speaker 1: common idea, quite a common trope about about the cat business,
Speaker 1: not just in Kenya, but but throughout you know, in
Speaker 1: Ethiopia as well, these kind of trucks that speed on
Speaker 1: by and basically that that is to try and meet schedules,
Speaker 1: especially nowadays in Kenya with the trade that the export
Speaker 1: of Kenyan cat to Somalia um so that that cat
Speaker 1: has to reach the airports in Nairobi very very quickly,
Speaker 1: you know, to them be able to be loaded up
Speaker 1: onto planes to get to to Somalia. So any any
Speaker 1: delays in that process really can lead to an unsellable,
Speaker 1: unsellable batch of cat. So let me ask you this thing,
Speaker 1: because one of the news items I came across was
Speaker 1: a major bust. It was in Seattle, and and and
Speaker 1: the you know, customs authorities sees I think ten tons
Speaker 1: of cart on a boat coming into the Seattle pork,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean sending it by boat. So how
Speaker 1: does the stuff stay it all good? If it's been
Speaker 1: on a boat coming from East Africa into Seattle. Well,
Speaker 1: it's a it's a very interesting development that that links
Speaker 1: to what's happened in the UK as well where I'm
Speaker 1: based um and the UK, as you probably are, ware
Speaker 1: finally banned a cat in twenty fourteen, So the UK
Speaker 1: was one of the last European countries to bring about
Speaker 1: a ban on on cat. And what you did find
Speaker 1: happened after the band So before the band, tons of
Speaker 1: the fresh cat was coming from Kenya, mostly from Kenya,
Speaker 1: some from Ethiopia as well, particularly daily coming into Heathrow
Speaker 1: Airport to then feed you know, the wider wider demand
Speaker 1: in the in the UK, so that this fresh cat
Speaker 1: was was coming in in vast quantities. But what seems
Speaker 1: to have happened since the ban is that there has
Speaker 1: been a shift to a dried form of cat. It's
Speaker 1: called grabber Um seems to be the name that a
Speaker 1: lot of people that know it know it by in
Speaker 1: the in the UK and elsewhere. And it's yeah, it's
Speaker 1: quite interesting with these ideas about its pharmacology, about how
Speaker 1: unstable cavin Own seems that seems to be. Yet consumers
Speaker 1: still seem to say your consumers that I've spoken to
Speaker 1: who have tried this dried cat they still seem to
Speaker 1: suggest that it is actually quite quite potent um. And
Speaker 1: to be honest, that the pharmacological research I don't think
Speaker 1: has been done yet to to really see what's going
Speaker 1: on there. We'll be talking more after we hear this ad.
Speaker 1: So I came across a funny story, and this may
Speaker 1: have been before this Graba version you're talking about came around,
Speaker 1: but it involves somebody getting busted some years ago in
Speaker 1: the US. But the person who arrested him sort of
Speaker 1: took their time in processing it, and and so the
Speaker 1: person who got and busted with the cuts said he
Speaker 1: wanted to have it chemically analyzed. And what had happened
Speaker 1: was that the cathinone in the cot had already degraded
Speaker 1: to the point that it was no longer testing positive
Speaker 1: for that. And so if it has still been testing positive,
Speaker 1: he would have been busted for, you know, selling or
Speaker 1: importing a drug that was essentially a Schedule one drug
Speaker 1: in the United States, you know, like like like heroin,
Speaker 1: or or or psychedelics or or a range of other things.
Speaker 1: But because the cathinone had degraded, it was now just
Speaker 1: the the catheine, which is only a schedule for substance.
Speaker 1: So therefore I think he almost I just got off
Speaker 1: with a slap on the wrist um. So I wonder
Speaker 1: if that's going to change now with this new grabba
Speaker 1: you're talking about. Quite quite possibly, but it's but there
Speaker 1: still is there still is demand for the for the
Speaker 1: fresh cat, and it kind of links again to that
Speaker 1: that need the speed sort of pulling it out a
Speaker 1: little bit, a little bit more broadly as well with
Speaker 1: even like the Drug Enforcement Administration offices and customs agents
Speaker 1: in places like the US, you know, being told like
Speaker 1: if if you do get a seizure of cat, you
Speaker 1: got to get it to the lab for testing US
Speaker 1: as as quickly as possible. Otherwise, you know, the Yet,
Speaker 1: like you say, Cavin owner, schedule one substance will degrade
Speaker 1: into this cabin so it would be a lesser a
Speaker 1: lesser charge as well, and not so not so good
Speaker 1: for statistics, I think for the kind of customs agents
Speaker 1: or the d as well in terms of you know,
Speaker 1: if you can say, it's a really interesting story that
Speaker 1: perhaps we can get onto in in a little little
Speaker 1: bit about the criminalization of around the around the world,
Speaker 1: and that the sched scheduling of it. Let's jump into
Speaker 1: that now. I mean, because I think you know, for
Speaker 1: people understand, I mean, I don't think it's part of
Speaker 1: the U N conventions. I mean, you know, the UN
Speaker 1: agencies having particularly friendly but it's not something that's been
Speaker 1: criminalized since the early twentieth century. I mean, the criminalizations
Speaker 1: that have happened around the world have been mostly in
Speaker 1: the you know, the late twentieth century or early twenty
Speaker 1: one century, right, that's right. So with with with cat
Speaker 1: that they come hounds on it are actually scheduled, So
Speaker 1: cabin on and cavine again, these are compounds that are
Speaker 1: scheduled according to the conventions, but then there was a
Speaker 1: lot of leeway given as to whether the plant itself
Speaker 1: would then also be be regarded as kind of scheduled
Speaker 1: because of the compounds. So different countries took different approaches
Speaker 1: to that. So for example, the UK, for for many years, UM,
Speaker 1: so the isolated cavinon or cavine would be restricted the compounds,
Speaker 1: but cat itself in platform wasn't was not restricted um.
