First Oregon legalized psychedelics for medical use, and decriminalized them statewide. Then California and Michigan floated bills to legalize psychedelics statewide as well. Now, it’s Washington offering up a bill that would legalize magic mushrooms throughout the entire state for recreational use. Will the bill go through?
It’s exciting that Washington might legalize magic mushrooms, but the bill hasn’t passed yet. Right now it’s one of three states looking to legalize recreational psychedelic substances in some way. We’re all about covering this new and emerging industry for both medical and recreational use! For more articles on the subject, subscribe to the Psychedelics Weekly Newsletter, and get your regular dose of psychedelic news.
Psychedelic drugs
Psychedelics are classified as psychoactive drugs, under the heading of hallucinogens. Psychedelics are known for the hallucinations they cause, wherein the user has a sensory experience inconsistent with reality. This can mean hearing, seeing, tasting, smelling, or feeling something that isn’t actually there. Psychedelics can be found in nature, like mushrooms, DMT, or ibogaine; or made in a lab like LSD, ketamine, and PCP.
Psychedelics are also known for causing feelings of euphoria and well-being, of promoting feelings of connectedness between people and with the universe. Of inciting spiritual experiences; and of altering mood, perception and general cognition. Though psychedelics often promote positive experiences, they sometimes can lead to a bad trip, in which the user experiences negative, or even scary, hallucinations; as well as anxiety, paranoia, elevated blood pressure, nausea, chills, erratic heartbeat, and vomiting. Taking precautions to ensure the correct dosage and surroundings, can go a long way to ensuring a good trip.
Despite being used throughout history, psychedelics were nearly uniformly banned by the mid-late 1900’s, starting with LSD and magic mushrooms. Drugs were used to detract from anti-war activists, and the counterculture movement that was driven on by opposition to the Vietnam war, and expanding ideas of social justice. The US passed the Staggers-Dodd bill in 1968 criminalizing LSD and mushrooms, followed by the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, and the UN’s Convention on Psychotropic Substances in 1971.