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Speaker 1: Hi. I'm Ethan Natalman and this is Psychoactive, a production

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Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio and Protozoa Pictures. Psychoactive is the

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Speaker 1: show where we talk about all things drugs. But any

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Speaker 1: views expressed here do not represent those of I Heeart Media,

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Speaker 1: Protozoa Pictures, or their executives and employees. Indeed, Heed, as

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Speaker 1: an inveterate contrarian, I can tell you they may not

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Speaker 1: even represent my own and nothing contained in this show

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Speaker 1: should be used as medical advice or encouragement to use

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Speaker 1: any type of drug. In this episode will also be

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Speaker 1: talking about sex and sexual assault. I have a feeling

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Speaker 1: that today's podcast is going to be particularly interesting and

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Speaker 1: maybe pushing boundaries and and maybe pushing buttons. Uh. My

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Speaker 1: guest today is Dan Savage. Thirty years ago, Dan started

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Speaker 1: writing a column my sex and relationships for the alternative

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Speaker 1: newspaper in Seattle called The Stranger and that thing or

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Speaker 1: less thirty years has become syndicated all around the United States.

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Speaker 1: And then since then he's also started his own podcast,

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Speaker 1: which is called Savage Love Cast. So, Dan, thanks so

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Speaker 1: much for joining me. I'm really looking forward to this conversation.

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Speaker 1: Thank you for having me. I'm excited to have this

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Speaker 1: conversation too. Yeah, So listen, let me first ask you.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I think you and I are going to

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Speaker 1: land up agreeing on a lot of stuff, So I'm

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Speaker 1: going to try to probably tie some issues as well

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Speaker 1: and see what we can mudge out some disagreements here.

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Speaker 1: But tell me, I mean, basically, what's your frame of

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Speaker 1: mind when you're thinking about drugs and sex? If I

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Speaker 1: just put those two words together, you know, I'm not

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Speaker 1: opposed to mixing them. There's a lot of people out there,

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Speaker 1: particularly with the conversation we've been having about consent and

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Speaker 1: informed consent and meaningful consent, who are arguing that any

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Speaker 1: impairment at all means to consent wasn't real, authentic, genuine,

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Speaker 1: freely given. And I disagree you. Sex makes us all nervous.

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Speaker 1: There's a reason why a lot of people need to

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Speaker 1: have a little bit of social lubricant of whatever form

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Speaker 1: before they head out in search of sex. Some people

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Speaker 1: need to medicate a bit with alcohol or other drugs

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Speaker 1: to find the courage to ask for what they want.

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Speaker 1: It's a slippery slope, though, because you can wind up

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Speaker 1: in a place where you're not thinking straight, you're not

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Speaker 1: reading another person's cues correctly. Uh, you're so nervous and

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Speaker 1: and repressed that you have to not just lubricate yourself

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Speaker 1: a bit socially, but flood the zone to such an

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Speaker 1: extent that you go a little crazy or aren't advocating

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Speaker 1: for yourself in the moment an effective way, and you

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Speaker 1: could end up being traumatized or harmed or traumatized or

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Speaker 1: harms someone else. So it's a it's a weird place,

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Speaker 1: you know. They're these two pressures um insects with with

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Speaker 1: mixing sex and drug sex and alcohol where it can

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Speaker 1: make sex and that kind of connection possible can help

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Speaker 1: believe be at our anxiety or on going order asking

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Speaker 1: for it, but too much can magnify the harm potentially

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Speaker 1: that non consensual sex are just sex. It leads you

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Speaker 1: feeling violated, even if you know the person who violated

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Speaker 1: you was you when it's over, and so you have

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Speaker 1: to approach it cautiously and carefully, which is not how

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Speaker 1: everyone does it. Okay, So I told you I might

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Speaker 1: dredge up some stuff from things you've written or said

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Speaker 1: in the past. Okay, So okay, Well, I gotta say

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Speaker 1: something first. I've been writing for thirty years. Like, sometimes

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Speaker 1: you write something, you think some more, you write some more,

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Speaker 1: you think differently, and then people will bring something up,

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Speaker 1: especially in the Internet age, because everything you've ever written

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Speaker 1: is on websites that you know have ads for movies

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Speaker 1: that came out this week. So everything you've ever written

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Speaker 1: with like you published it yesterday. Man, I can relate.

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Speaker 1: I started writing this stuff in eighties seven, and I

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Speaker 1: look at some of the framing, the language I used

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Speaker 1: back in the eighties. But let me tell you, let

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Speaker 1: me let me see how you respond to the dance

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Speaker 1: Savage of two thousand and three. Okay, you've got it

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Speaker 1: on your Savage log column. Somebody wrote to you about

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Speaker 1: uh female college sophomore's boyfriend. She was in a relationship,

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Speaker 1: but then she found out that he had also been

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Speaker 1: screwing some other women and using cocaine, and you right

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Speaker 1: back to where he goes. First, of all, coke is

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Speaker 1: not a date rape drug. Date rate drugs has commonly

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Speaker 1: understood her substances that render a girl helpless. Practically, comment

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Speaker 1: tose obliterator will in any ability to resist. If anything,

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Speaker 1: Cocaine would have to be considered the opposite of a

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Speaker 1: date rate drug, being pressured into having sex that you

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Speaker 1: regret the next morning does not mean that you were raped.

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Speaker 1: Being seduced does not mean that you were raped. Nor

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Speaker 1: does consenting to sex when you were drunk or high.

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Speaker 1: So what do you think we just stand viol those

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Speaker 1: words or pull back from some of them in this

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Speaker 1: new context. I would pull back from some of them

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Speaker 1: in this new context. Yet I wouldn't pull back as

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Speaker 1: far as others might. Certainly, now there's this awareness that

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Speaker 1: I have this awareness. I've thought through this about coercion,

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Speaker 1: but also about the way men are socialized and the

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Speaker 1: way women are socialized, and that women will often go

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Speaker 1: along with what a man seems to want in the

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Speaker 1: moment for fear of violence, to to de escalate the situation.

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Speaker 1: A lot of women will consent to sex, whether they're

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Speaker 1: drunk or high or not, because they fear that the

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Speaker 1: guy that they're with may do something worse than have

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Speaker 1: sex with them that they don't want or aren't enjoying

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Speaker 1: if they say no. And men, I think have to

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Speaker 1: be hyper conscious of that going into any sexual interactions

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Speaker 1: with women. Thank God, I'm gay, sometimes they think not

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Speaker 1: that this cad play out in same sex relationships as well.

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Speaker 1: Men have to control for that and in some ways

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Speaker 1: overcompensate for that. You may get the yes that you

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Speaker 1: hope to get, you need to verify that that was

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Speaker 1: an authentic yes, and that that wasn't yes because you

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Speaker 1: scare me. And what you don't want to do is

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Speaker 1: get into situation where you get unenthusiastic consent or inauthentic

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Speaker 1: consent or panicked consent, or consent that was granted reluctantly

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Speaker 1: because the woman felt coerced by the circumstances into having sex.

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Speaker 1: And I don't think most men want to have that

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Speaker 1: kind of sex. I don't think most men want to

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Speaker 1: have sex where you know, technically it seemed to be consensual,

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Speaker 1: but the woman felt violated afterwards. Uh, most men aren't monsters.

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Speaker 1: Other men who are monsters at least have some sort

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Speaker 1: of self preservation instinct these days around not wanting to

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Speaker 1: get into a ME two situation like that, And we'll

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Speaker 1: go to greater lengths. So I think that two thousand

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Speaker 1: three column was a little, which is almost twenty years old,

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Speaker 1: a little too glib with those distinctions. I was being

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Speaker 1: a little too technical in a way that gave men

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Speaker 1: advantage or license that men don't deserve and shouldn't take.

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Speaker 1: So there's you know, this phrase kem sex right, you know,

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Speaker 1: And I came across some of the fellow named David

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Speaker 1: Stewart who said he coined the term, and it refers

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Speaker 1: specifically to gay men in the use of particular drugs

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Speaker 1: crystal math, g H, b gb L, casinoe, things like that,

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Speaker 1: UM and other people to find it more broadly. But

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Speaker 1: here's the question I want to ask you, right, So,

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Speaker 1: so when people are entering, especially younger people, entering a

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Speaker 1: situation where drugs and sex, like, we're gonna talk a

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Speaker 1: lot on this show about drugs, set and setting, right,

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Speaker 1: the basic idea that how drugs impact you have as

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Speaker 1: much to do with the set in the setting as

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Speaker 1: they do with the drugs themselves. And obviously the same

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Speaker 1: it is going to be true with issues around sex

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Speaker 1: and possibly issues around consent. So somebody's going to a party,

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Speaker 1: a club, whatever, it's one where sexual contact is understood

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Speaker 1: to be part of what's the scene. Somebody's taking drugs

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Speaker 1: because they want to release some of those inhibitions, they

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Speaker 1: want to explore some aspects of their sexuality or whatever

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Speaker 1: in that context, and in that context, they are way

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Speaker 1: out there and doing all sorts of ship that they

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Speaker 1: may love in the moment but feel bad about the

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Speaker 1: next day, and that's on them, okay, And that's I

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Speaker 1: think a real risk of this actually repressive culture is

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Speaker 1: that some people the only way they can give themselves

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Speaker 1: permission to do what they want to do is to

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Speaker 1: put themselves in a situation where they don't feel there

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Speaker 1: in control. You know, they basically self medicate the shame

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Speaker 1: and inhibition away, and then when the drugs wear off,

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Speaker 1: when the shame and inhibition come rolling back in like

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Speaker 1: the tide, you can end up feeling awful about yourself

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Speaker 1: about what you did, about the people that you did

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Speaker 1: those things with, or did those things to you, Which

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Speaker 1: is why I think. You know, I'm very opposed to

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Speaker 1: crystal math. I think it's a terrible drug. You know.

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Speaker 1: I'm gay, and I've certainly had my fund and my

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Speaker 1: crazy experiences. I've never participated in chem sex sessions where

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Speaker 1: chem sex parties I would experience them as to humanizing

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Speaker 1: in a way that I don't think that I would

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Speaker 1: have a good time. But I've had friends who enjoyed

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Speaker 1: that scene. I've had friends who were destroyed by that scene.

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Speaker 1: I've also had friends who were destroyed by just sex

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Speaker 1: without chems. So everything is a hammer. Basically, you can

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Speaker 1: build something or you can beat your brains out with it.

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Speaker 1: Chem sex. I think it's a particularly dangerous. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean it was a time, must have been early

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Speaker 1: two thousands and meth amptheta mean was taken off in

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Speaker 1: the kind of gay club scene in New York and

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Speaker 1: there was a sort of split I think in the

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Speaker 1: gay community. And I remember being invited to give a

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Speaker 1: talk at Gay Men's Health Crisis where they were fighting

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Speaker 1: over the issue could there be such a thing as

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Speaker 1: safe sex with meth amptheta mean? Could there be such

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Speaker 1: a thing as harm reduction with meth amphetamine? Both of

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Speaker 1: us know a phone name. I think it was Peter

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Speaker 1: Staley who was like putting out, you know, ads on

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Speaker 1: New York City corners condemning meth and you know that,

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Speaker 1: really making a campaign, and it was weird. It was

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Speaker 1: obviously trying to discourage young gay men from doing this stuff,

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Speaker 1: but it was feeding into a stigmatization, demonization campaign as well.

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Speaker 1: So if you had a friend of yours, a younger

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Speaker 1: friend coming and saying Dan like, you know, I really

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Speaker 1: want to try this. I have a few friends who

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Speaker 1: have done it and hasn't been a problem so far. Yeah, No,

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Speaker 1: it's weird. I remember Peter Staley to do that ad

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Speaker 1: campaign about math. You know, Peter and I had kind

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Speaker 1: of a run in about um prep because I predicted

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Speaker 1: and I think I've been vindicated by the warding in

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Speaker 1: the data. Like just explained to our our listeners what

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Speaker 1: PREP pre exposure prophylaxics. It's a drug that gay men

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Speaker 1: and other men who have sex with men can take

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Speaker 1: so that basically prevents HIV infection. HIV negative men on

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Speaker 1: PREP and HIV positive men who have access to drugs

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Speaker 1: and care who have undetectable viral loads are not capable

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Speaker 1: of passing on HIV, which is why we've seen just

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Speaker 1: a rapid plummeting and HIV infections. But PREP doesn't protect

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Speaker 1: you from the other sexually transmitted infections, and so of

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Speaker 1: course it led to a huge spike and syphilis and

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Speaker 1: gnaria and chlamydia among gay men who stopped using condoms

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Speaker 1: because now they were on prep. Um. Anyway, you go

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Speaker 1: back to Peter and meth and there in the harm

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Speaker 1: reduction movement, which really started around HIV and condoms. That's

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Speaker 1: when that idea kind of got injected, uh into the

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Speaker 1: gay health discourse. There seemed to be a lot of

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Speaker 1: permission seeking flying under the banner of harm reduction or

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Speaker 1: being wandered through harm reduction, because people would argue that,

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Speaker 1: you know, gay men were shamed for being gay, therefore

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Speaker 1: you shouldn't shame gay men for using math and staying

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Speaker 1: up for four days and having sex with you know,

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Speaker 1: eighty people at a never ending party where nobody ever

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Speaker 1: stepped out to have food or a glass of water

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Speaker 1: and never slept, and you were participating in the shaming

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Speaker 1: of other gay men. If you said that sounds like

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Speaker 1: a bad idea. That sounds like an unsustainable sexual lifestyle,

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Speaker 1: if I could use that word, certainly an unsustainable sexual ecosystem,

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Speaker 1: and not an environment where people are going to be,

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Speaker 1: you know, exercising their best judgment. And you don't always

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Speaker 1: want to exercise your best judgment when you're having sex.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes you do want to take risks. We're wired for risk.

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Speaker 1: Risk is sexually arousing. Risk is exciting. Remember like Clinton

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Speaker 1: getting those blow jobs from Mirk Clominsky off the Oval

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Speaker 1: office and people are like, why would he do that,

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Speaker 1: it's so dangerous. Exactly why he did it because it

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Speaker 1: was so dangerous. The truth is, risk is arousing, and

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Speaker 1: we all want a certain amount of risk in our

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Speaker 1: sex lives. It's why I'm always in the position of

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Speaker 1: advising people have been together ten twenty years who say

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Speaker 1: there's no passion, the spark has gone. Sex is and

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Speaker 1: exciting to engineer risk, to take risks together as a couple,

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Speaker 1: because at the beginning of the relationship, you're the adventure.

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Speaker 1: There on their the adventure you're on. They're like taking

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Speaker 1: a chance on you. They don't know if you're an

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Speaker 1: X murder or Jeffrey Dahmer or not, and vice versa.

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Speaker 1: And so getting naked with somebody for the first couple

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Speaker 1: of dozen times is scary in this reptile brain way

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Speaker 1: that getting naked with somebody that you've been with for

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Speaker 1: ten years never can be We'll be talking more after

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Speaker 1: we hear this. Add It's funny, Well, you would say

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Speaker 1: to a long term couple, try out some danger and risk.