Speaker 1: Whereas the the U S seems to have gone down
Speaker 1: a different to a different rope because cavin Ow and
Speaker 1: Calvine were themselves scheduled that the US we took the
Speaker 1: measure of this assuming that UM. But because of that
Speaker 1: that the the United Nations intended that UM that CAT itself,
Speaker 1: if it contained cabin one or if it contained cavine,
Speaker 1: should also be restricted on those on those grounds, but
Speaker 1: there was no scheduling of CAT it itself UM. So
Speaker 1: that this did did lead to a lot of quite
Speaker 1: kind of quite interesting international situations in regard to the
Speaker 1: legality of CAT. Mm hmmm. Well, so when we look
Speaker 1: at the criminalizations that happened, right, it is these European
Speaker 1: countries in the U S and other I guess they
Speaker 1: begin criminalizing, but it actually goes back deeper than that,
Speaker 1: right because when you look, I mean back to the
Speaker 1: colonial era in Africa when the colonial overlords, you know,
Speaker 1: we're concerned and we'd try to ban it um. And
Speaker 1: it also goes This is also an interesting case where
Speaker 1: this justn't wasn't just Western elites banning something that they
Speaker 1: feared coming from abroad. A lot of the impetus in
Speaker 1: many places, both in the region as well as in
Speaker 1: Europe and maybe Canada other places, seemed to be coming
Speaker 1: from people within the Somali community or from some of
Speaker 1: the emigrant communities. There's they were sort of playing out
Speaker 1: is I if I understand what I've been reading from
Speaker 1: you and others playing out, you know, this their own
Speaker 1: debate over how to look at cat. That's right, it's um.
Speaker 1: And I think the terms that come out to a
Speaker 1: lot in the way people write about cat, terms like ambivalence,
Speaker 1: terms like ambiguity, because there does tend to be so
Speaker 1: much ambivalence within particular communities about the consumption of cat.
Speaker 1: But certainly lots and lots of debates within within Islam
Speaker 1: about whether whether cat is forbidden or permitted, whether it
Speaker 1: should be seen as forbidden as um as haram, or
Speaker 1: whether it could be seen as as hellal. So these debates,
Speaker 1: there's actually quite a quite a long tradition in especially
Speaker 1: in Yemen, of debates around around cat, and that the
Speaker 1: kind of the way Muslim scholars might might view it,
Speaker 1: whether as permitted or not. You know, some seeing it
Speaker 1: as kind of you know, so you can consume it
Speaker 1: as long as it's not harming your a day to
Speaker 1: day life or your link to your community, whereas others
Speaker 1: much more restrictive on its on its consumption and then yeah,
Speaker 1: kind of a lot of concern especially often quite gendered
Speaker 1: forms of the concerns as well about the the idea
Speaker 1: of cat is this very male pastime um where maybe
Speaker 1: taking the men away for long periods from the domestic
Speaker 1: sphere and contributing to the home and the the idea
Speaker 1: is spending too much money on this substance as well, Yeah,
Speaker 1: because it reminds me a bit because we've recently did
Speaker 1: an episode about the history of alcohol prohibition in the
Speaker 1: US and there that was very much a women's led
Speaker 1: movement as well. To bring on you who led the
Speaker 1: temperance movement and then alcohol prohibition in the US. It
Speaker 1: was the same concerns around men spending their money on
Speaker 1: booze and not taking care of their families and claimed
Speaker 1: you know, associations with violence and reckless behavior in all this,
Speaker 1: and I think you would have some of the same
Speaker 1: debates around opion in many traditional opium using communities, with
Speaker 1: you know, with the with the female heads of household
Speaker 1: upset with with what their husbands were doing and the
Speaker 1: waste of money going on. And then of course I
Speaker 1: think there's awten sometimes the class based conflict right with
Speaker 1: the elites kind of looking down their nose at the
Speaker 1: more working class folks, and obviously they concern around young
Speaker 1: people getting into it. I mean, it seems like some
Speaker 1: of those debates that I read about in your writings,
Speaker 1: you know, are around around the around the debates around
Speaker 1: what to do about cut are very similar to ones
Speaker 1: who've seen elsewhere on the world, around other substances, very
Speaker 1: much so, a lot of a lot of parallels and
Speaker 1: throughout those as as well. Within Keny. One thing I
Speaker 1: became particularly fascinated by was all the different varieties of
Speaker 1: cats that are sold um and you you do get
Speaker 1: cat being sold in Kenneth for all sorts of pockets.
Speaker 1: You know, you get the very expensive varieties of cats
Speaker 1: that come from the the oldest frees, kind of kind
Speaker 1: of light with vineyards, you know, like the best quality
Speaker 1: grapes coming from the oldest fines. And it's a very
Speaker 1: very similar discourse about the best quality cat coming from
Speaker 1: the oldest trees. And this sort of cat can really
Speaker 1: fetch quite a quite a large amount of money. But
Speaker 1: then then you do get to lesser varieties as well,
Speaker 1: you know, which are the equivalent of the maybe like
Speaker 1: the sweepings of tea from the factory floor that might
Speaker 1: be sold as you know, kind of low quality, low
Speaker 1: quality tea. So it was quite interesting always in Keny
Speaker 1: of those divisions around around class. So a lot of
Speaker 1: the Kenyan middle classes would often conflate all CAT consumers
Speaker 1: as perhaps being quite quite lonely people, you know, people
Speaker 1: working on the buses or in public transport or these
Speaker 1: kind of things, where whereas for those in the know,
Speaker 1: you know, CAT it does straddle a lot of different
Speaker 1: different class groups as well. So for those with inside
Speaker 1: and knowledge about all these different types of varieties, you know,
Speaker 1: you can see people who are buying a particular variety
Speaker 1: that is very very expensive compared to you know, someone
Speaker 1: who might just be buying the cheapest quality as well.
Speaker 1: CAT is not really criminalized in Europe u as much
Speaker 1: of the world until the eighties. And then as I
Speaker 1: understand that what happens is, you know, Somalia is falling
Speaker 1: apart into a horrific civil war, Somalians are emigrating around
Speaker 1: the world, including to throughout Europe, the US. Uh, they're
Speaker 1: bringing the cod tradition with them, and you know, the
Speaker 1: Western governments don't really know how to respond at first,
Speaker 1: but My understand is that part of what drives many
Speaker 1: of them in Scandinavia, the UK, probably some other countries
Speaker 1: is that you have Somalian Somali emigres refugees themselves pushing
Speaker 1: for the prohibition in these European and other Western countries,
Speaker 1: while others are saying, what are you doing? This is
Speaker 1: our indigenous product, this is something that's native to you know,
Speaker 1: our cultures. That's right, And it was quite quite a
Speaker 1: pronounced the aspect of all the debates in the UK
Speaker 1: leading up to the ban in um and it is
Speaker 1: very very interesting actually how it does link to those
Speaker 1: kind of diaspora, those kind of emigrade dynamics as well.
