The Joe Rogan Experience - Joe Rogan Experience #2357 - Sarko Gergerian

00:00:03.000 The Joe Rogan Experience.

00:00:05.000 Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night, all day.

00:00:09.000 What's up, Sockham Roy?

00:00:13.000 Hey, how are you, Joe?

00:00:15.000 Good to see you.

00:00:16.000 Oh, it's great to see you.

00:00:17.000 It's great to be here, man.

00:00:18.000 How did you meet Paul Sockham?

00:00:20.000 So Paul Stamitz introduced me to you.

00:00:22.000 So how did you meet Paul?

00:00:24.000 So I was aware of Paul for quite some time.

00:00:24.000 Yeah.

00:00:27.000 And this past psychedelic science, I was shadowing people and working to help the people that went to the conference feel safe just because of the nature of the environment that we're in now.

00:00:43.000 In what way?

00:00:44.000 So psychedelic science had a lot of Jewish practitioners.

00:00:49.000 They had invited Palestinian practitioners in.

00:00:52.000 There was Arab practitioners there.

00:00:54.000 So there was a lot of education around sensitive topics happening.

00:01:01.000 And I was invited in just to be available to help people feel secure.

00:01:07.000 What were they worried about?

00:01:10.000 Any protests building up.

00:01:12.000 Just because there was Jewish people and Palestinian people?

00:01:15.000 Well, you know, the nature of the environment, right?

00:01:17.000 There's like wars going on across the country.

00:01:19.000 But this is a psychedelic conference.

00:01:21.000 This is a psychedelic conference.

00:01:22.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:01:23.000 And they're worried about protests breaking out at psychedelic conferences?

00:01:26.000 Possible protests, possible people getting overwhelmed with emotion.

00:01:31.000 You know, because in Psychedelic Science 2023, there was a situation where when Rick Doblin was on stage, a group came in and disrupted his presentation, and they were allowed on stage to speak.

00:01:44.000 Oh, boy.

00:01:44.000 Right?

00:01:45.000 But that's a type of disruption, right?

00:01:47.000 And it should be handled carefully.

00:01:48.000 And Rick handled it like a master.

00:01:51.000 What did he do?

00:01:52.000 He made space for them.

00:01:54.000 Oh, well, is that really the way to do it?

00:01:56.000 Well, it depends.

00:01:57.000 It depends.

00:01:58.000 It depends.

00:01:59.000 There's a time and a place, right?

00:02:00.000 And I think Psychedelic Science 2025 did a wonderful job hearing all the groups that wanted to be there and allowing them to have space to speak from their hearts and minds.

00:02:11.000 Why don't you tell everybody what your background is?

00:02:13.000 Sure, sure.

00:02:15.000 So I am currently a law enforcement professional at the rank of lieutenant out of Massachusetts.

00:02:22.000 I've been in law enforcement.

00:02:23.000 I can tell by the accent.

00:02:25.000 I mean, my accent's going to kick in and on and off, on and off through this whole discussion.

00:02:29.000 A couple beers in the middle.

00:02:31.000 Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

00:02:32.000 Absolutely.

00:02:33.000 So that's been about 15 years.

00:02:36.000 I'm also a therapist, a trained psychedelic assisted therapist.

00:02:40.000 And I believe, a lot of people believe I'm the first law enforcement professional who got a religious exemption at their place of work to access entheogens.

00:02:52.000 So how did your journey from being a law enforcement professional to someone who's involved in psychedelics, how did that take place?

00:03:00.000 Okay, yeah, yeah.

00:03:02.000 I think I'm going to have to go a little bit further back for that, sure.

00:03:05.000 So I went to a little high school in Boston, Massachusetts, Newman Prep.

00:03:11.000 And when I graduated there, I was luckily accepted into Northeastern University.

00:03:16.000 So I go into Northeastern University in my 20s, and they ask you, what do you want to major in, right?

00:03:22.000 And who knows what they want to major in at that age?

00:03:24.000 I was like, let's study psychology, right?

00:03:27.000 Get to know myself, figure things out.

00:03:30.000 Such a behavioral program.

00:03:34.000 What I mean by that is rats pressing levers, observable stuff.

00:03:40.000 I wasn't getting what I was looking for.

00:03:42.000 So I take a philosophy class.

00:03:43.000 I take a religion class.

00:03:45.000 Eventually, I take so many of those classes, I graduate with an undergraduate degree in religion and philosophy and a huge minor in psychology, right?

00:03:54.000 So I'm a seeker.

00:03:55.000 At that time as well, Northeastern is a co-op school.

00:04:00.000 So you go to school for six months, you work for six months.

00:04:03.000 I was able to convince my co-op advisor to let me be a security guard in the nightclub industry in Boston for my co-op for school.

00:04:15.000 Okay?

00:04:15.000 So five-year program.

00:04:17.000 I'm studying religion, and I'm working as a security guard in the 90s in the nightclub scene in Boston.

00:04:26.000 I have a front row seat when ecstasy hits the scene.

00:04:31.000 I start working when it's high-test stimulants and alcohol, and I'm there continuing to work when the scene gets introduced to ecstasy, MDMA.

00:04:43.000 I not only get to see how it affects people, but it affects the whole culture.

00:04:49.000 The people at the clubs are no longer looking at each other like, who are you and what do you want?

00:04:55.000 They're saying hi and smiling.

00:04:57.000 They're high-fiving each other when they meet up.

00:04:59.000 They're hugging each other.

00:05:01.000 I had that in my head in my 20s.

00:05:05.000 Okay?

00:05:06.000 So I become a cop in my 30s.

00:05:09.000 I meet this police chief.

00:05:11.000 He notices that I think a little differently.

00:05:13.000 I see things a little differently.

00:05:14.000 My background's a little different than your typical officer.

00:05:18.000 He starts taking me to the International Association of Chiefs of Police Conference every year.

00:05:24.000 This is a really important point.

00:05:25.000 The IACP.

00:05:26.000 It's a really serious, huge international conference with upper level, chief executive level officers there.

00:05:35.000 I go one year when Rick Doblin's there in Florida.

00:05:41.000 He's presenting on Phase 2 clinical trials the results for MDMA-assisted psychotherapy, its efficacy against treatment-resistant severe PTSD.

00:05:54.000 I can't believe it.

00:05:56.000 Actually, I've shared the story before.

00:05:59.000 At the moment that he was going to present, to the left was Rick Doblin, and to the right was Donald Trump.

00:06:06.000 I'm not making this up.

00:06:07.000 Wow.

00:06:08.000 All right, so I go left, I sit in the front row, and the room that they gave him, this huge room, has 10 people in it because everybody went right.

00:06:19.000 67% of people with treatment-resistant severe PTSD had their PTSD pushed into sustained remission.

00:06:29.000 Sustained remission.

00:06:31.000 From how many experiences?

00:06:33.000 I think the way it was set up was like two or three.

00:06:36.000 You know, there's a model to the framework: preparation, experience, space, experience, space, experience, and then integration.

00:06:43.000 And this is all done through MAP, so it's all done in the clinical environment.

00:06:47.000 Yes.

00:06:48.000 Very controlled.

00:06:49.000 Very controlled.

00:06:50.000 Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies.

00:06:54.000 Rick's presenting there.

00:06:56.000 I'm in the front row.

00:06:57.000 I'm shaking.

00:06:58.000 I jump on stage.

00:06:59.000 I beeline it to him.

00:07:01.000 I introduce myself.

00:07:02.000 And I say, I have to help.

00:07:03.000 He says, why don't you tell me some stuff about who you are first?

00:07:06.000 You know what I mean?

00:07:07.000 Like, this is a guy in front of me shaking his hand and saying, I have to help with this.

00:07:12.000 And he finds out I'm a therapist too, cop and therapist.

00:07:15.000 And he says, the best way to help is to become a psychedelic assisted therapist.

00:07:20.000 What?

00:07:22.000 What's that?

00:07:23.000 You'd never heard of anything.

00:07:24.000 Never heard of any of that.

00:07:26.000 What year was this again?

00:07:28.000 Man, it must be five years ago.

00:07:31.000 Maybe more than that at this point.

00:07:33.000 Just working from memory.

00:07:35.000 It was Orlando, Florida, IACP conference.

00:07:38.000 Yeah.

00:07:40.000 You said something really important, Joe.

00:07:43.000 Psychedelic assisted therapist.

00:07:45.000 What?

00:07:46.000 What?

00:07:47.000 Medicalizing a Schedule I substance.

00:07:50.000 What?

00:07:51.000 You know?

00:07:52.000 How is this even possible?

00:07:56.000 But the story gets even more interesting.

00:07:59.000 He gives me his card and he says, contact me.

00:08:04.000 What the heck is going on here?

00:08:05.000 At this point, I'm already telling my current, my retired chief what's going on.

00:08:09.000 I'm meeting these people.

00:08:11.000 And MAPS gets me into one of the first MDMA-assisted therapist trainings, a cohort of people that they trained on how to do this methodology with people.

00:08:25.000 So you got to know what's going on, right?

00:08:27.000 I mean, when someone's on MDMA, they're different.

00:08:32.000 And you got to hold that.

00:08:33.000 You got to hold that.

00:08:34.000 But not only did they do that, MAPS contacts me and says, we might be able to get you into a federally sanctioned research protocol as a healthy normal, because I'm an example of a healthy normal, right?

00:08:53.000 Where you're going to be able to experience MDMA.

00:08:56.000 Because they think that it's important for the therapists to know what MDMA does.

00:09:04.000 So I mean, really?

00:09:07.000 I go back to my police chief and I say, chief, I'm not only going to be able to be trained as an MDMA-assisted therapist to help people with PTSD because it matters to me, right?

00:09:16.000 What are cops doing to themselves?

00:09:18.000 They're blowing their heads off.

00:09:20.000 Right?

00:09:21.000 The suicide rate in cops is two to three times higher than the rate in civilians.

00:09:26.000 More cops are dying by suicide, by the barrel of their own guns, than attack on the street.

00:09:35.000 Right?

00:09:37.000 The way the media is portraying everything, that's not getting out there.

00:09:42.000 So MDMA can help with that.

00:09:47.000 I'd say we're in an epidemic of suicide in first responders, if that's the numbers.

00:09:54.000 No?

00:09:55.000 Yeah, for sure.

00:09:56.000 Right?

00:09:57.000 Yeah.

00:09:58.000 And we've seen, Joe, you've seen this.

00:10:00.000 You've had guests on that talk about this.

00:10:02.000 You've seen what the government allows when we're in an epidemic.

00:10:07.000 Yeah, radical measures.

00:10:09.000 Radical measures.

00:10:10.000 Not when it comes to compounds on Schedule I. Why?

00:10:15.000 Well, because it's federally Scheduled I. It's supposed to have no medical use whatsoever.

00:10:21.000 And the most dangerous and addictive of compounds.

00:10:24.000 That's right.

00:10:26.000 May I say something about that?

00:10:29.000 It's a lie.

00:10:32.000 Well, it's certainly a lie.

00:10:33.000 Certainly a lie.

00:10:36.000 And I need everybody to hear that.

00:10:40.000 Because men and women are dying and suffering needlessly at the level Of an epidemic, and we're upholding a lie.

00:10:50.000 I think the problem is politically, it's very difficult to say what you're saying if you are anyone who is running for office or anyone who's currently seeking re-election, right?

00:11:00.000 Because it carries with this this taboo, this narrative that has existed since the 1970s that these are drugs that are ruining people's lives and it's going to waste, you're just going to waste away.

00:11:16.000 You're just escaping reality.

00:11:18.000 They're for weak people.

00:11:19.000 They're for losers and addicts.

00:11:22.000 You couldn't have summed up the problem better.

00:11:26.000 Nicely done.

00:11:27.000 It's a public narrative that's out there that unfortunately it's going to take a long time to turn that battleship around.

00:11:35.000 So I think what you're helping with is that I am asking for the politicians who can't speak up to help make safety for those of us who either can or want to.

00:11:54.000 I am asking for their help because I'm active law enforcement, and I got to tell you, Joe, we're muzzled. 0.78

00:12:02.000 We're muzzled.

00:12:03.000 Not only are our mouths shut, but our hearts are put in a cage.

00:12:10.000 Like how so?

00:12:11.000 What do you mean?

00:12:13.000 Law enforcement aspiring to build a career in the system can't talk about this stuff.

00:12:19.000 They not only can't talk about this stuff, they can't do this stuff.

00:12:21.000 So, so...

00:12:27.000 But what they can do is keep their mouth shut until they get to the point where they put a barrel of their gun in their mouth, or they can go buy a giant bottle of whiskey and drink themselves into depression, divorce, divorce, divorce, subclinical depression, anxiety, disordered eating, disordered sexual practices, because you know, chronically activated autonomic nervous system.

00:12:55.000 What does that cause?

00:12:56.000 Fight, flight, freeze, fawn, hypersexuality.

00:13:01.000 I dropped the last F. Right?

00:13:04.000 What does that destroy?

00:13:08.000 It destroys everything.

00:13:09.000 It destroys everything.

00:13:10.000 It's your life.

00:13:11.000 It destroys the human behind the badge, right? 0.62

00:13:16.000 Well, the issue is that police officers experience trauma on a daily basis that most people can't even comprehend.

00:13:26.000 And it's not discussed.

00:13:27.000 All that's ever discussed with police officers is when a cop does something bad.

00:13:31.000 That's right.

00:13:32.000 Let me paint a picture based on what you just brought in.

00:13:35.000 There's research out there that says the amount of critical incident exposure in an average law enforcement career is 200.

00:13:44.000 200 murders, suicide, car accidents.

00:13:48.000 Baby head crushed.

00:13:50.000 Yeah, 200.

00:13:51.000 Most civilians have five.

00:13:54.000 Critical incidents send people's lives sideways.

00:13:58.000 So the first responder's nervous system is a carrier of trauma at a level unimaginable by most people, which is what you just brought into this conversation.

00:14:10.000 And then, so you got the gasoline, right?

00:14:14.000 And you got the match.

00:14:15.000 They fly off the handle and everyone acts surprised.

00:14:19.000 How could that happen?

00:14:21.000 How did that officer end up doing that?

00:14:25.000 Because it's a known risk of the job.

00:14:28.000 And you know when we die?

00:14:30.000 Five to ten years after retirement.

00:14:32.000 That's a dirty little secret.

00:14:34.000 So you strive to get to retirement.

00:14:37.000 You carry the dark underbelly of society.

00:14:40.000 And then you die five years after you get out.

00:14:45.000 There's no time to wait.

00:14:49.000 Yeah, it's an unspoken trauma.

00:14:52.000 It's an unspoken issue that was really exacerbated during this whole defund the police shit that was going on a few years back.

00:15:02.000 Then you've got the demoralization, you know, and the fact that these people, not only they're not appreciated, but then they've been all turned into villains.

00:15:11.000 That's right.

00:15:12.000 That's right.

00:15:13.000 It makes it worse.

00:15:14.000 Yeah.

00:15:14.000 I work with some really caring young people, men and women.

00:15:20.000 And the whole defund the police movement was so hurtful.

00:15:24.000 It was so hurtful.

00:15:28.000 It hurt me watching them have to come to work and see them take the 911 calls for service and show up and do their best following the rules to make sure that that family or that person is okay and then come back and feel unappreciated and not understood.

00:15:44.000 Not understood.

00:15:45.000 Yeah.

00:15:45.000 You know?

00:15:47.000 Yeah, they were used as political pawns.

00:15:49.000 Yeah.

00:15:50.000 And, you know, openly, openly by politicians who are still in office.

00:15:55.000 It was pretty disgusting.

00:15:57.000 Yeah.

00:15:57.000 And just short-sighted and a complete lack of awareness of the difficulty of the job.

00:16:04.000 Because if you're around cops, if you know cops, like it is an insane job.

00:16:09.000 It's an insane job that you're asking people, just regular people, to go out and do on a daily basis.

00:16:15.000 That's right.

00:16:16.000 That's right.

00:16:17.000 You don't know what's going to happen.

00:16:19.000 You don't know who you're interacting with.

00:16:21.000 You don't know if it's going to turn into a life or death situation.

00:16:26.000 I see people try to paint the job as a normal job, and it isn't.

00:16:33.000 And someone's got to do it, right?

00:16:36.000 Someone's got to do it.

