No sex, but DRUGS and rock 'n roll (video)

Dev, Irma Quintero, CC Liu, Seven, Wisdom Quarterly; Coachella.com; Dr. Gabor Mate (Zeitgeist); Prof. Carl Hart (DemocracyNow.org); Christian (Off the Record/crschools.net)

Coachella concert crowd 2013 (Scott Gold/Los Angeles Times)

(TR) Southern California's desert festival is now a two-weekend duplicate event featuring a mix of techno, hip-hop, electronica, and rock on a lawn during the day under a scorching sun.

  

According to the New York Times (via Off The Record) the number of high school students smoking marijuana on a daily basis is at a 30-year high. Meanwhile, the number of students drinking, smoking cigarettes, or snorting cocaine is on the decrease! Progress?

 

The study, conducted by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) shows that about 25% of 8th, 10th, and 12th graders (what, no 11th graders?) are smoking cannabis, up from 21% four years ago. 

(Arkiharha Saara/weekday-illusion)

Drinking alcohol has fallen by almost half among 8th graders and is steadily dropping in other demographics as well.

 

Doctors and officials blame the rise on medical marijuana and synthetic (toxic) marijuana-substitutes like Spice and K2.

 

“We’re clearly seeing an increase in teenage marijuana use that corresponds pretty clearly in time with the increase in medical marijuana use,” said Dr. Christian Thurstone, medical director of the adolescent substance abuse treatment program at Denver Health and Hospital Authority, who was not involved in the study.

Recreational pot experiment makes first sales

Patrons smoke pot at a Prohibition-era-themed New Year's Eve party in Denver, Colorado to celebrate the start of retail pot sales in 2014 (Brennan Linsley/AP).

   
(Los Angeles Times) Marijuana retailers open their stores -- and a new chapter in the debate over legalizing pot -- as Colorado becomes the first state where specialty stores may sell small amounts of pot for recreational use. [Possession is legal in Washington state, decriminalized but not yet legal in Ecuador, and will soon be coming medicinally to New York if Cuomo and the bankers get their way. It is decriminalized and legal in Uruguay, and neighboring countries are looking to do the same. Even South Africa is considering it.] More

• Rethinking pot: Colorado has retail, NY wants medical
• Obama commutes 8 "unfair" crack cocaine sentences; ACLU calls for more reforms to drug laws

"Drugs Aren’t the Problem"

Addiction specialist Dr. Gabor Mate as featured in Part 1 of "Zeitgeist: Moving Forward"

 

Trauma sets us up for addiction, sex, shopping...

Addiction specialist Dr. Gabor Mate, M.D. makes the outrageous claim that there are NO addictive drugs. This is shocking, but it is true, and the proof is easy: If drugs themselves were addictive, everyone who used them would become addicted. But most users do not become addicts. Why do some? It is because some have been set up for addiction by early childhood stress and trauma. Such users, and there are a great many of them, are very susceptible to becoming addicted to self-soothing substances and behaviors. Addiction is not in the drugs. It is not in our genes. It is not in the trauma. It is in the interaction of exposure to early trauma AND exposure to drugs.

• An "interaction" is the phenomenon of, for example, not being harmed by nitro, and not being harmed by glycerin, but being blown up by nitroglycerin. Or take salt; it is composed of two caustic substances that become harmless together.

Societies traumatize children, expose and tacitly encourage young adults to try drugs, then jails (further traumatize) them for liking drugs as if punishment could ever cure the craving for being soothed. It is a vicious circle. Sadly, most drug abusers do not become intoxicated to "expand" their minds and enhance consciousness or explore dimensions, alternate realities, or go more deeply into this reality. No, most of us abuse drugs to obliterate consciousness, to go numb, to go unconscious. We are then susceptible to a great deal of further harm, like violating other precepts and suffering the many consequences of that bad karma. And our physical and mental health suffers. And our social life, which was helped at first, suffers. And our circles suffer. And society suffers. But FTW, we say. Party!

They are a symptom

Columbia University neuroscientist Carl Hart on brain science and myths about addiction 

Neo-hippies high on drugs (dudespaper.com)

There is a nationwide shift toward "liberalizing" drug laws. Neuropsychopharmacologist Dr. Carl Hart -- the first tenured African-American professor in the sciences at Columbia University -- is an associate professor in the Psychology and Psychiatry Departments. He is also a member of the National Advisory Council on Drug Abuse and a research scientist in the Division of Substance Abuse at the New York State Psychiatric Institute.

(highpricethebook.com)

However, long before he entered the hallowed halls of the Ivy League, Dr. Hart gained firsthand knowledge about drug usage while growing up in one of Miami’s toughest neighborhoods. He recently wrote a memoir titled High Price: A Neuroscientist’s Journey of Self-Discovery That Challenges Everything You Know About Drugs and Society. In the book, he recalls his journey, how he escaped a life of crime and drugs, and how he avoided becoming one of the crack addicts he now studies. More
 
Going to Coachella 2014

2014 is the best lineup ever!

Why pay $375.00 for GA to get in when you can pay $799.00 for VIP passes? Sorry, too late, it's sold out! Then there's the driving and fuel charges, parking and camping, shuttle passes ($60), food and water, and the illegal drugs won't be buying themselves. This is the "Woodstock" of our generation -- except for the MTV concert and all the policing, radio chipped wristbands, NSA spying, and herding people onto a giant lawn with an in loco parentis curfew.
 
Here's a "deal," ravers: one tee pee (as seen above) and two GA passes only $2,200 or for just an additional $900, make that VIP. Think of what "rebel rebels" you'll be! See more about prices, heatstroke risks, overdosing, dehydration, and other troubles concertgoers can expect to encounter at coachella.com. Remember to shower before day two of the weekend, and "no sex please. We're Ameboids and Gatchularians." - HHGTTG 
 
The most important thing is this, as when visiting Disneyland, BRING MONEY! That junk food and those glow sticks aren't going to buy themselves. And just on the off chance, for sensibilities' sakes, bring condoms. Never know, this could be the year. See, if you forget to pack a parachute, don't jump.
 
What's the moral to our story? Avoid drugs. But if you don't avoid drugs, make sure to have had avoided early childhood traumas like stressed parenting, abandonment, sexual molestation, physical abuse, economic hardship, emotional abuse, incest, codependence, bullying, and so on.

• 

  Microsoft's Bill Gates

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