Speaker 1: One kind of critical aspect of all this is a
Speaker 1: sense among some Somalis that that cat wasn't really an
Speaker 1: issue back in the in the home regions, but it's
Speaker 1: when it was displaced into the diaspora, the emigrade kind
Speaker 1: of context that it became a became a problem. Partly
Speaker 1: the argument that you know, there were more kind of
Speaker 1: cultural restraints around consumption in the in the home areas
Speaker 1: compared to the diaspora context, the emigrade context, but also
Speaker 1: one one kind of quite interesting dynamic is the real
Speaker 1: sense of strong morality that a lot of Somalis have
Speaker 1: in the emigrade context that if if you do get
Speaker 1: the um, if you you do get the chance to
Speaker 1: live in somewhere like London or or or Minneapolis, are
Speaker 1: these kind of places that you should keep on supporting
Speaker 1: families back in the in the home regions. So there's
Speaker 1: a lot of remittances that are that are sent back
Speaker 1: from Somali's in the emigrade context, back to back to Somalia,
Speaker 1: to Somali's in Kenya and elsewhere. And I think with
Speaker 1: cat there's there's quite a strong morality about it that,
Speaker 1: you know, if you get the chance to be in
Speaker 1: the in the somewhere like London, you know a place
Speaker 1: where you could could perhaps earn money, some of which
Speaker 1: could go back to supporting family, but instead you kind
Speaker 1: of waste it chewing chewing cat in in London or wherever.
Speaker 1: There was kind of a very very strong sort of
Speaker 1: ethical pushback against that, But all of that debate had
Speaker 1: its roots in similar debates going on in Yemen and
Speaker 1: in Kenya and Ethel being elsewhere, right, because even there
Speaker 1: you had issues about all this is not good and
Speaker 1: the men are just hanging around and they're spending money
Speaker 1: on carts instead of food and etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Right,
Speaker 1: I mean it wasn't It wasn't like these debates suddenly
Speaker 1: emerged when people got to go to Europe or to
Speaker 1: the US. It's just that they became i think, probably
Speaker 1: more exaggerated because they were dealing with a new cultural
Speaker 1: context and all the more worried about their kids and
Speaker 1: about employment. Oh definitely, it's something that became intensified. Like
Speaker 1: you say, these debates have been going on for a
Speaker 1: long time, and debates not necessarily about the individual consumer
Speaker 1: as well, but about you know, kind of the idea
Speaker 1: of whole whole countries as well, you know, very economistic
Speaker 1: kind of way of looking at life, like you know,
Speaker 1: wasting working hours by cheering this substance or so you
Speaker 1: often the way places like Jibouti and the Yemen might
Speaker 1: be written about, like as if a whole society was
Speaker 1: kind of addicted to this substance and not you know,
Speaker 1: the countries weren't developing as as well as they might.
Speaker 1: You know, if only people stopped touring cat then you know,
Speaker 1: development would come in a more concrete, concrete kind of form.
Speaker 1: And the same thing was true in the colonial era,
Speaker 1: right where the colonial overseers try to ban it at
Speaker 1: certain different certain times, or ban it for certain groups
Speaker 1: and night others, or trying to license it or where
Speaker 1: all this kind of thing. That's right, and um, some
Speaker 1: of my research it's one more more historical kind of
Speaker 1: archival research. I've done what was looking at again at
Speaker 1: the Kenyan context, which is the one I'm still most
Speaker 1: most familiar with. But it was that, yeah, very very
Speaker 1: interesting colonial story about the attempts to to prohibit this
Speaker 1: this substance. And again you can you can see from
Speaker 1: quite early on in the archives, you know, going back
Speaker 1: to around the nine twenties and thirties, when the British
Speaker 1: authorities in Kenya, the British colonial authorities suddenly realized how
Speaker 1: much cat was being consumed, how much was being grown,
Speaker 1: and how much was being traded because it suddenly came
Speaker 1: into their into their site as you know, a substance
Speaker 1: of interest. They hadn't really trapped it. And then all
Speaker 1: of a sudden they realized that this substance from places
Speaker 1: like the Mayory region of Kenya, it was traveling quite
Speaker 1: a quite large distances and being sold you know as
Speaker 1: far aways Mombassador and places like this, and there were
Speaker 1: all these debates, so again this idea of kind of
Speaker 1: ambivalence towards it and the ambiguities around it. So look,
Speaker 1: quite a few British officials didn't really see it being
Speaker 1: too problematic or you know, they were kind of comparing
Speaker 1: it to things like tobacco and in moderation it's it's
Speaker 1: not too bad a thing. But certain colonial officers really
Speaker 1: got to be in their bonnets, really became quite involved
Speaker 1: in um in wanting to prohibit the substance, especially for
Speaker 1: the certain parts of Kenya, like northern Kenya. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of concern that it's consumption there was growing, and
Speaker 1: it really was affecting a region that was quite a
Speaker 1: sensitive region as as well politically, because it was a
Speaker 1: buffer zone between Kenya and Ethiopia and the Italian Somali
Speaker 1: land as it as it then was. Yeah, I gotta
Speaker 1: kick out of At one point you mentioned that, you know,
Speaker 1: the British didn't want to kind of get too tough
Speaker 1: on the Merrow Kenyan Is because they respected them and
Speaker 1: it was dynamic account. I was dynic by the culture.
Speaker 1: But with respect to the Somali's who were living in
Speaker 1: Kenya and they if they wanted to get their kind
Speaker 1: at one point they had a licensing scheme where they
Speaker 1: had a register as addicts in order to get access
Speaker 1: to KA. I mean, not unlike you had with some
Speaker 1: of the opium control systems in parts of Southeast and
Speaker 1: southwast Asia UM at a roughly similar period in time,
Speaker 1: which is kind of humiliating to say, well, if you're
Speaker 1: Somali origin, you've got a register an addict. If you're
Speaker 1: not Somali origin, then we're just going to tolerat it.