00:16:38.000 Because it's inherently a part of human nature at times for confusion to come through, for misunderstanding that leads to violence to happen.

00:16:50.000 Someone has to show up and handle that.

00:16:53.000 It's not a normal job.

00:16:55.000 Yeah.

00:16:57.000 So from your first introduction to this idea of psychedelic therapy, how long before you actually experience it and how long before you actually help other people experience it?

00:17:13.000 Okay.

00:17:13.000 So take us through.

00:17:16.000 So you find out about this, you bring it to the department.

00:17:20.000 What was that like?

00:17:21.000 Yeah.

00:17:22.000 So it was very interesting.

00:17:23.000 I mean, these were all ideas that weren't even on my radar until I met Rick at the Chiefs of Police Conference.

00:17:28.000 They get on my radar and they fire me up because this is what I want to do, right?

00:17:34.000 Because of my history, I'm compelled to step in between warring parties and get them to stop.

00:17:41.000 Okay, we can touch upon that if it fits into the conversation.

00:17:46.000 And then MAPS is able to get me into this research protocol and I'm able to get permission from my chief to experience MDMA.

00:17:55.000 I have a mystical experience.

00:17:57.000 I have a mystical experience on film.

00:18:00.000 The segment when I'm, you can't make this up.

00:18:03.000 When I take the blue pill, you know, Morpheus analogy there.

00:18:08.000 You don't want to take the blue pill?

00:18:09.000 No.

00:18:10.000 Is it the red one?

00:18:11.000 Yeah, the red one's the one that lets you see reality.

00:18:13.000 Okay, so I'm flipping the colors.

00:18:15.000 It's okay.

00:18:16.000 The blue one puts you right back to the picture.

00:18:21.000 But I experience MDMA on film.

00:18:23.000 It makes it into Michael Pollen's How to Change Your Mind docuseries.

00:18:28.000 The MDMA episode, right?

00:18:28.000 Oh, yeah.

00:18:31.000 And I have a mystical experience.

00:18:33.000 So now I go back and I'm like, chief, you know, what the hell, right?

00:18:39.000 Our men and women need access to this. 0.55

00:18:41.000 If they need it, they should have access to it.

00:18:43.000 They still don't have access.

00:18:44.000 This is where I'm going.

00:18:45.000 This is where I'm going with this.

00:18:47.000 You heard about what happened with the FDA.

00:18:50.000 The panel that was supposed to decide the final step before medicalization was allowed said no to Rick.

00:18:58.000 Right?

00:18:58.000 Yeah.

00:18:59.000 Yeah.

00:19:00.000 They wanted more tests.

00:19:00.000 What did they say?

00:19:02.000 Yes.

00:19:03.000 And I love that you did that because I tend to have to correct people.

00:19:06.000 It wasn't a no.

00:19:07.000 They said, we're going to delay you and we want another phase three clinical trial.

00:19:12.000 Right.

00:19:13.000 But some of the things that came up, I want to talk about real quick, is they couldn't make sense of how good the data was.

00:19:13.000 Right.

00:19:22.000 What?

00:19:23.000 You're going to use that as a reason to not go forward?

00:19:26.000 Is that really what they said?

00:19:28.000 I believe that was part of the problem.

00:19:30.000 Yeah.

00:19:31.000 I mean, we can look this up.

00:19:32.000 But I believe that was part of the problem.

00:19:34.000 They also couldn't make sense of how do you make the prescription a drug paired with therapy.

00:19:40.000 They couldn't make sense of the therapy part because it would be the first prescription of a drug paired with therapy.

00:19:46.000 That was the goal.

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00:20:43.000 Well, isn't there also an issue with doing double-blind placebo-controlled studies?

00:20:48.000 Because it's very clear whether or not you've taken the drug.

00:20:50.000 That's right.

00:20:51.000 That's right.

00:20:52.000 So here's what I want to ask you about that, and I want to ask a science about that.

00:20:56.000 Is that a problem with the power and magic of MDMA, or is that a problem with where science is?

00:21:03.000 Well, it's a perception problem, right?

00:21:05.000 Because obviously MDMA has profound impacts on soldiers, the PTSD.

00:21:11.000 The studies have already been very clear, and MAPS has done an amazing job in explaining all that.

00:21:17.000 But the problem is a perception issue.

00:21:20.000 Okay.

00:21:20.000 And that this drug is also used by people who go to raves and wind up dying of heat exhaustion.

00:21:27.000 And people die because they hear they die of an overdose, which really they died of fentanyl poisoning because they're getting illegally sourced MDMA, which is probably not even really MDMA.

00:21:38.000 A lot of times it's amphetamines and it's cut with fentanyl and there's a lot of other shit in it and they wind up dying of an overdose.

00:21:43.000 That's right.

00:21:44.000 Look, you bring up something called the challenge of accessing safe supply.

00:21:50.000 Yeah.

00:21:51.000 Right?

00:21:52.000 We need to, people need to check their drugs because the illicit supply isn't standardized.

00:22:01.000 It isn't safe.

00:22:03.000 Well, the real barrier is the fact that it's illegal.

00:22:05.000 That's right.

00:22:06.000 The problem is there is a demand.

00:22:08.000 And so when you have a demand and then you make it illegal for people to access, then what happens is outlaws step in and you get criminal organizations who sell it and they don't give a fuck about you.

00:22:20.000 There it is.

00:22:21.000 And they're used to killing people.

00:22:22.000 There it is.

00:22:23.000 They don't mind poisoning you and they don't mind if they're selling you something that's totally not what you're trying to get.

00:22:29.000 That's right.

00:22:30.000 And you know where I learned about this?

00:22:32.000 I think you'll get a kick out of this.

00:22:33.000 Yeah.

00:22:34.000 My promotional books, Studying to Become a Sergeant.

00:22:37.000 Really?

00:22:37.000 Yeah.

00:22:38.000 They actually have an entire section on what prohibition of alcohol cost.

00:22:44.000 And yet nobody applies that to other substances.

00:22:47.000 That's exactly what it is.

00:22:48.000 It's kind of funny.

00:22:49.000 Right.

00:22:50.000 It's kind of funny.

00:22:51.000 Tragically funny.

00:22:52.000 Right.

00:22:53.000 And here's the muzzle part.

00:22:56.000 Why aren't officers allowed to talk about this?

00:22:59.000 Why aren't working officers allowed to talk about the problems with the war on drugs and how it's being waged?

00:23:08.000 Why?

00:23:08.000 In America?

00:23:10.000 Really?

00:23:11.000 When you say you aren't allowed to, is it because it will hinder your career?

00:23:16.000 I think so.

00:23:17.000 Yeah.

00:23:17.000 I think it's fear.

00:23:18.000 I think it's programming.

00:23:19.000 You mentioned the programming from the Nixon time till now, right?

00:23:23.000 Yeah.

00:23:25.000 This is prohibited stuff.

00:23:27.000 We can't talk about it.

00:23:29.000 Not only can't we talk about it, but we can't think about it because thinking leads to behaviors.

00:23:34.000 And if those behaviors are risky, out goes your career.

00:23:37.000 Yes.

00:23:38.000 Well, I think we're in a very unique time now where the door is open.

00:23:43.000 And credit to Rick Perry, Former Republican governor of Texas, who championed the Ibogaine initiative here, and it's now become a thing.

00:23:52.000 They're going to start doing that, which is amazing and so beneficial for soldiers in particular.

00:23:59.000 People with extreme PTSD and people that are suffering from severe drug addictions and they don't understand why, and they're just fucked.

00:24:08.000 A lot of soldiers and a lot of really traditionally right-wing people are getting involved in psychedelics.

00:24:17.000 They're going to psychedelic retreats.

00:24:19.000 A lot of other soldiers that have had positive experiences and have gotten help are reaching out to their brothers and sisters, bringing them into these experiences.

00:24:28.000 That's right.

00:24:29.000 So instead of this narrative that psychedelics are for hippies and losers with no discipline, now you've got some of the most disciplined human beings on earth who are seeking these things out for help.

00:24:42.000 That's right.

00:24:43.000 And realizing that there is strength in seeking help.

00:24:47.000 It's not a weakness to take these things.

00:24:49.000 And these things are not drugs in the sense of something that allows you to escape reality.

00:24:54.000 They allow you to see reality through a completely different lens and that can heal you.

00:24:59.000 And this is not something that has been a narrative before.

00:25:02.000 This narrative is very recent.

00:25:04.000 This narrative, particularly among right-wing people, among conservative people, among disciplined people, hardworking, disciplined people.

00:25:11.000 Now they're realizing this is a tool that's been denied us because of a corrupt government.

00:25:17.000 A corrupt government that was seeking to silence the civil rights movement and the anti-war movement in the 1970s and the 1960s.

00:25:24.000 This was what this was all about.

00:25:26.000 And we are still dealing with this shit 60 years later, which is really crazy.

00:25:31.000 It is crazy.

00:25:32.000 It's fucking crazy.

00:25:33.000 It's so crazy because we know the facts now.

00:25:35.000 We know what started it.

00:25:37.000 We know who was involved.

00:25:39.000 We know the conversations that they had, why they did it in the first place.

00:25:43.000 And yet, the public narrative is still the same.

00:25:46.000 The public narrative is still drug takers are undisciplined losers who are trying to escape reality.

00:25:52.000 And I don't want my kids doing drugs.

00:25:55.000 And that same shit that you hear over and over and over again.

00:25:58.000 That's right.

00:25:59.000 That's right.

00:26:00.000 It's crazy and extremely tragic.

00:26:04.000 And let me take that narrative thread that you just brought in, and let's go all the way back to the times when the Spanish were colonizing this country.

00:26:13.000 It was actually part of the program to destroy the medicine and women, medicine men and medicine women wisdom keepers, which directly connects, I believe, to the war on drugs.

00:26:28.000 That's gone on forever, right?

00:26:29.000 I mean, that's the Illusinian mysteries.

00:26:32.000 The Romans silenced that. 0.99

00:26:34.000 You go to Siberian shaman, they were silenced by the powers that be in those days.

00:26:42.000 It's just always been the case where people that take things that allow them to understand the methods of control that are being inflicted upon them and how to escape that.

00:26:52.000 And then they get a bunch of other people that follow them and they don't want to listen to propaganda anymore.

00:26:56.000 And then people go, hey, this is a real problem.

00:26:58.000 What's the cause of this?

00:27:00.000 Oh, it's these fucking dudes go to Elysis and they figure out life.

00:27:05.000 We've got to stop that.

00:27:06.000 Yeah, we've got to put a fucking kibosh on that. 1.00

00:27:06.000 That's right. 1.00

00:27:08.000 And then they spread all throughout the world to try to do it.

00:27:11.000 And they went into hiding.

00:27:11.000 There it is.

00:27:12.000 Let's bring that thread all the way to the present.

00:27:14.000 And I want to see if I can succeed at making this point.

00:27:18.000 And it has now hijacked law enforcement.

00:27:25.000 It has hijacked law enforcement.

00:27:27.000 And it moves law enforcement away from protecting and serving life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, and the First Amendment, religious expression, into industry interest profits without us even knowing it.

00:27:43.000 I'm not pointing a finger at any one law enforcement professional.

00:27:46.000 I'm challenging people to wake up to what's going on.

00:27:49.000 Because when we kick indoors and arrest black and brown people for having a relationship with a plant like cannabis and charge them and put them in a cage and lock them up and they weren't doing anything violent, we have to ask, who is this hurting?

00:28:06.000 And I'm here to tell you, it's hurting them and us.

00:28:11.000 For sure.

00:28:12.000 For sure, because anyone who's a law enforcement officer that's arresting someone for weed, they know that they're not doing anything good.

00:28:18.000 Moral injury.

00:28:19.000 Yeah, it's a moral injury on the person that's actually being forced to enforce those laws.

00:28:25.000 That's right.

00:28:26.000 That's right.

00:28:27.000 Yeah, because you can't feel good about yourself.

00:28:29.000 You're arresting some guy who's got an ounce of weed, who's sitting at home with his wife, chilling.

00:28:33.000 That's crazy.

00:28:34.000 And that went on for decades in this country, decades.

00:28:37.000 Well, it's still happening.

00:28:39.000 Somewhere around 40 states have recreationalized or medicalized, so we still have work to do.

00:28:44.000 And if you look at the Drug Policy Alliance a few years back, we could look this up.

00:28:49.000 We're still arresting in the hundreds of thousands of people, nonviolent marijuana.

00:28:52.000 Well, they're trying to go backwards in Texas.

00:28:54.000 The lieutenant governor is trying to go backwards, and he's against the legalization, and so they're trying to ban all THC products.

00:29:04.000 It's completely inappropriate.

00:29:05.000 It's not just inappropriate.

00:29:06.000 It's funded.

00:29:07.000 Okay?

00:29:08.000 It's funded by the alcohol lobby.

00:29:08.000 Right?

00:29:10.000 And they know that they're losing people from drinking alcohol.

00:29:13.000 That's right.

00:29:14.000 The numbers are already showing it.

00:29:16.000 They're building up to a collapse.

00:29:17.000 People are going to get off the alcohol.

00:29:19.000 They're not going to be able to rely on the profits to be the same.

00:29:22.000 I agree with you.

00:29:23.000 And then you know what else?

00:29:25.000 Cannabis is such a threat because it's a medicine that can help with such a broad array of symptoms and challenges.

00:29:34.000 What a threat to pharma.

00:29:36.000 Yeah.

00:29:37.000 It's definitely that.

00:29:37.000 It's just one plant.

00:29:38.000 This one plant.

00:29:40.000 I know.

00:29:40.000 And it's not just a threat to pharma.

00:29:43.000 I mean, I'm sure you're aware of the original reason why it was outlawed.

00:29:47.000 Hit me.

00:29:48.000 Okay.

00:29:49.000 Remind me.

00:29:49.000 William Randolph Hearst.

00:29:51.000 So William Randolph Hearst.

00:29:52.000 So if you go back to the 1930s when alcohol prohibition ended, you have a bunch of enforcement officers that aren't doing anything anymore.

00:30:02.000 Then you have William Randolph Hearst, and then there's a machine, an invention called the decorticator.

00:30:08.000 And the decorticator allowed them to effectively process hemp fiber.

00:30:13.000 Hemp was always a very difficult Plant to process.

00:30:17.000 And when Eli Whitney, was it Eli Whitney created the cotton gin?

00:30:21.000 Is that what it was?

00:30:23.000 I think that sounds right.

00:30:25.000 When they created the cotton gin, now cotton took over for hemp clothing.

00:30:30.000 So cannabis, hemp, you know, the term cannabis, that was what canvas was.

00:30:37.000 So all paintings, the first draft of the Declaration of Independence was made on hemp paper.

00:30:44.000 It's a superior textile.

00:30:46.000 It's a superior paper.

00:30:48.000 It's a commodity.

00:30:50.000 You can take an acre of land that you're using to grow trees on that you process into paper, and it'll take you years and years to regrow the trees in order to have the same amount of paper in that area.

00:31:05.000 With hemp, it's instantaneous almost.

00:31:08.000 It grows very quickly, and within a few months, you have these plants again.

00:31:13.000 You harvest the stalks, you run it through the decorticator.

00:31:16.000 So in 19, whatever it was, 1930 something, cover of Popular Science magazine, hemp the new billion-dollar crop, because of this invention.

00:31:28.000 So this invention was going to, because hemp makes superior clothes.

00:31:32.000 I have a hemp jiu-jitsu gi that I got from this company called Datsura.

00:31:36.000 It's fucking indestructible.

00:31:37.000 My cotton gis, they rip apart all the time.

00:31:40.000 They're good for a year or two, and then they tear, and you got to buy a new one, or you just show up at class with a fucked up gi, which a lot of people do. 1.00

00:31:46.000 Hemp gis are way better.

00:31:48.000 They're just far superior.

00:31:49.000 Hemp paper, you grab it, you pull it, you tear it, you're like, this is crazy.

00:31:53.000 It's so much stronger than regular paper.

00:31:56.000 It's a superior product.

00:31:57.000 So William Randolph Hearst, who didn't just own Hearst Publications, he didn't just own this news empire.

00:32:04.000 He also owned paper mills.

00:32:07.000 So he also owned forests that he was growing trees in.

00:32:10.000 He recognized this threat from this new industry.

00:32:14.000 And so to combat that threat, he starts putting out propaganda pieces.

