Psychedelics Coming to a Retailer Near You?

Media Hints at Legal Psychedelics and How They'll Be Sold

Serious cracks in the foundation of psychedelic drug policy in the United States are beginning to appear in mainstream media. Within the past month two outlets have both suggested we’re on our way to legalizing psychedelics for personal use and that they will be available for retail purchase. Is the United States trippin?

Who’s Sounding the Psychedelic Clarion Call?

About a month ago online media outlet Vox published a piece, “How should we sell psychedelics?” Earlier this week, Rolling Stone followed with an article, “The Psychedelic Underground’s Future Is in Consumer Packaged Goods.” To anyone paying attention this should appear as a large blip on the psychedelic radar.

Any savvy media analyst or observer knows that mainstream media often signals the arrival of something before coming to fruition. This doesn’t happen all the time, but often enough that it’s a pattern in the American media. Considering their size and cultural weight, Vox and Rolling Stone touting the retail sales of psychedelics should be grabbing as much attention as the twerking Olympic medalist with an OnlyFans page.

However, we live in a wild and weird 2024 too bizarre to believe and with a news cycle that runs faster than the Road Runner. The Olympics came and went with a “beep beep” and this monumental shift in the cultural attitude towards psychedelics got lost in the trail dust. The tracks left behind lead to some interesting destinations.

Psychedelic “Soft Opening”

As the Rolling Stone article points out, there are similarities between legal marijuana and psychedelics. Medical marijuana was only one step removed from legal recreational marijuana. It’s not a stretch of the imagination to foresee that once psychedelics go medical, recreational psychedelics will soon follow.

Moreover, many Americans have already given psychedelics, whether medical or recreational, a green for go. If government legal approval of psychedelics is a grand opening, then Americans are enjoying the psychedelic soft opening now.

From traveling ayahuasca shamans, to psilocybin-assisted psychotherapists, to psilocybin chocolate bars, the psychedelic current sweeping through the country is giving the Gulf Stream a run for its money. Speaking of money, the only thing more robust than the underground psychedelic scene might be the black market that follows in lockstep.

Is the government just catching up now? I get the feeling the Feds could be having their Al Capone moment. They’re realizing they’ll never stop America’s insatiable thirst for alcohol and drugs. Like alcohol, too many Americans are partaking despite a prohibition on psychedelics. Meanwhile the government must be thinking, “If we can’t beat them, tax them!” Al Capone was never arrested for bootlegging. He got put away for tax evasion.

Just think about black market psilocybin chocolate bars. They’re everywhere now. I’ve seen any number of brands, varities, and flavors. They have retail quality packaging and could sit next to a Hershey bar in a Target checkout line without a soccer mom batting an eye. I often wonder who is making these and where? There’s a lot of unrealized tax collections out there.

Then there’s this uncomfortable reality- people are getting sick and perhaps even dying due to unregulated mushroom chocolate bars. This poses a problem similar to when moonshine made people blind. It is true that moonshine did in fact cause blindness, and now you can get a permit to distill it anywhere in the United States. So maybe before anyone else gets sick or dies, we should just go ahead and legalize psychedelics and retail them over-the-counter. But how?

Let’s see what we’ve learned since 1885

Four Psychedelic Retail Routes

The Vox article proposes four route for retail psychedelic sales.

1. Sales by a government authority- As the article points out, this has never worked well. Government run alcohol retailers just don’t cut it. The government shouldn’t have a monopoly on anything. Plus, I walked into a state sanctioned liquor store in Utah once. I felt seedy entering and by the time I left, I felt like I had to go to confession.
   

2. Sales by nonprofits or Sales by for-benefit corporations- Though these two models are distinct, they’re similar. Of all the options, one of these may be the most palatable. Retail sales by for-benefit corporations helps with a focus on equity and public health. Both of which the United States could use a lot more of. Going one step further, sales by nonprofits mimics a collective model used in Europe. Various European countries allow “social clubs” for marijuana, like Spain for example. Peer and community support create the foundation of this model. This could work wonders for integration, community and social health.
   

3. For-profit Sales- The Vox article talks up “psychedelic permits” being proposed in New York. These would function like a driving license. Vox calls it a “potentially reasonable way forward.” Let me share all the reasons why this is a bad idea.
   

   1. According to Vox, “People 18 and up would have to go through a health screening, take an educational course, and pass a test, after which they’d receive a permit to buy psychedelics.” Are we going to surrender sovereignty over our consciousness by allowing the government to decide who is healthy enough to take them or not? The government can’t even figure out who is healthy enough to own a gun. And they want to screen for psychedelic health?
      

   2. Speaking of guns, what happens with gun owners? Can they have a psychedelic permit? Can you only have one freedom or the other? What if you already have a medical marijuana card and own a gun? Are you still eligible for a psychedelic permit? Just wait for the first scandal that erupts when a person with a psychedelic permit commits a gun crime. Which permit does a person lose first? Or is it all three?
      

   3. The FDA couldn’t even grasp psychotherapy in regards to the MDMA-assisted therapy ruling. So how will the government assess mental health for a psychedelic permit screening? If you know anything about spiritual emergence, there’s a mycelial-fine line between genius and madness. Indigenous societies cherish shamans, yet shamans are known to be mentally fluid between the Earthly realm and the spiritual realm. How is the government going to wrap its head around this? They haven’t even figured out our basic healthcare system.
      

   4. Psychedelic permits make us vulnerable to data breaches. The United States just suffered the biggest data breach in history. Almost 3 billion people had their social security numbers and sensitive financial data compromised. You think the government will keep our psychedelic usage private? What if your employer finds out you do psychedelics? Are companies going to be ok with this? I’d rather not find out.
      

   5. Speaking of privacy, how often do you hear people say they don’t care about their data, or that the government knows what they’re doing? Here’s the problem with this. What happens if our government turns oppressive and authoritarian in the future and they decide to criminalize psychedelics again? Or what happens if an opposing political movement blossoms from psychedelic users that challenges the establishment? No worries, there’s a ready-made list of dissidents to target.
      

   6. Do you want to get permission to do psychedelics? Is that freedom? Isn’t freedom going out into nature, sourcing your own medicine and doing it on your own terms? Some people say driving isn’t a right it’s a privilege. Are psychedelics a right or a privilege? What about your mental health, consciousness, and nature?

      

Taking Care of Community Business

More people are beginning to realize the momentous era of change we find ourselves in. More people are realizing that as we molt the old world, a new world is being born. One key feature of the new world many point to is decentralization. Regardless of field, industry or interest, many people call for aspects of our government, society and institutions to be decentralized.

Decentralization’s adaptability and flexibility allow us to respond better to the rapid changes taking place. Stiff, lethargic and hulking institutions can’t react in a quick manner to change. A smaller, more intimate locus of control like community retains our freedom and sovereignty over our consciousness instead of surrendering it to a government entity.

I’ve never heard the word “community” used as much as I have in the past 5 years. Let’s start making community happen by giving us the freedom to decide how psychedelics will be bought and sold where we live. We know the people in our community who could benefit from psychedelics or not. A government bureaucrat living in Arlington, Virginia doesn’t have a clue. Furthermore, state governments have already created a retail marijuana racket, by shutting out small and mid-size business to licenses.

Psychedelic retail sales by nonprofits or for-benefit corporations are the way to go. Otherwise, if we allow our consciousness to be appropriated, repackaged and sold back to us, it will give new meaning to “sell your soul.”