Speaker 1: And you know, either have it be legal or look
Speaker 1: the other way. That's right. And it was quite racialized,
Speaker 1: the idea that these sort of pastoralist people of northern Kenya,
Speaker 1: like Somali's um that consumption by them was something quite problematic,
Speaker 1: whereas for these agricultural people like the Marrow, you know,
Speaker 1: it wasn't so seen as so lomatic. So it was
Speaker 1: quite interesting how it how it became quite racialize, these
Speaker 1: kind of concerns about it by the by the British,
Speaker 1: but yes, it did. It did lead to incredible situations
Speaker 1: where you did have people to to go to go
Speaker 1: and get their supply of cat. At one point they
Speaker 1: would go and register with the district commissioners office to
Speaker 1: to go and get their their supply, and I think
Speaker 1: quite a few people did did take on the the
Speaker 1: kind of the label of being an addict because then
Speaker 1: you did get a supply of cat given to you
Speaker 1: by the British district officers as well. So at this
Speaker 1: point now it's fully legal right in Ethiopia, in Yemen,
Speaker 1: in Kenya, in Djibouti, that's right, yes, And is it
Speaker 1: fully legal anywhere else in different countries it's you can
Speaker 1: get quite a lot of legal ambiguities around it. So
Speaker 1: in some where like Uganda where there is quite a
Speaker 1: quite a growing consumption of the cat and cultivation of
Speaker 1: cats as well, but I think district different districts in
Speaker 1: Uganda do have like local kind of local laws kind
Speaker 1: of restricting restricting cats as well. And in some places
Speaker 1: it's never quite clear. You know, some some like for
Speaker 1: example Madagascar, it's often written about as being illegal, but
Speaker 1: then also seems to be written about as being legal,
Speaker 1: and it's it can be quite hard to cut through
Speaker 1: the haze of this because one one thing with CAT
Speaker 1: is it does get so many so much legal ambiguity
Speaker 1: built up around it. So even in somewhere like Kenya,
Speaker 1: whereas is perfectly perfectly legal, but quite a lot of
Speaker 1: people see it as, you know, something to be regarded
Speaker 1: with suspicion and something quite quite dubious in many ways.
Speaker 1: So it does still takes arm kind of an air
Speaker 1: of being something that even if it can be sold openly,
Speaker 1: but it's there's something not quite not quite right there.
Speaker 1: There's the other thing it became conflated with in the
Speaker 1: post n era, with the war on terrorism as well.
Speaker 1: But there was quite a bit to push in the
Speaker 1: in the US, especially that CAT CAT trading routes should
Speaker 1: be should be properly pleased, because there's this idea that
Speaker 1: the likes of al Qaedo and so forth Islamic militant
Speaker 1: groups in in Somalia were a lot of their funding
Speaker 1: was coming from CAT. This was the idea anyway, Well,
Speaker 1: there was probably some truth to it, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: it makes it makes sense that groups that are involved
Speaker 1: in transnational criminality are looking to raise money any which
Speaker 1: way they can, that they're going to be getting some
Speaker 1: of their revenue from illicit drug sales. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: true have been true of most guerrilla movements, and not most,
Speaker 1: but many guerrilla movements. And I think most you know,
Speaker 1: terrorist organizations that you know, they have a constant need
Speaker 1: for capital and there are constantly involved in you know,
Speaker 1: trying to you know, get guns from one place and
Speaker 1: then use the same planes to shift back drugs on
Speaker 1: the other. I think about the histories by Alfred J.
Speaker 1: McCoy about the politics that Heroin and Southeast Asia. He
Speaker 1: tracked where you know, basically traces all kind of this history.
Speaker 1: So it would make sense that some of that was
Speaker 1: going on, although no doubt it was being exaggerated in
Speaker 1: the Western media. Yes, what what you would find? I mean, certainly,
Speaker 1: I think al Qaeda had no as far as I'm aware,
Speaker 1: any no links to it to CAT. But you certainly
Speaker 1: do find like groups like al Shabab kind of militia group,
Speaker 1: militant group in control of still quite large swaves of Somalia.
Speaker 1: Um that because CAT is still sold if they sometimes
Speaker 1: do try and ban it, because these kind of militant
Speaker 1: Islam groups like al Shabab, you know, often do do
Speaker 1: see CAT is something you know, that should be forbidden.
Speaker 1: So sometimes there are attempts to ban it, but mostly
Speaker 1: you know, they do kind of tolerate it. And it
Speaker 1: is the case that for for a lot of these groups,
Speaker 1: because cat is being sold in the in the area,
Speaker 1: it is something that they tax and so quite a
Speaker 1: bit of revenue is made for them. But then everything
Speaker 1: is acts, you know, like all commodities like sugar and charcoal, um,
Speaker 1: so anything going through these kind of regions. But I
Speaker 1: think quite a bit of that concern, especially thinks I
Speaker 1: read in the US coming out to the US maybe
Speaker 1: around two thousand and four, two thousand and five, that
Speaker 1: kind of era, a lot of the concerns about cat
Speaker 1: and funding terrorism really did seem to be based on
Speaker 1: very very little evidence. It was more more the case
Speaker 1: like you know, cat is being sold all over the world.
Speaker 1: You know, it's a popular, popular commodity. It's it seems
Speaker 1: to be a drug, and it's mostly associated with Muslims.
Speaker 1: We don't know where the money is going from CAT.