00:32:18.000 And then they coined the term marijuana.

00:32:21.000 So marijuana was originally a term, a slang term for a wild Mexican tobacco.

00:32:29.000 It had nothing to do with cannabis.

00:32:30.000 Cannabis, which had been used for thousands of years, and hemp, which had been used for thousands of years.

00:32:36.000 So then they started printing these stories that blacks and Mexicans were taking this new drug and raping white women.

00:32:43.000 And then you have the Reaper Madness films and all these propaganda films that show young people taking a smoke of marijuana and losing their mind.

00:32:53.000 So people act quickly and they pass laws, not even knowing that they're outlawing hemp, thinking that they're stopping this new drug, because most people are unaware of it.

00:33:03.000 Clearly, this is a time before the internet.

00:33:05.000 Very difficult to access information and understand exactly what's going on.

00:33:09.000 So they hoodwinked the entire world.

00:33:11.000 So Harry Anslinger, William Randolph Hearst, they all conspired to stop a commodity.

00:33:18.000 And that's what hemp was.

00:33:19.000 It had nothing to do with the psychoactive form of THC.

00:33:24.000 It had everything to do with hemp as a commodity that was threatening to the businesses.

00:33:30.000 Only just business.

00:33:31.000 And to this day, you can make hemp crete.

00:33:34.000 It's a superior building material.

00:33:37.000 It's flame resistant.

00:33:38.000 It's lighter.

00:33:39.000 It's stronger.

00:33:41.000 It lasts longer.

00:33:42.000 You can build houses with it.

00:33:44.000 You can make clothes with it.

00:33:46.000 Hemp oil is hemp seeds.

00:33:50.000 Not only are they good for you, they contain all the amino acids.

00:33:55.000 It's a superior protein source.

00:33:57.000 It's like hemp protein powder is fantastic for you.

00:34:00.000 It's like really good stuff in so many different ways.

00:34:03.000 And they put the kibosh on that in the 1930s.

00:34:07.000 And that, 90 fucking years later, is still this anchor around our necks that we're carrying.

00:34:14.000 It's still in place.

00:34:16.000 One asshole.

00:34:16.000 That's right.

00:34:17.000 One asshole in the 1930s who didn't want to compete with hemp and had this incredible power because he owned the newspapers.

00:34:25.000 He started this all.

00:34:26.000 That's right.

00:34:27.000 That's right.

00:34:28.000 I'm tracking.

00:34:29.000 Pull up that article, Hemp the New Billion Dollar Crop, because it's wild to watch.

00:34:29.000 Have you ever seen that article?

00:34:34.000 Because this machine, this decorticator, before that, it was really, it was brutal, back-breaking work to take the hemp fiber and break it down because it's such a durable plant.

00:34:46.000 Like if you ever pick up a hemp stalk, a hemp stalk that would, this is a mammoth tusk, but this is heavy.

00:34:53.000 But if you had a hemp stalk that was this size, it would be incredibly light like balsa wood, but hard like oak.

00:35:02.000 It's like an alien plant.

00:35:04.000 Yeah, it sounds different than everything else.

00:35:07.000 So here it is.

00:35:08.000 The new billion-dollar crop.

00:35:10.000 American farmers are promised a new cash crop with an annual value of several hundred million dollars, all because of a machine that has been invented which can solve a problem more than 6,000 years old.

00:35:22.000 It is hemp, a crop that will compete with other American products.

00:35:27.000 Instead, it will displace imports of raw materials and manufactured products produced by underpaid, what does that mean, coolie and peasant labor, and will provide thousands of jobs for American workers throughout the land.

00:35:41.000 So that was the machine underneath it.

00:35:43.000 That's the decorticator, and that's this new machine that they invented.

00:35:46.000 And this is what it's all about.

00:35:48.000 It has nothing to do with marijuana was a real problem.

00:35:51.000 We were losing people.

00:35:53.000 No, people have been smoking marijuana and taking marijuana in edible form and, you know, the sadhus and taking hashish.

00:36:01.000 People have been using it for thousands and thousands of years without problems.

00:36:04.000 That's right.

00:36:05.000 Can you abuse it?

00:36:06.000 Of course.

00:36:06.000 You can abuse cheeseburgers, too.

00:36:08.000 I was just going to say that.

00:36:09.000 Yeah, but I don't think you should shut down Burger King.

00:36:11.000 Be able to get a fucking cheeseburger if you want.

00:36:13.000 And there's a lot of things that people can abuse.

00:36:15.000 You could abuse every single thing.

00:36:16.000 You could abuse cake.

00:36:17.000 You can abuse everything.

00:36:19.000 Human beings tend to abuse things. 0.97

00:36:21.000 That doesn't mean that they shouldn't be allowed to use it.

00:36:23.000 It's like a hammer.

00:36:25.000 You could build a house with a hammer or you can hit yourself in the dick if you're fucking crazy.

00:36:29.000 It doesn't mean we should outlaw hammers.

00:36:30.000 That's right.

00:36:31.000 There is a use for these things.

00:36:32.000 And it requires discipline.

00:36:35.000 And it requires an understanding of what the thing is.

00:36:38.000 Well, when you turn that thing into a Schedule I substance, when everybody knows that's not true, especially when you have a Schedule I substance That is illegal when there's things like alcohol that are totally legal that I support.

00:36:51.000 You should be able to drink.

00:36:52.000 I own a bar.

00:36:53.000 I don't care.

00:36:53.000 I don't drink anymore, but I feel like you should be able to drink.

00:36:57.000 I drank most of my life.

00:36:58.000 Drink if you want to.

00:36:59.000 I say the same thing about it.

00:37:00.000 But it's not good for you.

00:37:02.000 Right.

00:37:03.000 It's a depressant that's a carcinogen.

00:37:04.000 Again, when I say that.

00:37:05.000 It's also fun.

00:37:06.000 Right.

00:37:06.000 It's also fun.

00:37:07.000 Get you.

00:37:07.000 And I drink.

00:37:08.000 Yeah.

00:37:08.000 Tipsy's fun.

00:37:09.000 But the point is, we need freedom.

00:37:13.000 And you need the freedom to be able to explore these things and find out what's right for you and wrong for you.

00:37:18.000 And you need the freedom to be able to run studies and get accurate information in terms of dosages and side effects and what sort of genetic issues that certain people might have that make them more inclined to be addicted to alcohol or addicted to cannabis or whatever their issue is, whether it's psychological or biological.

00:37:37.000 We need to have information to put a blockade on this in the form of prohibition is stupid.

00:37:44.000 And the fact that we're doing it in 2025 with all the information that we have available today, we have an abundance of information.

00:37:52.000 That's right.

00:37:53.000 Well, look, I think it was, as you said, there was intentionality behind what was done.

00:37:58.000 And when you don't have 50 years of creating an evidence base, you have a weaker argument for decriminalization.

00:38:07.000 And that was intentional.

00:38:09.000 That was intentional.

00:38:09.000 Yes.

00:38:10.000 For sure.

00:38:10.000 Right, Joe, I mean, you brought this up, right?

00:38:13.000 Highly addictive, no known medical use.

00:38:16.000 That's a lie.

00:38:17.000 We can go through the list of Schedule I and we can point out which one it's a lie about, which one is actually anti-addictive.

00:38:24.000 You take psilocybin and you have an experience with psilocybin magic mushrooms.

00:38:28.000 You don't want to drink.

00:38:29.000 We don't know why.

00:38:29.000 Right.

00:38:31.000 We haven't been able to study that, right?

00:38:33.000 Ibogaine.

00:38:34.000 You want to reprieve from your opioid use disorder?

00:38:36.000 Iboga, Ibogaine, I'll give it to you three, four, four months.

00:38:39.000 Yeah.

00:38:40.000 What's that about?

00:38:41.000 Yeah, it's also one experience has an 80% success rate.

00:38:47.000 80% of the people don't go back to opiates.

00:38:49.000 With two experiences, it's in the high 90s.

00:38:53.000 So look, look, those numbers are staggering.

00:38:56.000 Science can't make sense of it.

00:38:58.000 We're in an epidemic.

00:38:59.000 Well, we got to slow down.

00:39:01.000 Watch out for the risks.

00:39:02.000 We need to study these things more.

00:39:04.000 I can respect that, but there's harm in not allowing access to.

00:39:09.000 We've got to talk about that.

00:39:10.000 You also have to make sense of it in a time where things are prescribed and you can get them from a doctor that we absolutely know are addictive and highly damaging and kill people.

00:39:22.000 That's right.

00:39:23.000 So make sense of it to me.

00:39:26.000 If there's something, cannabis is the easy one, right?

00:39:28.000 Because it doesn't kill anybody.

00:39:30.000 Literally doesn't kill anybody.

00:39:31.000 The LD50 rate for cannabis is fucking bananas.

00:39:35.000 That's right.

00:39:36.000 It's not even physically possible to consume enough to kill you.

00:39:39.000 Same thing with psilocybin.

00:39:41.000 Exactly.

00:39:41.000 Yes, right.

00:39:42.000 There's this research study.

00:39:43.000 It's at the mushroom the size of this fucking table.

00:39:48.000 You wouldn't physically be able to consume it.

00:39:50.000 If that even does.

00:39:51.000 Right.

00:39:51.000 If that even kills.

00:39:51.000 That's right.

00:39:52.000 And that's LD50.

00:39:53.000 That would be 50% of the population would die of an overdose from that.

00:39:56.000 That's right.

00:39:57.000 And you wouldn't be able to consume it.

00:39:58.000 Physically, you wouldn't be able to fit it into your body enough to kill you.

00:40:01.000 Yeah.

00:40:02.000 Yeah.

00:40:02.000 And then on top of that, Joe, we have the federal government giving permission to certain groups of people to access plants, cacti, fungi, animal secretions with permission and not others under a religious context.

00:40:19.000 Right.

00:40:21.000 So, is it dangerous?

00:40:23.000 Is it not?

00:40:25.000 Is it a sacred sacrament?

00:40:25.000 Right.

00:40:27.000 Right.

00:40:27.000 Is it not?

00:40:28.000 Is it Brazilian churches that are taking ayahuasca?

00:40:32.000 Right.

00:40:32.000 Yeah.

00:40:32.000 Right.

00:40:32.000 And again, like, we're talking, we talk, I don't want to talk poorly about alcohol.

00:40:37.000 I drink alcohol.

00:40:38.000 I'm not talking poorly about these people should go get their rights, right?

00:40:42.000 Yes.

00:40:43.000 More power to them.

00:40:44.000 But you can't have it both ways, not them.

00:40:47.000 I'm talking to the government.

00:40:49.000 Right.

00:40:49.000 You have to make logical sense as to why you're imposing these laws and then imprisoning people and taking away their freedom for not listening to you.

00:40:58.000 That's right.

00:40:58.000 Because you don't make any sense.

00:41:00.000 And here's another part of the problem.

00:41:02.000 A vast majority of the people that are pushing for these laws and want these people to be locked up have not had these experiences themselves.

00:41:12.000 And that's a part of the problem.

00:41:13.000 That's a big part of them.

00:41:14.000 They don't know what they're talking about.

00:41:16.000 They don't know what these experiences are.

00:41:18.000 That's right.

00:41:19.000 Like these drugs are going to ruin your mind.

00:41:21.000 Are you fucking sure?

00:41:23.000 Because I don't think they are.

00:41:24.000 I don't think you're correct.

00:41:25.000 I think they open your mind up to new possibilities and expand your consciousness in a way that I don't think is available without them.

00:41:33.000 I agree.

00:41:33.000 It isn't available without them.

00:41:35.000 And that was intentionally blocked out.

00:41:38.000 So, you know, we're hearing the stories about the really brilliant tech people, right?

00:41:45.000 You dig deep enough, they've had some experiences with these things.

00:41:47.000 Yeah, a large number of them, right?

00:41:50.000 And still do a large number of them.

00:41:51.000 Right?

00:41:52.000 So these things that are so dangerous.

00:41:52.000 Yeah.

00:41:56.000 Or are we blocking out certain groups from having access?

00:41:59.000 And this is one of my primary things that I try to talk about.

00:42:02.000 I want the audience that's in law enforcement to go, why?

00:42:07.000 Why is this the case?

00:42:08.000 Why do I feel uncomfortable not talking about this?

00:42:11.000 Why do I feel uncomfortable saying that this sergeant who might be hurting needs access?

00:42:16.000 Say it.

00:42:17.000 Bring it up.

00:42:18.000 Talk.

00:42:19.000 Right.

00:42:19.000 Go into your power.

00:42:21.000 But people are scared of losing their career, right?

00:42:23.000 Imagine for talking about something.

00:42:26.000 And losing their career because most people are ignorant of it.

00:42:30.000 That's right.

00:42:30.000 Yeah.

00:42:31.000 That's right.

00:42:31.000 And the only way that that's going to change is you and I and other people to continue to have these public conversations where more people hear it.

00:42:39.000 And I guarantee you, there's people listening to this right now that have never heard this before, never considered this before, and am I wrong?

00:42:47.000 Do I have these deep-held beliefs that are completely ignorant?

00:42:51.000 And why do I have these beliefs?

00:42:53.000 What started them?

00:42:55.000 Why do I have this in my mind as this is what this stuff is?

00:42:59.000 Exactly.

00:43:00.000 And there's a lot of people out there that are stone, cold, sober, disciplined people, think that's the only way.

00:43:05.000 This is the way.

00:43:06.000 That's right.

00:43:07.000 And you know what?

00:43:08.000 Maybe this is the way.

00:43:10.000 That's your way.

00:43:12.000 We're human beings.

00:43:13.000 We're called To create an artistic expression of a unique life.

00:43:19.000 To me, that's what the divine is commanding.

00:43:22.000 That's what the divine gets to experience.

00:43:25.000 The more of us who get to live and be our authentic selves internally and expressing them outwardly, the more the divine gets to experience unique difference.

00:43:37.000 Well, the more possibilities there are for creativity, the more possibilities there are for people to rethink their lives, get on a better path, there's a lot that people are missing just because you've been hoodwinked and you've been led into this false narrative.

00:43:54.000 That's right.

00:43:55.000 It's also there's a problem with the term drugs.

00:43:59.000 Because just I hear drug, I hear drugged, I hear someone is all fucked up and doesn't know what's going on.

00:44:05.000 How are you putting all these things under the same blanket, including nicotine and caffeine and things that people use on a daily basis?

00:44:14.000 These are all drugs.

00:44:15.000 That's right.

00:44:15.000 And then you have cannabis in there, and you also have methamphetamine in that category.

00:44:19.000 How do you have cannabis and methamphetamine in the same thing?

00:44:22.000 How do you have psilocybin and heroin in the same group of things?

00:44:27.000 This is crazy.

00:44:28.000 That's right.

00:44:29.000 How do you have industrial opiates?

00:44:31.000 Yeah.

00:44:32.000 You're all in that same category?

00:44:34.000 We've been stripped of our power to define what medicine is.

00:44:38.000 Yes.

00:44:39.000 Right?

00:44:40.000 Yeah.

00:44:40.000 Have you heard people say, community is medicine?

00:44:44.000 Joy is medicine.

00:44:45.000 Oh, yeah, for sure.

00:44:46.000 It is.

00:44:47.000 Yeah.

00:44:47.000 Right?

00:44:47.000 Well, ask a hardcore Western science model, is that medicine?

00:44:52.000 And they'd go, well, you've got to show us the evidence.

00:44:55.000 Yeah.

00:44:55.000 Right?

00:44:56.000 Well, there is evidence that loneliness is worse than cigarette smoking.

00:45:00.000 That's right.

00:45:01.000 In terms of how long you live.

00:45:03.000 That's right.

00:45:04.000 Well, we can show that, right?

00:45:04.000 That's right.

00:45:06.000 But is community medicine?

00:45:07.000 I say it is.

00:45:08.000 Yeah.

00:45:09.000 But the point I'm trying to make is how did we lose the power to define what medicine is for ourselves?

00:45:16.000 Right?

00:45:16.000 Yeah.

00:45:17.000 Joy is medicine.

00:45:19.000 Community is medicine.

00:45:20.000 And there's the right thing.

00:45:21.000 Maybe the term medicine is the wrong term.

00:45:23.000 Maybe it is good for you.

00:45:24.000 Sure.

00:45:26.000 But why define medicine in such a rigid way?