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Speaker 1: I would probably say try out some drugs. Oh, the

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Speaker 1: drugs are something I recommend to long term couples frequently,

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Speaker 1: And so which ones are you recommending? Uh, you know,

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Speaker 1: I think ecstasy saved my marriage. Terry and I were

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Speaker 1: at a real low point and we got a cabin

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Speaker 1: on the Pacific coast and took a weekend away and

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Speaker 1: did he on Saturday, and we're really able to reconnect

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Speaker 1: in what wasn't the drug talking. The drug was allowing

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Speaker 1: us to talk, uh, in an authentic way. And I

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Speaker 1: think ecstasy saved my marriage. I recommended m d m

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Speaker 1: A to couples. Well, Dan, let let me stop with

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Speaker 1: you with the m d m A thing, because I say,

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Speaker 1: in my marriage, m d m A did not save

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Speaker 1: our marriage, but I think it helped us come to

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Speaker 1: a softer landing where we then became very good friends

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Speaker 1: thereafter and continue to be so and co raised her

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Speaker 1: daughter and things like that. I could see m DA

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Speaker 1: doing that too. Yeah, but but I mean, you can't

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Speaker 1: take it every day, so obviously want is to bring

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Speaker 1: those lessons into your life going forward. How did you

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Speaker 1: and Terry take that experience and bring it forward in

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Speaker 1: a way that didn't just wear off after a few

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Speaker 1: weeks or months. It just surfaced a lot of love

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Speaker 1: that had and buried under a lot of resentment. And

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Speaker 1: score keeping, and our personal lives are very complicated. We're

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Speaker 1: polly amorous and have other boyfriends, and that requires a

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Speaker 1: lot of sort of tense negotiation and scheduling, as all

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Speaker 1: the Polly people will tell you, And we had sort

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Speaker 1: of lost sight of not just each other, but the

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Speaker 1: fact that being with him allowed me to have my

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Speaker 1: boyfriend too, and being with me allowed him to have

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Speaker 1: his boyfriend who and being with me men he didn't

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Speaker 1: have to choose, and being with him and I didn't

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Speaker 1: have to choose, and neither of us wanted to choose.

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Speaker 1: And we were able to talk about that in a

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Speaker 1: way that that became sort of a focal point of

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Speaker 1: our affection and regard for each other, that this thing

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Speaker 1: that we've been fighting about was actually a thing that

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Speaker 1: had value, and that was a demonstration of our love

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Speaker 1: for each other that we were in negotiation about these

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Speaker 1: things that we had managed for years to find a

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Speaker 1: way to not finesse but allow, you know, the conversation

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Speaker 1: we had on e really land in a place where

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Speaker 1: we said, we're gonna love and support and leave each other,

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Speaker 1: or we're gonna love and support and let each other.

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Speaker 1: And we weren't able to have that conversation in the

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Speaker 1: way that we did before we took E, and you know,

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Speaker 1: had this wave of the surfacing of the love that

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Speaker 1: was there. It wasn't like the E was creating feelings

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Speaker 1: of love. It was unleashing them and unburying them. And

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Speaker 1: I really, honestly, you know, we didn't do it in

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Speaker 1: a controlled clinical setting. We didn't have a couple's counselor

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Speaker 1: at our elbows. We weren't in a therapist office. We

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Speaker 1: were on the ocean on a beach, just the two

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Speaker 1: of us, um with some m d m A that

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Speaker 1: we acquired the traditional way or the you know, I

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Speaker 1: guess you could say getting it from a couple of

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Speaker 1: scounsel was the traditional way before it was criminalized, because

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Speaker 1: it had been used in couples counseling up until the seventies.

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Speaker 1: But we had to get it from you know, friends

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Speaker 1: who can access those things, and it really helped us.

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Speaker 1: Did you continue to use it to reconnect, to re

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Speaker 1: reprocess these issues thereafter? We haven't. And you know, we

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Speaker 1: had used you once when we first met each other

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Speaker 1: twenty six almost seven years ago, recreationally, and we have

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Speaker 1: it in the house and we've talked about it, but

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Speaker 1: we haven't done it again. But we keep saying to

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Speaker 1: each other like we're gonna get away for a weekend

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Speaker 1: and and do you again. It almost feels like a

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Speaker 1: tune up. But this was probably two years ago, year

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Speaker 1: and a half ago. Oh is that recently? Yeah? And

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Speaker 1: I've always said to when drugs come up in my

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Speaker 1: talks at colleges that I guess, except for work, I

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Speaker 1: don't have a very addictive personality. And whenever I found

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Speaker 1: a drug that I really enjoyed, my responses and oh,

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Speaker 1: I'm gonna do that every day. My response is I'm

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Speaker 1: going to put that on the shelf so that when

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Speaker 1: I do want to do that again, it has as

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Speaker 1: big an impact as it did today or last night.

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Speaker 1: And so you know that E worked for us so

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Speaker 1: well that weekend doesn't mean we've done the every weekend since.

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Speaker 1: To tolerate each other, yea, well it when worked out.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, look from I think about the

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Speaker 1: role for me in my life, I mean, I'm sort

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Speaker 1: of your basic, you know, heterosexual serial monogamist, and for me,

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Speaker 1: N d m A has played a role beginning in

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Speaker 1: my thirties until maybe ten years ago when it stopped

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Speaker 1: really working for me. It's really in processing issues in

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Speaker 1: a relationship. You know. It is the way of kind

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Speaker 1: of clearing out talking basically what you're talking about. And

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Speaker 1: it wasn't obviously every week thing. It was a kind

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Speaker 1: of once a year sort of thing um to really

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Speaker 1: process those kinds of issues. And isn't it interesting how

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Speaker 1: people will take E and then say very loving things,

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Speaker 1: and then someone will dismiss them and say it's just

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Speaker 1: the drug talking. It's almost as if we're afraid of

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Speaker 1: the enormity of the affection and feelings of love that

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00:17:45,000 --> 00:17:47,960
Speaker 1: he can surface that our response to them, and not

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Speaker 1: just individually, but I think culturally because you see this

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Speaker 1: in sort of writing about E or representations of taking

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Speaker 1: E in films, is this rush to dismiss whatever was

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Speaker 1: that are done us as a lot? Well, you know,

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Speaker 1: I think there has to be some element of consciousness

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Speaker 1: around it though, because people ask me about ecstasy E

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Speaker 1: and I'll say, I say, look, it's a drug. It's

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Speaker 1: not a sex drug. It's more a hug drug. Oh god, yeah, No,

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00:18:14,920 --> 00:18:16,639
Speaker 1: it's not a sex drug. It's more of an No,

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Speaker 1: it doesn't it's you know, you may get aroused, but

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Speaker 1: it's not You're not gonna be orgasming in that way,

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Speaker 1: and that it's also I also say, it's a drug

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Speaker 1: that will make you feel warmly towards strangers, lovingly towards friends,

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Speaker 1: and profoundly in love with your lover. But what I

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Speaker 1: also know is at the times I did, I knew

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Speaker 1: right from the beginning that it could wear off and

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Speaker 1: that there could be a tendency even among people have

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Speaker 1: done it, and it felt these incredible feelings of love

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Speaker 1: for those things to fade and say it's just the drugs.

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Speaker 1: And so part of I remember the first time sort

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Speaker 1: of sitting looking at my life at the time while

361
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Speaker 1: we're on it and just looking at the eye and saying,

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Speaker 1: this is going to fade. Let's think about how we

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Speaker 1: come back, you know, during the week and the months ahead,

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00:18:53,119 --> 00:18:55,919
Speaker 1: where we try to bring up this feeling again without

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Speaker 1: the drug, because we know that you know, all drugs

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Speaker 1: basically trigger alter states of consciousness. You know that can

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Speaker 1: be triggered without those drugs. The question is learning how

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Speaker 1: to teach yourself to trigger those things. So and I

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Speaker 1: think it's easier to trigger those things if you've experienced

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Speaker 1: them as intensely as he can help you experience him

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Speaker 1: like like I love my husband. Uh I certainly when

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Speaker 1: it's just you know, he and I in the couch

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Speaker 1: watching TV in a very similar physical position as we

374
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Speaker 1: were on that deck, and you know, on the coast

375
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Speaker 1: of Washington, like I'll feel that I love him. I

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Speaker 1: don't feel this like, oh my god, I'm turning inside out.

377
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Speaker 1: I love him, right, But that turning inside out feeling

378
00:19:34,800 --> 00:19:39,440
Speaker 1: from two years ago helps me identify that feeling even

379
00:19:39,480 --> 00:19:43,040
Speaker 1: when you know life and stress and family ship has

380
00:19:43,320 --> 00:19:46,399
Speaker 1: buried it. I think it's more easily surfaced. That's the

381
00:19:46,400 --> 00:19:48,040
Speaker 1: word I always come to that, like he helped us

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Speaker 1: surface a bunch of stuff that just the the accrual

383
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Speaker 1: of time and conflict. Life is a grind and and

384
00:19:57,280 --> 00:20:00,000
Speaker 1: one of the traps of people who are an open

385
00:20:00,040 --> 00:20:03,840
Speaker 1: relationships or polyamorous relationships can fall into is that you're

386
00:20:04,640 --> 00:20:07,800
Speaker 1: a spouse or your committed partner. Your primary partner is

387
00:20:07,840 --> 00:20:09,520
Speaker 1: the one you have to talk with about the rent

388
00:20:09,520 --> 00:20:12,160
Speaker 1: and putting a new roof on the house, and conflicts

389
00:20:12,160 --> 00:20:16,520
Speaker 1: about kids and deal with a family crisis, and the

390
00:20:16,600 --> 00:20:19,479
Speaker 1: boyfriend is who you turn to for fun, and you

391
00:20:19,480 --> 00:20:22,880
Speaker 1: have to make a really conscious effort not to just

392
00:20:23,680 --> 00:20:26,000
Speaker 1: have all the fun with the secondary partners and all

393
00:20:26,040 --> 00:20:28,879
Speaker 1: the grind with the primary partner. That makes sense. What

394
00:20:28,920 --> 00:20:30,960
Speaker 1: about psychedelics as they played a role in your life?

395
00:20:32,560 --> 00:20:38,520
Speaker 1: I took acid in college and it was uh okay

396
00:20:38,520 --> 00:20:41,760
Speaker 1: and not very strong. My then best friend and I

397
00:20:41,800 --> 00:20:44,120
Speaker 1: were like wandering around this huge performance arts center looking

398
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Speaker 1: at the woodwork and it was kind of like moving

399
00:20:46,000 --> 00:20:48,560
Speaker 1: and I saw like lizard patterns, very like an Escher

400
00:20:48,600 --> 00:20:52,120
Speaker 1: print in the floor. And then like twenty years later,

401
00:20:52,880 --> 00:20:55,760
Speaker 1: I was in a gay bar and somebody offered me

402
00:20:55,840 --> 00:20:59,119
Speaker 1: acid and I took it, expecting that sort of slightly

403
00:20:59,200 --> 00:21:02,000
Speaker 1: visually enhanced to experience. And then an hour later they

404
00:21:02,000 --> 00:21:03,600
Speaker 1: asked me if I was feeling anything, and I said no.

405
00:21:03,720 --> 00:21:05,320
Speaker 1: When they asked me if I wanted another hit, and

406
00:21:05,359 --> 00:21:08,040
Speaker 1: I took it and the first hit hadn't hit yet,

407
00:21:08,119 --> 00:21:10,040
Speaker 1: and then the first hit hit, and then the second

408
00:21:10,080 --> 00:21:13,440
Speaker 1: hit hit, and nobody told me that in the intervening

409
00:21:13,480 --> 00:21:17,120
Speaker 1: twenty years the power of acid had increased by some

410
00:21:17,200 --> 00:21:20,600
Speaker 1: exponential effect. And I saw that place that people don't

411
00:21:20,600 --> 00:21:25,520
Speaker 1: come back from. So I am afraid of acid and

412
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Speaker 1: kind of don't want to ever do it again. After

413
00:21:27,960 --> 00:21:31,520
Speaker 1: what about mushrooms or ayahuasca. Also, I was in a

414
00:21:31,560 --> 00:21:35,040
Speaker 1: gay bar on Halloween in drag judging a costume contest,

415
00:21:35,359 --> 00:21:37,080
Speaker 1: and then everybody in the bar found out I was

416
00:21:37,119 --> 00:21:40,320
Speaker 1: tripping my head off on acid and was fucking with

417
00:21:40,359 --> 00:21:42,840
Speaker 1: me all night. But I couldn't leave because I didn't

418
00:21:42,840 --> 00:21:46,480
Speaker 1: trust that the sidewalk was actually not the ocean. So

419
00:21:46,560 --> 00:21:49,840
Speaker 1: you basically violated harm reduction one O one principles in

420
00:21:49,960 --> 00:21:53,159
Speaker 1: terms of where and how you did that stuff. Yeah,

421
00:21:53,200 --> 00:21:56,320
Speaker 1: I was very uninformed about acid the second time I

422
00:21:56,359 --> 00:21:59,240
Speaker 1: did it and not prepared for that. I've done mushrooms

423
00:21:59,240 --> 00:22:03,480
Speaker 1: a couple of times. Um did mushrooms last pretty recently

424
00:22:03,520 --> 00:22:07,160
Speaker 1: with my husband's boyfriend. We had some mushroom tea together

425
00:22:07,240 --> 00:22:10,680
Speaker 1: and watched cats uh huh, which I think is the

426
00:22:10,720 --> 00:22:13,800
Speaker 1: only way to watch cats uh, but not the only

427
00:22:13,800 --> 00:22:15,520
Speaker 1: thing to do while on mushrooms. But for you and

428
00:22:15,600 --> 00:22:19,760
Speaker 1: mushrooms and sex has not been a thing. No, no,

429
00:22:20,160 --> 00:22:22,439
Speaker 1: And like a little bit of pot and sex, sometimes

430
00:22:22,480 --> 00:22:24,199
Speaker 1: a little bit of alcohol and sex. But I'm a

431
00:22:24,800 --> 00:22:27,640
Speaker 1: I'm grateful. I'm a sober sex kind of person. I'm

432
00:22:27,640 --> 00:22:32,200
Speaker 1: not like strictly always, but I've seen a lot of

433
00:22:32,240 --> 00:22:34,720
Speaker 1: gay men self medicate with alcohol and drugs so that

434
00:22:34,800 --> 00:22:38,880
Speaker 1: they can have sex without being paralyzed by shame, without

435
00:22:39,160 --> 00:22:42,200
Speaker 1: feeling guilty or conflicted, and it can create a really

436
00:22:42,200 --> 00:22:44,679
Speaker 1: powerful association. I think it can carve a deep groove

437
00:22:44,760 --> 00:22:48,040
Speaker 1: in someone. That's often what I see going on with

438
00:22:48,359 --> 00:22:51,919
Speaker 1: the people that I have known, And that's an important distinction.