Speaker 1: Therefore there's a high likelihood it's funding al Qaeda. And
Speaker 1: it seems some quite tenuous logic was going on in
Speaker 1: in in in this kind of exaggeration, so people just
Speaker 1: weeding it into the kind of narco terrorism war on
Speaker 1: drugs and narrative that they would cocaine and actually never
Speaker 1: really got attached to marijuana very much. Now in terms
Speaker 1: of the enforcement in the emigrant communities, I don't know
Speaker 1: if it's in your writings or in others where you know,
Speaker 1: I was reading that in place like Sciandinavia, it actually
Speaker 1: got pretty tough. I mean they weren't just doing a
Speaker 1: blind eye of this stuff. They were using informants and
Speaker 1: random stops and arrests. I mean, there actually are some
Speaker 1: significant numbers of people, you know, Somalians others who are
Speaker 1: been getting arrested and going to jail at least I said,
Speaker 1: is that right or is it really still just slap
Speaker 1: on the wrist type thing. It's very very much does
Speaker 1: depend on the on the contextum So it's it's very
Speaker 1: interesting to look at at somewhere like the UK and
Speaker 1: in relation to to cat Well, like I said, it
Speaker 1: was finally banned in in twenty four teen, but the band,
Speaker 1: the way it's it's been enforced, it's they kind of
Speaker 1: have a free strike system, um where you know, first
Speaker 1: off you just get a warning, next time, maybe a fine,
Speaker 1: and then then finally there might be more proceedings kind
Speaker 1: of brought to brought against you. I kind of I
Speaker 1: think it would be interesting to do some research on
Speaker 1: on how many people are actually getting busted with with
Speaker 1: CAT But my sense anyways, but it's very very low
Speaker 1: down any priorities for the police forces, you know, who's
Speaker 1: funding is. UM is generally quite quite marginal at the
Speaker 1: at the best of time. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: you had media um you know, I mean I saw
Speaker 1: claim across one thing, like back in two thousand and four,
Speaker 1: a relatively respected newspaper like The Guardian had ran a
Speaker 1: piece with the headline about Cott quote this has the
Speaker 1: same effect as ecstasy and cocaine and it's legal. Or
Speaker 1: before you know I started this interview, I pulled up
Speaker 1: the drug fact sheet from the d e a's website
Speaker 1: and they asked the question, what's this effect on the mind?
Speaker 1: Cott It says can induce manic behavior with grandiose delusions, paranoia, nightmares, hallucinations,
Speaker 1: and hyperactivity. Chronic catpories can result in violence and suicidal depression.
Speaker 1: And that's a d A fact sheet that's up there today, right,
Speaker 1: So you see this kind of you know, natural desire
Speaker 1: to kind of make cats sound as if it's indistinguishable
Speaker 1: from the purified form of cathine on or even worse right,
Speaker 1: and just fit it in with the same kind of
Speaker 1: rhetoric if they use respect to a bunch of other
Speaker 1: drugs which have oftentimes much more powerful impact on human behavior.
Speaker 1: That's right. I think this kind of conflation goes on,
Speaker 1: goes on so much with it with all drugs obviously.
Speaker 1: But we talked earlier about the labeling of cat as
Speaker 1: a as a drug and people kind of pushing back.
Speaker 1: So for example, the Mary who produced a lot of
Speaker 1: the cats holding kenure and and and beyond, a lot
Speaker 1: of the cats sold around the world, but they very
Speaker 1: much do push back against that idea of cat as
Speaker 1: a drug like you know, cocaine or over like, because
Speaker 1: you know, they're aware of how how that that that
Speaker 1: kind of idea is something that has restricted the trade
Speaker 1: and led to these these kind of prohibitions and and
Speaker 1: and so forth. There's an interesting thing that when you
Speaker 1: look at substance suits that are coming. You know, if
Speaker 1: you look at Cradam coming for kryptom as it's called
Speaker 1: in Southeast Asia coming into the West and it's being
Speaker 1: used you know, oftentimes by you know, not emigrated communities,
Speaker 1: but by people you know, you know, a whole variety
Speaker 1: of people living you know, you know, have long you know,
Speaker 1: go back multigeneration from multigenerations in the United States and
Speaker 1: other consuming countries. If you look at kava coming from
Speaker 1: South Pacific, once again, it's not just among South Pacific emigrads.
Speaker 1: Um uh. And I think that's true probably of a
Speaker 1: whole number of other sort of plant based psychoactive substances.
Speaker 1: But with COD, I don't see anything about it being
Speaker 1: used outside the emigrade communities. I don't hear anything about
Speaker 1: you know, you know, white people or black people, or
Speaker 1: you know, or Hispanic people. The United States taken this up.
Speaker 1: It just seems to be so powerfully connected to the
Speaker 1: cultural tradition that it's not breaking out. But is there
Speaker 1: any evidence that that that COD is being used out
Speaker 1: side the immigrant communities. Very very little, I think. But
Speaker 1: maybe some whites in places like the UK, you know,
Speaker 1: who had experience, perhaps they've been to Yemen and to
Speaker 1: choose some cat there or or ken you and the
Speaker 1: like would would perhaps too. But it is something that
Speaker 1: really seems so very different to most of the the
Speaker 1: sort of mainstream drug culture in somewhere like the UK,
Speaker 1: you know, which does tend to revolve around substances that
Speaker 1: that kind of do give you a more intense feeling
Speaker 1: or a more a quicker effect. I think for a
Speaker 1: lot of people have thought of chewing a wad of cat.
Speaker 1: Chewing a wad of green leaves for hours on end
Speaker 1: is not something that is particularly appealing, you know, beyond
Speaker 1: those communities where it's more traditionally associated. And then I
Speaker 1: think one way that producers in Kenya, people like the
Speaker 1: like the Mary involved in the cat industry, some of
Speaker 1: them have been quite forward thinking and realizing that the
Speaker 1: four of chewing this substance for hours on end is
Speaker 1: not necessarily going to get them, but you know, very
Speaker 1: very much broader repeal than it then it has at
Speaker 1: the moment. So there has been development of things like
Speaker 1: kind of espresso shots of the cat, kind of espresso
Speaker 1: pods that have been developed where you know, the water
Speaker 1: will will come through and the still I suppose that
Speaker 1: must probably be dried cat, but still does apparently produce
Speaker 1: produce the effects that that people are looking for. And
Speaker 1: the other interesting thing they're in Kenya is that there's
Speaker 1: a company that does make um what's called hand ass juice,
Speaker 1: and hand ass is the main Kenyan term for the
Speaker 1: effects of the cat. You know, if you're feeling hand ass,
Speaker 1: you're you're feeling under the influence of the cat. And
Speaker 1: that there is a company selling kind of like the
Speaker 1: equivalent of energy drinks, but produced from from cat. So
Speaker 1: I think these are ways that people are trying to
Speaker 1: make it more repealing, you know, to the wider wider population.