00:45:30.000 Also, why only allow one methodology to create an evidence base for that medicine?

00:45:37.000 Let me give you an example.

00:45:38.000 And this is Paul Stamitz.

00:45:40.000 I listened to him talk at Psychedelic Science 2025, where he said we should see the world through two eyes.

00:45:46.000 Western science and indigenous wisdom.

00:45:50.000 Right?

00:45:51.000 And they don't have to be attacking one another.

00:45:53.000 Right.

00:45:54.000 The time of extractionary capitalistic relationships with this living planet might have to be coming to an end.

00:45:54.000 Right?

00:46:04.000 And what's going to replace it?

00:46:06.000 Reciprocity?

00:46:08.000 Stewardship?

00:46:09.000 Care?

00:46:10.000 Community?

00:46:12.000 Right?

00:46:12.000 Yeah.

00:46:13.000 These two eyes, they need to be in the same being.

00:46:16.000 They need to work together.

00:46:17.000 It really makes you wonder what would the world look like had they not placed that sweeping psychedelic act of 1970 and then impose those standards on most of the rest of the world as well.

00:46:28.000 What would the world look like?

00:46:31.000 It would be radically different.

00:46:32.000 I believe that it would be radically different.

00:46:35.000 Well, this is what they were scared of.

00:46:37.000 The difference between the 1950s and the 1960s culturally is clear.

00:46:41.000 It's evident in everything.

00:46:43.000 It's evident in the music.

00:46:44.000 It's evident in the artwork, the films.

00:46:47.000 It's evident in the cars, the design of the automobiles.

00:46:50.000 Like everything changed.

00:46:52.000 And it changed because the culture was accepting psychedelics.

00:46:57.000 It was a big part of it.

00:46:59.000 It was LSD and psilocybin and marijuana and all these different things these people were experimenting with.

00:47:05.000 And then out of that, you get Jimi Hendrix.

00:47:07.000 You know, you get this wild new form of expression that was radically different than music that appeared before that.

00:47:14.000 That's right.

00:47:15.000 And they were scared of that.

00:47:16.000 That's right.

00:47:17.000 And you know, I just made a comment about my belief system to you.

00:47:21.000 Who gets to experience and be with that or in that and of that?

00:47:25.000 That's the divine.

00:47:26.000 That's Jimi Hendrix outside of the box.

00:47:29.000 Yeah.

00:47:29.000 Right?

00:47:30.000 That level of artistic expression, I think that's our purpose.

00:47:34.000 Yeah.

00:47:35.000 And you're right.

00:47:35.000 Right?

00:47:36.000 We took that away.

00:47:37.000 We pushed it into the underground.

00:47:39.000 And then we hijacked our law enforcement to show up as in forces, kick indoors and take people to cages.

00:47:45.000 Yeah.

00:47:46.000 Right?

00:47:47.000 Members of our own community.

00:47:48.000 That's right.

00:47:49.000 And who did we hurt?

00:47:50.000 Our community and our law enforcement.

00:47:52.000 So this is what I want to be clear on here.

00:47:54.000 I want law enforcement to ask why.

00:47:58.000 Why?

00:47:59.000 Why are we in this current moment?

00:48:01.000 Why are we still arresting people for wanting a relationship with plants, cacti, fungi, animal secretions?

00:48:06.000 Why?

00:48:07.000 Are we protecting and serving our community members or industry interests?

00:48:12.000 When you start asking these questions, things shake.

00:48:16.000 For me, they did.

00:48:17.000 They made me into an activist, not only an advocate, but an activist.

00:48:21.000 So I got behind Massachusetts ballot question four in a very public way.

00:48:26.000 What is that?

00:48:26.000 That was to decriminalize the psychedelics and create healing centers in Massachusetts.

00:48:32.000 43, 44% of adults voted yes, but it wasn't enough.

00:48:36.000 It wasn't enough.

00:48:37.000 Well, listen to what I just found out before I came to your show today.

00:48:42.000 The Psychiatric Society of Massachusetts just endorsed or got behind three psilocybin bills.

00:48:50.000 They didn't get behind the ballot question, which failed, but they're now getting behind decriminalizing psilocybin measures that are at the state house.

00:49:01.000 That's great.

00:49:01.000 It's great.

00:49:02.000 Yeah, progress is being made.

00:49:04.000 It happens at a snail's pace, and it happens through back-breaking labor from people like you and Paul Stamitz and Rick Doblin and so many more who are doing the Lord's work, literally.

00:49:16.000 But this is, it's just a frustrating thing for a lot of people that know the truth behind this, that how many people it can help, and then how many people who are being damaged by these unfair, unjust, immoral, and illogical laws.

00:49:29.000 That's right.

00:49:29.000 There they are.

00:49:30.000 That's right.

00:49:31.000 And if we bend it, if we bend it, if you take on one end the enforcers, right, which I believe are called to be peace officers and guardians, and the other end, the civilians, which are being split up into groups and pitted Against one another, and you bend them, everybody's getting hurt, and trauma load is exponentially growing.

00:49:31.000 Yeah.

00:49:51.000 Exponentially growing.

00:49:51.000 Yeah.

00:49:53.000 And what does the media like to put out there?

00:49:55.000 Not media like this, but standard media.

00:49:58.000 The algorithm is based on hate, fear, division, isolation.

00:50:04.000 Well, the algorithm is based on your interaction.

00:50:07.000 And unfortunately, people tend to lean towards those things.

00:50:11.000 That's the problem.

00:50:12.000 The algorithm is not evil.

00:50:14.000 The problem is human beings can be easily manipulated by their own ideas.

00:50:20.000 And these ideas that they have and this inclination to pay more attention to things that outrage you.

00:50:27.000 And fear.

00:50:28.000 And fear.

00:50:29.000 Things that cause rage and fear and distrust.

00:50:35.000 Unfortunately, things that you hate, those are the things you pay attention to.

00:50:38.000 That's right.

00:50:39.000 That's right.

00:50:39.000 I mean, we're biologically created to worry about things that we fear.

00:50:43.000 Right.

00:50:44.000 Right.

00:50:44.000 And logically, I'll give you an example from my community.

00:50:47.000 I think about this all the time.

00:50:48.000 There's about 20, 25,000 people in my community.

00:50:51.000 Every day they wake up, they go to work, they interact with one another and go to bed.

00:50:55.000 20, 25,000 people with one or two issues that the cops have to go to.

00:51:02.000 That's amazing.

00:51:03.000 People are wildly nice.

00:51:06.000 Yeah, for the most part, right?

00:51:07.000 Yeah.

00:51:08.000 And in control and okay.

00:51:08.000 Yeah.

00:51:11.000 Yeah, but the problem is cops deal with the very small percentage of people that aren't.

00:51:16.000 There it is.

00:51:16.000 Yeah.

00:51:17.000 There's this research article called the clinician's delusion.

00:51:20.000 I call it the enforcer's delusion, where your perspective gets completely warped based on the people that you continually interact with.

00:51:27.000 So when you're continually showing up and helping people in their worst moment, you think everybody's their worst moment all the time.

00:51:35.000 Of course.

00:51:36.000 Right?

00:51:38.000 That's a box.

00:51:40.000 That's a dark box.

00:51:41.000 A lonely, terrible box to be in.

00:51:44.000 And to require officers to be able to escape that and have objectivity is crazy.

00:51:51.000 Like, how?

00:51:54.000 Through what mechanism of the human mind allows you to ignore all the evidence that you see on a daily basis?

00:52:00.000 Your evidence.

00:52:01.000 Right, right.

00:52:01.000 Right.

00:52:02.000 Personal experience.

00:52:03.000 That critical incident, amplified data set.

00:52:07.000 Right.

00:52:08.000 That activated nervous system.

00:52:11.000 It actually makes you rely on your biases more.

00:52:15.000 Instead of being able to check your biases, it actually listens to your biases more.

00:52:23.000 So an officer now is taught, try to slow down if you can.

00:52:27.000 Why?

00:52:28.000 So you can breathe.

00:52:29.000 Why?

00:52:29.000 So you can check your bias before you act.

00:52:33.000 Right?

00:52:33.000 Yeah.

00:52:34.000 Because you're amped up.

00:52:36.000 The quicker you act, the safer you'll be.

00:52:38.000 Right.

00:52:39.000 And that's through that automatic process near the brainstem.

00:52:42.000 Right.

00:52:43.000 Not here.

00:52:45.000 Yeah.

00:52:47.000 Yeah, it's a dark predicament, you know, because there's a lot of people that are going to fall victim before anything gets changed.

00:52:55.000 I agree.

00:52:56.000 I agree.

00:52:56.000 And you know, Joe, when back to that FDA committee that delayed everything with MDMA, I ended up really, really sad for like three months because of what you just said.

00:53:11.000 A lot of people who will benefit from MDMA are not going to be able to access, not for a month or two, for years, for years.

00:53:21.000 At a cost that could hurt a person like Rick Doblin and Maps and Lycos and the philanthropists that help him get to this point.

00:53:33.000 That's how expensive it is.

00:53:35.000 Yeah.

00:53:35.000 And then the cost of human life.

00:53:37.000 And the cost of human life.

00:53:39.000 Is compounded every year.

00:53:40.000 That's right.

00:53:41.000 And all the people they interact with and the butterfly effect of that.

00:53:45.000 That's right.

00:53:45.000 Yeah.

00:53:46.000 That's right.

00:53:47.000 And let's take that thread back to what you said.

00:53:49.000 Could you imagine the world we could live in if these things were available to people so that they could heal, so that they could dream, so that they can become their own versions of Jimi Hendrix?

00:54:00.000 Yeah.

00:54:01.000 You know?

00:54:02.000 I know.

00:54:03.000 It's really crazy when you think about it that one president and one administration changed the course of civilization because they wanted control and they wanted to stop the anti-war movement and the civil rights movement.

00:54:15.000 And that's the fact.

00:54:16.000 That's really what happened.

00:54:17.000 And I like that statement, course of civilization, because they succeeded at taking it on a road show into other countries through international treaties.

00:54:28.000 You know, this brings something up.

00:54:31.000 I was blessed with being able to go and speak on a panel at the United Nations, and it was put together by an organization called LEAP Law Enforcement Action Partnership.

00:54:40.000 I want to give a shout out to Diane Goldstein, amazing executive director of a wonderful organization of law enforcement that are trying to change these issues.

00:54:49.000 And we spoke about access for psychedelics for law enforcement.

00:54:55.000 And I was able to call out Schedule I at the United Nations, at the CND, Commission on Narcotic Drugs, and say, we need to do away with the schedule.

00:55:04.000 And here's the two things that I found out I wanted to get to this point.

00:55:07.000 The World Health Organization has now recognized that Schedule I is a fraud.

00:55:12.000 It's fake.

00:55:13.000 It's unscientific.

00:55:13.000 They're going to try to create their own, right?

00:55:16.000 And two, I got to see how they spend all day on a treaty focusing on one word across like 40 countries, whether they agree on that one word or not.

00:55:29.000 What was a word?

00:55:31.000 Make up a word.

00:55:32.000 Are they going to allow harm reduction into the treaty?

00:55:37.000 All day.

00:55:38.000 12 hours later, they're asking this country if it's okay and that country if it's okay.

00:55:44.000 I went, oh my God, you said snail's pace.

00:55:46.000 I think you said snail's pace.

00:55:48.000 This is even slower than a snail's pace.

00:55:52.000 It's painful.

00:55:55.000 Change, having it happen is painful.

00:56:02.000 It's incredible.

00:56:03.000 Yeah, it's...

00:56:21.000 Very difficult.

00:56:22.000 Once they're lost, and this is what's really obvious about the 1970s Schedule I Act, because it's like we're dealing with the same issue all these years later, but it's not the 1970s, right?

00:56:34.000 So we have all the access to the data now instantaneously.

00:56:38.000 You could pull it up on ChatGPT.

00:56:40.000 Yeah.

00:56:41.000 You know, like right now, instantaneously.

00:56:43.000 So there's no excuse for it.

00:56:45.000 But yet it's still difficult to get these laws changed.

00:56:49.000 Insanely difficult.

00:56:50.000 It takes so much time.

00:56:53.000 Well, so the system that we have takes the power and then it doesn't want to give it back.

00:56:59.000 This is what I'm hearing.

00:57:00.000 And then you've got to fight to give it back.

00:57:02.000 But you did indicate something, which I agree with.

00:57:05.000 Things are speeding up because of technology.

00:57:09.000 I mean, technology is involved in this show and us being able to talk to each other.

00:57:13.000 This is a miracle in and of itself.

00:57:15.000 People being able to share ideas at a lightning pace, influencing one another.

00:57:21.000 That's a miracle in and of itself.

00:57:23.000 But I want to bring up a point.

00:57:24.000 Maybe we can explore this together.

00:57:27.000 People are taking back their power and recognizing that the founding documents of this country are designed to protect the life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, and religious expression of the individual human being.

00:57:42.000 It's the most radical thing ever.

00:57:45.000 Yeah, it is.

00:57:48.000 It's a sacred establishment that we're working under, but people don't realize that the individual, when they truly, sincerely believe what they're doing in this country, they can do it.

00:58:00.000 As long as it doesn't harm another human being.

00:58:03.000 It's that simple.

00:58:05.000 Yeah, that's what it should be.

00:58:07.000 Yeah.

00:58:08.000 Let's talk about that.

00:58:10.000 How do we get to the point where people realize that that's the way it should be?

00:58:16.000 We wake the enforcers up.

00:58:20.000 We get the politicians to help create safe space for the exploration of these topics.

00:58:28.000 We meet up in conversation and break bread in safety.

00:58:34.000 Well, I think the big thing is public perception.

00:58:37.000 Public perception moves all those other things because then people will contact politicians and respond by not voting for them or voting people out that do have like this lieutenant governor.

00:58:49.000 He's politically in deep water because so many people have reacted so negatively to this draconian attempt to ban all THC products where people are like, why?

00:59:01.000 Like, what are you doing?

00:59:02.000 And what are you being paid by?

00:59:06.000 Like, what lobbies are enforcing this idea?

00:59:09.000 Like, where is this coming from?

00:59:11.000 So it's going to weaken his position.

00:59:11.000 Right.

00:59:13.000 Yeah.

00:59:14.000 Yeah.

00:59:14.000 Well, it's going to weaken his career.

00:59:16.000 And rightly so.

00:59:17.000 Rightly so.

00:59:18.000 It should.

00:59:18.000 He's on the wrong side of history.

00:59:19.000 There it is.

00:59:20.000 There it is.

00:59:21.000 Yeah.

00:59:21.000 And the public perception has changed.

00:59:24.000 It's changed pretty radically.

00:59:26.000 And I credit the internet with that because over the last 20 years, you've seen this massive shift in this idea that psychedelics are dangerous.

00:59:33.000 You could lose your mind to, hey, that's how my uncle quit smoking.

00:59:38.000 You know, hey, that's how my aunt got off of opiates. 1.00

00:59:40.000 Hey, that's, you know, and everyone knows somebody that's had positive experiences that was deeply depressed and now's a different person.

00:59:49.000 And they're so much happier and healthier because of it.

00:59:51.000 And so it's the narrative publicly has shifted.

00:59:55.000 Has shifted.

00:59:55.000 And a lot of it is because of conversations.

00:59:57.000 And a lot of it is because of podcasts.

00:59:59.000 A lot of it is access to information.

01:00:01.000 There's plenty of online documentaries about it now.

01:00:04.000 That's right.

01:00:05.000 That's right.

01:00:05.000 And you know, Joe, I want to give credit to the courageous people who are the carriers of this knowledge and wisdom by experimenting, learning, realizing, right?

01:00:16.000 This is the hero's journey, right?

01:00:18.000 Going into the darkness, like metaphorically and literally into the underground and coming back with the bounty, the realization, right?

01:00:27.000 The gold and sharing it.

01:00:29.000 Yeah, and having the courage to share it.

01:00:30.000 That's a courageous act.

01:00:32.000 Well, especially if you're in a business like yourself, like law enforcement, you know, where it's like, that's a forbidden topic.

01:00:38.000 That's right.

01:00:40.000 And, you know, I was able to access MDMA and I had a numinous experience.

01:00:48.000 I felt like I was surrounded by love.

01:00:50.000 I was gifted a gratitude that was big enough to hold everything that went into who I am in the present moment.

01:00:56.000 Let me explain that real quick.