439
00:22:51,920 --> 00:22:53,800
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna say my friends who got into keem sex,

440
00:22:53,840 --> 00:22:57,320
Speaker 1: because I have very few friends who got into keem sex,

441
00:22:57,400 --> 00:22:59,360
Speaker 1: because I didn't know anybody who got into kem sex

442
00:22:59,400 --> 00:23:03,000
Speaker 1: who came back from it in one piece. Some didn't

443
00:23:03,000 --> 00:23:07,120
Speaker 1: come back from it at all, some died, but nobody

444
00:23:07,320 --> 00:23:11,920
Speaker 1: emerged from a couple of years in kem sex whole

445
00:23:12,040 --> 00:23:15,040
Speaker 1: enough to have a friendship with. I think it's very

446
00:23:15,040 --> 00:23:18,120
Speaker 1: deeply damaging. There. There's some things I don't think harm

447
00:23:18,160 --> 00:23:22,199
Speaker 1: reduction applies to, Like the harm reduction doesn't apply to

448
00:23:22,280 --> 00:23:25,040
Speaker 1: Russian Roulette with five bullets in the gun, and that's

449
00:23:25,200 --> 00:23:29,080
Speaker 1: keem secks. Well, I mean, you're more of an expert

450
00:23:29,080 --> 00:23:31,000
Speaker 1: on these angles than I am. But I do know

451
00:23:31,119 --> 00:23:34,320
Speaker 1: people who would say, you know that anything can potentially

452
00:23:34,320 --> 00:23:36,480
Speaker 1: have a harm reduction approach to it, and that there's

453
00:23:36,520 --> 00:23:38,760
Speaker 1: understanding that there are ways to use some of these

454
00:23:38,800 --> 00:23:43,760
Speaker 1: substances which can enhance sexual intensity, etcetera um, and to

455
00:23:43,880 --> 00:23:46,840
Speaker 1: dabble in these things without going whole more into them.

456
00:23:46,880 --> 00:23:48,920
Speaker 1: And there's sometimes a bias in what we hear about

457
00:23:48,920 --> 00:23:50,879
Speaker 1: stories because the people who screw up on drugs are

458
00:23:50,880 --> 00:23:52,720
Speaker 1: the ones we always hear about, whereas the people who

459
00:23:52,760 --> 00:23:55,480
Speaker 1: use it with some responsibility control are the ones that

460
00:23:55,560 --> 00:23:58,119
Speaker 1: keep it quiet, don't talk about it is so stigmatized

461
00:23:58,119 --> 00:23:59,480
Speaker 1: in the eyes of everybody else they don't want to

462
00:23:59,480 --> 00:24:01,199
Speaker 1: be disapproved to even though they're used to doing it

463
00:24:01,240 --> 00:24:03,360
Speaker 1: in a you know, blah blah blah blah blah. It's

464
00:24:03,359 --> 00:24:05,080
Speaker 1: funny you should throw that at me, because I've always

465
00:24:05,080 --> 00:24:08,919
Speaker 1: said that about three ways and open relationships, particularly for

466
00:24:08,960 --> 00:24:12,320
Speaker 1: straight people. Straight people would always say, like, three ways

467
00:24:12,400 --> 00:24:16,399
Speaker 1: always mean the relationship collapses. It's always the end, and

468
00:24:16,440 --> 00:24:20,240
Speaker 1: open relationships always fail, and no, it's those are the

469
00:24:20,240 --> 00:24:22,440
Speaker 1: ones you heard about. If your parents had a three

470
00:24:22,440 --> 00:24:24,800
Speaker 1: way or your dad cheated and your parents got divorced,

471
00:24:24,800 --> 00:24:26,520
Speaker 1: you heard about it. If they didn't get divorced, you

472
00:24:26,520 --> 00:24:29,000
Speaker 1: didn't hear about it. So you knew lots of couples,

473
00:24:29,000 --> 00:24:33,399
Speaker 1: straight couples who were successfully open or successfully sexually adventurous

474
00:24:33,440 --> 00:24:35,520
Speaker 1: without the relationship following your part. You just didn't know

475
00:24:35,640 --> 00:24:38,000
Speaker 1: you knew them exactly. Maybe it's the same thing for

476
00:24:38,040 --> 00:24:40,840
Speaker 1: me and people who can have one weekend a year

477
00:24:41,000 --> 00:24:43,120
Speaker 1: where they do a bunch of math. And I draw

478
00:24:43,119 --> 00:24:47,720
Speaker 1: a distinction between ketamine math and what's the other one?

479
00:24:48,280 --> 00:24:51,880
Speaker 1: Uh h b HB Yeah, yeah, although you know there's

480
00:24:51,880 --> 00:24:54,680
Speaker 1: an argument for low do sam fetamine that's also is

481
00:24:54,680 --> 00:24:57,800
Speaker 1: different between KIM six oftentimes evolves very high dose stuff

482
00:24:58,080 --> 00:24:59,439
Speaker 1: and you know, a lot of times with drugs, it's

483
00:24:59,440 --> 00:25:03,359
Speaker 1: all about the yeah, no, you're not going there, Okay,

484
00:25:03,520 --> 00:25:05,000
Speaker 1: you know, I don't want to push in it. You know,

485
00:25:05,040 --> 00:25:07,159
Speaker 1: I'm not. I'm not going to push drugs on you

486
00:25:07,240 --> 00:25:09,159
Speaker 1: or tell you to give it a try. Um, but

487
00:25:09,359 --> 00:25:12,280
Speaker 1: I did math ones well, I'm talking also not about

488
00:25:12,280 --> 00:25:15,119
Speaker 1: meth amphetamine in the you know, heavy form, you know

489
00:25:15,160 --> 00:25:17,600
Speaker 1: the way, the way same which ways in which you know,

490
00:25:17,760 --> 00:25:21,359
Speaker 1: millions of young adolescent boys are prescribed you know riddle

491
00:25:21,440 --> 00:25:24,080
Speaker 1: in which is basically an amphetamine type drug, and if

492
00:25:24,119 --> 00:25:25,840
Speaker 1: you were to snort or inject that, it would be

493
00:25:25,840 --> 00:25:28,239
Speaker 1: like meth amphetamine. And conversely, if you were to take

494
00:25:28,280 --> 00:25:31,040
Speaker 1: mess amphetamine in a small pill form, it would be

495
00:25:31,080 --> 00:25:33,080
Speaker 1: more like the riddle and the kids are taking And

496
00:25:33,119 --> 00:25:35,280
Speaker 1: there may well be an argument that, um, you know,

497
00:25:35,440 --> 00:25:38,399
Speaker 1: taking in a very low dose, perhaps combined with cannabis,

498
00:25:38,480 --> 00:25:41,359
Speaker 1: might actually be a positive thing. Only one of your

499
00:25:41,359 --> 00:25:45,200
Speaker 1: teeth will fall out. Well, speaking from personal experience, no

500
00:25:45,359 --> 00:25:48,639
Speaker 1: teeth fell out, and it's got its benefits, you know. Um,

501
00:25:49,080 --> 00:25:51,840
Speaker 1: I actually did do math one time, and this is

502
00:25:51,880 --> 00:25:53,720
Speaker 1: like I think this was literally a plot line on

503
00:25:53,840 --> 00:25:56,480
Speaker 1: Girls on HBO. I had done a little bit of

504
00:25:56,480 --> 00:25:59,119
Speaker 1: cocaine in college. I just moved to Seattle. I was

505
00:25:59,160 --> 00:26:02,080
Speaker 1: twenty five or went four years old, and I was

506
00:26:02,160 --> 00:26:06,439
Speaker 1: offered a white powdery substance to snort by somebody that

507
00:26:06,480 --> 00:26:09,080
Speaker 1: I was having a three way with and I did

508
00:26:09,080 --> 00:26:12,520
Speaker 1: it and then he told me it was math. Because

509
00:26:12,520 --> 00:26:15,440
Speaker 1: I was like, wow, that is some shitty tasting cocaine.

510
00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:18,560
Speaker 1: Because I had done a bunch of coking college A

511
00:26:18,600 --> 00:26:20,959
Speaker 1: bunch relative for me, a bunch. I've done it like

512
00:26:21,119 --> 00:26:25,000
Speaker 1: probably a dozen times. Uh, And I was not happy

513
00:26:25,040 --> 00:26:27,840
Speaker 1: about it, and I was up for two days and

514
00:26:27,880 --> 00:26:30,960
Speaker 1: I felt like ship and I didn't do that much.

515
00:26:31,840 --> 00:26:34,919
Speaker 1: Uh huh. You know that's a data point. That's not

516
00:26:35,000 --> 00:26:39,359
Speaker 1: a trend, and that's an anecdote, not data. But it

517
00:26:39,560 --> 00:26:44,280
Speaker 1: just confirmed for me that math wasn't for me, and

518
00:26:44,280 --> 00:26:45,640
Speaker 1: and I had a deep and I had better understanding

519
00:26:45,640 --> 00:26:47,359
Speaker 1: about the guys. I'd seem destroyed by it because I

520
00:26:47,359 --> 00:26:50,239
Speaker 1: couldn't imagine putting that in my body on a regular basis. No, right,

521
00:26:50,280 --> 00:26:52,160
Speaker 1: But it actually the truth is day and it really

522
00:26:52,200 --> 00:26:54,080
Speaker 1: does come down to the dose and with the way

523
00:26:54,080 --> 00:26:56,280
Speaker 1: you consume it and consuming it orally is opposed to

524
00:26:56,320 --> 00:26:59,919
Speaker 1: storting or injecting it and the dose level being substantially different.

525
00:27:00,040 --> 00:27:01,760
Speaker 1: And that's true. We really all drugs in a way.

526
00:27:01,960 --> 00:27:04,520
Speaker 1: I was just gonna say, like one cocktail versus thirty

527
00:27:04,720 --> 00:27:09,879
Speaker 1: exactly exactly. Alcohol poisoning can kill you. But like you

528
00:27:09,920 --> 00:27:12,000
Speaker 1: brought it up in the context of these chem sex parties,

529
00:27:12,040 --> 00:27:14,399
Speaker 1: Now that's true. That yeah, I don't think there's a

530
00:27:14,440 --> 00:27:18,520
Speaker 1: lot of moderation at chem sex parties. Okay, well let's

531
00:27:18,560 --> 00:27:21,800
Speaker 1: shift over. So for me, when I think about sex

532
00:27:22,000 --> 00:27:25,159
Speaker 1: and drugs, the psychedelics actually do have their upsides. I mean,

533
00:27:25,200 --> 00:27:27,320
Speaker 1: there was Timothy Leary. He used to write about, you know,

534
00:27:27,359 --> 00:27:29,879
Speaker 1: being with women who are having hundreds of orgasms, and

535
00:27:29,880 --> 00:27:32,480
Speaker 1: and there's a whole sort of it's it's not just him.

536
00:27:32,520 --> 00:27:34,960
Speaker 1: There's a whole kind of world in which and then

537
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:37,280
Speaker 1: even in my own personal experience, there's been ways in

538
00:27:37,320 --> 00:27:39,280
Speaker 1: which not in the thick of the experience, but maybe

539
00:27:39,320 --> 00:27:41,320
Speaker 1: it's the very beginning or the end where it does

540
00:27:41,359 --> 00:27:43,800
Speaker 1: have his positive size. But the real one, I think

541
00:27:43,880 --> 00:27:46,560
Speaker 1: is marijuana. I mean marijuana in the same way to

542
00:27:46,640 --> 00:27:50,439
Speaker 1: enhance his music taste, other things can enhance um, you know,

543
00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:53,240
Speaker 1: sexual and I think as much as it does for men,

544
00:27:53,720 --> 00:27:56,840
Speaker 1: probably even more so for women generally speaking, I think

545
00:27:56,880 --> 00:27:59,800
Speaker 1: so too, And that's come up on my show a lot,

546
00:28:00,040 --> 00:28:02,920
Speaker 1: and I've recommended it to women in place of a

547
00:28:02,960 --> 00:28:05,760
Speaker 1: couple of glasses of chardonnay that a lot of females

548
00:28:05,760 --> 00:28:08,919
Speaker 1: sex advice Calum Mr Writers have recommended to women. And

549
00:28:08,960 --> 00:28:11,920
Speaker 1: I've gotten tons of, you know, anecdotes, not data, feedback

550
00:28:11,960 --> 00:28:16,439
Speaker 1: from my listeners who have experimented with pot. They found

551
00:28:16,480 --> 00:28:19,920
Speaker 1: it disinhibiting. And you know, I don't want to make

552
00:28:20,000 --> 00:28:22,480
Speaker 1: when you start making generalizations about men and women, you're

553
00:28:22,480 --> 00:28:25,320
Speaker 1: making generalizations about three point five billion people, and four

554
00:28:25,359 --> 00:28:27,439
Speaker 1: billion people and four billion other people will be hundreds

555
00:28:27,480 --> 00:28:32,080
Speaker 1: of millions of exceptions. Women have more shame and inhibition

556
00:28:32,160 --> 00:28:35,119
Speaker 1: heaped up on them, and it's so constant that it

557
00:28:35,119 --> 00:28:36,960
Speaker 1: can be a lot harder for a woman to know

558
00:28:37,160 --> 00:28:39,520
Speaker 1: whether what she's doing is what she wants to be doing.

559
00:28:40,240 --> 00:28:42,520
Speaker 1: The example I always cite is that Fifty Shades of

560
00:28:42,560 --> 00:28:45,360
Speaker 1: Gray phenomenon. It wasn't a bunch of sixteen year old

561
00:28:45,360 --> 00:28:48,360
Speaker 1: girls buying that book and suddenly getting into S and

562
00:28:48,520 --> 00:28:51,560
Speaker 1: M or realizing that power play turned them on. It

563
00:28:51,600 --> 00:28:54,400
Speaker 1: was a bunch of middle aged housewives who were suddenly

564
00:28:54,400 --> 00:28:56,640
Speaker 1: getting into that book and realizing because they finally had

565
00:28:56,640 --> 00:29:00,560
Speaker 1: permission to fantasize about that from an external force, which

566
00:29:00,600 --> 00:29:03,560
Speaker 1: was the best seller list. Pot can be that permission

567
00:29:03,640 --> 00:29:07,280
Speaker 1: for some women to really tap into what turns them on.

568
00:29:07,800 --> 00:29:11,600
Speaker 1: And it does seem to have UH when applied topically,

569
00:29:12,480 --> 00:29:16,880
Speaker 1: an effect UH in the genitals for some women. There

570
00:29:16,880 --> 00:29:19,560
Speaker 1: are like some THHC lubes out there that I've gotten

571
00:29:19,600 --> 00:29:21,880
Speaker 1: a lot of positive feedback on. I hate to like

572
00:29:21,920 --> 00:29:26,120
Speaker 1: sound like a wellness industry crank or hack, but the

573
00:29:26,200 --> 00:29:31,280
Speaker 1: studies aren't done until there's some anecdotal screaming and yelling

574
00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:34,200
Speaker 1: about the d I Y effects that people are creating,

575
00:29:34,680 --> 00:29:36,880
Speaker 1: right because there's actually there's very little and certainly on

576
00:29:36,960 --> 00:29:40,080
Speaker 1: topicals and like CBD, th HC, things like that. Yeah,

577
00:29:40,200 --> 00:29:42,000
Speaker 1: maybe it's just the feeling of being naughty that you're

578
00:29:42,040 --> 00:29:45,680
Speaker 1: like applying this, like previously bidden the legal sub constitute

579
00:29:45,720 --> 00:29:47,800
Speaker 1: genitaly in a form of a loube and just the

580
00:29:47,880 --> 00:29:51,040
Speaker 1: act of it is exciting enough that it's a placebo

581
00:29:51,360 --> 00:29:53,720
Speaker 1: that I've had to say, a cultural placebo test right here.

