Psychedelic cults

[Magickduck]

I don't think psychedelics diminish your freedom to choose or your ability to discern, but if you do make the choice to drink the cult koolaid, then psychedelics will permit the content to drive more deeply into your psyche than normal. It's a natural effect of the drugs making your mind more open than usual. Without the choice being made and the mind being wilfully opened up, there usually remains a boundary that can't be crossed.

It's also probable that doing psychedelics over and over with the same people, in the same kinds of environments, under the same experiential context, will begin forming deeply-knit group culture that may seem cult-like to outsiders who don't understand the kinds of references the group members make. It's sort of like the standard group micro-culture amplified to the nth degree.

I agree mostly with you only that these people take psychedelics anyway and its more like if they happen upon this certain type of festival, and as your saying, I don't think its a bad thing (at least most of it) but they do start to develop cult-like tendancies.. i have even seen memes made by other people of two "psytrance bros" and its like 'its all about freedom and self-expression. let me tell you why you should join my manipulative cult'...

 

[Foreigner]

^ Yeah I know what you mean. I guess as long as they aren't harming anyone else, they can drink whatever koolaid they want.

 

[B1tO'RoughJack]

To be completely honest, I think their intent is good for MOST of them. I think they are attempting to awaken people to ancient truths as well as brainwash people in the direct opposite direction than say watching the TV would... I think it is to attempt to speed-evolve us away from the claws of an oppresive government and into our own right.

Totally agree. They help us to open our minds and hearts again, so we can counter-condition ourselves and other people. Then through our open minds, we naturally see things for how they really are, once we have integrated the psychedelic experience. It is important during that time of integration not to watch anything too conditioning for a few weeks(newspapers, tv, internet articles about anything other than health or trivia) IMO - just get on with doing yoga and working and seeing friends.

I didn't start opening my mind to more conspiracy theories or psychic connections - anything other than contemporarily-recognized scientific tings - until a year AFTER I took psychedelics for a wee while.

THe only thing I looked into during my psychedelic "career" (once or more per month for a bout 2 years, after which I took it down to once per season) was the 9/11 conspiracy theories. Maybe I will look into that again now I am not taking psychedelics but have a very open discerning third eye...

Either way - they are useful, until people stop leaving enough time to integrate the experiences in between trips, don't use any kind of internal balancing teks like tai chi/qi gong/yoga, and get wrapped up in egotistical power play.

Therefore until one gets ones ego in check, no amount of good intentions will help anything real, until the megalomaniac has been vanquished.

Psychedelics are powerful things - once one has done them, enough then usage should happen less and less frequently - all psychedelic drugs, including ganja, are there to show us what we can achieve naturally through meditation and other teks.

 

[Incunabula]

lol, we should big and dandify this thread imo:

The big and dandy paranoid conspiracy theories thread

 

[justinsayno]

This can take weeks, months years, each time going is like a "brain upgrade" - i have heard it referred to as this by many people who attend these type of things.

'

If you, or people you know, feel that they are 'upgraded' by combining psychs and music then maybe they are reinforcing thier own beliefs rather than being manipulated [?]
Self hypnosis rather than hypnosis...

A kind of placebo effect combined with an afterglow and the spring in your step that a good night out can give ?

 

[selfmedicinals]

back when i was doing acid and shrooms alot i guess you can say i was brainwashed by videos/recordings of timothy leary, ram dass, terence mckenna and robert anton wilson. i dont remember much but i was really far down the rabbit hole and actually had a group of kids i met start treating me like their cult leader. i was like a psychedelic priest to them

 

[GreenMachine]

back when i was doing acid and shrooms alot i guess you can say i was brainwashed by videos/recordings of timothy leary, ram dass, terence mckenna and robert anton wilson. i dont remember much but i was really far down the rabbit hole and actually had a group of kids i met start treating me like their cult leader. i was like a psychedelic priest to them

i dont know man robert anton wilson is like the opposite of a conspiracy theorist. however terrence mckenna started having some pretty fucking wacky ideas towards the end of his life.

 

[webbykevin]

i dont know man robert anton wilson is like the opposite of a conspiracy theorist. however terrence mckenna started having some pretty fucking wacky ideas towards the end of his life.

Go hang out at your local church, ask them their ideas about reality, then compare to McKenna and see who's whacky

 

[EarthBounded]

I cannot believe how much attention this thread has received, this is a buffet of perception.

 

[kidklmx]

i dont know man robert anton wilson is like the opposite of a conspiracy theorist. however terrence mckenna started having some pretty fucking wacky ideas towards the end of his life.

McKenna's talks from the 70s-80s are a lot more out there than the ones from the 90s though. Even great minds like Ray Kurzweil (someone with a lot more legitimacy than the likes of McKenna and Leary) picked up on his idea of the singularity and such, his ideas on technology (while totally "not getting" computers at all) hold some truth even today

I mean seriously, you think his experiences in the Amazon and the ideas he spurred out at that time are LESS wacky than his technocratic future? (which is being echoed by a lot of futurists in some ways)

 

[missmeyet?]

Some things cannot be proven by science...that does not mean they are not 'real.' Nevertheless, you should re-read what a double blind study is. You can't have a double-blind study...PERIOD if the scientist is required to have 'faith'...I think you are getting some concepts and some 'realities' confused. Or maybe I just have not been brainwashed by the black magic enough to be feelin' ya.