01:00:58.000 If I accept myself wholly, wholly, completely, I have to accept my light and dark aspect as well.

01:01:06.000 I have to accept my traumas as well.

01:01:09.000 I have to accept my lineage's history as well, in its entirety.

01:01:13.000 I'm not saying something radical.

01:01:15.000 There's been books written about this by smarter people than I. MDMA helped me access that, right?

01:01:21.000 I've experienced ketamine.

01:01:23.000 Ketamine, I say, was like a luscious massage of my soul.

01:01:28.000 I felt like the energy of my being was traveling in and out of my body.

01:01:33.000 And I had three energetic streams traveling with me.

01:01:37.000 My martial arts instructor periodically, my wife, and God.

01:01:43.000 On ketamine.

01:01:45.000 It was unbelievable.

01:01:46.000 What do you mean, streams, like in what way?

01:01:49.000 Energetic streams.

01:01:50.000 So on ketamine, I felt like there was a bit of a disembodiment that occurred, right?

01:01:55.000 And we can label what that disembodiment is.

01:01:57.000 It's a disassociative anesthetic.

01:02:01.000 People say it feels like their spirit, soul, or identity disconnected from their body.

01:02:06.000 I had that happen.

01:02:07.000 But the energy wasn't just one.

01:02:11.000 I had remembrances of these three.

01:02:15.000 I felt like I needed to give gratitude to God.

01:02:18.000 I felt like the presence of my wife was with me and my martial arts instructor as well, Doreen Cogliandro.

01:02:26.000 And her energetic, their energetic streams were going in and out of my body.

01:02:31.000 And I could remember such joyous thoughts associated to them.

01:02:35.000 It was like a massage to my spirit.

01:02:39.000 You know?

01:02:40.000 And the thoughts associated with that massage and that peace and that sense of Safety was there.

01:02:47.000 Ketamine lifts suicidality in minutes.

01:02:52.000 It just became a medicine approved for depression.

01:02:54.000 Why?

01:02:55.000 That's weird.

01:02:57.000 Why did that just happen?

01:02:59.000 I don't know.

01:02:59.000 Well, it's been going on for quite a bit, right?

01:03:01.000 I mean, I know people in Los Angeles were doing it a decade ago.

01:03:05.000 Well, here's the thing.

01:03:06.000 Let's broaden that.

01:03:08.000 How long were the people partying with it, right?

01:03:11.000 I don't know.

01:03:12.000 I knew of a guy who had a problem with it.

01:03:14.000 He was an MMA fighter.

01:03:15.000 He got addicted to ketamine.

01:03:18.000 And I remember a friend of mine went to visit him in a rehab center, and he was all fucked up. 0.97

01:03:22.000 But that was the narrative that he was doing ketamine.

01:03:24.000 I was like, oh, he's doing a tranquilizer?

01:03:26.000 Like, this is 1990s, late 90s.

01:03:31.000 Okay.

01:03:31.000 Well, you can get addicted.

01:03:33.000 Ketamine is addicted to?

01:03:34.000 You can get addicted to ketamine.

01:03:37.000 Not like an opiate.

01:03:39.000 Is it a psychological addiction or is it a physical addiction?

01:03:42.000 There might be a combination.

01:03:44.000 I don't want to purport to speak about it scientifically too much, but I've heard there can be a compulsion to use it.

01:03:51.000 And it can hurt your bladder if you go overboard.

01:03:54.000 I know a lot of people in the Austin area use it recreationally.

01:03:57.000 We actually had a girl go into a K-hole at my club. 1.00

01:04:01.000 She was in the middle of the comedy club just.

01:04:03.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:04:04.000 I mean, that's full disembodiment, right?

01:04:06.000 You're in another place and your somatic self has to be kept full.

01:04:10.000 Well, they're doing a nasal spray, so they're like doing it throughout the day.

01:04:14.000 That's the prescription.

01:04:16.000 I forget from what company for depression.

01:04:20.000 So you could kind of double pump and go a little overboard.

01:04:20.000 Yeah.

01:04:25.000 Do it all day long if you want.

01:04:25.000 Yeah.

01:04:27.000 If you wanted to.

01:04:28.000 Yeah, that's a problem with, well, that's a problem with everything, right?

01:04:31.000 You know, it's a problem with any, I mean, if you really need Adderall, you have like chronic fatigue and Adderall is the only thing that lifts you out of that.

01:04:39.000 What's to stop you from taking two pills?

01:04:42.000 I'm glad you did three pills.

01:04:43.000 Or even coffee, right?

01:04:43.000 That's right.

01:04:45.000 Double espresso can become a quad.

01:04:47.000 Then you're drinking six.

01:04:48.000 Oh, I know a lot of people are addicted.

01:04:50.000 I mean, I'm kind of addicted to caffeine.

01:04:52.000 I quit it when I was on my vacation.

01:04:55.000 I was on vacation for 10 days and I didn't have any coffee, any caffeine at all for five, six days.

01:05:00.000 And I was like, ooh, I sleep so much better.

01:05:01.000 I feel so much better.

01:05:03.000 But I feel like when it comes to conversations, it's like I lean on it.

01:05:06.000 I lean on caffeine.

01:05:07.000 I lean on it to get me going.

01:05:09.000 I'm a happier person on caffeine.

01:05:11.000 I really enjoy that substance.

01:05:13.000 I like it.

01:05:13.000 I just wanted to know that I could stop taking it and it wouldn't be any problem.

01:05:17.000 It was no problem at all.

01:05:18.000 I stopped taking nicotine pouches and I stopped taking caffeine for 10 whole days.

01:05:24.000 And I was like, I'm fine.

01:05:25.000 And I stopped the caffeine for five or six days.

01:05:27.000 Then I said, ah, I feel like having a cup of coffee.

01:05:30.000 And I limited myself to one cup a day.

01:05:33.000 Yeah, I have a hard time coming off of caffeine.

01:05:37.000 I get headaches.

01:05:38.000 Yeah, I get headaches.

01:05:38.000 But I've done it.

01:05:39.000 It affects my mood a little bit.

01:05:42.000 I like the caffeine.

01:05:42.000 I like it.

01:05:44.000 Yeah, I don't think it's overall detrimental.

01:05:47.000 I don't think it affects your judgment.

01:05:48.000 I don't think it makes you do anything squirrely.

01:05:51.000 It just gives you a little, it peps you up a little bit.

01:05:53.000 I mean, most of the world is having it in the morning.

01:05:55.000 Yeah.

01:05:55.000 Right.

01:05:56.000 And then most of the world is having a drink at night.

01:05:58.000 But, you know, this is also the argument for coca leaves because coca leaves apparently is a superior stimulant.

01:05:58.000 Yeah.

01:06:05.000 It's just they chew it and they chew coca leaves and this is something that, you know, farmers and hardworking people in South America have been doing forever.

01:06:15.000 And unfortunately, somebody figured out how to synthesize it and turn it into cocaine and then it became illegal.

01:06:15.000 That's right.

01:06:20.000 Illegal.

01:06:21.000 Yeah.

01:06:21.000 Now you can't get because if you get just coca leaves and just chew on coca leaves in America, I mean, maybe that's superior to coffee.

01:06:28.000 We don't know because we can't try.

01:06:30.000 Exactly.

01:06:31.000 And that is the block of experimentation that's unjust.

01:06:36.000 Yeah.

01:06:36.000 Right?

01:06:37.000 You know what's interesting about cocaine is it's medically appropriate.

01:06:45.000 I think they use it for eye surgery.

01:06:47.000 Right.

01:06:48.000 Yeah, there's medical uses for it.

01:06:50.000 So I can't off the top of my head remember if it's on Schedule 1.

01:06:53.000 I don't think it is.

01:06:55.000 Cocaine's not on Schedule 1, really?

01:06:57.000 I mean, we could look it up.

01:06:58.000 That's interesting.

01:06:58.000 Well, here's the thing.

01:06:59.000 If it can be used for eye surgery, right?

01:07:03.000 So it would be interesting to see.

01:07:05.000 Yeah, so is it like a numbing agent?

01:07:06.000 Is that what it is?

01:07:08.000 They've just, I've heard that they've realized before it became a big issue that it's safe for eyeball.

01:07:14.000 Yeah.

01:07:16.000 Numbing agent.

01:07:17.000 Well, I know there's medical cocaine.

01:07:19.000 I do know that.

01:07:20.000 I just don't know what the applications are.

01:07:23.000 You know, the number one manufacturer of it?

01:07:26.000 Coca-Cola.

01:07:27.000 Coca-Cola.

01:07:30.000 They still use the coca leaf for flavor for Coca-Cola.

01:07:35.000 Like they shut down the cocaine molecule something.

01:07:38.000 They extract it.

01:07:39.000 Right.

01:07:39.000 And they use it to produce medical-grade cocaine.

01:07:44.000 Interesting.

01:07:45.000 And then some thing of that still gets into coca-cola.

01:07:49.000 The flavor.

01:07:49.000 Yes.

01:07:50.000 What's in Coke?

01:07:51.000 I guess it's the flavonoids.

01:07:53.000 That's what's in Coca-Cola.

01:07:55.000 And it used to be cocaine was in Coca-Cola.

01:07:57.000 I would like to go back and try some of that.

01:07:59.000 I like to go, like, what was that like?

01:08:01.000 Like, how much cocaine was in there?

01:08:03.000 You think they have original recipe Coke bottles at the factory?

01:08:07.000 With cocaine?

01:08:07.000 At Coca-Cola.

01:08:08.000 I mean, what year was that?

01:08:09.000 Coke headquarters.

01:08:10.000 What year did they, let's find out what year they took cocaine out of Coca-Cola?

01:08:16.000 Because I remember the whole story for, I don't remember exactly the details of, like, how cocaine was in Coca-Cola for the first place.

01:08:25.000 But cocaine used to be prescribed, 1929.

01:08:31.000 So 1903, fresh coca leaves were removed from the formula.

01:08:34.000 After 1904, instead of using fresh coca leaves, Coca-Cola started using spent leaves, the leftovers of the cocaine extraction process with trace levels of cocaine.

01:08:43.000 And since then, by 1929, they've used cocaine-free.

01:08:46.000 So in 1903, they started removing cocaine.

01:08:53.000 But they're still using cocaine-free coca leaf extracts.

01:09:00.000 Yes.

01:09:01.000 Yes.

01:09:01.000 And they're the only company, I believe, that's allowed to do that.

01:09:05.000 I think they're grandfathered in.

01:09:06.000 And how did...

01:09:12.000 Like, what's the story?

01:09:12.000 Find that out.

01:09:14.000 What is the story Of cocaine in Coca-Cola.

01:09:19.000 Okay.

01:09:20.000 Pemberton called for five ounces of coca leaf per gallon of syrup, a significant dose.

01:09:26.000 In 1891, Candler claimed his formula altered extensively from Pemberton's originally contained only a tenth of this amount.

01:09:33.000 So it used to be really juicy.

01:09:34.000 Coca-Cola once contained an estimated 9 milligrams of cocaine per glass.

01:09:39.000 For comparison, a typical dose or line of cocaine is 50 to 75 milligrams.

01:09:45.000 So it was like a mild pick-me-up, nine milligrams.

01:09:49.000 After 1904, instead of using fresh leaves, Coca-Cola started using spent leaves.

01:09:53.000 Today, that extract is prepared at a Stephan company, Stepan Company plant in Maywood, New Jersey, the only manufacturing plant authorized by the federal government to import and process coca leaves, which it obtains from Peru and Bolivia.

01:10:11.000 Stepan Company extracts cocaine from the leaves, which it sells to Mallencrock, the only company in the United States licensed to purify cocaine for medical use.

01:10:21.000 There it is.

01:10:21.000 Medical use.

01:10:22.000 Wild.

01:10:23.000 They call it here in the ad says it's an intellectual beverage.

01:10:28.000 Ah, intellectual beverage.

01:10:29.000 A valuable brain tonic.

01:10:30.000 A valuable brain tonic.

01:10:32.000 A cure for all nervous afflictions.

01:10:36.000 Affections.

01:10:37.000 Sick, headache, neurologica, whatever that is.

01:10:41.000 Hysteria, melancholy, etc.

01:10:44.000 The particular, oh, peculiar flavor of Coca-Cola delights every palate.

01:10:49.000 It is dispensed from the soda fountains in the same manner as any of the fruit syrups.

01:10:55.000 Wow.

01:10:56.000 What an advertisement.

01:10:57.000 Wow.

01:10:59.000 I'd like to go back and try that.

01:11:01.000 I'd like to go back to 1900 and get a glass and see what's up.

01:11:06.000 You hear the pop and the bubbly poured over ice right out of the fountain.

01:11:10.000 Yeah, what was that?

01:11:11.000 That's a beautiful advertisement.

01:11:12.000 Wow.

01:11:13.000 Long after the syrup ceased to contain any significant amounts of cocaine in North Carolina, dope remained a common colloquialism for Coca-Cola.

01:11:21.000 And dope wagons were trucks that transported it.

01:11:24.000 Wow.

01:11:25.000 Must have been good.

01:11:26.000 It must have been real good.

01:11:28.000 It must have been real good.

01:11:29.000 Like just a little bit of a juice.

01:11:31.000 The cola nut, cola nuts for caffeine.

01:11:34.000 Cola nut acts as a flavoring and the original source of caffeine in Coca-Cola.

01:11:38.000 It contains 2 to 3.5% caffeine and has a bitter flavor.

01:11:43.000 In 1911, the U.S. government sued the United States versus 40 barrels and 20 kegs of Coca-Cola, hoping to force the Coca-Cola Company to remove caffeine from its formula.

01:11:55.000 Interesting.

01:11:56.000 That's interesting.

01:11:57.000 Court found the syrup, when diluted as directed, would result in a beverage containing 1.21 grains, 78.4 milligrams, of caffeine per eight fluid ounces.

01:12:08.000 The case was decided in favor of Coca-Cola Company at the district court, but subsequently in 1912, the U.S. Pure Food and Drug Act was amended, adding caffeine to the list of habit-forming and deleterious substances, which must be listed on a product's label.

01:12:26.000 In 1913, the case was appealed by the Sixth Circuit in Cincinnati, where the ruling was affirmed, but then appealed again in 1916 to the Supreme Court, where the government effectively won as a new trial was ordered.

01:12:41.000 The company then voluntarily reduced the amount of caffeine in its product and offered rather to pay the government's legal costs to settle and avoid further litigation.

01:12:52.000 Wow, that was all over caffeine.

01:12:55.000 78 milligrams.

01:12:59.000 Yeah, but like, what is a Red Bull?

01:13:01.000 I was going to say, what's in a monster?

01:13:06.000 So let's find out how much caffeine is in a monster.

01:13:09.000 One of the things that Monster, I don't know if Monster does it, but some of these companies do it.

01:13:12.000 It's kind of tricky.

01:13:13.000 By the way, I like Monster.

01:13:14.000 I drink them all the time when I do the UFC.

01:13:17.000 The problem is it'll say like two servings.

01:13:21.000 Who's splitting a monster with their friends?

01:13:23.000 It's like, I'm going to drink.

01:13:25.000 You have some per serving.

01:13:28.000 Yeah.

01:13:29.000 And how many servings are in a can of Monster?

01:13:31.000 Well, this just says per serving.

01:13:35.000 Does it say it in a can?

01:13:37.000 Like when you get a big old can.

01:13:38.000 Man, just when I Googled it, it just said one serving.

01:13:40.000 Because they have big cans.

01:13:41.000 There's a monster.

01:13:41.000 Yeah.

01:13:42.000 This is a jumbo side.

01:13:43.000 I had a friend who was a Mormon, and he wasn't allowed to drink coffee, and that motherfucker would pound energy drinks all day. 0.99

01:13:49.000 I was like, hey, dude, what are you doing?

01:13:52.000 It's a gray area in the world.

01:13:53.000 140.

01:13:55.000 A monster is, oh, my God.

01:13:58.000 140 for zero sugar.

01:14:00.000 A regular monster as 160. 0.83

01:14:03.000 160.

01:14:04.000 Mountain Dew Rise has 180.

01:14:08.000 That's incredible.

01:14:09.000 Beyond Raw Lit.

01:14:13.000 That has 250.

01:14:15.000 Bang with 300.

01:14:16.000 Five-hour energy shots as 200?