Speaker 1: Let's take a aight here and go to an ad.
Speaker 1: You know, there's also a thing where you and your
Speaker 1: colleague at Bristol or Ga Kanchik, who I also made
Speaker 1: an abuja at the African Drugs Conference in October. You know,
Speaker 1: I put forward this notion of quasi legality and seeing
Speaker 1: that as a useful frame with which to think about
Speaker 1: caught and cannabis and possibly other substances. Who just elaborate
Speaker 1: on that idea of quasi legality, Well, quasi legality is
Speaker 1: our attempt really to get at the these kind of
Speaker 1: legal ambiguities that we see as revolving around substances like
Speaker 1: cat and also cannabis in particular, in various African and
Speaker 1: not just African, elsewhere in the world context. I'm really
Speaker 1: trying to get at the so with for example, at,
Speaker 1: it always seemed like a substance that was often legal,
Speaker 1: like for example, in Kenya, for for most of post
Speaker 1: independence Kenyan Kenyan history, cat has been legal, yet until recently,
Speaker 1: cat has been seen as something to be held in suspicion,
Speaker 1: you know, partly because the internationally was seen as a
Speaker 1: substance to be suspicious of, and you know, the substance
Speaker 1: that had been banned in various other other parts of
Speaker 1: the world. And also the fact that cat, you know,
Speaker 1: it's kind of produced in these countries legally like Kenya
Speaker 1: and Ethiopia, but then when it travels into somewhere like
Speaker 1: Tanzania or Um or other places, it does you know,
Speaker 1: then enter into an illegal, illegal kind of framing um.
Speaker 1: So really we were trying to trying to get it
Speaker 1: that kind of that kind of ambiguity of you know,
Speaker 1: substances like cat which aren't really it's not very exactly
Speaker 1: clear kind of where they're whether what they're legal, legal
Speaker 1: status is and we've actually it was quite quite quite interesting,
Speaker 1: but it's often legal in places, you know, Ethiopia and Kenya,
Speaker 1: yet often seen as being something kind of illegal. So
Speaker 1: according to the statute books it's legal, yet according to
Speaker 1: the way a lot of people in society view it,
Speaker 1: it's kind of is something that's conflated with these these
Speaker 1: other illegal illegal drugs, and therefore it takes on those
Speaker 1: connotations of being illegal. Whereas, interestingly, with cannabis, it often
Speaker 1: seems to be the opposite, you know, cannabis in most
Speaker 1: African countries. So it is this is changing now with
Speaker 1: various policy changes in relation to cannabis in some African countries,
Speaker 1: but cannabis often seemed to be the opposite. Almost it
Speaker 1: was um usually by the statute books it or certainly
Speaker 1: by the statute books it was illegal. Yet often it
Speaker 1: was seen as you know, socially something that was very
Speaker 1: much tolerated or even even supported. And I think that
Speaker 1: these kind of terms get get to that idea of
Speaker 1: the fact that what the statute books say, you know,
Speaker 1: it doesn't necessarily take you very far into how how
Speaker 1: a society views these these kinds of substances. So interesting
Speaker 1: to see that when you're talking about being legal to
Speaker 1: sort of frowned upon. I mean, you tell the story
Speaker 1: about for example, the government of Kenya was generally kind
Speaker 1: of negative about COT until the point where the United
Speaker 1: Kingdom criminalized it. And they criminalize it over the recommendations
Speaker 1: of their own Advisory Committee on Drugs, which I think
Speaker 1: you had advised saying don't criminalize it. And at that
Speaker 1: point can you kind of jumps to the defensive cop
Speaker 1: and realize that it's got this economic value in parts
Speaker 1: of the country and realize it's a significant source of
Speaker 1: you know, tax revenue and export revenue for the government.
Speaker 1: So you see a kind of jumping forward to defend it.
Speaker 1: Yet on the other hand, Um, I guess they're also issues.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you look with climate change over the
Speaker 1: place like Yemen, you know where issues around water and
Speaker 1: limited access to water and of large parts of agricultural
Speaker 1: land are actually being used to grow caught in places
Speaker 1: where you have a country in a major state of disruption,
Speaker 1: that could be problematic. Um, you would think, and I
Speaker 1: think actual Client makes this point in some of his
Speaker 1: writings that development agencies would in fact be embracing CAT
Speaker 1: because it's an indigenously produced agricultural you know, uh product
Speaker 1: market something that has international ramifications, especially especially within the region, um,
Speaker 1: yet they seem to stay away from it, uh where
Speaker 1: it's more lucrative than coffee and more reliable and lucrative
Speaker 1: than coffee and some other products that are usually exported
Speaker 1: to foreign markets and therefore provides a good, you know,
Speaker 1: constant source of revenue for farmers in the same way
Speaker 1: that those in Afghanistan benefit from opium and those in
Speaker 1: South America benefit from coca. It's a fascinating It's a
Speaker 1: story that is unique in many respects compared to i
Speaker 1: mean similar other places. But also it's got its own
Speaker 1: unique dynamics. That's right, and I think it does bring
Speaker 1: out to quite a lot of ambiguit wide the ambiguities
Speaker 1: in the world of drugs more generally. But but that, yes,
Speaker 1: the way it's kind of seen in terms of development,
Speaker 1: you know, something that that obviously that there has been
Speaker 1: quite a lot of concern, especially in places like Ethiopia,
Speaker 1: of farmers, you know, kind of pulling up their coffee plants.
Speaker 1: You often hear of this and planting a cat instead.