582
00:29:53,840 --> 00:29:56,200
Speaker 1: But I think there's another variable two which is related

583
00:29:56,240 --> 00:29:57,880
Speaker 1: to what you're saying, which is I think that in

584
00:29:57,920 --> 00:30:02,080
Speaker 1: a way, marijuana can help the chatter in the brain

585
00:30:02,200 --> 00:30:06,280
Speaker 1: that can stand between um, a woman and attaining or

586
00:30:06,280 --> 00:30:09,360
Speaker 1: achieving a better orgasm. Right, it's that kind of in

587
00:30:09,360 --> 00:30:11,240
Speaker 1: the same way that you can focus more intensely on

588
00:30:11,360 --> 00:30:14,920
Speaker 1: music or on touch or things like that. It enables,

589
00:30:14,960 --> 00:30:16,680
Speaker 1: I think, both for men and women, but maybe even

590
00:30:16,680 --> 00:30:19,280
Speaker 1: more so for women to just quiet that stuff so

591
00:30:19,320 --> 00:30:22,240
Speaker 1: that you're fully focused in the moment on the experience.

592
00:30:22,480 --> 00:30:26,240
Speaker 1: In Macbeth, talking about alcoholic character says, you know, booze

593
00:30:26,240 --> 00:30:29,880
Speaker 1: basically inspires the desire and pieas the performance. I'm paraphrasing,

594
00:30:29,960 --> 00:30:33,080
Speaker 1: perhaps badly. Uh So we know that, least in men,

595
00:30:33,120 --> 00:30:35,800
Speaker 1: we've like acknowledged for hundreds of years that alcohol can

596
00:30:35,880 --> 00:30:40,200
Speaker 1: have a deflating effect. Well, the clitterists is an erectile

597
00:30:40,640 --> 00:30:44,360
Speaker 1: tissue two with two erectile chambers and a glands, just

598
00:30:44,440 --> 00:30:47,360
Speaker 1: like a penis. And it stands to reason that alcohol

599
00:30:47,440 --> 00:30:48,840
Speaker 1: that can like make it hard for a guy to

600
00:30:48,880 --> 00:30:50,920
Speaker 1: get it up, can make it hard for a woman

601
00:30:51,040 --> 00:30:56,480
Speaker 1: to become fully aroused, whereas pot doesn't interfere with that

602
00:30:56,640 --> 00:30:59,760
Speaker 1: ability for most men. So it stands to reason, you know,

603
00:30:59,760 --> 00:31:02,560
Speaker 1: women and basically have everything that men have, just the

604
00:31:02,560 --> 00:31:05,640
Speaker 1: packages assembled in a very different way. A penis is

605
00:31:05,640 --> 00:31:08,960
Speaker 1: a giant clint actually in some sex differentiation, although a

606
00:31:08,960 --> 00:31:11,920
Speaker 1: fewer nerve innings. Unfortunately, Well that's why you have to

607
00:31:11,920 --> 00:31:17,760
Speaker 1: prostate and other conversations. Let's take a break here and

608
00:31:17,840 --> 00:31:33,400
Speaker 1: go to an ad M. I'll tell you a funny story.

609
00:31:33,560 --> 00:31:36,560
Speaker 1: You know, must have been early two thousands, and you know,

610
00:31:36,640 --> 00:31:38,920
Speaker 1: as part of our my organization's efforts to kind of

611
00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:42,480
Speaker 1: change public opinion around marijuana, marijuana legalization, and one of

612
00:31:42,480 --> 00:31:45,760
Speaker 1: the things we saw was a significant gender gap. The

613
00:31:45,840 --> 00:31:50,560
Speaker 1: numbers were like men and of women favored legalizing marijuana.

614
00:31:51,240 --> 00:31:53,120
Speaker 1: And so I was trying to figure out what to

615
00:31:53,200 --> 00:31:56,120
Speaker 1: do about that, and so I began to bounce the

616
00:31:56,240 --> 00:32:00,360
Speaker 1: idea about the benefits of marijuana use among older people,

617
00:32:00,640 --> 00:32:03,280
Speaker 1: especially women, right, And I bounced this afo my board

618
00:32:03,280 --> 00:32:05,880
Speaker 1: members and other friends, and all the women I were

619
00:32:05,880 --> 00:32:09,160
Speaker 1: talking to are most of them were saying, ethan great idea, fantastic,

620
00:32:09,200 --> 00:32:11,080
Speaker 1: And it was all about you know, we knew that

621
00:32:11,280 --> 00:32:13,719
Speaker 1: the public would would whereas they we get freaked out

622
00:32:13,720 --> 00:32:16,160
Speaker 1: about marijuana kids. You talk about drugs and older people,

623
00:32:16,160 --> 00:32:18,640
Speaker 1: and people are a lot more tolerant. Right. The notion

624
00:32:18,720 --> 00:32:21,240
Speaker 1: that hey, viagra worked from my husband, but marijuana is

625
00:32:21,240 --> 00:32:24,200
Speaker 1: the real magic for me by people is focused on

626
00:32:24,240 --> 00:32:26,600
Speaker 1: people in long term relationships. You know, it seems like

627
00:32:26,680 --> 00:32:29,840
Speaker 1: a whole way to appreciate these kind of health and wellness,

628
00:32:29,920 --> 00:32:32,280
Speaker 1: sexual benefits of these things. And so I was getting

629
00:32:32,320 --> 00:32:35,080
Speaker 1: all excited about doing this campaign. And then I ran

630
00:32:35,120 --> 00:32:37,840
Speaker 1: into a couple of problems. Where is the older people

631
00:32:37,880 --> 00:32:41,440
Speaker 1: I talked to oftentimes loved the idea. My younger staff,

632
00:32:41,560 --> 00:32:45,840
Speaker 1: my communication staff, they were totally opposed. And the reason was,

633
00:32:45,960 --> 00:32:49,200
Speaker 1: I think, because the thought about sex and older people

634
00:32:49,440 --> 00:32:51,440
Speaker 1: hit the yuck factor and they just didn't want to

635
00:32:51,520 --> 00:32:53,360
Speaker 1: run with it. And I just basically hadn't let go

636
00:32:53,440 --> 00:32:55,200
Speaker 1: of the thing. They didn't want to think about their

637
00:32:55,240 --> 00:32:59,760
Speaker 1: parents fucking exactly exactly who wants to go there? So

638
00:33:00,160 --> 00:33:02,240
Speaker 1: I think that stuff is really evolved. I mean, now

639
00:33:02,320 --> 00:33:05,400
Speaker 1: that you see that his marijuana is becoming increasingly legalized,

640
00:33:05,400 --> 00:33:07,760
Speaker 1: there's very little increase in adolescent use, but there's a

641
00:33:07,800 --> 00:33:10,920
Speaker 1: tripling or quadrupling of use among elderly people. And I

642
00:33:10,960 --> 00:33:13,080
Speaker 1: think some fair bit of it has to do with

643
00:33:13,240 --> 00:33:17,280
Speaker 1: long term married couples invigorating and keeping alive their relationship.

644
00:33:17,800 --> 00:33:19,840
Speaker 1: I've seen that too, and I think that's really positive.

645
00:33:20,360 --> 00:33:24,320
Speaker 1: And pot, as you know from your years of advocacy,

646
00:33:24,440 --> 00:33:29,080
Speaker 1: is so much less harmful than alcohol. Pot doesn't make

647
00:33:29,120 --> 00:33:31,160
Speaker 1: you aggressive or impair your judgment in the same way

648
00:33:31,200 --> 00:33:34,560
Speaker 1: that alcohol does, or in any way comparable to what

649
00:33:34,840 --> 00:33:38,000
Speaker 1: alcohol does people, and that's a terrible combo impaired judgment

650
00:33:38,000 --> 00:33:39,920
Speaker 1: and aggression, you know. I remember when I was a

651
00:33:39,960 --> 00:33:43,000
Speaker 1: little kid, my dad, who was a Chicago cop, would

652
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:47,000
Speaker 1: talk about having to arrest the hippies who were stund

653
00:33:47,040 --> 00:33:51,280
Speaker 1: for pod and the attitude among the police him and

654
00:33:51,320 --> 00:33:53,080
Speaker 1: all of his partners, even though they cracked heads at

655
00:33:53,120 --> 00:33:56,560
Speaker 1: the six eight Democratic Convention in Grant Park, was that

656
00:33:56,600 --> 00:33:59,720
Speaker 1: it wasn't the pod heads that were problems, that they'd

657
00:33:59,800 --> 00:34:02,960
Speaker 1: rather arrest potheads because they were easier to arrest, because

658
00:34:03,000 --> 00:34:07,600
Speaker 1: they weren't a gro they weren't out of control crazy.

659
00:34:07,800 --> 00:34:10,239
Speaker 1: Even though the pot propaganda, particularly at that time in

660
00:34:10,239 --> 00:34:12,480
Speaker 1: the late sixties early seventies, was all that pot made

661
00:34:12,520 --> 00:34:16,120
Speaker 1: people crazy. Read again, pot makes you impotent, and the

662
00:34:16,160 --> 00:34:21,240
Speaker 1: opposite was true. It's alcohol that makes you fucking piece

663
00:34:21,239 --> 00:34:25,640
Speaker 1: of ship in big doses, in big doses. But too

664
00:34:25,760 --> 00:34:28,719
Speaker 1: much alcohol you want to get in a fight. Too

665
00:34:28,760 --> 00:34:30,480
Speaker 1: much pot you want to get in a seven eleven

666
00:34:30,680 --> 00:34:33,960
Speaker 1: candy ale and give me the stone or over the

667
00:34:34,120 --> 00:34:36,719
Speaker 1: boozer any day. You know, let's shift gears. I mean,

668
00:34:36,960 --> 00:34:41,680
Speaker 1: in my advocacy around UH drug policy reform, you know,

669
00:34:42,000 --> 00:34:46,120
Speaker 1: there were tremendous analogies um to the fights around gay rights.

670
00:34:46,480 --> 00:34:49,320
Speaker 1: And I often times, especially on the marijuana piece of

671
00:34:49,360 --> 00:34:53,000
Speaker 1: drug policy reform, that the gay rights movement really felt

672
00:34:53,080 --> 00:34:56,520
Speaker 1: like something of an elder sibling, somebody who was paving

673
00:34:56,560 --> 00:34:59,239
Speaker 1: the way. And for all sorts of reasons, all these

674
00:34:59,239 --> 00:35:03,480
Speaker 1: powerful and oologies between that struggle, um, ranging from the

675
00:35:03,520 --> 00:35:07,120
Speaker 1: stigmatization on the one hand, two elements of personal autonomy

676
00:35:07,480 --> 00:35:09,600
Speaker 1: on the others, And I wonder how much that's been

677
00:35:09,640 --> 00:35:13,279
Speaker 1: part of your thinking around these issues. I certainly think

678
00:35:13,280 --> 00:35:16,520
Speaker 1: there's a parallel there. And remember, the gay rights movement

679
00:35:16,600 --> 00:35:19,160
Speaker 1: was the offspring of the women's rights movement, which was

680
00:35:19,160 --> 00:35:22,479
Speaker 1: the offspring of the civil rights movement. Each inspired the other.

681
00:35:22,719 --> 00:35:28,040
Speaker 1: And I do remember years ago when normal adopted coming

682
00:35:28,040 --> 00:35:31,520
Speaker 1: out as a metaphor, what they were importuning people who

683
00:35:31,520 --> 00:35:35,160
Speaker 1: smoked pot recreationally to start doing because the public image

684
00:35:35,160 --> 00:35:37,640
Speaker 1: of the pothead and the reality of the pot user

685
00:35:38,080 --> 00:35:40,520
Speaker 1: were in such conflict, and so many more people used

686
00:35:40,560 --> 00:35:46,719
Speaker 1: pot responsibly um and recreationally than anybody who made policy

687
00:35:47,040 --> 00:35:51,000
Speaker 1: was aware. Era most voters were aware, and so the

688
00:35:51,080 --> 00:35:55,120
Speaker 1: pot community borrowed the coming out metaphor. Some gay people

689
00:35:55,200 --> 00:35:58,400
Speaker 1: were offended. Some gay people lived to be offended. I'm

690
00:35:58,440 --> 00:36:00,839
Speaker 1: not one of those gay people. I was defended at all.

691
00:36:01,440 --> 00:36:03,640
Speaker 1: Lots of different people have borrowed the coming out metaphor.

692
00:36:03,640 --> 00:36:05,719
Speaker 1: I'm offended when the ex gay is borrowed the coming

693
00:36:05,760 --> 00:36:08,040
Speaker 1: out metaphor and then come out as X gay and

694
00:36:08,120 --> 00:36:09,799
Speaker 1: argue that no one should be gay and the gay

695
00:36:09,800 --> 00:36:12,560
Speaker 1: people shouldn't have rights because they're not sucking picks anymore

696
00:36:12,640 --> 00:36:15,360
Speaker 1: fun those guys. That's an abuse of the coming out metaphor.

697
00:36:15,680 --> 00:36:19,400
Speaker 1: But I think the pot folks adopting it was an

698
00:36:19,400 --> 00:36:22,520
Speaker 1: affirmation of of our of the you know, the secret

699
00:36:22,520 --> 00:36:25,560
Speaker 1: weapon of like the gays, you know, we were randomly

700
00:36:25,560 --> 00:36:29,239
Speaker 1: distributed throughout the population and embedded in every family. It's

701
00:36:29,280 --> 00:36:32,800
Speaker 1: not a perfect analogy, but if race worked the same way,

702
00:36:33,360 --> 00:36:35,120
Speaker 1: we would live in a very different world. If you

703
00:36:35,200 --> 00:36:37,120
Speaker 1: found out you're going to meet your kid was black

704
00:36:37,120 --> 00:36:41,359
Speaker 1: when your kid turned fifteen or thirteen, George Zimmerman would

705
00:36:41,400 --> 00:36:43,839
Speaker 1: be on death row. Yeah, well, let me ask, because

706
00:36:43,960 --> 00:36:45,640
Speaker 1: let me push you a bit, because I've seen some

707
00:36:45,680 --> 00:36:47,840
Speaker 1: things where maybe we can find some room to disagree

708
00:36:47,840 --> 00:36:51,080
Speaker 1: on something here, which is that I also think there's

709
00:36:51,120 --> 00:36:54,439
Speaker 1: an element of identity, right So for me and trying

710
00:36:54,480 --> 00:36:57,400
Speaker 1: to build a drug policy reform movement, it was I

711
00:36:57,440 --> 00:36:59,759
Speaker 1: saw myself in following the footsteps and standing on the

712
00:36:59,760 --> 00:37:02,359
Speaker 1: show holders of civil rights and women's rights and gay

713
00:37:02,480 --> 00:37:05,520
Speaker 1: rights and other fights against discriminating minority groups that were

714
00:37:05,520 --> 00:37:09,360
Speaker 1: discriminated against. And it raised questions about to what extent

715
00:37:10,120 --> 00:37:14,040
Speaker 1: one's use of illicit drugs created a sense of identity

716
00:37:14,400 --> 00:37:16,680
Speaker 1: in a way. And there's even a phrase I would

717
00:37:16,680 --> 00:37:19,040
Speaker 1: sometimes use that I didn't I don't like the sound

718
00:37:19,040 --> 00:37:20,279
Speaker 1: of it, So I never used it a lot. But

719
00:37:20,440 --> 00:37:24,200
Speaker 1: it was druggism, just not unlike racism. Right that people

720
00:37:24,520 --> 00:37:28,480
Speaker 1: have negative they stigmatized, they demonized, they have negative views

721
00:37:28,520 --> 00:37:32,920
Speaker 1: of people who use people because of the drugs they use, right,

722
00:37:33,040 --> 00:37:35,640
Speaker 1: um and often and and and that that's and then

723
00:37:35,640 --> 00:37:40,480
Speaker 1: in some respects, that prejudice almost became the one acceptable prejudice,

724
00:37:40,920 --> 00:37:43,960
Speaker 1: not just among conservatives, but even among liberals, where we

725
00:37:44,000 --> 00:37:47,800
Speaker 1: would accept a criminalization of people based upon the substance

726
00:37:47,840 --> 00:37:49,920
Speaker 1: they were putting in their body when we were when

727
00:37:49,920 --> 00:37:52,879
Speaker 1: when liberals were abandoning this on all other fronts. Are

728
00:37:52,920 --> 00:37:55,279
Speaker 1: you with me on this? I'm with you. This is

729
00:37:55,280 --> 00:37:58,480
Speaker 1: not an area of disagreement necessarily. Uh and and Druggism

730
00:37:58,560 --> 00:38:01,520
Speaker 1: of course, that kind of describe military attitude grew out

731
00:38:01,560 --> 00:38:05,120
Speaker 1: of the drug War and a hundred years of propaganda

732
00:38:05,400 --> 00:38:09,279
Speaker 1: stigmatizing drug use and people who use drugs, even as

733
00:38:09,320 --> 00:38:12,359
Speaker 1: the whole country swelled alcohol and smoked cigarettes. I think

734
00:38:12,400 --> 00:38:16,600
Speaker 1: cigarette is the worst and most destructive drug. You know

735
00:38:17,160 --> 00:38:19,759
Speaker 1: that that that that's always for me a big hang up.

