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Keep MDMA Harm Reduction in Perspective

bhamster

Bluelighter
Joined
Feb 17, 2011
Messages
95
While we all have an interest in reducing harm, I sometimes feel that the caution here is over the top when discussing ecstasy. In all comparison studies I have read over the years; in terms both of dependence and harm, MDMA/ecstasy is safer than tobacco and alcohol (and less dependent than cannabis.)

Okay, sure, maybe we should also be telling people not to smoke, drink every weekend or smoke weed every day, but some people like to use recreational drugs with some regularity. Alcohol, marijuana and ecstasy are some substances which can be used somewhat regularly without too much concern for most people.

Of course, there are some people who have very addictive personalities and might have a problem if they drank, smoked or dropped with some regularity. Most people won't though.

Stay fit! Eat healthily! Exercise! Have fun!

20drugs.gif
 
I would agree with you *IF* you knew what you were getting when you bought ecstasy. But given the risk of getting something other than mdxx, it's far from safe. Even if a test kit is positive for mdxx, it can still be adulterated and contain other stuff. I think that's the real danger.
 
I would agree with you *IF* you knew what you were getting when you bought ecstasy. But given the risk of getting something other than mdxx, it's far from safe. Even if a test kit is positive for mdxx, it can still be adulterated and contain other stuff. I think that's the real danger.

True dat. *sigh*

Test. Test. Test.

...and don't support the pipes
 
Splinter's Thoughts (With MasterSplinter)

While we all have an interest in reducing harm, I sometimes feel that the caution here is over the top when discussing ecstasy. In all comparison studies I have read over the years; in terms both of dependence and harm, MDMA/ecstasy is safer than tobacco and alcohol (and less dependent than cannabis.)

Okay, sure, maybe we should also be telling people not to smoke, drink every weekend or smoke weed every day, but some people like to use recreational drugs with some regularity. Alcohol, marijuana and ecstasy are some substances which can be used somewhat regularly without too much concern for most people.

Of course, there are some people who have very addictive personalities and might have a problem if they drank, smoked or dropped with some regularity. Most people won't though.

Stay fit! Eat healthily! Exercise! Have fun!

20drugs.gif

Um...where is this data coming from again? Or perhaps you made it in Microsoft Paint?

Honestly bro, you can take ecstasy regularly if you want...and while we dont have all the facts on how much damage it really causes I can say for sure first hand that taking ecstasy 'regularly' changed me for the worse..

Im pretty sure my use resulted in a Chemical Imbalance...now you can dismiss that as physical damage if you like, yet clearly I have done mental damage to myself.

I think your chart is based more on "perceived" physical damage and not on actual mental damage. Im not saying it causes brain damage but the mindstate you find yourself in from using every other weekend is rather unpleasant.

While Alcohol and Tobacco are physically damaging to the body, they dont cause serious enough mental damage that you cant even get through the day or get out of bed...(unless of course you're an alcoholic)

So before you dismiss the bluelight community for "over the top caution" I suggest you take a trip over to The Dark Side and see how people who use MDMA regularly feel now.

Bluelight is and always will be a Harm Reduction Website. Period. No one is overstating the facts...we speak from experience. If we can help prevent people from using MDMA too regularly then of course we are going to do it.

These types of threads always go no-where..

Burnout -
"MDMA is sooooo safe compared to alcohol and tobacco..chill out bro"

ugh..let us know when you lose the magic.
 
MS Paint? It's from a British medical journal.

Abusing any drug is obviously not a good thing.
 
I have to say that I'm with MasterSplinter on this one.
what counts as physical harm? and how often are you using each drug to get this sort of chart?
 
Image Source:
"Relative physical harm and dependence of ecstasy (the British medical journal The Lancet)[113]"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MDMA
While MDMA may not be that harmful,
Ecstacy, Thiz, Beans, Molly, Adam, "Sassafras"
or anything that your drug dealer gives you, could be fucking fatal.
 
Im talking about "mental Damage"(not to be confused with brain damage)

Lets see data about alcohol, tobacco, and MDMA in terms of the post week mental state it puts you in..
 