Speaker 1: You know, often the idea being like sort of you know,
Speaker 1: coffee giving very very sort of limited funds and generally
Speaker 1: generally being marketed in particular ways where the farmers don't
Speaker 1: have particularly much control over it, whereas cats, you know,
Speaker 1: giving much more regular payments and more regular harvests and
Speaker 1: and things like this, as as well as being a
Speaker 1: more more valuable, valuable crop. But I was always amused,
Speaker 1: probably about a decade ago now, reading an article that's
Speaker 1: somebody wrote an Irish guy who runs a coffee coffee
Speaker 1: chain in in Ireland, and he had traveled to Ethiopia
Speaker 1: and he was horrified because in the in the area
Speaker 1: where some of the coffee was coming from for his
Speaker 1: his chain. He was absolutely horrified to hear about these farmers,
Speaker 1: you know, pulling up coffee plants to plant cat instead
Speaker 1: kind of, but didn't quite see the contradiction of you know,
Speaker 1: it's just a these are both stimulants in a way.
Speaker 1: But you know, no, obviously there is like a hard
Speaker 1: and fast kind of economic logic to why these farmers
Speaker 1: are switching to or were at that time anyway, switching
Speaker 1: to cat. But what explains why it's more lucrative and
Speaker 1: if it's not illegal, usually what adds the price is
Speaker 1: the kind of prohibition tax that you know, the way
Speaker 1: in which making something criminal makes it much more valuable
Speaker 1: for those people who produce it, so long as they
Speaker 1: don't get caught by the law. But in the case
Speaker 1: of cat, right it's relatively easy to produce, doesn't require
Speaker 1: a lot of care um, yet it seems to sell
Speaker 1: for substantially more than most other agricultural products. Why is that?
Speaker 1: That's a really good question, and I think it probably
Speaker 1: almost need to look at that in reverse, like why
Speaker 1: why do the lights of coffee and te fetcher fect
Speaker 1: so little? And partly I think it is to do
Speaker 1: with the particularly in Kenny, of the way the industry
Speaker 1: developed in relation to cats very much more an informal
Speaker 1: way of work, way of operating the trade, and you know,
Speaker 1: grew with like you were saying, the Kenyan government for
Speaker 1: a long time was very hands off with cat. They
Speaker 1: realized a lot of people depended on it, so they
Speaker 1: weren't going to prohibit it and move in that direction.
Speaker 1: But on the other hand, they didn't want to be
Speaker 1: seen to be encouraging it for much of of ken
Speaker 1: Year's post independence history, so really let the let the
Speaker 1: farmers get on with it. And I think that the
Speaker 1: way it developed in this this kind of way was
Speaker 1: was a lot more on the on the terms of
Speaker 1: the people involved in the in its production, in its trade.
Speaker 1: And yes, it's you know, there's always people who make
Speaker 1: more money in the commodity chain of obviously any any
Speaker 1: agricultural commodity or any commodity more generally. But but in general,
Speaker 1: I think not having that the corporate way of working
Speaker 1: that things like tea and coffee has um you know,
Speaker 1: with these smallholder farmers, really paps, you know, getting very
Speaker 1: very little for their for their product. You know, this
Speaker 1: is something that has helped CAT maintain its value. M hmm. Now, yeah,
Speaker 1: I really know. We didn't quite get deeply into the
Speaker 1: health aspects of cut, right, I mean, you know, when
Speaker 1: you think about how relatively safe it is, what are
Speaker 1: the harms associated with it? I mean, what more can
Speaker 1: you tell us about, you know, the margins of risk
Speaker 1: and benefit from a health perspective about cut chewing? Yes,
Speaker 1: very important question. Yeah, in general, a lot a lot
Speaker 1: of research on the kind of health harms because people
Speaker 1: much more often, I think, in research on cat and
Speaker 1: other substances like this, focus on harms, don't they rather
Speaker 1: than the potential benefits of these these kinds of substances.
Speaker 1: You know, the way the way research might be might
Speaker 1: be framed, but certainly our issues associated of it um
Speaker 1: in particular, for example, um dental problems can be can
Speaker 1: be quite a big issue, particularly with people who chew
Speaker 1: cheaper varieties of cat which can be very bitter, so
Speaker 1: a lot often the sweeten them with bubblegum or sugar,
Speaker 1: you know, and if you're not brushing your teeth kind
Speaker 1: of well after that, that that can lead to to issues.
Speaker 1: So sort of dental problems can be can be quite
Speaker 1: quite a big issue. And the probably the most alarming
Speaker 1: thing you hear about in relation to cat. Again, it's
Speaker 1: you know, in terms of causality, as as with all
Speaker 1: these things, it's very hard to pull apart. But you
Speaker 1: do hear people talk of the syndrome called cat psychosis
Speaker 1: um of you know, people having psychotic episodes after after
Speaker 1: consuming a cat um. And there seems to be some
Speaker 1: evidence that cat may have play may have played a
Speaker 1: cause of role in in in the In regard to this,
Speaker 1: though often seems to have been much more the case
Speaker 1: among people who have experienced, you know how high degrees
Speaker 1: of trauma you know, perhaps in the in the Somali
Speaker 1: Civil war, or you know, kind of the refugee refugee process. Um, So,
Speaker 1: how do you sort of disaggregate cats and issues of causality,
Speaker 1: you know, from these other wider, wider factors that might
Speaker 1: make people more susceptible to um to two psychesis is
Speaker 1: quite a quite a difficult thing. So, Neil, from a
Speaker 1: policy perspective, I mean, from everything we've talked about and
Speaker 1: from all my reading and preparing for our discussion, it
Speaker 1: seems to me that of what we're making a policy recommendation,
Speaker 1: one would be saying, don't criminalize this stuff. There's no
Speaker 1: reason for countries around the world to be criminalizing it
Speaker 1: um and that the harms of criminalization probably exceed you know,
Speaker 1: the benefits of criminalization. That the United Nations has been
Speaker 1: smart not to try to criminalize card or, including the
Speaker 1: city of the International Anti Drug Conventions, in that the
Speaker 1: UN agencies, the UN o DC, and the International Cards
Speaker 1: Control Board the i n c B, should you know,
Speaker 1: just keep their hands off it and shut up. And
Speaker 1: then basically the risk of full legalization, even full global legalization,
Speaker 1: are pretty negligible given the relative sort of benefit risk
Speaker 1: ratio of cut use. Would you agree, I think, I
Speaker 1: think on the whole yes, and it was quite a