736
00:38:19,800 --> 00:38:21,760
Speaker 1: Like the point of smoking a joint isn't to smoke,

737
00:38:22,200 --> 00:38:24,960
Speaker 1: it's to stop smoking. The joint and get onto the freedoms. Right.

738
00:38:24,960 --> 00:38:26,759
Speaker 1: But I saw you say someplace like, you know, listen

739
00:38:26,760 --> 00:38:29,680
Speaker 1: to the difference here though, is that if you're gay,

740
00:38:30,040 --> 00:38:33,000
Speaker 1: lesbian or whatever, you know, even if you stop fucking,

741
00:38:33,080 --> 00:38:35,279
Speaker 1: you're still gay or lesbian. It is it is a

742
00:38:35,280 --> 00:38:38,400
Speaker 1: core identity. Where is if you're a drug user and

743
00:38:38,480 --> 00:38:41,239
Speaker 1: you stop using, you're no longer a drug user. I mean,

744
00:38:41,280 --> 00:38:43,279
Speaker 1: put aside the whole twelve step always an addicting and

745
00:38:43,440 --> 00:38:45,520
Speaker 1: put that on the side. But I don't think. I

746
00:38:45,560 --> 00:38:49,520
Speaker 1: don't think drug user is a analogous to a sexual orientation,

747
00:38:50,800 --> 00:38:52,600
Speaker 1: is it. Well, let let me press you on this,

748
00:38:52,680 --> 00:38:55,240
Speaker 1: right because and it also raises the issue of how

749
00:38:55,360 --> 00:38:59,279
Speaker 1: much stigmatization plays a role. Right. So for me, if

750
00:38:59,320 --> 00:39:02,400
Speaker 1: I think out in my own evolution from being a

751
00:39:02,480 --> 00:39:05,560
Speaker 1: kid who was totally you know, stupid on issues about

752
00:39:05,600 --> 00:39:09,480
Speaker 1: about homosexuality and what have you, and then my evolution was, well,

753
00:39:09,520 --> 00:39:11,719
Speaker 1: what this fight is basically about is getting to the

754
00:39:11,800 --> 00:39:15,120
Speaker 1: point where one sexuality is you know, no different thing

755
00:39:15,160 --> 00:39:17,960
Speaker 1: about that. Then we think about left handedness versus right handedness.

756
00:39:18,040 --> 00:39:20,319
Speaker 1: I mean, roughly the same percent of the population are

757
00:39:20,360 --> 00:39:22,879
Speaker 1: probably gay or left handed, but we don't even think

758
00:39:22,920 --> 00:39:25,680
Speaker 1: about left handedness. There's no negative thing a touched to

759
00:39:25,719 --> 00:39:30,120
Speaker 1: it at all anymore anymore exactly. And the question is, is

760
00:39:30,000 --> 00:39:33,160
Speaker 1: is I you know now in terms of as as

761
00:39:33,280 --> 00:39:36,080
Speaker 1: being gay or lesbian or even other parts of l

762
00:39:36,120 --> 00:39:39,920
Speaker 1: g B t Q become more normalized hopefully, does that

763
00:39:40,040 --> 00:39:46,000
Speaker 1: sense of identity connection to that identity become increasingly diminished. Well,

764
00:39:46,160 --> 00:39:50,640
Speaker 1: some people argue are arguing that it already has. Um.

765
00:39:50,680 --> 00:39:53,680
Speaker 1: The world is some parts of the world are less

766
00:39:53,719 --> 00:39:56,040
Speaker 1: hostile place. We've seen other parts of the world become

767
00:39:56,040 --> 00:39:58,799
Speaker 1: more hostile to queer people in reaction to the parts

768
00:39:58,800 --> 00:40:02,120
Speaker 1: of the world where there's less hostility. Um, you have

769
00:40:02,160 --> 00:40:05,680
Speaker 1: countries like Russia trying to assert its moral superiority over

770
00:40:05,680 --> 00:40:09,400
Speaker 1: the decadent West by killing gay people and queer people

771
00:40:09,440 --> 00:40:12,120
Speaker 1: and trans people and persecuting them in ways that they

772
00:40:12,160 --> 00:40:15,920
Speaker 1: weren't persecuting them twenty years ago. So individual results may

773
00:40:16,000 --> 00:40:20,840
Speaker 1: very check your geolocation before you make statements about like

774
00:40:20,880 --> 00:40:25,760
Speaker 1: how you know much better everything is for queers. The difference,

775
00:40:25,800 --> 00:40:28,799
Speaker 1: I think though, is the overwhelming majority of people are

776
00:40:28,840 --> 00:40:34,840
Speaker 1: straight like and all queer people are going to face

777
00:40:35,360 --> 00:40:39,319
Speaker 1: the heterosexual and cis gender assumption. And it's not an

778
00:40:39,360 --> 00:40:42,719
Speaker 1: irrational assumption when something's correct at the time. That's an

779
00:40:42,719 --> 00:40:44,919
Speaker 1: assumption that human beings are gonna make. Even gay human

780
00:40:44,920 --> 00:40:46,960
Speaker 1: beings are going to make those kinds of assumptions when

781
00:40:46,960 --> 00:40:49,279
Speaker 1: they're correct ninety seven percent of the time. So all

782
00:40:49,320 --> 00:40:52,239
Speaker 1: gay people, all queer people going forward, are still going

783
00:40:52,280 --> 00:40:53,880
Speaker 1: to have to come out, are still going to have

784
00:40:53,960 --> 00:40:58,919
Speaker 1: to push away the assumption that was made about their

785
00:40:58,920 --> 00:41:05,040
Speaker 1: sexual orientation or gender identity and assert themselves as gay, lesbian, buyer,

786
00:41:05,120 --> 00:41:06,680
Speaker 1: trans in a way that a straight person doesn't have

787
00:41:06,680 --> 00:41:11,239
Speaker 1: to assert themselves is straight because the default identity that

788
00:41:11,440 --> 00:41:16,440
Speaker 1: the presumed identity assumption fit And wasn't you know, a

789
00:41:16,480 --> 00:41:19,520
Speaker 1: hair shirt like it was for us. And when it

790
00:41:19,560 --> 00:41:23,160
Speaker 1: comes to drug use, don't we all use drugs? When

791
00:41:23,160 --> 00:41:25,080
Speaker 1: I go to the pot shop, it is literally three

792
00:41:25,080 --> 00:41:27,719
Speaker 1: blocks away from my house in the city, where I

793
00:41:27,800 --> 00:41:29,560
Speaker 1: used to smoke a little weed on my back porch

794
00:41:29,640 --> 00:41:31,800
Speaker 1: and worry about a neighbor calling the cops and the

795
00:41:31,840 --> 00:41:34,279
Speaker 1: cops coming, which was in a rational worry. I'm a

796
00:41:34,280 --> 00:41:37,919
Speaker 1: white guy in a white neighborhood predominantly, and the cops

797
00:41:37,920 --> 00:41:39,200
Speaker 1: are not going to come arrest me in my porch.

798
00:41:39,239 --> 00:41:40,919
Speaker 1: But it's still played in the back of my mind

799
00:41:41,040 --> 00:41:43,560
Speaker 1: because I have worst case scenario disorder. And now I

800
00:41:43,600 --> 00:41:46,080
Speaker 1: walked to the pot shop. I don't see twenty one

801
00:41:46,120 --> 00:41:48,759
Speaker 1: year olds in there. I see people my age in there.

802
00:41:48,960 --> 00:41:51,200
Speaker 1: You know, I mean your your state. Washington State was

803
00:41:51,239 --> 00:41:53,279
Speaker 1: the first state to legalize marijuana. Now a third of

804
00:41:53,280 --> 00:41:55,440
Speaker 1: the states that a little more had done so. But

805
00:41:55,560 --> 00:41:58,080
Speaker 1: you know, we're basically talking about two countries out of

806
00:41:58,120 --> 00:42:00,839
Speaker 1: two hundred, and we're talking about the Russias and others

807
00:42:00,880 --> 00:42:04,200
Speaker 1: of the world, which demonizes not just gays and lesbians,

808
00:42:04,239 --> 00:42:07,200
Speaker 1: but also demonizes users of other drugs. And there are

809
00:42:07,239 --> 00:42:10,440
Speaker 1: ways in which alcohol is to other drugs, the way

810
00:42:10,520 --> 00:42:14,439
Speaker 1: being straight is to other types of sexuality or sexual identity. Yeah, yeah,

811
00:42:14,480 --> 00:42:16,160
Speaker 1: that's true. I think that's true. And the other thing

812
00:42:16,160 --> 00:42:18,040
Speaker 1: I remember because there was this period in the early

813
00:42:18,080 --> 00:42:20,680
Speaker 1: two thousands when all of a sudden, basically the anti

814
00:42:20,719 --> 00:42:22,839
Speaker 1: retroviral drugs that come along, and the people have been

815
00:42:22,960 --> 00:42:26,239
Speaker 1: leaders in the HIV AIDS struggle, they were all looking

816
00:42:26,280 --> 00:42:28,399
Speaker 1: for something new, and many of them ended up working

817
00:42:28,440 --> 00:42:30,600
Speaker 1: for me on drug policy reform. They it was another

818
00:42:30,600 --> 00:42:33,880
Speaker 1: social justice issue. It was where there were these ongoing issues,

819
00:42:34,000 --> 00:42:37,799
Speaker 1: and so I would push this analogy between gay rights

820
00:42:37,840 --> 00:42:40,759
Speaker 1: and drug post reform, between issues of personal autonomy on

821
00:42:40,840 --> 00:42:44,360
Speaker 1: these things identity, And I know it made some of

822
00:42:44,400 --> 00:42:47,680
Speaker 1: my gay colleagues uncomfortable, right that that this was something

823
00:42:47,719 --> 00:42:51,080
Speaker 1: that somehow identity as a drug consumer was not of

824
00:42:51,160 --> 00:42:53,160
Speaker 1: the same level. And then I would kind of point out,

825
00:42:53,200 --> 00:42:55,399
Speaker 1: I'd say, you know, think about it this way. If

826
00:42:55,440 --> 00:42:58,920
Speaker 1: you're gay, to get criminalized, your moralists have to be

827
00:42:59,000 --> 00:43:02,200
Speaker 1: caught in the act. Right legally speaking, twenty years ago,

828
00:43:02,600 --> 00:43:04,799
Speaker 1: with drugs, you didn't need to be caught in the

829
00:43:04,840 --> 00:43:07,719
Speaker 1: act of consuming. You just needed to be caught in possession.

830
00:43:08,200 --> 00:43:10,520
Speaker 1: With drugs, you could be drug tested for what you

831
00:43:10,560 --> 00:43:12,560
Speaker 1: did two days ago, four days of six days ago,

832
00:43:12,719 --> 00:43:15,520
Speaker 1: but you cannot be gay tested in the workplace, right, Yeah.

833
00:43:15,600 --> 00:43:17,239
Speaker 1: You know, we keep getting to my brother and I

834
00:43:17,280 --> 00:43:20,120
Speaker 1: call it when we're in violent agreement instead of violent disagreement.

835
00:43:20,360 --> 00:43:22,839
Speaker 1: We keep landing in a place of violent agreement. Gay

836
00:43:22,840 --> 00:43:25,719
Speaker 1: people who can't see the parallel, you know, it's not

837
00:43:25,840 --> 00:43:29,680
Speaker 1: it's never exact, but the parallel between being you know,

838
00:43:29,719 --> 00:43:31,239
Speaker 1: we used to get thrown in jail for what we

839
00:43:31,280 --> 00:43:34,320
Speaker 1: put in our mouths. That there are people in jail

840
00:43:34,440 --> 00:43:37,280
Speaker 1: for what for a substance they wanted to consume for you,

841
00:43:37,280 --> 00:43:39,560
Speaker 1: you know, for some guy, poor motherfucker arrested in a

842
00:43:39,600 --> 00:43:42,000
Speaker 1: park in l A thirty years ago it was semen.

843
00:43:42,560 --> 00:43:44,680
Speaker 1: And if some buddies getting arrested and thrown in jail

844
00:43:44,760 --> 00:43:46,640
Speaker 1: right now because they want to put a joint between

845
00:43:46,640 --> 00:43:50,160
Speaker 1: their lips, there's a parallel. I don't think it's around identity.

846
00:43:50,200 --> 00:43:54,480
Speaker 1: I think it's around behavior, desire, you know, the desired effect, right,

847
00:43:54,640 --> 00:43:57,800
Speaker 1: but also the ecstasy maybe like the ecstasy of sucking

848
00:43:57,840 --> 00:44:00,960
Speaker 1: something dude on in the park X to see like

849
00:44:01,040 --> 00:44:04,920
Speaker 1: that human desire for that kind of transcendence and sexuality

850
00:44:04,920 --> 00:44:08,520
Speaker 1: and sexual acts are one way to transcend death, transcend

851
00:44:08,520 --> 00:44:11,440
Speaker 1: the moment. Drugs are another way. You know. It reminds

852
00:44:11,440 --> 00:44:14,680
Speaker 1: me of gay people who can't see that anti choice

853
00:44:16,040 --> 00:44:20,240
Speaker 1: laws that criminalize women's control of their own reproductive systems

854
00:44:20,280 --> 00:44:23,080
Speaker 1: are in the same basket with laws that criminalized our

855
00:44:23,120 --> 00:44:26,840
Speaker 1: expression of sexual desire. To telling people what they can

856
00:44:26,920 --> 00:44:28,760
Speaker 1: and can't do with their body, it's the state taking

857
00:44:28,800 --> 00:44:35,120
Speaker 1: control of your body. Uh. And some years ago, one

858
00:44:35,160 --> 00:44:38,239
Speaker 1: of our first allies in Congress, who is Barney Frank, right,

859
00:44:38,320 --> 00:44:41,640
Speaker 1: the first openly gay member of Congress, and we're talking

860
00:44:41,680 --> 00:44:44,080
Speaker 1: about marijuana reform or talking a little bitout gay rights.

