cannabisnews.com: Column: The Truth About Ecstasy 





Column: The Truth About Ecstasy 
Posted by FoM on June 04, 2000 at 19:11:02 PT
By Robert Tinghitella, The Daily U. Washington
Source: U-WIRE
With all the talk lately about ecstasy (methylenedioxymethamphetamine) being deadly, what is one to believe? Is it the deadly drug that you have been hearing from the government, or is it the harmless cool drug underground culture makes it out to be? 
According to the National Institute of Drug Abuse the health hazards of ecstasy range from severe anxiety, paranoia, and psychosis, all the way to brain and liver damage. Back in February, it was reported that 254 people from 1997 to 1999 in Florida died from "club drugs" (ecstasy, GHB, ketamine, fentynl, methamphetamine, and nitrous oxide) and undoubtedly the number will increase as the full analysis is finished according to the state drug czar McDonough. But just last week the Orlando Sentinel did an analysis of the data and reported that only twenty-five people died from "club drugs." How could the government be so off? Well they were adding people like a 58 year-old man who died after a heart by-pass, a 37 year-old pedestrian killed by a hit-and-run driver and cancer patients who committed suicide among other absurd cases where "club drugs" were obviously not the reason for death. When confronted with the data, McDonough asked why a reporter would question shortcomings in the research instead of helping his staff fight drug abuse. Past experience with marijuana would show that the government is full of it. Just look at the government funded "scientific" studies from the sixties and seventies that still get cited that say marijuana kills brain cells, causes amotiovation syndrome, and infertility. All have been discounted, but they still pop up, from D.A.R.E. officers to literature provided to Wal-Mart employees. (I work at Wal-Mart and have asked them to tell me their sources or get rid of the obviously wrong information on their internal Web site. That was 10 days ago and they are still trying to "find" their sources for the information as of yesterday.) When the government lies to justify its bloated bureaucracy, why should we trust what they say about drug abuse? If they can't be trusted to come up with a reliable count of deaths how can we trust them to tell us the true effects - both short-term and long-term - of drugs. According to the group DanceSafe (an organization based in Berkeley, Calif., that tests ecstasy at raves in eight cities, including Seattle) 40 percent of the ecstasy pills submitted from all over the country are not true ecstasy. With a market that is willing to pay $10 to $30 per pill, it doesn't take a genius to realize the profit in selling aspirin, caffeine, or DXM (dextromethorphan, a cough suppressant used in Robitussin DM and other drugs) as ecstasy. At a recent massive rave in Oakland, Calif. (more than 5,000 people were in attendance) nine people were taken by ambulance to a local hospital. Eight of them were found to have taken DXM - which inhibits sweating, easily causing heatstroke. Another dangerous adulterant is PMA (paramethoxyamphetamine), an illegal drug that in May killed two Chicago-area teenagers who took it thinking they were taking ecstasy. PMA is a vastly more potent hallucinogenic and hyperthermic drug than ecstasy. From most of the deaths, it seems apparent that the prohibitionist policies of the United States are killing people. During alcohol Prohibition people didn't know the purity, or if there were any adulterants (e.g. antifreeze) in the alcohol, which in turn resulted in many more people dying from alcohol than before Prohibition. Just as then, we have no labeling, we don't know exactly what we are getting, and at what dosage for all illegal drugs. If the "War on Drugs" is meant to protect us from drugs why is it doing the opposite? Seattle (U-WIRE) June 2, 2000(C) 2000 The Daily via U-WIRE  Copyright © 2000 At Home Corporation. Related Article:The Lure Of Ecstasy:http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread5881.shtml
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Comment #2 posted by sianowens on March 21, 2001 at 11:05:05 PT:
pills ecstasy
i would liike to now what is in xtc i am doing a study on it could u help me please
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Comment #1 posted by X taker on June 04, 2000 at 23:18:28 PT
MDMA
Pure MDMA is really groovy. It should be legal and pure, not like all that stuff sold as X.I bet if pure X were available, a lot less problems would occur. 
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