Don't get me wrong, I have tremendous appreciation and respect for the bluelight community. I have tremendous respect for AA too. Of course, some people will run into problems -- physiologically, mentally or emotionally when using alcohol or drugs of any kind. Hell, many people run into serious physical, mental or emotional problems without using drugs. Sucks, but I've known people with lung cancer who never smoked. I know crack addicts that got hooked after just several parties. People react differently to substances, depending on what else is going on in their life and their bodies and their minds, etc. This is why harm reduction is important. You have to play to the lowest common denominator.

Personally, I WAS one of those guys who used every weekend in Europe for a year (sometimes 3 times/week), and didn't have any noticeable adverse affects. I never felt that deep depression that some do. Never had any issues with tolerance being affected. Never had my recreational drug or alcohol use interfere with my job or my relationships. Neither did my wife, or my friends.

We stopped using after leaving Ireland 6 years ago, just sort of got bored of it all. Recently, we had some nice Molly and again, enjoyed it on back to back days, weekend after weekend until it was gone. It was great every time. Source ran out and now it's been 6 months or so since we've had any.

For me, I've always had fun whether drugs were involved or not. I take good care of myself, eat really healthy (lots of dark green leafys, ginger, hemp seed, flax seed, etc.) exercise regularly and meditate.

IMO bad diet and exercise will affect you more than any pill will. It causes more premature deaths, illness, disease, etc. than any drug ever will. And, yet, nobody seems too interested in harm reduction from the dangerous American diet or sedentary lifestyle. That's where we need harm reduction the most.

Peace out!

...and PLUR
 
And, yet, nobody seems too interested in harm reduction from the dangerous American diet or sedentary lifestyle. That's where we need harm reduction the most.

Michelle Obama has made it her life's missions to take all the enjoyment out of our diets! We can all expect the nutrition nazis to start pulling all delicious food from the marketplace and penalizing us for every bad thing we eat.
 
Everything in regulation...if you know you could lose a hold of it simply don't do it. About the American diet comment I couldn't agree more haha. The only thing is it's more "normal" to go down a double quarter pounder with cheese large fries and a coke than it is to use lsd or mdma
 
So far, all the PROPER studies that have been done have showed that with moderate use, the negative side-effects of MDMA are entirely reversible. Chances are, if you're still suffering side-effects months to years down the line, it's due to dirty pills, not the MDMA itself.

However, what has yet to be studied thoroughly are possible unknown long-term side-effects that can surface later in life. So there is that to consider.
 
What really matters is an individuals reactions to the substance. If most handle MDMA fine but you or I don't, then it doesn't matter how other people react. It is most important to know your own body and mind.
 
@ Legerity
I cant quite remember why the Friend Request. It had to be something of wisdom you said in a post and I added you to contacts. Couldnt message back dont have 50 post yet.
 
Um...where is this data coming from again? Or perhaps you made it in Microsoft Paint?

Honestly bro, you can take ecstasy regularly if you want...and while we dont have all the facts on how much damage it really causes I can say for sure first hand that taking ecstasy 'regularly' changed me for the worse..

Im pretty sure my use resulted in a Chemical Imbalance...now you can dismiss that as physical damage if you like, yet clearly I have done mental damage to myself.

I think your chart is based more on "perceived" physical damage and not on actual mental damage. Im not saying it causes brain damage but the mindstate you find yourself in from using every other weekend is rather unpleasant.

While Alcohol and Tobacco are physically damaging to the body, they dont cause serious enough mental damage that you cant even get through the day or get out of bed...(unless of course you're an alcoholic)

So before you dismiss the bluelight community for "over the top caution" I suggest you take a trip over to The Dark Side and see how people who use MDMA regularly feel now.

Bluelight is and always will be a Harm Reduction Website. Period. No one is overstating the facts...we speak from experience. If we can help prevent people from using MDMA too regularly then of course we are going to do it.

These types of threads always go no-where..