861
00:44:44,080 --> 00:44:47,120
Speaker 1: And as I'm leaving, I say, you know, Barney, I

862
00:44:47,120 --> 00:44:50,880
Speaker 1: mean gay rights, drug reform. I mean, it really boils

863
00:44:50,920 --> 00:44:53,280
Speaker 1: down the same principle that nobody deserves to be punished

864
00:44:53,280 --> 00:44:55,279
Speaker 1: what they put in their body, whether it's a cock

865
00:44:55,400 --> 00:44:58,840
Speaker 1: or a joint. And how did he react. He smiled,

866
00:44:58,920 --> 00:45:01,000
Speaker 1: He got it, you know, because I mean, you know,

867
00:45:01,000 --> 00:45:03,000
Speaker 1: he's a smart guy, and it was it was obvious.

868
00:45:03,400 --> 00:45:07,719
Speaker 1: You can always find the tiny percentage of gay land

869
00:45:07,760 --> 00:45:11,760
Speaker 1: that's offended by anything. There's been some writing comparing the

870
00:45:11,800 --> 00:45:15,799
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen pandemic to the HIV AIDS pandemic, and there

871
00:45:15,800 --> 00:45:19,600
Speaker 1: are eerie parallels. I lived through the HIV AIDS pandemic

872
00:45:19,920 --> 00:45:22,120
Speaker 1: I came out, or the crisis. You know, it's still

873
00:45:22,160 --> 00:45:24,600
Speaker 1: with a million people died of AIDS last year. I

874
00:45:24,640 --> 00:45:27,560
Speaker 1: came out in eighty and then AIDS came out in

875
00:45:29,080 --> 00:45:32,560
Speaker 1: and you know, people talking about you know, antibodies and

876
00:45:32,560 --> 00:45:36,600
Speaker 1: whether they're negative or positive, and risk and harm reduction

877
00:45:36,800 --> 00:45:38,920
Speaker 1: and how to have sex in a pandemic, like, all

878
00:45:38,960 --> 00:45:43,200
Speaker 1: of these things have been terribly triggering for me in

879
00:45:43,280 --> 00:45:46,440
Speaker 1: a not in a trauma sense, just like throwing me

880
00:45:46,520 --> 00:45:49,759
Speaker 1: back into moments of well, I guess in a trauma sense,

881
00:45:49,800 --> 00:45:53,960
Speaker 1: fear and panic around HIV and yet some gay people.

882
00:45:54,760 --> 00:45:57,400
Speaker 1: And I've noticed that when I like see gay people

883
00:45:57,480 --> 00:46:01,120
Speaker 1: being very angry about these comparisons, I'll go and look

884
00:46:01,200 --> 00:46:05,480
Speaker 1: at their social media profiles and their thirty mm and

885
00:46:05,520 --> 00:46:08,320
Speaker 1: then you see gay guys like me. You see Andrew Sullivan,

886
00:46:08,400 --> 00:46:12,320
Speaker 1: who's very controversial, has written some very moving things about

887
00:46:12,440 --> 00:46:15,080
Speaker 1: his experiences as an HIV positive man in the pandemic

888
00:46:15,239 --> 00:46:18,240
Speaker 1: then compared to the pandemic now and drawing those parallels.

889
00:46:18,280 --> 00:46:20,240
Speaker 1: And he's also reading some very good stuff about drugs

890
00:46:20,280 --> 00:46:22,480
Speaker 1: actually as well. Yeah, do you see older gay men

891
00:46:22,520 --> 00:46:25,360
Speaker 1: and gay people who lived through it get it, and

892
00:46:25,360 --> 00:46:28,920
Speaker 1: the gay people taking offense that anyone would compare. You know,

893
00:46:29,160 --> 00:46:31,640
Speaker 1: the whole government kicked into action about this pandemic in

894
00:46:31,640 --> 00:46:34,040
Speaker 1: a way they didn't about HV. Yeah, that's absolutely true.

895
00:46:34,320 --> 00:46:38,560
Speaker 1: The response was very different. A lot of these echoes

896
00:46:39,320 --> 00:46:43,600
Speaker 1: are there, though, and they're very evocative for those of

897
00:46:43,640 --> 00:46:47,640
Speaker 1: us who lived through the AIDS crisis. You know, it's funny,

898
00:46:47,640 --> 00:46:49,680
Speaker 1: I feel little bit like we're talking like to you know,

899
00:46:49,680 --> 00:46:52,400
Speaker 1: the Yiddish expression is all the cocker's, you know, old farts,

900
00:46:52,440 --> 00:46:55,279
Speaker 1: you know, but I mean, I mean the senses. There

901
00:46:55,600 --> 00:46:58,200
Speaker 1: is this thing. It's like I look at my I

902
00:46:58,200 --> 00:47:00,560
Speaker 1: would look at my younger staff, and they were in

903
00:47:00,600 --> 00:47:03,239
Speaker 1: first grade when marijuana was getting legalized. It maybe not

904
00:47:03,280 --> 00:47:06,319
Speaker 1: even born when marian's getting legalized for medical purposes, and

905
00:47:06,440 --> 00:47:08,880
Speaker 1: they were in middle school or something when marijuana was

906
00:47:08,880 --> 00:47:11,280
Speaker 1: getting legalized in Washington, Colorado, and they have no idea

907
00:47:11,320 --> 00:47:13,960
Speaker 1: of the struggles that went on before that, right, And

908
00:47:14,080 --> 00:47:16,120
Speaker 1: the same thing on harm reduction type stuff. And obviously

909
00:47:16,160 --> 00:47:19,040
Speaker 1: you must feel the same thing about gay rights, where younger,

910
00:47:19,080 --> 00:47:22,160
Speaker 1: you know, LGBT people have no idea what the stigmatization

911
00:47:22,200 --> 00:47:24,840
Speaker 1: demonization was like before. And it's the same way in

912
00:47:24,880 --> 00:47:27,479
Speaker 1: which older civil rights leaders sometimes go, oh, young people

913
00:47:27,520 --> 00:47:29,600
Speaker 1: don't get what it was like before or what happened.

914
00:47:29,640 --> 00:47:31,440
Speaker 1: You know what I've said to some of my younger

915
00:47:31,440 --> 00:47:34,000
Speaker 1: gay friends. You know, at the Pride parade, the P

916
00:47:34,160 --> 00:47:35,840
Speaker 1: flag will come down the street, parents and friends of

917
00:47:35,880 --> 00:47:38,880
Speaker 1: lesbians and gays. I don't think it'd stands for that anymore,

918
00:47:38,920 --> 00:47:42,680
Speaker 1: because it's not just lesbians and gays anymore. And I'll

919
00:47:42,680 --> 00:47:44,279
Speaker 1: point out to them that P flag comes down the

920
00:47:44,320 --> 00:47:47,879
Speaker 1: street now, and nobody cries when p flag came down

921
00:47:47,880 --> 00:47:51,000
Speaker 1: the street. When I was twenty and at your eighteen

922
00:47:51,000 --> 00:47:54,360
Speaker 1: and at my first Pride parade, people bald because it

923
00:47:54,440 --> 00:47:56,960
Speaker 1: was the exception to have parents that loved you. It

924
00:47:57,040 --> 00:47:59,640
Speaker 1: was the exception to have parents that hadn't rejected you.

925
00:48:00,600 --> 00:48:03,320
Speaker 1: And to see parents marching with their gay kids, to

926
00:48:03,360 --> 00:48:07,000
Speaker 1: see parents who loved their gay kids was just gutting

927
00:48:07,040 --> 00:48:10,600
Speaker 1: because for most people in the crowd, they didn't have that.

928
00:48:10,960 --> 00:48:13,680
Speaker 1: And I point that out to young, my young gay friends,

929
00:48:13,719 --> 00:48:15,560
Speaker 1: like when I've been to Pride pards with them, You're

930
00:48:15,600 --> 00:48:20,960
Speaker 1: not crying. Please be aware of what that means, because

931
00:48:21,120 --> 00:48:23,000
Speaker 1: I can't even talk about people like I'm crying right now.

932
00:48:23,000 --> 00:48:25,560
Speaker 1: I can't even talk about people like without getting weepy,

933
00:48:25,640 --> 00:48:28,440
Speaker 1: because you know, when I came out to my mom,

934
00:48:28,480 --> 00:48:30,520
Speaker 1: who I loved and who loved me, I had a

935
00:48:30,560 --> 00:48:33,320
Speaker 1: friend waiting on my porch because there was no cell phones,

936
00:48:33,360 --> 00:48:36,000
Speaker 1: there was no texting people in an emergency. I had

937
00:48:36,000 --> 00:48:38,040
Speaker 1: a friend waiting on my porch whose apartment I could

938
00:48:38,040 --> 00:48:40,279
Speaker 1: go live in with him on his couch if I

939
00:48:40,280 --> 00:48:44,520
Speaker 1: got thrown out that night. And now people come out

940
00:48:44,560 --> 00:48:47,960
Speaker 1: to their parents and it's just it's exceptional when the

941
00:48:48,000 --> 00:48:51,400
Speaker 1: parents reject them. It's shocking, like news stories get written

942
00:48:51,440 --> 00:48:54,000
Speaker 1: about that. No, it isn't that great that they take

943
00:48:54,040 --> 00:48:56,200
Speaker 1: it for granted because now they're fighting too. Like it

944
00:48:56,280 --> 00:48:58,879
Speaker 1: means we won, It means that we've been this our

945
00:48:58,960 --> 00:49:01,680
Speaker 1: generation has been the toorious. It means we won. And

946
00:49:01,719 --> 00:49:03,680
Speaker 1: when you win movements, what do they do? They move

947
00:49:03,760 --> 00:49:06,120
Speaker 1: on to what hasn't been one yet. That's what they're

948
00:49:06,120 --> 00:49:09,120
Speaker 1: supposed to do. You know, during the marriage equality fight

949
00:49:09,280 --> 00:49:12,520
Speaker 1: that I was very involved in, you know, people would say, oh,

950
00:49:12,560 --> 00:49:15,319
Speaker 1: the gay rights movement was supposed to be about liberation

951
00:49:15,640 --> 00:49:19,160
Speaker 1: and sexual freedom and not marriage. And I would say

952
00:49:19,160 --> 00:49:21,600
Speaker 1: to them, Okay, well we have secured the right to

953
00:49:21,840 --> 00:49:24,360
Speaker 1: suck a million decks and wear an appalling outfit to

954
00:49:24,440 --> 00:49:27,720
Speaker 1: the bride bread without getting arrested. Yeah, yeah, job done.

955
00:49:28,200 --> 00:49:29,919
Speaker 1: But the movement has moved on to what we don't

956
00:49:29,960 --> 00:49:33,880
Speaker 1: have yet, which is marriage. Yeah, exactly. And you know

957
00:49:33,960 --> 00:49:35,279
Speaker 1: it's it's I mean, I look at it with the

958
00:49:35,280 --> 00:49:38,880
Speaker 1: marijuana legalization victories. I mean, you know, until almost yes year,

959
00:49:38,920 --> 00:49:41,760
Speaker 1: there's still seven hundred thousand people in America being arrested

960
00:49:41,760 --> 00:49:44,759
Speaker 1: for marijuana, mostly possession and disproportionate young men of color

961
00:49:44,800 --> 00:49:47,799
Speaker 1: and all that. Now that we're legalizing, the stories that

962
00:49:47,920 --> 00:49:50,000
Speaker 1: bring me to the same tears that you had when

963
00:49:50,000 --> 00:49:52,480
Speaker 1: that flag was waving was when I hear about people

964
00:49:52,520 --> 00:49:54,560
Speaker 1: who are being suddenly lead out of jail or dismissed

965
00:49:54,600 --> 00:49:58,280
Speaker 1: from court or having the records expunged because now they're free.

966
00:49:58,600 --> 00:50:00,799
Speaker 1: And my own personal experience that literally, I mean, we're

967
00:50:00,800 --> 00:50:03,239
Speaker 1: having this conversation now in early May. Literally just a

968
00:50:03,239 --> 00:50:05,399
Speaker 1: few days ago, I went with an old buddy, right,

969
00:50:05,600 --> 00:50:07,759
Speaker 1: and we were taking a walk in Central Park and

970
00:50:07,920 --> 00:50:10,239
Speaker 1: New York has just changed the law so that you

971
00:50:10,280 --> 00:50:13,360
Speaker 1: can smoke a joint openly anywhere you can smoke a cigarette.

972
00:50:13,360 --> 00:50:15,080
Speaker 1: First day in the country to do that. Right now,

973
00:50:15,080 --> 00:50:17,480
Speaker 1: you're not allowed to smoke a cigarette in Central Park,

974
00:50:17,520 --> 00:50:19,640
Speaker 1: which means you can't smoke a joint. So we walked

975
00:50:19,680 --> 00:50:23,439
Speaker 1: outside Central Park. We're sitting on a bench on Fifth Avenue, right,

976
00:50:23,840 --> 00:50:26,600
Speaker 1: and I said, let's light up, and there's a cop

977
00:50:26,680 --> 00:50:29,239
Speaker 1: sitting across the street in his car. And my friend

978
00:50:29,239 --> 00:50:32,359
Speaker 1: goes Ethan, there's a cop there. We can't I said, Howard,

979
00:50:32,400 --> 00:50:35,319
Speaker 1: this is the meaning of freedom. We can light up

980
00:50:35,360 --> 00:50:37,799
Speaker 1: this joint with a police officer sitting in the car

981
00:50:37,840 --> 00:50:41,520
Speaker 1: across the street and we are totally legal. And that

982
00:50:41,680 --> 00:50:44,400
Speaker 1: feeling that, you know, what we were fundamentally fighting for

983
00:50:44,719 --> 00:50:48,800
Speaker 1: was freedom right is something that I hope people just

984
00:50:48,880 --> 00:50:51,280
Speaker 1: keep hanging on to. That. There was a citizen initiative

985
00:50:51,280 --> 00:50:56,920
Speaker 1: in Seattle to make marijuana crimes the lowest law enforcement priority.

986
00:50:57,040 --> 00:50:59,080
Speaker 1: So if the police were arresting more people for pot

987
00:50:59,120 --> 00:51:02,840
Speaker 1: than for jaywalking, the police were breaking the law. And

988
00:51:02,880 --> 00:51:06,200
Speaker 1: it got onto the ballot and every city council member,

989
00:51:06,239 --> 00:51:08,759
Speaker 1: the mayor, the governor was a Democrat. I think at

990
00:51:08,800 --> 00:51:11,920
Speaker 1: the time, the entire political stalishment said vote no. It

991
00:51:12,000 --> 00:51:16,640
Speaker 1: passed by. It was really the trial balloon for decriminalization

992
00:51:16,680 --> 00:51:20,200
Speaker 1: in Washington State. That's really true. Well, remember who was

993
00:51:20,040 --> 00:51:22,359
Speaker 1: It was a young guy named Dominic Holden, right, who

994
00:51:22,400 --> 00:51:24,719
Speaker 1: was your colleague at the newspaper The Stranger and my

995
00:51:24,800 --> 00:51:27,800
Speaker 1: ally and the policy reform movement, and he pioneered this idea.