01:14:19.000 Holy shit, man.

01:14:20.000 Those little tiny energy shots, those five-hour energy drinks has 200 milligrams of caffeine.

01:14:25.000 Wow.

01:14:27.000 Bang has 300? 0.62

01:14:29.000 Holy shit, man.

01:14:31.000 And Coca-Cola led the battle.

01:14:34.000 When was that?

01:14:34.000 1911?

01:14:36.000 Some of those dates.

01:14:37.000 About caffeine.

01:14:38.000 The amount being in it.

01:14:38.000 Yeah.

01:14:40.000 Well, it's like people have always tried to control other people for whatever reason, especially when the government has the power to do it.

01:14:40.000 Interesting.

01:14:48.000 For whatever reason, human beings really enjoy controlling other people.

01:14:52.000 They really do.

01:14:53.000 And once they have power, they really enjoy exercising that power.

01:14:56.000 And keeping it and controlling it and not giving it back.

01:14:59.000 And you got to resist.

01:15:03.000 You do.

01:15:03.000 Yeah.

01:15:04.000 You got to resist.

01:15:05.000 But the problem is, like, legalizing these things would cause a big problem.

01:15:10.000 It'd be a big problem.

01:15:12.000 If you just legalize them, there's a lot of people who would never try any illegal drug who would try a legal drug.

01:15:19.000 You know, if you made heroin, cocaine, you know, fill in the blank, all the different substances, psychedelic and otherwise, if you made them all legal, you're going to have a bunch of people that are going to have problems with these things that wouldn't have problems with them normally.

01:15:38.000 So it would be a period of time where it would cause damage.

01:15:42.000 And that would be really problematic for politicians, lawmakers, anybody who enforced these ideas.

01:15:49.000 You know, there'd be blood is on your hands. 0.98

01:15:51.000 but this infidelization of human beings, like turning them into babies that need to be controlled by the state.

01:16:01.000 That's the problem.

01:16:02.000 And we're in this problem, and the only way to get out of that problem is to tear the fucking band-aid off.

01:16:07.000 I completely agree with you.

01:16:08.000 And I don't want to do cocaine.

01:16:10.000 I've never done cocaine in my whole life.

01:16:12.000 I saw, when I was a kid in high school, I saw a bunch of people that had cocaine problems, and I was like, I don't want to have anything to do with that.

01:16:17.000 Right, right.

01:16:18.000 But listen, you made that decision for yourself.

01:16:21.000 Yeah.

01:16:21.000 Right?

01:16:22.000 And look, we know we were just touching upon examples of people having a relationship with a cocoa plant without it causing an issue.

01:16:29.000 I don't think it's that addictive when you're just chewing the leaves.

01:16:29.000 Yeah.

01:16:33.000 I think those people do it without much problems.

01:16:35.000 There's also mate de cocoa, which is a tea that they make from the leaves.

01:16:39.000 Well, look, we're starting to talk about, we're using the word legalization and saying there will be a problem with legalization for a time being.

01:16:49.000 Why don't we talk about decriminalization and regulation?

01:16:53.000 But the problem is, even with decriminalization, what's the supply?

01:16:57.000 Where are people getting it from?

01:16:59.000 If you can't sell it legally, then how do I know it's pure?

01:17:02.000 That's right.

01:17:03.000 That's the real issue.

01:17:04.000 The real issue with cocaine is probably not cocaine itself.

01:17:07.000 The real issue is getting cocaine that's stepped on and cut and cut a lot of times with fentanyl.

01:17:15.000 I mean, we all know people that have died from fentanyl overdoses.

01:17:18.000 I know a bunch of people that have.

01:17:19.000 Yep, I've done follow-up on police calls to people who said to me directly, I was trying to get Coke.

01:17:26.000 I got fentanyl and almost died.

01:17:28.000 That's a tragedy.

01:17:30.000 But Joe, you're jumping to this next idea that we should probably explore, which is called safe supply.

01:17:37.000 Yeah.

01:17:38.000 And who should control safe supply?

01:17:39.000 But let me remind our audience, and let me bring this back into the conversation.

01:17:44.000 Our police promotional books, we're not talking radical here.

01:17:50.000 Our police promotion books talk about the problem with prohibition and criminalization, unleashing gangsters and dangerous supply on our civilians.

01:18:00.000 And that's where the cartels come into play.

01:18:02.000 Exactly.

01:18:03.000 Look, when we were kids, the cartels weren't an issue.

01:18:06.000 That's right.

01:18:07.000 Do you ever remember?

01:18:08.000 How old are you?

01:18:09.000 I'm 48.

01:18:10.000 I grew up in Chelsea, Mass.

01:18:11.000 I'm almost 58.

01:18:13.000 I grew up in Newton.

01:18:14.000 I didn't ever hear about cartels.

01:18:16.000 That's right.

01:18:17.000 You never heard about Mexican cartels.

01:18:19.000 You never heard about the problem.

01:18:20.000 Now it's like all over the news.

01:18:21.000 It's a big thing.

01:18:22.000 Why is it a big thing?

01:18:23.000 Because they control the drug supply into the United States because drugs are illegal.

01:18:27.000 So only outlaws sell drugs.

01:18:30.000 And what happens with value when you make something illegal?

01:18:33.000 Yeah.

01:18:34.000 Shoots through the roof.

01:18:36.000 And the most violent come in and replace the less violent.

01:18:36.000 That's right.

01:18:41.000 Exactly.

01:18:42.000 You know?

01:18:43.000 Just like during Prohibition when the mob took over.

01:18:45.000 That's how they gained power.

01:18:45.000 That's right.

01:18:46.000 That's how they got money.

01:18:47.000 That's right.

01:18:47.000 They were selling alcohol.

01:18:48.000 And so what's safe supply or a safe use room?

01:18:52.000 I would purport to say that a bar is a safe use room where you can get safe supply.

01:18:57.000 Right.

01:18:57.000 Yeah.

01:18:57.000 You know you're getting actual real alcohol.

01:18:59.000 That's it.

01:19:01.000 And how about we incorporate treating adults like adults?

01:19:05.000 Yeah.

01:19:05.000 Powerful education and decide who's going to control safe supply.

01:19:11.000 Because right now, the most dangerous people on earth control it.

01:19:15.000 Yes.

01:19:15.000 And I think education, what you just said, is a huge part of it.

01:19:18.000 And let people understand, like, hey, everyone knows there's giant problems with alcohol use.

01:19:24.000 There's alcoholism, there's liver failure, there's a host of different diseases that come from being an alcoholic.

01:19:29.000 And then there's also operating motor vehicles when you're drunk and drunk driving kills a ton of people every year.

01:19:37.000 And also a bunch of violent acts that get perpetrated by people that are drunk.

01:19:42.000 There's a lot of things wrong with alcohol, but yet we allow alcohol, you know?

01:19:47.000 And alcohol is one of the worst drugs.

01:19:51.000 It's one of the worst drugs for you physically.

01:19:53.000 It's one of the only drugs that if you become addicted to it, you can't quit cold turkey or you'll fucking die.

01:19:58.000 That's right.

01:19:59.000 Right then and there.

01:20:00.000 Exactly.

01:20:01.000 So working with this logic, Joe, right?

01:20:03.000 Because people sometimes make me out to be out of my mind when I say this stuff.

01:20:07.000 If the most dangerous, toxic, and carcinogenic is available, and the least dangerous, helpful, non-addictic is not available, let's fix that.

01:20:07.000 Of course.

01:20:19.000 Why do I sound wild when I say that?

01:20:21.000 Yeah.

01:20:22.000 Well, I think the mushroom one is the easiest one because of the fact that it genuinely can't kill people.

01:20:31.000 Cocaine is a lot harder to sell.

01:20:33.000 Because also, I don't necessarily think it's good for you.

01:20:36.000 But I know people that have done pure cocaine that really enjoyed the experience and didn't get addicted to it.

01:20:42.000 So I can't speak on that.

01:20:45.000 I just think that things that are physically addictive that have been known to ruin your life are things you should probably avoid.

01:20:51.000 And we can teach upon that.

01:20:53.000 And we can educate upon that.

01:20:54.000 I mean, look at the wonderful job we've done at kind of putting the reins on nicotine through advertisement and education.

01:21:03.000 Well, cigarette smoking in particular, because the problem isn't really the nicotine, which we've found to be.

01:21:09.000 Yeah, it's like nicotine actually has health benefits to it, which sounds crazy to people.

01:21:09.000 That's right.

01:21:14.000 It's aeroprotectant.

01:21:16.000 It actually stopped people from getting COVID.

01:21:19.000 There's a lot of weird stuff with the compound nicotine.

01:21:23.000 But then there's the delivery method.

01:21:25.000 And it's not even just like, it's hard to know what's true or what's not true.

01:21:30.000 But I'm sure you saw that Russell Crowe movie, The Insider.

01:21:34.000 It's a great movie.

01:21:34.000 I haven't.

01:21:35.000 But it's about these companies that added chemicals to cigarettes to make them far more addictive.

01:21:44.000 And he was a whistleblower.

01:21:45.000 He was a chemist that was working at this company.

01:21:47.000 Russell Crowe was playing this doctor.

01:21:49.000 He was a real guy whose life was threatened because he exposed that these companies had put a bunch of different chemicals into cigarettes to make them highly addictive, much more addictive than just plain regular tobacco smoking.

01:22:04.000 Well, I was told that those scientists were absorbed into the food industry.

01:22:11.000 Well, that's the problem is that the companies that were getting Sued after it was determined that cigarette smoking does cause cancer, cigarettes are addictive.

01:22:22.000 Once they lost a bunch of money, they went out and bought all the processed food companies.

01:22:27.000 And now they made those more addictive.

01:22:29.000 And so now, like, you know, they even openly flaunted.

01:22:32.000 I bet you can't eat one chip.

01:22:34.000 That's right.

01:22:35.000 Bet you can't eat it.

01:22:35.000 That's right.

01:22:36.000 Give it a try.

01:22:37.000 Open a bag of Doritos.

01:22:38.000 I mean, that's the thing.

01:22:39.000 And again, I think you should be able to eat Doritos.

01:22:42.000 I like them.

01:22:42.000 They're delicious.

01:22:43.000 Same here.

01:22:43.000 Nothing wrong with them.

01:22:45.000 But they are addictive.

01:22:46.000 And why are they addictive?

01:22:47.000 Because they're chemically designed to be addictive.

01:22:50.000 That's right.

01:22:51.000 Because these food manufacturing companies want you to buy more of them.

01:22:54.000 Simple.

01:22:54.000 It's like, how do we get people to eat more chips?

01:22:57.000 Make the chips impossible to put down or very difficult to put down.

01:23:01.000 And if you want to increase their value through the roof, prohibit access after they've tasted them and let the cartels produce them in another country and try to get them across the border to sell to our people.

01:23:11.000 You're going to get fentanyl potato chips.

01:23:13.000 That's right.

01:23:17.000 Which is so crazy.

01:23:18.000 Imagine if they outlawed all processed foods and you had to get fucking contraband Twinkies. 0.89

01:23:23.000 Good lord.

01:23:23.000 Right.

01:23:24.000 Like, yeah, I think you should be able to buy ring dings.

01:23:24.000 Right.

01:23:28.000 They should be legal.

01:23:29.000 But I wouldn't recommend eating them every day.

01:23:31.000 They're fucking terrible for you.

01:23:32.000 Exactly.

01:23:32.000 But they taste delicious if you want one every now and again.

01:23:35.000 And that's the environment that we're in with some things and not others.

01:23:40.000 Right, right.

01:23:41.000 It's illogical.

01:23:41.000 And that's the problem.

01:23:43.000 It's illogical.

01:23:44.000 And there's also this fear aspect to it because if you go against it, you know, you're going to get put into a very bad position where there's people with enormous power and influence that want to silence you.

01:23:57.000 And this is why guys like Rick Doblin are so courageous, like, because he spent his entire life trying to do this the right way and doing it above board, by the books, and show through the use with police officers and military people and people experiencing PTSD that, look, this has extreme beneficial aspects to it that you shouldn't ignore.

01:24:22.000 And they're good for society.

01:24:23.000 And we should probably expand the use of them in an appropriate way.

01:24:27.000 That's right.

01:24:28.000 I think that his work is leading to one of the first big kinks in the armor of the system.

01:24:35.000 And you speak to the value of the way that he did it.

01:24:39.000 You know what I mean?

01:24:41.000 What are the rules?

01:24:42.000 Tell me will operate within them.

01:24:44.000 What kind of data do I have to create?

01:24:46.000 Well, let me make that data.

01:24:48.000 How do I access the compound?

01:24:50.000 How are you going to let me?

01:24:51.000 Right.

01:24:51.000 And if we don't know how, we need the rules.

01:24:55.000 And sometimes the rules weren't there.

01:24:57.000 And Rick and MAPS had to push, right?

01:24:59.000 And in our system, how do we battle?

01:25:01.000 What's the appropriate way to unleash violence?

01:25:03.000 It's with lawyers.

01:25:05.000 It's frowned upon to physically be violent.

01:25:09.000 So he had to fight.

01:25:10.000 He had to fight with the government.

01:25:12.000 And what really makes me nuts, Joe, is the amount of back and forth, again, I heard that they did with the FDA, with the regulators.

01:25:22.000 They knew what they were doing, the design of the process, everything was being talked about, right?

01:25:28.000 And they get a, let's wait.

01:25:31.000 It's interesting, but the results were too good.

01:25:34.000 You know?

01:25:35.000 I mean, just from the ones I hold in my heart.

01:25:38.000 So what kind of pressure do you think they're under to not allow these things?

01:25:38.000 Yeah.

01:25:44.000 Because that's the question.

01:25:45.000 Like, what is it?

01:25:46.000 Is it public social pressure?

01:25:49.000 Because if they do pass this, then they'll be scrutinized and people that are ignorant and that have bought into the narrative will then look at them as like, you're a part of the problem.

01:25:57.000 You're contributing to the deterioration of society by allowing this use of MDMA to push forward.

01:26:04.000 And by minimizing the risks of it, by talking about the benefits of it, you're essentially allowing people to think that it's a lot safer than it really is.

01:26:16.000 Look, I think that's a component, right?

01:26:20.000 We were talking about public perception and that changing and then that pressuring and things changing as well.

01:26:26.000 I think this is a paradigm changing and shifting thing that the entire system, including pharma and all these people that are on these boards, these decision makers, power brokers, right, are trying to make sense of.

01:26:40.000 And I'll explain.

01:26:42.000 We have an identified disorder or challenge.

01:26:46.000 We have a medicine that masks that symptom.

01:26:50.000 This is going to allow people to truly heal.

01:26:53.000 When you truly heal, you don't have to keep taking a medicine.

01:26:58.000 You might have to come back to it periodically.

01:27:01.000 Sure.

01:27:01.000 Let's call that a flare-up.

01:27:03.000 Yeah, let's call it a touch-up.

01:27:05.000 But when you're not taking your pill every day, every other day, that's going to be a big hit to people's power and money.

01:27:14.000 Right.

01:27:14.000 Especially when you deal with things like there's a giant business in keeping people, I don't want to say happy, but not depressed.

01:27:25.000 Right?

01:27:26.000 Like there's a giant industry in people that are on SSRIs and antidepressants and anti-anxiety medication.

01:27:33.000 When it's been proven that exercise is far more effective than SSRIs are.

01:27:39.000 Far more medically proven, statistically proven that SSRIs are not as effective as regular exercise.

01:27:47.000 Well, let me throw something in there.

01:27:48.000 Is that a medicine?

01:27:50.000 Right.

01:27:51.000 Oh, exercise is definitely a medicine.

01:27:51.000 Yeah.

01:27:53.000 So there's an organization, I think it's called Exercise as Medicine.

01:27:53.000 Right.

01:27:57.000 But a mainstream medical doctor going to be able to prescribe exercise to somebody?

01:28:04.000 They can't.

01:28:05.000 They should be able to.

01:28:06.000 Yeah, they really should.

01:28:08.000 But the problem is there's no profit in that.

01:28:09.000 Right.

01:28:10.000 Unless you own the gym.

01:28:11.000 You do it on your own.

01:28:13.000 Join the gym yourself.

01:28:14.000 And you know, half the people aren't going to go because they're scared.

01:28:17.000 They don't want to look goofy.

01:28:20.000 The other quarter who do go might not approach it correctly and blow out a tendons.