Speaker 1: difficult issue actually in the for example, in the UK
Speaker 1: context with the band that came in twenty fourteen, particularly
Speaker 1: as so much support for the band was coming, especially
Speaker 1: mostly from Somali's within the UK. It was quite quite
Speaker 1: a thing, you know when the community themselves that even
Speaker 1: people who did Chew, a lot of them kind of
Speaker 1: argued that it should be banned, you know, this thing
Speaker 1: should be should be banned. So that that was an
Speaker 1: aspect of the debates that that is, you know, for
Speaker 1: for the scholars and aviously because it is quite an
Speaker 1: interesting good, you know, quite quite a difficult thing to
Speaker 1: deal with in some ways, you know when it is
Speaker 1: coming from the community themselves. Than My kind of perspective
Speaker 1: at the time of the UK ban was how like
Speaker 1: it was. It was really an opportunity, I thought, for
Speaker 1: the UK government to try and bring in something, you know,
Speaker 1: some better policy to towards CAT. So for example, the
Speaker 1: before Cat was banned, it the British government was raising
Speaker 1: revenue on on cat imports um and it's you know,
Speaker 1: it seemed like potentially a way of a way of
Speaker 1: dealing with a lot of the issues that the communities
Speaker 1: were concerned about in relation to to cat you know,
Speaker 1: and wider issues facing communities like the Somalis in the UK,
Speaker 1: that maybe some of that tax revenue could be kind
Speaker 1: of hypothecated, you know, it could have been put towards
Speaker 1: efforts to help those communities, or or policies such as
Speaker 1: such as that. You know that that wouldn't have been
Speaker 1: been a band because what what has effectively happened in
Speaker 1: the UK is that nobody's happy now having over then
Speaker 1: the UK government which is kind of kicked the issue
Speaker 1: of into the into the long grass um. But no,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna keep pushing you too. You give
Speaker 1: me a straight answer here. I'm saying, if somebody asks you,
Speaker 1: Neil Carrier, what should we do with our God? Should
Speaker 1: this stuff simply be legal around the world. There's got
Speaker 1: no business being a prohibited substance anywhere. Would you say yes?
Speaker 1: Or would you say I don't know or no? I
Speaker 1: would I would generally say yes, okay, yes, yeah, it's good.
Speaker 1: Good to push. I think where the sensitivitivities come though,
Speaker 1: because it are those sensitivities of you know, so much
Speaker 1: of the calls for it to be banned coming from
Speaker 1: the communities themselves, you see. But as you say, I mean,
Speaker 1: there's been such a history in the world were often times,
Speaker 1: you know, people from indigenous communities or others will call
Speaker 1: for prohibitions, you know, not foreseeing all the ways in
Speaker 1: which those prohibitions will have radically negative consequences for their communities. So,
Speaker 1: you know, my view has been it's kind of incumbent
Speaker 1: on anybody looks at this from both the policy perspective
Speaker 1: and a human rights perspective, you know, to look at
Speaker 1: it clearly and speak clearly, even if people from when
Speaker 1: those communities are divided about what the policy should be. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a very fair point. Well, I'll tell you. I
Speaker 1: want to thank you ever so much for having this
Speaker 1: conversation about Catt with me and my listeners on Psychoactive.
Speaker 1: As I said, I think it may be the first
Speaker 1: podcast ever, although maybe I missed one on this issue
Speaker 1: of cott uh and hopefully uh we see policies. Policy
Speaker 1: doesn't seem to be changing very much anywhere in the
Speaker 1: world right now, but it you know, it seems like
Speaker 1: it's not doing too much harm, although it could be better.
Speaker 1: But you know, thank you very much. The best of luck. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was just going to make one final point that
Speaker 1: it's quite interesting because well, well you know, when we
Speaker 1: think about how drug policy does seem to be influx
Speaker 1: quite a bit, I think substances are going in different directions.
Speaker 1: You know, Cannabis around the world seeming to become more
Speaker 1: liberalized in various parts of the world. Whereas cat, you know,
Speaker 1: something most people I think would see as a mildest substance,
Speaker 1: but you know, he's becoming more and more illegal around
Speaker 1: the world. So so I think cat and cannabis do
Speaker 1: do you speak to a lot of the ambiguities of
Speaker 1: when you put those into comparison. Well, with that, Neil,
Speaker 1: I want to thank you ever so much for having
Speaker 1: this conversation with me and my listeners on Psychoactive. Thank you,
Speaker 1: thank you very much. If you're enjoying Psychoactive, please tell
Speaker 1: your friends about it, or you can write us a
Speaker 1: review at Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: We love to hear from our listeners. If you'd like
Speaker 1: to share your own stories, comments and ideas, then leave
Speaker 1: us a message at one eight three three seven seven
Speaker 1: nine sixty that's eight three three psycho zero, or you
Speaker 1: can email us at Psychoactive at protozoa dot com or
Speaker 1: find me on Twitter at Ethan natal Mad. You can
Speaker 1: also find contact information in our show notes. Psychoactive is
Speaker 1: a production of I Heart Radio and Protozoa Pictures. It's
Speaker 1: hosted by me Ethan Naedelman. It's produced by Noham Osband
Speaker 1: and Josh Stain. The executive producers are Dylan Golden, Ari Handel,
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Geesus and Darren Aronofsky from Protozoma Pictures, Alex Williams
Speaker 1: and Matt Frederick from My Heart Radio and me Ethan Naedelman.
Speaker 1: Our music is by Ari Blucien and a special thanks
Speaker 1: to ab Brios f Bianca Grimshaw and Robert BB. Next
Speaker 1: week I'll be talking with Dennis McKenna, the famed ethnobodanist
Speaker 1: and anthropologist whose book The Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss
Speaker 1: will soon be re released. Well, science fiction was a
Speaker 1: huge influence somics, you know, and cultivate A did a
Speaker 1: fascination with the esoteric and the strange, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: for our from our perspective, you know, we were weird
Speaker 1: and the weirder the better, you know. And so when
Speaker 1: psychedelics came along. I think that we viewed it not
Speaker 1: from a context of UH spirituality or or indigenous practices
Speaker 1: or anything like that. I mean, we discovered that later,
Speaker 1: but originally the idea was that these are other dimensions.
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