996
00:51:27,840 --> 00:51:30,000
Speaker 1: We were already moving forward a medical marri Wanna that

997
00:51:30,080 --> 00:51:32,799
Speaker 1: was changing one element of it. The racial justice piece

998
00:51:32,800 --> 00:51:35,520
Speaker 1: had not yet really emerged. And here out of Seattle

999
00:51:35,600 --> 00:51:38,480
Speaker 1: comes as beautiful measures basically saying to the cops, we

1000
00:51:38,520 --> 00:51:40,920
Speaker 1: can't force you but we're telling you this should now

1001
00:51:40,960 --> 00:51:43,840
Speaker 1: be the lowest priority of enforcement. It was a big breakthrough.

1002
00:51:44,400 --> 00:51:48,080
Speaker 1: And then when it was on the ballot statewide to decriminalize,

1003
00:51:48,120 --> 00:51:52,680
Speaker 1: to to legalize relates, almost every I think political elected

1004
00:51:52,680 --> 00:51:58,080
Speaker 1: official in Blue Washington said vote now, and overwhelmingly people

1005
00:51:58,120 --> 00:52:01,640
Speaker 1: voted yes. And I was just thinking about that when

1006
00:52:01,680 --> 00:52:04,480
Speaker 1: I was sixty two passed and came into effect, because

1007
00:52:04,960 --> 00:52:07,440
Speaker 1: you know that I've mentioned earlier, like having into my

1008
00:52:07,480 --> 00:52:11,000
Speaker 1: backyard and worried, like what if a neighbor smells this

1009
00:52:11,200 --> 00:52:13,319
Speaker 1: and calls the cops and their board and they want

1010
00:52:13,360 --> 00:52:15,800
Speaker 1: to like make it seem like marijuana enforcement isn't just

1011
00:52:15,840 --> 00:52:17,520
Speaker 1: something that they do to black kids, and so they

1012
00:52:17,520 --> 00:52:19,279
Speaker 1: make a point of driving into my neighbor restue me.

1013
00:52:19,600 --> 00:52:23,040
Speaker 1: And I would have those anxieties. And it was the

1014
00:52:23,440 --> 00:52:26,240
Speaker 1: feeling of like smoking pot in public after that past

1015
00:52:26,960 --> 00:52:32,399
Speaker 1: and just feeling free was tremendous. I gotta say that

1016
00:52:32,480 --> 00:52:34,960
Speaker 1: I think one of the missing and I've argued this,

1017
00:52:35,000 --> 00:52:39,520
Speaker 1: I've written things about this. I get so angry at

1018
00:52:39,800 --> 00:52:41,920
Speaker 1: elected officials when they say it's no longer a crime,

1019
00:52:42,200 --> 00:52:44,680
Speaker 1: it's not not a crime to possess pot. Now, therefore,

1020
00:52:45,600 --> 00:52:49,680
Speaker 1: these people with records for possession. These records should be cleared.

1021
00:52:50,360 --> 00:52:53,000
Speaker 1: It's not a crime to sell it anymore either, And

1022
00:52:53,040 --> 00:52:55,040
Speaker 1: yet there are people in jail for selling it still

1023
00:52:55,960 --> 00:52:57,960
Speaker 1: who sold it when it was a crime, just like

1024
00:52:58,000 --> 00:52:59,759
Speaker 1: there are people in jailford possessing it when it was

1025
00:52:59,760 --> 00:53:03,319
Speaker 1: a on. And we need to the movement and you know,

1026
00:53:03,440 --> 00:53:04,719
Speaker 1: you hear more about this now and I think they're

1027
00:53:04,719 --> 00:53:07,600
Speaker 1: doing this. New York needs to argue for expunging the

1028
00:53:07,600 --> 00:53:10,759
Speaker 1: records of people who had dealing convictions. I mean, Dan,

1029
00:53:10,800 --> 00:53:12,800
Speaker 1: you know, the fact of the matter is when that initiative,

1030
00:53:12,840 --> 00:53:14,799
Speaker 1: I mean, my organization was not involved in drafting the

1031
00:53:14,840 --> 00:53:17,360
Speaker 1: initiative in Washington State that year. But the fact of

1032
00:53:17,360 --> 00:53:19,919
Speaker 1: the matter is the first generation typically are the first

1033
00:53:19,920 --> 00:53:23,320
Speaker 1: generation of these new laws are typically more restrictive because

1034
00:53:23,320 --> 00:53:25,600
Speaker 1: public opinion is not advanced as far. So we could

1035
00:53:25,600 --> 00:53:28,239
Speaker 1: not put those expungement provisions because that might have been

1036
00:53:28,280 --> 00:53:30,759
Speaker 1: a no go for people who otherwise vote for it.

1037
00:53:30,920 --> 00:53:33,480
Speaker 1: There were provisions about continuing to allow drug testing, which

1038
00:53:33,480 --> 00:53:36,200
Speaker 1: were now able to really restrict. In the later laws,

1039
00:53:36,239 --> 00:53:38,759
Speaker 1: there were issues about where the tax revenue went. So

1040
00:53:38,840 --> 00:53:40,720
Speaker 1: I think it's it's the issue where the old, older

1041
00:53:40,760 --> 00:53:43,719
Speaker 1: generation of these laws are the pioneering ones, but they

1042
00:53:43,719 --> 00:53:46,120
Speaker 1: only can go so far because the public has only

1043
00:53:46,160 --> 00:53:48,320
Speaker 1: gone so far. Now, in two thirds of the public,

1044
00:53:48,760 --> 00:53:50,920
Speaker 1: um is in favor. Um, you can push it a

1045
00:53:50,960 --> 00:53:52,920
Speaker 1: lot further. So listen, last day, so I'll talk to

1046
00:53:52,920 --> 00:53:56,040
Speaker 1: you about So. I mean you you and your husband

1047
00:53:56,120 --> 00:53:59,160
Speaker 1: have a kid who's went now in his early twenties. Yeah,

1048
00:53:59,360 --> 00:54:01,719
Speaker 1: and you've had to talk not just about sex, but

1049
00:54:01,760 --> 00:54:04,719
Speaker 1: about drugs with him growing up. So how did that

1050
00:54:04,760 --> 00:54:10,000
Speaker 1: conversation evolve? Um? Uh, if I can ask, uh, you know,

1051
00:54:10,080 --> 00:54:12,160
Speaker 1: this is something I can't talk about. My son doesn't

1052
00:54:12,239 --> 00:54:14,239
Speaker 1: like me to talk about him. Yeah, ten years ago

1053
00:54:14,280 --> 00:54:16,040
Speaker 1: he told us he was off the record, and I

1054
00:54:16,600 --> 00:54:18,879
Speaker 1: I have to respect that. Yeah. Yeah, Yeah. My daughter

1055
00:54:18,920 --> 00:54:20,680
Speaker 1: is saying the same thing about a bunch of things.

1056
00:54:20,800 --> 00:54:24,680
Speaker 1: But she does understand the basic ideas that that essentially

1057
00:54:24,800 --> 00:54:29,200
Speaker 1: harm reduction visa v. Drug education really models on sex education, right.

1058
00:54:29,320 --> 00:54:31,840
Speaker 1: It's accepting the fact that people are going to do something,

1059
00:54:31,880 --> 00:54:34,279
Speaker 1: engage in sex, engage in drug use, and that one

1060
00:54:34,280 --> 00:54:36,440
Speaker 1: way or another you have to keep them safe. And

1061
00:54:36,480 --> 00:54:38,040
Speaker 1: the other point I'd make is that you know, young

1062
00:54:38,080 --> 00:54:41,239
Speaker 1: people typically lose their quote unquote drug virginity before they

1063
00:54:41,320 --> 00:54:44,319
Speaker 1: use their sexual virginity right, they get drunk, they get high,

1064
00:54:44,320 --> 00:54:46,759
Speaker 1: they do this, they use their friends real and oftentimes

1065
00:54:46,760 --> 00:54:48,880
Speaker 1: before they ever get laid, you know, And so that

1066
00:54:48,920 --> 00:54:52,600
Speaker 1: we better have that same sort of pragmatic advice going forward.

1067
00:54:52,880 --> 00:54:56,080
Speaker 1: We certainly had conversations with him, they didn't always have

1068
00:54:56,239 --> 00:54:58,799
Speaker 1: the impact that we hoped that they would have. Um,

1069
00:54:58,840 --> 00:55:02,360
Speaker 1: there's a lot of addiction in my biological family and

1070
00:55:02,400 --> 00:55:04,839
Speaker 1: my you know, bio grandparents. Our son has adopted. There's

1071
00:55:04,840 --> 00:55:08,000
Speaker 1: a lot of addiction issues in his biological family, UM

1072
00:55:08,120 --> 00:55:12,480
Speaker 1: that he's had to be careful about and I've had

1073
00:55:12,520 --> 00:55:16,160
Speaker 1: to be careful about because of the hereditary component for addiction,

1074
00:55:17,520 --> 00:55:23,640
Speaker 1: the propensity for addiction. And so those weren't always easy conversations. Yeah,

1075
00:55:23,680 --> 00:55:25,120
Speaker 1: I mean have you had I mean I think we

1076
00:55:25,120 --> 00:55:27,160
Speaker 1: also didn't talk about is a issue of drug addiction

1077
00:55:27,200 --> 00:55:29,960
Speaker 1: and sex addiction and uh, I mean you obviously have

1078
00:55:30,080 --> 00:55:32,160
Speaker 1: had to give a lot of advice on your columns

1079
00:55:32,160 --> 00:55:34,279
Speaker 1: about sex addiction. And yeah, I don't. I don't think

1080
00:55:34,320 --> 00:55:38,759
Speaker 1: sex addiction is real. I think there's compulsive sexuality is

1081
00:55:38,800 --> 00:55:41,719
Speaker 1: sort of like overlaps d behavior and sexualities also sells

1082
00:55:41,760 --> 00:55:45,560
Speaker 1: destructiveness around sexuality that can attach to it very easily

1083
00:55:45,560 --> 00:55:48,960
Speaker 1: because we live in a sex negative, kink shaming, homophobic culture,

1084
00:55:49,680 --> 00:55:54,799
Speaker 1: and some people are so packed with self loathing about

1085
00:55:54,800 --> 00:55:58,720
Speaker 1: their desires that they will then punish themselves with those

1086
00:55:58,760 --> 00:56:01,880
Speaker 1: desires how they act on those desires. They believe that

1087
00:56:01,920 --> 00:56:05,600
Speaker 1: they deserve destruction for you know, who they are sexually,

1088
00:56:06,200 --> 00:56:08,800
Speaker 1: and they will throw themselves on those rocks, which is possible,

1089
00:56:08,800 --> 00:56:11,400
Speaker 1: particularly if you're gay. You know, you can fund yourself

1090
00:56:11,440 --> 00:56:16,040
Speaker 1: to death of your game. Um, you know everything that

1091
00:56:16,440 --> 00:56:19,520
Speaker 1: the excesses of gay male culture that sometimes straight people

1092
00:56:19,520 --> 00:56:22,480
Speaker 1: assume is something we all do that that's not about

1093
00:56:22,480 --> 00:56:26,000
Speaker 1: being gay, that's about being a man. If there was

1094
00:56:26,040 --> 00:56:30,120
Speaker 1: a you know, a bath house in every city in

1095
00:56:30,160 --> 00:56:32,880
Speaker 1: the country where women showed up wanting to have anonymous

1096
00:56:32,880 --> 00:56:35,880
Speaker 1: sexual intercourse with heterosexual men that they would never see again,

1097
00:56:36,520 --> 00:56:39,399
Speaker 1: straight men would go there in droves. A bath house

1098
00:56:39,440 --> 00:56:43,040
Speaker 1: is a whorehouse staff by volunteers, as I've frequently parously said,

1099
00:56:43,160 --> 00:56:45,960
Speaker 1: And there's no parallel in in gay land or in

1100
00:56:46,000 --> 00:56:49,800
Speaker 1: straight land. And we can't we can't discount the zap

1101
00:56:49,920 --> 00:56:51,640
Speaker 1: that can be placed on people's heads about who they

1102
00:56:51,640 --> 00:56:53,320
Speaker 1: are sexually and not just gay people, like there's a

1103
00:56:53,320 --> 00:56:56,440
Speaker 1: lot of straight people struggle with shame as well, postically

1104
00:56:56,440 --> 00:56:59,919
Speaker 1: people from religious backgrounds, but almost everyone who is head

1105
00:57:00,040 --> 00:57:03,640
Speaker 1: link the sex addiction models sex addiction therapy. It's a

1106
00:57:03,680 --> 00:57:07,239
Speaker 1: way of secularizing a religious argument about sex and sexuality.

1107
00:57:07,560 --> 00:57:10,400
Speaker 1: And most of the people pushing it are religious, and

1108
00:57:10,400 --> 00:57:14,080
Speaker 1: most of the organizations pushing it are religious, and they

1109
00:57:14,080 --> 00:57:16,800
Speaker 1: want people to feel conflict about their desires. And you know,

1110
00:57:16,960 --> 00:57:19,360
Speaker 1: you see guys who are like looking at a little

1111
00:57:19,400 --> 00:57:21,680
Speaker 1: porn and the only way that they can get out

1112
00:57:21,680 --> 00:57:23,640
Speaker 1: of trouble with the wife and the congregation is to

1113
00:57:23,640 --> 00:57:26,120
Speaker 1: claim that they're addicted to porn. The evils of porn,

1114
00:57:26,800 --> 00:57:28,680
Speaker 1: And now we have a movement to ban porn and

1115
00:57:28,720 --> 00:57:32,400
Speaker 1: declare porn of public health menace because it's so addictive

1116
00:57:32,400 --> 00:57:34,760
Speaker 1: and destructive and it's just not There's some people who

1117
00:57:34,800 --> 00:57:38,080
Speaker 1: will spend twelve hours in front of a computer masturbating

1118
00:57:38,120 --> 00:57:42,600
Speaker 1: until their bloody. That person has a problem. Porn is

1119
00:57:42,720 --> 00:57:45,720
Speaker 1: what they're punishing themselves with. But porn is a neutral

1120
00:57:45,760 --> 00:57:49,200
Speaker 1: actor because millions of other people at the same time

1121
00:57:49,280 --> 00:57:51,520
Speaker 1: can like enjoy a little porn and push away from

1122
00:57:51,520 --> 00:57:53,920
Speaker 1: the computer. The problem isn't the porn, Well, you know,

1123
00:57:53,960 --> 00:57:55,840
Speaker 1: I like, well, so where you started in this by

1124
00:57:55,880 --> 00:57:59,680
Speaker 1: saying that you essentially reject the term sex addiction, and

1125
00:57:59,720 --> 00:58:02,800
Speaker 1: you know, there's a whole way of thinking about drugs

1126
00:58:02,840 --> 00:58:06,360
Speaker 1: which also rejects the term drug addiction. I mean, first

1127
00:58:06,360 --> 00:58:08,240
Speaker 1: of all, because so many people use it to mean

1128
00:58:08,360 --> 00:58:11,360
Speaker 1: so many different things. But beyond that that, when we're

1129
00:58:11,360 --> 00:58:13,840
Speaker 1: talking about whether it's sex, or whether we're talking about

1130
00:58:13,880 --> 00:58:16,680
Speaker 1: drugs or all host of things, is the quality and

1131
00:58:16,760 --> 00:58:19,880
Speaker 1: nature of that relationship, the difference between healthy relationships and

1132
00:58:20,000 --> 00:58:23,920
Speaker 1: unhealthy relationships, the difference between use and abuse. And we

1133
00:58:23,960 --> 00:58:25,680
Speaker 1: have to be very clear about that. There's difference between

1134
00:58:25,800 --> 00:58:27,640
Speaker 1: use and abuse. And when it comes to the sex

1135
00:58:27,640 --> 00:58:30,560
Speaker 1: addiction model, like, very often what people mean by sex

1136
00:58:30,560 --> 00:58:32,400
Speaker 1: addiction is someone is having more sex than I think

1137
00:58:32,440 --> 00:58:34,640
Speaker 1: that they should have or should want to have, or

1138
00:58:34,640 --> 00:58:36,800
Speaker 1: a different kind of sex than I think anybody should

1139
00:58:36,840 --> 00:58:39,560
Speaker 1: want to have. And it's about a moral judgment and

1140
00:58:39,640 --> 00:58:44,120
Speaker 1: shame and not about harm necessarily. It's possible to have

1141
00:58:44,160 --> 00:58:46,400
Speaker 1: tons of gay sex. It's possible to have multiple partners.