Amen...

 

[zn13bt]

I think the CIA figured out quite a while ago that psychedelics are a poor choice for brainwashing - they're too unpredictable in their effects and they tend to undermine the ontological bases of whatever belief system you're trying to inculcate in your subjects. If you're looking to set up a mind-control cult, it seems like depressants or dissociatives are better choices for spiking the kool-aid with. (Not that I spend a lot of time thinking about such things...)

Of course, the real problem with thaumaturgy as opposed to theurgy, whether drugs are involved or not, is that over time the practitioners can't help but start to believe in their own bullshit, and as the group gets more disconnected from consensual reality it all implodes in a dazzle of psychopathic power-games. As evidenced by the current behavior of the U.S. Republican Party.

 

[webbykevin]

I think the CIA figured out quite a while ago that psychedelics are a poor choice for brainwashing - they're too unpredictable in their effects and they tend to undermine the ontological bases of whatever belief system you're trying to inculcate in your subjects. If you're looking to set up a mind-control cult, it seems like depressants or dissociatives are better choices for spiking the kool-aid with. (Not that I spend a lot of time thinking about such things...)

Of course, the real problem with thaumaturgy as opposed to theurgy, whether drugs are involved or not, is that over time the practitioners can't help but start to believe in their own bullshit, and as the group gets more disconnected from consensual reality it all implodes in a dazzle of psychopathic power-games. As evidenced by the current behavior of the U.S. Republican Party.

Don't limit it to the republicans

 

[bloodshed344]

lol, we should big and dandify this thread imo:

The big and dandy paranoid conspiracy theories thread

+1

I still think this is pointless and silly. I don't think we should allow Magickduck's psychedelic delusion thread but thats just me. I don't think there is ANY merit in what he is saying. None.

 

[2002Tii]

^Doesn't mean you should censor his opinion.

 

[bloodshed344]

^Doesn't mean you should censor his opinion.

that's not even what it's about dude. Just because it's his opinion doesn't mean that it fits in with the board at all. Look at the first 3 pages of PD, which threads dont belong? This one and the delusion thread. I have nothing against the guys opinions the threads are just ridiculous and the discussion generated is worthless and spammy.

EDIT: Okay I'll stop making any more posts of this nature. This thread will run it's course anyway.

 

[Deinonychus]

that's not even what it's about dude. Just because it's his opinion doesn't mean that it fits in with the board at all. Look at the first 3 pages of PD, which threads dont belong? This one and the delusion thread. I have nothing against the guys opinions the threads are just ridiculous and the discussion generated is worthless and spammy.

As much as I feel I've been vocal in trying to debunk his conspiracy theories, which was pretty much ignored, I don't think it's really up to skeptics to shut stuff like this down, or try to.

Thankfully we're at least back on the subject of psychedelics, instead of some of the more absurd things in page two and three of the thread. But even if we weren't, I think – this is just my own personal opinion – that shutting down threads that are below the standard of discussion on BL or violate rules is legitimate, even if I don't agree with some of the BLUA myself. Magicduck can converse in a manner befitting the forum I think, even if I disagree with the things he has said. No ad homonem crap and legible, grammatically proper posts are fair game, again IMHO.

Don't get me wrong, I feel where you're comin from, totally. Just think we shouldn't try to stifle things that we are ideologically opposed to is all.

 

[elucidator]

Just think we shouldn't try to stifle things that we are ideologically opposed to is all.

Well said. This is a subject that IMO is very well suited to a psychedelic harm reduction forum. I reckon that anyone trying to take advantage of psychedelic users is extremely disturbing and morally wrong.
I am not surprised at some of the reactions shown here, some people do not like being told that there is more to it than you can see. Excellent thread btw ,Magickduck. It has definitely ruffled some feathers and got some people thinking.

 

[bloodshed344]

Well said. This is a subject that IMO is very well suited to a psychedelic harm reduction forum. I reckon that anyone trying to take advantage of psychedelic users is extremely disturbing and morally wrong.
I am not surprised at some of the reactions shown here, some people do not like being told that there is more to it than you can see. Excellent thread btw ,Magickduck. It has definitely ruffled some feathers and got some people thinking.

No really there isn't anything behind the scenes that's more than meets the eye. If they're making an impact, it's obvious. They're spreading the use of psychedelics and the music. Conspiracies about magic men sitting behind the scenes doing rituals and tapping 100 strings attached to a crystal ball are just too hilarious to be useful. While there might be a cool guy tapping strings and talking and doing his shit, he's not doing magic or anything subconscious. That is what this thread is about, magic. The general idea of talking about "psychedelic cults" is good, but the main topic is people doing rituals to affect large groups of people at festivals... are you kidding me?

I still think you're MagickDuck, like that other guy said, or his buttbuddy.

 

[elucidator]

I still think you're MagickDuck, like that other guy said, or his buttbuddy.

I am not MagickDuck, and I do not know him other than what he has posted on BL. Just because that I am someone that agrees with the OP and can input my own opinion and experiences on this delicate matter, does not mean I am the same person.

All of that aside, has anyone else noticed anything funny about psychedelic music? Not specifically festival music as this is way too broad, but with any free psychedelic music available on the internet through Creative Commons license.