01:28:26.000 They'll hurt themselves.

01:28:27.000 Yeah, you need trainers.

01:28:28.000 Right?

01:28:29.000 It's a really interesting thing here.

01:28:32.000 So back to your question, this is going to be a paradigm-shifting thing.

01:28:37.000 I believe that psychedelic-assisted talk therapy is going to allow talk therapy to live up to its promise as a talking Cure.

01:28:46.000 I believe the psychedelics are going to be able to cure or push into remission a lot of these unshakable challenges.

01:28:54.000 And that's going to be a big hit to the SSRIs.

01:28:57.000 That's going to be a big hit to certain medicines.

01:29:00.000 You know what else I think it's going to do?

01:29:02.000 I think it's going to move people from agnosticism or atheism towards religion and spirituality.

01:29:11.000 And it's also going to be a boon for religion and spiritualists.

01:29:17.000 Wild.

01:29:18.000 Yeah.

01:29:19.000 Wild.

01:29:20.000 Have you ever heard of John Marco Allegro's book, The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross?

01:29:25.000 No.

01:29:26.000 It's a book that he wrote after he was one of the people that was contracted to decipher the Dead Sea Scrolls.

01:29:35.000 It was like a 14-year job where they were deciphering the Dead Sea Scrolls.

01:29:39.000 And he was the only one on the committee that was agnostic.

01:29:42.000 He was an ordained minister, but through his studying of theology, he started becoming agnostic because he recognized that there's just too many religions and too many parallels.

01:29:52.000 And like, what's the real religion and root of this all?

01:29:55.000 Or origin rather and root of this all.

01:29:58.000 So he wrote this book after 14 years where he's going to sort of paraphrase, but he thought that the entire Christian religion was based on the consumption of psychedelic mushrooms and fertility rituals.

01:30:12.000 And that this was what it was all about.

01:30:15.000 And I believe the book, because I've said this before, but I need to know it's true, was the book bought up by the Catholic Church?

01:30:21.000 I think it was bought up by the Catholic Church, and they stopped production of it.

01:30:26.000 And then he released a new book called The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Christian Myth.

01:30:30.000 And that one was available.

01:30:32.000 But then since then, they've republished them.

01:30:37.000 But the big one was The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross, because that was the one that was kind of very difficult to get.

01:30:42.000 And I have a couple copies of it, but they're original copies that I had to buy online.

01:30:46.000 Okay.

01:30:47.000 And it's a fascinating book.

01:30:49.000 It's a fascinating book because he translates or he breaks down the word Christ to an ancient Sumerian word, which was a mushroom covered in God's semen.

01:31:06.000 And this is what he's saying, is that they thought that when it rained, that this was God, his semen on the earth, which has caused all life to rise from.

01:31:19.000 We all need water.

01:31:20.000 And then plants, of course, need water.

01:31:22.000 And then after rainfall, they would find these mushrooms.

01:31:25.000 Because mushrooms grow incredibly quickly.

01:31:27.000 And they would consume these mushrooms and have these religious experiences.

01:31:31.000 And this was a hugely controversial book, of course.

01:31:35.000 And to really be able to know if he's right or wrong, you would have to have a deep understanding of ancient languages and the Bible and so many different things.

01:31:45.000 Well, you know what that brings up in me, Joe, is the sacredness of sexuality.

01:31:50.000 One.

01:31:51.000 I don't know why what you just said triggered that in me.

01:31:54.000 And the other is what about every Sunday magically transmuting bread and wine into flesh and blood of God?

01:32:04.000 Right?

01:32:05.000 This isn't a radical concept.

01:32:07.000 This is accepted.

01:32:09.000 This is like a billion follower strong type of Christianity that is through sacred ritual transforming food into the body and blood of God.

01:32:21.000 Right.

01:32:22.000 Right?

01:32:23.000 Just because we can understand that this is wood and a table and we've labeled it and boxed it and analyzed it doesn't mean that the mystery of it all has been stripped away.

01:32:35.000 And I don't think we need to allow that process to happen.

01:32:40.000 Right?

01:32:42.000 This is a magical, mysterious experience.

01:32:45.000 When we're staring at one another, just because we identify as human beings, do we really know what's happening?

01:32:53.000 Or is that ego inflation and science trying to dumb down a mystery and a magic?

01:33:00.000 Well, it's all a mystery, right?

01:33:02.000 We've become accustomed to the mystery, so it seems normal.

01:33:05.000 But, you know, if you didn't exist on Earth and Earth was a drug that you could take where you could experience life on Earth, you'd be like, this is crazy.

01:33:13.000 It absolutely is wild.

01:33:14.000 Being a human being interacting with people, looking at things through your eyes, hearing things through your ears, touching and feeling, smelling and using all your senses and navigating through this bizarre experience of life.

01:33:28.000 Very weird.

01:33:29.000 And what about that image of the Ouroboros, right?

01:33:31.000 The snake or dragon eating itself?

01:33:34.000 I mean, let's talk about sacred sexuality and the fact that every living thing is in a system that's eating and birthing itself continuously in all directions.

01:33:44.000 How do you wrap your mind around that?

01:33:46.000 You know, I got a big sense of that when I went into Old Growth Rainforest in Costa Rica for the first time.

01:33:52.000 And I touched like the handle of a bridge and it felt like it was moving because like every drop of everything is alive and everything is either competing, going along with and helping, supporting or eating one another in that space.

01:34:07.000 And it's like, what is happening in here?

01:34:08.000 It's like everything is alive.

01:34:10.000 Yeah.

01:34:11.000 You know?

01:34:11.000 And I had that type of an experience on psychedelics in the religious context, psilocybin.

01:34:18.000 I felt like I dropped into the collective conscience and I got to see the partitioned section that was my psychic space where all my complexes and traumas were pulsing energetically into one another and how that energy was spilling over on my family and community.

01:34:36.000 That was the access that was given to me through psilocybin.

01:34:41.000 You know?

01:34:42.000 And those energetic forces are pushing me around right now as we speak.

01:34:45.000 Well, which makes you think, like, if you were an ancient person and you had this experience, of course you would think you're communing with God.

01:34:52.000 Yeah.

01:34:53.000 I agree.

01:34:53.000 Yeah.

01:34:54.000 And look, we're all ancient persons right now in this moment in time.

01:34:59.000 And I believe that.

01:35:00.000 Yeah.

01:35:00.000 Well, we are ancient.

01:35:02.000 And, you know, if you go 5,000 years from now, how they're going to look at us like these dorks, like they were fighting and arguing about.

01:35:10.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:35:11.000 Yeah, yeah.

01:35:12.000 I can't wait till war is old technology that We all laugh about. 1.00

01:35:16.000 Yeah, God, isn't that a crazy thing that if you asked a person, is it possible in your lifetime for war to not exist?

01:35:22.000 Most people would be like, There's no way.

01:35:25.000 Which is insane.

01:35:26.000 It's so insane.

01:35:27.000 Because in small groups, it's clearly easy.

01:35:29.000 Like, if it was just you, me, and Jamie, and we were the only people on Earth, it would be super easy to not go to war with each other.

01:35:35.000 We just communicate.

01:35:35.000 That's right.

01:35:37.000 But then you're dealing with different languages and control of resources, and then you have people that are leaders that have control over giant groups of people and then use propaganda.

01:35:47.000 Manipulation.

01:35:48.000 Yeah, and manipulate them into thinking that the only way is we have to go over there and kill these people.

01:35:52.000 Exactly.

01:35:53.000 It's the only way to fight for your freedom.

01:35:55.000 Yep.

01:35:56.000 And Joe, you know, when we, there's research out there that shows that for a period of time, our species ended up having something like 5,000 of us on Earth.

01:36:09.000 It's out there, right?

01:36:09.000 Have you seen that?

01:36:10.000 There's a few moments in history.

01:36:12.000 Right.

01:36:13.000 The Toba volcano.

01:36:14.000 And how did we survive that?

01:36:17.000 Did we eat each other or hurt each other?

01:36:19.000 We probably helped each other.

01:36:21.000 Yeah.

01:36:22.000 Right?

01:36:23.000 Well, there was probably so few people they had to.

01:36:25.000 Yeah.

01:36:26.000 Well, this is also the point of Allegro's work, that fertility rituals were important because people didn't really survive much.

01:36:26.000 That's right.

01:36:35.000 You know, it was very difficult.

01:36:37.000 Just labor, just childbirth killed a lot of women, killed a lot of babies. 1.00

01:36:41.000 Infections killed a lot of people.

01:36:43.000 You break your leg, you're dead.

01:36:44.000 There's a lot of things that cause people to die.

01:36:46.000 So it was very important to have as many children as possible because most of them weren't going to live.

01:36:51.000 That's right.

01:36:52.000 And you bring up a point the woman might not have made it through with the process itself. 0.79

01:36:52.000 That's right. 0.79

01:36:56.000 Yeah.

01:36:57.000 And what an important process for the overall species' well-being.

01:37:02.000 Yeah, the most critical of all processes.

01:37:05.000 And that's been reduced to a thing now that's trivialized.

01:37:09.000 Trivialized or even still taboo.

01:37:11.000 Yeah.

01:37:13.000 Yeah.

01:37:13.000 It's kind of crazy.

01:37:14.000 I mean, there's people out there that love people that don't want to have children.

01:37:17.000 I'm like, okay.

01:37:18.000 Well, I wouldn't want to bring a child into this world.

01:37:20.000 Like, yeah, why would you with all the books and medicine and shit?

01:37:23.000 Nicely said.

01:37:24.000 Yeah, like people had, people, people gave birth when they didn't know what a door was.

01:37:29.000 They hadn't figured out floors yet.

01:37:31.000 You know, it's like we're constantly in this process of evolving and changing and growing, but it just gets stifled by so many different aspects of civilization, so many different aspects of control and propaganda and manipulation and fear.

01:37:45.000 And the fear of others.

01:37:47.000 And fear.

01:37:48.000 I mean, look at what's happening with our life expectancy, like you said, and good medicine keeping people alive.

01:37:56.000 And we're living to be 80, 90 years old.

01:38:00.000 And hopefully, if you live to be 80 or 90 years old, you'll be wiser.

01:38:04.000 Right.

01:38:04.000 Hopefully.

01:38:05.000 Right.

01:38:05.000 Hopefully.

01:38:06.000 Hopefully, you'll get more of an understanding of what you've done wrong.

01:38:09.000 And why have I lived my life in this foolish way?

01:38:12.000 Like, what can I do to correct that?

01:38:14.000 What can I do to make a more positive impact on people around me and live my life in a more harmonious way?

01:38:21.000 But, you know, some people, they're 80 years old, they just watch Fox News and yell at the TV.

01:38:25.000 You know, the image that went through my head is somebody turning the TV off.

01:38:29.000 Yeah.

01:38:30.000 Maybe picking up a book.

01:38:32.000 And then, you know, there's a choice point here, Joe, where you can, you, sometimes it's hard because there's things in the psyche that are manipulating what you're focusing on.

01:38:42.000 Traumas plus external factors.

01:38:45.000 But if you start focusing on gratitude, if you start focusing on the beauty, if you start focusing on the benefits of science, the benefits of operating in communion with other human beings, that thing that we said, I mean, how many people in Manhattan, right, every day waking up, they go to work, they go home.

01:39:04.000 Yeah, there's a handful of problems, but that's not how it's presented.

01:39:08.000 It's miraculous if you think about it.

01:39:10.000 It is.

01:39:11.000 Right.

01:39:12.000 The amount of negative interactions that people have are incredibly small.

01:39:16.000 I mean, think about the sheer number of humans.

01:39:16.000 Yeah.

01:39:18.000 That's right.

01:39:19.000 Yeah.

01:39:19.000 That's right.

01:39:20.000 We concentrate on the fear.

01:39:22.000 Exactly.

01:39:23.000 We concentrate on the dangers.

01:39:24.000 And the media zooms in on someone who doesn't have a house, someone who has an addiction problem.

01:39:31.000 Someone who's violent.

01:39:32.000 Someone who's violent.

01:39:33.000 Someone who's a criminal.

01:39:34.000 That's right.

01:39:35.000 Someone's stealing.

01:39:36.000 That's right.

01:39:36.000 That's all you hear.

01:39:37.000 That's right.

01:39:39.000 I heard a statistic that the military knows about 2% of people are sociopathic or psychopathic.

01:39:47.000 They don't have that same conscience that we automatically assume a human has.

01:39:52.000 Right, they don't have any empathy.

01:39:53.000 Right?

01:39:53.000 Yeah.

01:39:55.000 And it seems to me that we're so fear-based that we built the outer ecology that people have access to around concerns related to that.

01:40:07.000 We build the mainstream culture, the laws that we operate under, out of concern for the 2% rather than celebration of the 98% that do care, that do feel empathy, that do.

01:40:24.000 And that is the problem with the algorithm.

01:40:27.000 That's the problem with social media, and that's the problem with this addiction to devices, that you are constantly being inundated with the negative.

01:40:35.000 You're constantly interacting with the worst aspects of life on earth and not appreciating all the good that's around you all the time.

01:40:42.000 That's right.

01:40:43.000 Yeah, and the algorithm, Joe, like you brought up so eloquently, it takes you down the path that you click towards.

01:40:54.000 And I recall intentionally starting to click things outside of my comfort zone and follow thinkers and presenters not within my bubble.

01:41:04.000 And that's what it starts filling with as well.

01:41:08.000 Oh, yeah, you certainly can do that if you curate a good feed.

01:41:12.000 And you can ignore the negative.

01:41:14.000 And there's a lot of great stuff.

01:41:16.000 One of the great things about social media is just the access to new and fascinating information.

01:41:21.000 You're constantly, if you do follow the right people and do go down the right roads, you'll be constantly inundated with fascinating information.

01:41:31.000 New discoveries, the James Webb telescope and new things that people are learning about quantum physics and all these different fascinating things that can enrich your mind and expand your understanding of the world that we live in Instead of dwelling on all the negative aspects of human civilization.

01:41:31.000 That's right.

01:41:50.000 Right, right.

01:41:51.000 And that kind of speaks to the fact that we are lucky to be able to have access to social media in that way.

01:41:58.000 There's nations that don't allow that type of access by design.

01:42:02.000 Yeah.

01:42:03.000 So the power, the power of our method is liberty and freedom.

01:42:07.000 Yes.

01:42:08.000 Not criminalization and prohibition.

01:42:08.000 Right.

01:42:11.000 Right.

01:42:11.000 So you see the jump I'm trying to make there.

01:42:13.000 And the jump also is what you were talking about before with education.

01:42:16.000 And I think we need education too with people in social media use.

01:42:21.000 People need to be kind of coached and understand how to use it, how to use it correctly.

01:42:26.000 And, you know, I've been trying to express to as many people as I can, especially people in the public eye, don't read comments.

01:42:26.000 Right.

01:42:35.000 You've got to stop doing that.

01:42:36.000 Don't read things about you.

01:42:37.000 Don't read negative things about you.

01:42:39.000 It's bad for you.

01:42:40.000 Yeah.

01:42:40.000 It's bad for you.

01:42:41.000 And also, you're dealing with the percentage of people that are commenting negative things.

01:42:47.000 Those people almost entirely live lives that you would not envy.

01:42:52.000 Nicely said.

01:42:53.000 They're almost all a mess.

01:42:54.000 And so you're interacting with the, I don't want to say the worst aspects of society, but the most troubled human beings.

01:42:54.000 That's right.

01:43:02.000 The people that are thinking in the most ridiculous way.

01:43:07.000 They're constantly focusing on negative aspects of either human beings or of society in general.

01:43:13.000 And they're feeding off of it.

01:43:15.000 And that's their focus all day long.

01:43:18.000 And they spend most of their time arguing with people online.

01:43:21.000 Do you want to be involved in that?

01:43:23.000 When we live in what is primarily a beautiful world.

01:43:27.000 Nicely said.

01:43:28.000 And I think you're pointing at something that's important to keep in mind is be careful about what you let in.

01:43:28.000 Yeah.

01:43:35.000 Right?

01:43:35.000 Yes.

01:43:36.000 I think that's a universal principle, but it's eloquently shared in Buddhism where they say guard your Dharma gates, right?

01:43:36.000 Yeah.

01:43:45.000 Your eyes, your ears, your dharma, your mind, right?