Burnout -
"MDMA is sooooo safe compared to alcohol and tobacco..chill out bro"

ugh..let us know when you lose the magic.

i dont think that the OP was talking every other weekend as being recreational. he prob meant that using it like you are supposed to, you wont have any problems most likely. now, if you are taking it like you said you were, then yea i imagine you prob fried a good bit of brains cells
 
Don't get me wrong, I have tremendous appreciation and respect for the bluelight community. I have tremendous respect for AA too. Of course, some people will run into problems -- physiologically, mentally or emotionally when using alcohol or drugs of any kind. Hell, many people run into serious physical, mental or emotional problems without using drugs. Sucks, but I've known people with lung cancer who never smoked. I know crack addicts that got hooked after just several parties. People react differently to substances, depending on what else is going on in their life and their bodies and their minds, etc. This is why harm reduction is important. You have to play to the lowest common denominator.
ok...

Personally, I WAS one of those guys who used every weekend in Europe for a year (sometimes 3 times/week), and didn't have any noticeable adverse affects. I never felt that deep depression that some do. Never had any issues with tolerance being affected. Never had my recreational drug or alcohol use interfere with my job or my relationships. Neither did my wife, or my friends.
Try it for several years and tell us the difference. You didn't notice a loss of magic? Fuzzy feeling gone dull and boring?

We stopped using after...just sort of got bored of it all.
So you did lose the "magic"
Recently, we had some nice Molly and again, enjoyed it on back to back days, weekend after weekend until it was gone. It was great every time. Source ran out and now it's been 6 months or so since we've had any.
Okay... But you didn't do that for several YEARS straight like half the people in this forum have.
For me, I've always had fun whether drugs were involved or not. I take good care of myself, eat really healthy (lots of dark green leafys, ginger, hemp seed, flax seed, etc.) exercise regularly and meditate.

IMO bad diet and exercise will affect you more than any pill will. It causes more premature deaths, illness, disease, etc. than any drug ever will. And, yet, nobody seems too interested in harm reduction from the dangerous American diet or sedentary lifestyle. That's where we need harm reduction the most.

Peace out!

...and PLUR

^^ wrong forum. try "Healthy Living"

Diet and exercise have nothing to do with Ecstasy, even though I do recommend them to everybody (not just drug users)
 
So far, all the PROPER studies that have been done have showed that with moderate use, the negative side-effects of MDMA are entirely reversible. Chances are, if you're still suffering side-effects months to years down the line, it's due to dirty pills, not the MDMA itself.

However, what has yet to be studied thoroughly are possible unknown long-term side-effects that can surface later in life. So there is that to consider.

That's not exactly true. They show that SERT densitys return to NEAR normal levels but that the 5-ht axons grow back incorrect / not as they should.
 
That's not exactly true. They show that SERT densitys return to NEAR normal levels but that the 5-ht axons grow back incorrect / not as they should.

Are there any studies that show evidence of problems due to the way that axons regrow, or is it only known that they regrow differently than they were before? If you know of a study a link would be much appreciated.
 
Umm to be honest the only 1 I can find atm (I swear i've read it from more than this place though?) is this summary of a load of studies:

http://dancesafe.org/drug-information/ecstasy-and-neurotoxicity#ref5

Animal research suggests that when a neurotoxic dosage of MDMA is given, damage to the axons starts to occur in as little as an hour or two.) Animal experiments suggest that if neurotoxicity occurs, some new serotonin axons can grow to replace them...but they grow in different places than where the original ones were.[2] The long-term effects of this 'rewiring' are not known.

Researchers aren't absolutely sure what these results mean. Some people think this 'recovery' could be the result of surviving axons growing or changing (producing more SERTs) to compensate for destroyed axons. Others argue that the short-term reduction in SERT density might not have been due to lost axons, but could be the result of the neurons simply changing the number of SERTs in response to drug exposure. (A number of prescription drugs that affect serotonin but do not damage neurons also cause a reduction in SERT.[5])

It's not known what practical effect, if any, these changes might have had on these ecstasy users; a follow up study found that their mental health was poorer than that of non-drug users, but no worse than that of people who used other drugs (such as marijuana) but not ecstasy

Although there is considerable debate over how much MDMA it would take to cause damage to a human user's brain, there is no real doubt that at some dosages damage can and will occur. Fortunately, brain damage doesn't seem to happen at moderate recreational doses.
 
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