1142
00:58:46,480 --> 00:58:50,919
Speaker 1: It's possible to you know, be straight and swingers or

1143
00:58:51,080 --> 00:58:55,680
Speaker 1: you know, a serial monogamist or whatever and be healthy.

1144
00:58:56,600 --> 00:59:00,520
Speaker 1: It's not one woman, one man marriage, heterosexual missionary in

1145
00:59:00,520 --> 00:59:03,040
Speaker 1: the dark for life to be healthy, although anybody that

1146
00:59:03,080 --> 00:59:05,000
Speaker 1: deviates in the lightest way from that standard is in

1147
00:59:05,080 --> 00:59:07,959
Speaker 1: danger of being labeled a sex addict. Well, and there's

1148
00:59:08,000 --> 00:59:10,360
Speaker 1: also an analogy they already drug use, which is that

1149
00:59:10,440 --> 00:59:13,480
Speaker 1: one can use some drugs every single day, but if

1150
00:59:13,480 --> 00:59:15,480
Speaker 1: it's not causing a problem in your life, it's not

1151
00:59:15,600 --> 00:59:18,280
Speaker 1: really an addiction. One can use a multiplicity of different

1152
00:59:18,320 --> 00:59:21,040
Speaker 1: drugs for long periods of time for different reasons, and

1153
00:59:21,080 --> 00:59:24,360
Speaker 1: once again, it's not an addiction unless it's really causing problems.

1154
00:59:24,440 --> 00:59:26,840
Speaker 1: But can you acknowledge that there's a potential health consequence

1155
00:59:26,880 --> 00:59:30,680
Speaker 1: there to the to to do that kind of habitual

1156
00:59:30,760 --> 00:59:34,400
Speaker 1: regular use. I can acknowledge. I have written, very controversially

1157
00:59:34,400 --> 00:59:37,000
Speaker 1: for like the gays, that it is possible to suck

1158
00:59:37,040 --> 00:59:40,240
Speaker 1: too much dick, that the more men that you're having

1159
00:59:40,240 --> 00:59:42,400
Speaker 1: sex with, the more risk you're running, not just for

1160
00:59:42,560 --> 00:59:44,520
Speaker 1: s t I S, but for like Jeffrey Dahmer's and

1161
00:59:44,600 --> 00:59:47,880
Speaker 1: John Wayne Gacy's and Andrew Cananon's like the more people

1162
00:59:47,880 --> 00:59:50,919
Speaker 1: that you have sex with who don't care about you,

1163
00:59:51,040 --> 00:59:53,120
Speaker 1: they just care about the sex, the likely you're out

1164
00:59:53,160 --> 00:59:55,200
Speaker 1: to wind up in bed with someone who is going

1165
00:59:55,240 --> 00:59:58,040
Speaker 1: to harm you, right, not maybe not murder your neat you.

1166
00:59:58,160 --> 01:00:00,520
Speaker 1: But and the same thing is true in that relationship

1167
01:00:00,560 --> 01:00:03,400
Speaker 1: with a drug, I mean nicotine itself. You can be

1168
01:00:03,480 --> 01:00:05,720
Speaker 1: taking it every day all your life in a relatively

1169
01:00:05,720 --> 01:00:07,920
Speaker 1: safe way. It's not really gonna harm you. You're smoking

1170
01:00:07,960 --> 01:00:09,800
Speaker 1: a pack of cigarettes every day, there's a very good

1171
01:00:09,880 --> 01:00:12,400
Speaker 1: chance it's going to kill you. Right. Alcohol you can

1172
01:00:12,440 --> 01:00:14,680
Speaker 1: have the occasional drink, and there might be slight risk

1173
01:00:14,720 --> 01:00:17,640
Speaker 1: associated with that, especially with older women and such, but

1174
01:00:17,720 --> 01:00:19,920
Speaker 1: by and large, if you're drinking a pint a day

1175
01:00:20,000 --> 01:00:22,080
Speaker 1: or a cord a day, that could destroy your liver

1176
01:00:22,160 --> 01:00:24,320
Speaker 1: and kill you. With cocaine, you can play with it,

1177
01:00:24,360 --> 01:00:26,720
Speaker 1: but in the wrong amounts that can kill you. With opioids,

1178
01:00:26,880 --> 01:00:29,360
Speaker 1: it can become a lifelong medication for some people and

1179
01:00:29,400 --> 01:00:31,840
Speaker 1: actually enhance the quality of your life, especially if you're

1180
01:00:31,880 --> 01:00:34,160
Speaker 1: using it in a control of responsible way. But if

1181
01:00:34,160 --> 01:00:37,280
Speaker 1: you're injecting ship of unknown potency and purity, you know

1182
01:00:37,440 --> 01:00:40,080
Speaker 1: that's going to be a problem. Um psychedelics, you know

1183
01:00:40,080 --> 01:00:42,560
Speaker 1: where the benefits so much exceed the downside for so

1184
01:00:42,600 --> 01:00:45,160
Speaker 1: many people, But you do it in a stupid context.

1185
01:00:45,560 --> 01:00:47,240
Speaker 1: You know, to go back to where you start off,

1186
01:00:47,400 --> 01:00:50,400
Speaker 1: you know, not such a good idea. You can land

1187
01:00:50,440 --> 01:00:52,680
Speaker 1: up in trouble there. So it's just, I mean, the

1188
01:00:52,720 --> 01:00:57,280
Speaker 1: aggravating thing is there's no clear line that we can't draw,

1189
01:00:58,000 --> 01:01:02,040
Speaker 1: like a definite line. There are guys out there who

1190
01:01:03,040 --> 01:01:05,400
Speaker 1: can like drink or use a little bit of drugs,

1191
01:01:05,520 --> 01:01:09,280
Speaker 1: or drink more or use more drugs than someone else

1192
01:01:09,440 --> 01:01:12,720
Speaker 1: can drink or use drugs and still be healthy and functional,

1193
01:01:13,240 --> 01:01:15,760
Speaker 1: and they're fine. But there's a point at which we

1194
01:01:15,800 --> 01:01:19,320
Speaker 1: all recognize, like twelve drinks in a night, every night,

1195
01:01:19,480 --> 01:01:21,520
Speaker 1: do you have a problem? Six? Maybe you have a

1196
01:01:21,560 --> 01:01:25,840
Speaker 1: problem too, you don't have a problem. Then it's our

1197
01:01:25,880 --> 01:01:29,880
Speaker 1: inability to draw a clear line because individual results may vary.

1198
01:01:30,000 --> 01:01:34,120
Speaker 1: That make these conversations so not unproductive or unsatisfying, just

1199
01:01:34,600 --> 01:01:36,760
Speaker 1: we can never resolve them. We can never come up

1200
01:01:36,760 --> 01:01:39,520
Speaker 1: with recommended daily dose of anything. You kept breaking up

1201
01:01:39,520 --> 01:01:45,600
Speaker 1: dosage because an individual's body, their tolerance levels, what works

1202
01:01:45,640 --> 01:01:51,520
Speaker 1: for them. But but you know, at a certain point,

1203
01:01:52,640 --> 01:01:54,600
Speaker 1: we can, you know, we we reckon. We can't see

1204
01:01:54,600 --> 01:01:56,520
Speaker 1: where the line is, but we can see when someone's

1205
01:01:56,520 --> 01:02:00,560
Speaker 1: gone so far past it that it's definitely a problem. Yeah,

1206
01:02:00,600 --> 01:02:02,120
Speaker 1: when it comes to sex, when it comes to food,

1207
01:02:02,160 --> 01:02:05,720
Speaker 1: when it comes to drugs, when it comes to twitter,

1208
01:02:06,400 --> 01:02:08,480
Speaker 1: when it comes to almost everything. We can see when

1209
01:02:08,480 --> 01:02:10,040
Speaker 1: it's a problem, but we can't see quite the point

1210
01:02:10,040 --> 01:02:12,000
Speaker 1: of tips over into the problem. That's true. I mean,

1211
01:02:12,160 --> 01:02:15,800
Speaker 1: now you see as the COVID restrictions are lifting, Uh,

1212
01:02:16,040 --> 01:02:17,880
Speaker 1: do you think we're going to have this explosion of

1213
01:02:17,960 --> 01:02:20,800
Speaker 1: reckless sex and drug use coming up ahead and next

1214
01:02:20,840 --> 01:02:23,720
Speaker 1: year or two. Well, I was talking about Nicholas Kostoka's

1215
01:02:23,800 --> 01:02:26,480
Speaker 1: book last week where he's predicting that there will be

1216
01:02:26,720 --> 01:02:30,600
Speaker 1: uh an explosion of hedonism I labeled at the horring twenties.

1217
01:02:30,640 --> 01:02:34,080
Speaker 1: We'll see we're also in the midst. Other social scientists

1218
01:02:34,080 --> 01:02:37,160
Speaker 1: have documented a kind of a sex recession where more

1219
01:02:37,200 --> 01:02:40,160
Speaker 1: and more people are making their sexual debuts, as they're called.

1220
01:02:40,200 --> 01:02:43,280
Speaker 1: We are all debutantes. It's guys think about later in life.

1221
01:02:43,520 --> 01:02:45,400
Speaker 1: There's a lot of people who have had no sex

1222
01:02:45,440 --> 01:02:49,480
Speaker 1: partner in the last year on average, and that's the

1223
01:02:49,480 --> 01:02:53,880
Speaker 1: pre COVID years, uh than ever before. And so we'll see.

1224
01:02:53,960 --> 01:02:55,760
Speaker 1: I know people are desperate to get out there and

1225
01:02:55,920 --> 01:03:00,040
Speaker 1: drink strangers spit. But we'll see where the intersection of

1226
01:03:00,080 --> 01:03:03,560
Speaker 1: this excer session and this, this pent up demand comes.

1227
01:03:03,600 --> 01:03:05,320
Speaker 1: On that note, I just want to thank you. I

1228
01:03:05,440 --> 01:03:07,560
Speaker 1: love talking with you, man. This is so much fun.

1229
01:03:07,920 --> 01:03:10,120
Speaker 1: And hopefully we meet in person one of these days.

1230
01:03:10,520 --> 01:03:12,560
Speaker 1: You're welcome, and I'm glad I didn't have too many

1231
01:03:12,600 --> 01:03:15,240
Speaker 1: more quotes from my old columns thrown at me. I'm

1232
01:03:15,240 --> 01:03:16,880
Speaker 1: sure you have more. I did have a few more,

1233
01:03:16,920 --> 01:03:23,200
Speaker 1: but I said I'll leave him there, you know. Psychoactive

1234
01:03:23,440 --> 01:03:26,400
Speaker 1: is a production of I Heart Radio and Protozoa Pictures.

1235
01:03:26,800 --> 01:03:30,240
Speaker 1: It's hosted by me Ethan Naedelman. It's produced by Katcha

1236
01:03:30,320 --> 01:03:34,680
Speaker 1: Kumkova and Ben Cabrick. The executive producers are Dylan Golden,

1237
01:03:34,880 --> 01:03:39,160
Speaker 1: Ari Handel, Elizabeth Geesus and Darren Aronovski for Protozoa Pictures,

1238
01:03:39,640 --> 01:03:43,000
Speaker 1: Alice Williams and Matt Frederick for I Heart Radio and

1239
01:03:43,080 --> 01:03:47,080
Speaker 1: me Ethan Nadelman. Our music is by Ari Belusian and

1240
01:03:47,240 --> 01:03:52,560
Speaker 1: especial thanks to Abiv Brio, Sef Bianca Grimshaw and Robert Beatty.

1241
01:03:53,080 --> 01:03:55,920
Speaker 1: If you'd like to share your own stories, comments, or ideas,

1242
01:03:56,320 --> 01:03:59,800
Speaker 1: please leave us a message at eight three three seven

1243
01:04:00,000 --> 01:04:07,280
Speaker 1: of the nine sixty. That's one eight three three Psycho zero.

1244
01:04:08,200 --> 01:04:11,720
Speaker 1: You can also email us as psychoactive at protozoa dot

1245
01:04:11,800 --> 01:04:15,280
Speaker 1: com or find me on Twitter at ethan Natalman. And

1246
01:04:15,320 --> 01:04:17,360
Speaker 1: if you couldn't keep track of all this, find the

1247
01:04:17,400 --> 01:04:24,960
Speaker 1: information in the show notes. Tune in next time. From

1248
01:04:25,000 --> 01:04:28,280
Speaker 1: my conversation with Melissa Moore, my former colleague at Drug

1249
01:04:28,320 --> 01:04:32,240
Speaker 1: Policy Alliance, who led the successful effort to legalize marijuana

1250
01:04:32,240 --> 01:04:36,400
Speaker 1: in New York State, all the evidence showed that if

1251
01:04:36,400 --> 01:04:39,360
Speaker 1: you would randomly stop a hundred black kids under brown

1252
01:04:39,440 --> 01:04:42,240
Speaker 1: kids that are white kids in almost any city in America,

1253
01:04:42,560 --> 01:04:45,360
Speaker 1: virtually the same percent of them would have marijuana in

1254
01:04:45,360 --> 01:04:47,760
Speaker 1: their pocket, but the black kids were two to ten

1255
01:04:47,760 --> 01:04:50,160
Speaker 1: times more likely to get busted than the white kids.

1256
01:04:50,200 --> 01:04:52,080
Speaker 1: That's right. And you know, the data that we have

1257
01:04:52,160 --> 01:04:55,000
Speaker 1: from the Department of Health in New York City in particular,

1258
01:04:55,440 --> 01:04:58,520
Speaker 1: shows that young white people in New York City actually

1259
01:04:58,600 --> 01:05:02,560
Speaker 1: use cannabis at eificantly higher rates than black and Latin

1260
01:05:02,680 --> 01:05:04,800
Speaker 1: X young people in the city. And yet what we

1261
01:05:04,840 --> 01:05:07,680
Speaker 1: see is the enforcement is pretty much the exact inverse

1262
01:05:07,800 --> 01:05:10,960
Speaker 1: of that. Subscribe to cycoactive now see it, an't miss it.