01:43:48.000 Your senses.

01:43:49.000 What are you taking in?

01:43:50.000 Yes.

01:43:51.000 Because, you know, there's other philosophies that say thoughts are things.

01:43:55.000 Be careful what you think.

01:43:57.000 You know?

01:43:58.000 Yeah.

01:43:59.000 And I've come to notice, let's call it the CBT triangle, cognitive behavioral therapy or theory triangle, right?

01:44:07.000 Thoughts lead to emotions, lead to actions, right?

01:44:12.000 Because of psychedelic work, I've able to see how a thought actually is a portal that allows a certain energetic flow into you and that affects you and that can manifest in reality out of you.

01:44:26.000 As a therapist, how have you incorporated this in everyday life with your patients?

01:44:33.000 Two things come to mind when you ask that question.

01:44:35.000 It's made me more empathetic because I've had direct access, direct experience of some of these theories you read about or have a teacher as the expert tell you about, I've had direct access to.

01:44:51.000 The second is I'm able to share with people when they come to me being pulled towards experiencing these things ideas around harm reduction, where to go.

01:45:03.000 There's legal states.

01:45:04.000 There's less legal states.

01:45:06.000 I can talk to them about the substances.

01:45:09.000 I'm not prescribing, but if you come to talk to me, I can listen.

01:45:15.000 See what I'm saying?

01:45:16.000 And I know from direct experience some things.

01:45:21.000 Right.

01:45:22.000 I'm also able to fight off fear, and I can go into these territories with people.

01:45:29.000 Therapists need to know themselves.

01:45:32.000 You don't want to step outside of the lanes that you're comfortable being in.

01:45:36.000 If you're not comfortable being in a certain lane, you've got to go get training, training and experience to be an ethical practitioner before you talk about something, right?

01:45:44.000 And I've gotten that experience.

01:45:46.000 It's never ending.

01:45:47.000 I'm not done.

01:45:48.000 I'm just in my process of awakening.

01:45:51.000 And I can share from that reference point.

01:45:54.000 As a therapist, that was your question.

01:45:57.000 That's how I think I can help people.

01:45:58.000 I'm more empathetic.

01:46:00.000 You come in and want to talk to me about a particular substance.

01:46:02.000 I have a little bit of a lived experience knowledge base I can share with you.

01:46:07.000 And legally, I'm allowed to talk harm reduction.

01:46:11.000 Yeah.

01:46:12.000 I can't prescribe.

01:46:13.000 I'm not going to tell you to do something illegal.

01:46:16.000 But if you want to talk to me about it, I know a thing or two.

01:46:20.000 Not everything.

01:46:21.000 Just a thing or two.

01:46:22.000 I think one of the best arguments against decriminalization is what happened with Portland.

01:46:29.000 So, you know, they went down this path.

01:46:29.000 Okay.

01:46:33.000 It was Portland, right?

01:46:34.000 It wasn't Seattle.

01:46:35.000 They went down this path of pure legalization.

01:46:37.000 Oregon, everything.

01:46:38.000 Yeah.

01:46:39.000 Decriminalized everything.

01:46:40.000 And it went sideways.

01:46:43.000 And I think it was probably because the culture that had already been firmly established in that place condoned open-air drug markets, people that were addicted to fentanyl and opiates out on the street and methamphetamines out on the street, using them constantly, no education.

01:47:05.000 And then they just sort of opened the doors for everything.

01:47:07.000 And then people went there specifically because they could do these things.

01:47:12.000 And be that on the streets.

01:47:13.000 And also be subsidized.

01:47:16.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:47:17.000 So let me bring some things up about that.

01:47:21.000 So, you know, I believe in decriminalization, but there's a right and a not-so-right way to do something, right?

01:47:29.000 And I'm going to use examples of laws we already have on the book.

01:47:33.000 This might not be a popular statement, but it's my truth.

01:47:37.000 If you say you're going to decriminalize, you can look at the way we handle alcohol.

01:47:41.000 We don't allow public drunkenness.

01:47:44.000 We don't have to allow it.

01:47:45.000 A lot of places say you can't walk around and be inebriated and open bottle drink.

01:47:50.000 Even the most liberal places, right?

01:47:52.000 A cop can come up, they can protective custody you into a cage, or they can help you get home, right?

01:47:59.000 Why don't those rules apply?

01:48:03.000 If you're in public, we can say we're not going to want you to use openly in public.

01:48:10.000 Right.

01:48:10.000 You know?

01:48:11.000 But when you've already got people openly camping out on the streets and littering Everywhere, and like what they've already allowed, unfortunately, they need to clean that up first before they can say we're going to decriminalize everything.

01:48:25.000 Because you've already allowed people to do something that you know publicly is frowned upon, to just like be shitting on the street and to open drug use everywhere.

01:48:38.000 Have people camped out, homeless people like covering up sidewalks where you can't get around, and there's needles everywhere and it's like garbage everywhere.

01:48:46.000 Well, we can agree that we don't want that.

01:48:48.000 And in many places, like there's local ordinances against that.

01:48:53.000 There's state-level laws against that.

01:48:55.000 And we can go all the way up.

01:48:56.000 There's no levels.

01:48:57.000 We're not doing anything about that.

01:48:58.000 Well, that's the thing we can analyze.

01:49:01.000 Why wasn't the funding in place to ensure that public areas with public access followed some rules?

01:49:10.000 Why?

01:49:11.000 What happened?

01:49:12.000 You know, I think that can be figured out.

01:49:15.000 Right?

01:49:15.000 Yeah.

01:49:16.000 So we realize that if we say full-scale decriminalization, anything goes, doesn't work, I would have told you right from the beginning, well, that's kind of freaky.

01:49:26.000 Why are we going that far?

01:49:28.000 Why don't we have any funding to help people and tell them, no, you can't take a shit over there.

01:49:33.000 You have to take a shit over here.

01:49:33.000 Right.

01:49:35.000 We can all agree.

01:49:37.000 We don't want human feces over here. 0.74

01:49:39.000 Right?

01:49:40.000 That's not a shot against that person.

01:49:42.000 We've got to figure out what's going on.

01:49:43.000 Why are they pooping over there and not in the port-a-potty over here?

01:49:46.000 Or how about have a location where those people can go that isn't a prison?

01:49:51.000 Right.

01:49:51.000 Where we have wraparound services, where we have maybe access to what they need, maybe access to what they're addicted to.

01:50:01.000 Now we're starting to talk about safe supply with care and medical intervention.

01:50:06.000 Yeah, no one's ever done that successfully, though, right?

01:50:09.000 Like, has any state ever incorporated some sort of successful program where they gave people safe supply and then counseling and got like a percentage of them off drugs and healthy?

01:50:22.000 So I've heard that Canada is exploring the medical access of medical-grade heroin for certain people.

01:50:28.000 And we know that certain countries for years at this point have safe injection facilities where people can come to use their drugs under care and consideration and then leave.

01:50:41.000 We know these things work, but they've got to be curated properly.

01:50:46.000 Yeah.

01:50:47.000 Well, you also can't impose it on all the rest of society by allowing people to just camp out everywhere on the streets.

01:50:53.000 Well, that's the example that, right?

01:50:55.000 Like we can have rules, local ordinances that say this isn't a campground.

01:51:00.000 Yeah.

01:51:01.000 Right.

01:51:02.000 And what do you need for this not to be a campground?

01:51:04.000 Let's talk.

01:51:05.000 Come talk in this building over here.

01:51:07.000 Right.

01:51:08.000 We can even figure out what kind of, I mean, what's that going to cost?

01:51:12.000 We can figure that out.

01:51:13.000 And why isn't it being funded?

01:51:16.000 Right.

01:51:17.000 And why aren't the police properly funded to act in a guardianship way in those situations?

01:51:27.000 Right?

01:51:28.000 Yeah.

01:51:28.000 Because look, look, our efforts go in the direction that our funding goes because people build their lives around that.

01:51:35.000 And if funding is 90% on enforcement, then that's what you're going to get.

01:51:41.000 Right?

01:51:42.000 And we talked about the problems and how hurtful defund was.

01:51:46.000 How about properly funding law enforcement to work in a guardianship paradigm for these situations that aren't necessarily criminal?

01:51:56.000 They might be public health.

01:51:58.000 Now you're keeping the cops involved.

01:52:00.000 Right.

01:52:01.000 Right?

01:52:01.000 You're not saying we're going to defund you.

01:52:03.000 We don't need you.

01:52:03.000 We do need you.

01:52:05.000 You play a vital role in our society.

01:52:07.000 But that would require like a fundamental shift of progressive ideology.

01:52:11.000 They'd have to change the way they view cops.

01:52:15.000 Maybe that'll have to be incorporated in drips and drabs and carefully into training.

01:52:20.000 Right?

01:52:21.000 Yeah.

01:52:21.000 But I got an example for you.

01:52:23.000 Okay.

01:52:23.000 I got an example for you.

01:52:24.000 I think it's really important.

01:52:25.000 It's from where I come, right?

01:52:27.000 In Winthrop, Massachusetts, Winthrop, Massachusetts, 10 years ago, when I was a patrol officer and I kept coming in seeing public health issues in the police logs and police incidents, public health issue, mental health challenge, a person not having access to their psychiatrist running out of their medicine, overdose save, overdose loss tragically, over and over and over again.

01:52:48.000 And I went talk to the police chief.

01:52:51.000 I said, his name's Terrence Delahante.

01:52:53.000 I said, chief, on patrol, when I'm in, will you let me make a pile of work?

01:52:59.000 Let's call it cases to investigate, because I think I have a detective fetish.

01:53:03.000 I've never been a detective, but I wanted to investigate things too.

01:53:07.000 He's like, then what are you going to do with that pile?

01:53:09.000 I said, I'm going to follow up in police uniform, patrol car.

01:53:12.000 I'm going to go knock on a door and have a conversation with somebody, see what they really need to prevent that 911 call for service.

01:53:20.000 He's on record saying he thought I was going to bang my head up against the wall.

01:53:23.000 He's like, there's no one's going to talk to this kid in full uniform.

01:53:26.000 But he was so excited, I had to let him try.

01:53:29.000 Two, three weeks later, I come back.

01:53:31.000 I said, Chief, I got a problem.

01:53:33.000 People are inviting me into their house, telling me to sit down, calling somebody down who's telling me that they were looking for cocaine, got fentanyl.

01:53:40.000 We have a good problem.

01:53:41.000 I got to connect these people to the appropriate help.

01:53:44.000 You know what he said to me?

01:53:45.000 He said, connect them to the public health department.

01:53:48.000 There's a woman in there. 1.00

01:53:49.000 Her name is Meredith Hurley.

01:53:50.000 And she's brought in people with lived and living experience with challenges related to intoxicating substances who are open about it to help with the overdose crisis.

01:54:02.000 Bang.

01:54:04.000 Public safety connected with public health.

01:54:07.000 We created what I call the police-to-public health pipeline.

01:54:13.000 Right?

01:54:15.000 Picture this.

01:54:16.000 A cop showing up to your house because they know what's going on in your house.

01:54:22.000 You called 911 and you told us without us even coercing you and saying, Joe, what's going on?

01:54:29.000 What do you need?

01:54:30.000 What do you need to be well?

01:54:31.000 We don't want you to die.

01:54:33.000 Talk to us.

01:54:34.000 We're not going to use it against you.

01:54:36.000 I'm actually not going to run you because I'm playing this distinct role.

01:54:40.000 I don't want to know if there's any outstanding warrants.

01:54:40.000 I'm not going to run you.

01:54:43.000 I'm not here.

01:54:43.000 I'm not here to snoop around to find something that I'm going to be able to charge you with.

01:54:49.000 I'm here to see what you need to not die and not have my detective show up and put you in a cage.

01:54:58.000 That started in Winthrop over 10 years ago.

01:55:01.000 It's called CLEAR: Community and Law Enforcement Assisted Recovery.

01:55:06.000 Well, that's hopeful.

01:55:08.000 He's going to expand something like that.

01:55:10.000 I think we have room to expand it across the whole country.

01:55:14.000 We are repositories.

01:55:17.000 Police departments are repositories of information on human suffering.

01:55:22.000 You know what we're doing with that?

01:55:25.000 If it's not traditional enforcement-based policing to make cases for court, nothing.

01:55:32.000 That's not right.

01:55:34.000 So it's the way it's approached.

01:55:38.000 It's the way these problems are approached and that they need new solutions.

01:55:43.000 Solutions that are preventative and that enforce the sense of community and help law enforcement officers ingratiate themselves with these people and be a part of the community instead of just being a person who comes to lock them up.

01:55:57.000 There it is.

01:55:58.000 You know what that is?

01:56:00.000 That's community policing.

01:56:03.000 We call it recovery-oriented community policing.

01:56:08.000 Now let me plug something else in that I think is a sophisticated, important point that people got to keep in mind.

01:56:16.000 This isn't an attack on traditional enforcement type of policing.

01:56:26.000 If you are sensitive to human nature, you know there's going to be violations of the type that need somebody to show up and take a person out of their house in cuffs, put them in a jail cell, and take them to court.

01:56:38.000 Unfortunately, the dark side is a part of human nature.

01:56:43.000 And that type of policing done right is important and it keeps us well.

01:56:48.000 But when it's the only type of policing, we're missing something.

01:56:53.000 We're missing something important and special.

01:56:57.000 And our people are expecting our officers to show up and put a hand out, a hand, a helping hand and say, we know what's going on and we want you to be well.

01:57:07.000 We don't want you to die.

01:57:09.000 We don't want you to be in a cage, human being in a cage. 1.00

01:57:14.000 I think it is fundamentally law enforcement's role to do that.

01:57:19.000 This and that.

01:57:22.000 Yeah, well said.

01:57:25.000 That might be a good way to end this.

01:57:27.000 Tell people how they can get a hold of you, social media, like where you are.

01:57:31.000 Sure.

01:57:32.000 I appreciate that.

01:57:34.000 Well, they can look up my name, Sarko Giergeriana.

01:57:36.000 I'm out of Winthrop, Massachusetts.

01:57:37.000 Tell those last name because they're not going to be able to get that right.

01:57:39.000 Sure.

01:57:40.000 It's G-E-R-G-E-R-I-A-N. 1.00

01:57:44.000 I'm out of Winthrop, Massachusetts.

01:57:45.000 I'm a lieutenant with the Winthrop Police Department.

01:57:49.000 Joe, let me plug this in.

01:57:52.000 I am here speaking of my own beliefs, sharing about the positives about my community, my department, the safety I found there.

01:58:01.000 But these are my ideas.

01:58:02.000 I'm not purporting to talk on behalf of Winthrop Police, Winthrop Mass.

01:58:07.000 I just need people to know that.

01:58:08.000 But they can find me online.

01:58:11.000 They can get a hold of me at my work email.

01:58:15.000 I liberally share my personal email.

01:58:19.000 And if they send me an email, I'll respond.

01:58:21.000 How do they get your email?

01:58:23.000 You know, it's just my last name at gmail.com.

01:58:26.000 G-E-R-G-E-R-I-A-N at gmail.com.

01:58:31.000 Okay, good luck with the amount of emails you're going to get after this.

01:58:34.000 All right.

01:58:35.000 Let's do it.

01:58:36.000 Give me some time to get back to you.

01:58:37.000 All right.

01:58:37.000 Well, thanks, brother.

01:58:38.000 I appreciate you.

01:58:39.000 I appreciate your perspective, the fact that you're willing to express it the way you do, and that you're willing to come on here and stick your neck out like this.

01:58:48.000 Means a lot.

01:58:49.000 Joe, let me say something back to you, man.

01:58:52.000 This was a really special, special moment for me.

01:58:57.000 I'm not only a colleague of yours, man, I'm a fan.

01:59:01.000 And a number of close personal friends, one in particular, Billy Reinstein, who I love to death, said, tell Joe that he has helped me so tremendously.

01:59:12.000 His show has helped me stay well, be well, be happy.

01:59:17.000 And I wanted to get that message off.

01:59:19.000 Shout out to Billy.

01:59:19.000 That's awesome.

01:59:21.000 All right.

01:59:21.000 Thank you very much.

01:59:21.000 All right.

01:59:22.000 Appreciate it.

01:59:23.000 All right.

The Joe Rogan Experience - July 30, 2025

Joe Rogan Experience #2357 - Sarko Gergerian

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