hes so goffik
— Chatham Harrison is tending his garden (@chathamharrison.bsky.social) February 23, 2025 at 1:45 AM
I have to admit that I have never understood (beyond the ineviatable ‘this year’s fad’) why people should find it worthwhile to dose themselves with a dissociative anesthetic for recreational purposes. Wired, which has been doing amazing work, had an article on “The Ketamine-Fueled ‘Psychedelic Slumber Parties’ That Get Tech Execs Back on Track”:
… WIRED spoke to the cofounders of an organization that offers ketamine-assisted leadership coaching in the San Francisco Bay Area. The two speakers are identified by pseudonyms, which they selected for themselves. Aria Stone has a doctorate in psychology. Shuang Shuang is a spiritual coach. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Shuang Shuang: We fast-track coaching by really locking it in with the psychedelics. We deliver it to you on a cellular level…
SS: We call it an off-site, not a retreat, because we’re not retreating from anything. We don’t do them big—nine or 10 clients—partially due to the importance of confidentiality. Our clientele is primarily CEOs of Fortune 100 companies, CFOs, C-level founders of startups. All of them are in a pressure cooker.
Aria Stone: Those are the kind of leaders that come—people who have achieved so much in their life, and they’re like, “OK, what’s the next horizon? Because I’ve checked pretty much every box.”
SS: Here are all the loneliest people. They have to lead and go through so many things by themselves. They can come and see that they’re not alone, and let go of the burden of being so protected all the time. They just want to be people…
SS: Our off-site costs $2,600 for three days, plus a $350 fee for a medical assessment and ketamine prescription. Meals are included, but transportation and lodging are not…
AS: When we transition into the journey, we pull the BackJacks out.
SS: It’s pretty sweet. They have little nests, little beds. They’re all tucked in. They have blankets and pillows, and earplugs if the ambient music playing on the speakers gets too loud. They’re wearing eye masks, because ketamine is more of a dissociative medicine—there is this sense of naturally going inward and being quiet. There are a bunch of stuffed animals there that some people take for their journey.
AS: There’s this huge teddy bear holding a cup of the intramuscular ketamine.
We encourage clients to bring things that are meaningful for them—like a journal, photos of loved ones, loved ones that have passed, rocks. It’s just really loving, grounding, and open…
Cynic that I am, I’m reading about a batch of high-strung self-identified Achievers who’ve dropped three grand for the chance to ‘nest’ and have their hands held by solicitous counselors while they ‘increase their neuroplasticity’. How many of them would be just as ‘successful’ if they were, at this point, injected with Ringer’s solution?
But rose-petal-strewn weekend circles certainly don’t explain Elon Musk’s ketamine… habits. Being he’s Elon Musk, it may just be his narcissistic need to be Absolutely Different from every mere normie. As he sees it, he has a “real doctor” who prescribes ‘clinical doses’ for an unfortunate chronic illness (depression) that intermittently attacks him like a case of covid. And those ‘clinical doses’ apparently provide what he considers the best outcome: Manic bursts of non-stop social media postings attacking his myriad enemies and boasting of his own infallibility. Sure, weaker individuals might be tempted to dial back, intimidated by everything from liver toxicity to ketamine dick, but Elon Musk, God-Emperor of Mars and Lord of the DOGE, cares nothing for the meatsack currently hosting his magnificent consciousness!
And maybe, for Musk, for the moment, that feeling of invincibility is enough.
Boring Week
sentient ai from the future
yeah, i never understood ketamine’s appeal. mdma, sure, psilocybin or lsd, absolutely.
but ketamine? really?
SpaceUnit
Maybe they’re all just batshit crazy and we’re in a heap of shit.
Martin
You don’t offer up ‘rocks’ as something that is meaningful to a billionaire unless there’s one out there bringing rocks instead of family photos.
YY_Sima Qian
More on the pathologies building up in the US socio-economy (gift link to WSJ article below):
Since the rich have been getting richer on top of the rapidly rising asset prices, a stock market retrenchment from the currently stratospheric valuations (concentrated among the Magnificent 7), will have outside impact on the US economy. Trumpian misrule will do it, too.
NotMax
“Sir, Adderall is so last century.”
//
sentient ai from the future
also, ketamine’s closest analogue among drugs of abuse, pharmacologically, is PCP. remember james brown’s travails with pcp?
anyway, here you go.
https://youtu.be/pRQgviNNZEM
NotMax
@Martin
“A menhir dresses up any room.”
– Obélix
;)
Martin
Keep in mind the marginal value of money means that $3K for these guys is literally nothing. I have no idea why they are charging so little.
Rusty
It’s pathetic, their lives are so empty they need a drug fueled weekend where they supposedly connect by not actually connecting with anyone. How about instead of pictures of loved ones, you actually spend time with loved ones. It would be deeply sad, but for at least some of the same people running their organizations like psychopaths.
WTFGhost
Deleted – sorry, language processing is down too far.
VFX Lurker
If we survive the next four years, I can picture Elon Musk on a poster, warning future generations against the perils of drug abuse. Hell, he’s doing a great job warning folks about drug abuse now.
Kristine
I guess it makes a kind of sense that some of these people believe the rest of us yearn for the chance to talk to people who don’t exist (AI buddies).
Pathologies of the Rich & Famous.
NotMax
“I once tried drowning my sorrows, till I found out they could swim.”
– Peter De Vries, The Vale of Laughter
;)
sentient ai from the future
@Rusty:
it’s so much worse than that.
they need a drug-fueled weekend and have no way of making that happen on their own, unless they drop 3k on these charlatans.
put another way, they maintain no connections with normal-enough people that have drug connections to be able to dabble on the weekends, so they need to hire a fucking drug-weekend consultant for this.
Gloria DryGarden
Enhanced dissociation.
That doesn’t seem like it would enhance compassion. Or relationships, empathy, or giving a fuck about swathes of humanity that you can influence and harm.
I only think dissociation is good for surviving life-threatenening violence, so one can distance oneself and not be totally reliving the feeling states associated with such experiences.
I think it’s should be contra- indicated for leaders and people im positions of leadership.
wealth and privilege, and a sense of entitlement, already give those folks too much distance and separation from the real world most of us live it.
Diwsvit puss you off as much as it pisses me off?
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@Gloria DryGarden: I’m put in mind of the old movie Paths of Glory, about the First World War, in which the Generals are safe in their chateaus pushing around tokens on tabletop maps to plan out how to advance the battle line and take maybe half a square mile of territory from the enemy, in the hope that a successful push will lead to accolades and promotions for themselves, completely disregarding the fact that every one of those tiny tokens represents a hundred or more people who are going to be sent out into a no-man’s-land where anything that moves will be torn apart by bullets and shrapnel.
Yes, it pisses me off.
ColoradoGuy
Our best hope is he OD’s, or has a stroke as he abuses his brain.
I’m struck by the parallels with the Nazis, with their amphetamine-fueled Blitzkriegs, and Hitler’s growing addiction to heroin+cocaine “speedballs”. Steve Bannon is an obvious alcoholic, along with General Hegseth. The rumors of Trump using ground-up Adderall have persisted for decades. These folks aren’t just “weird”, they’re hard-core drug abusers who are shielded by armies of super-lawyers and NDA agreements applied to their victims.
It seems like it takes drugs/alcohol to complete the transformation into a complete monster.
sentient ai from the future
@Bruce K in ATH-GR: paths of glory is the best kubrick movie. yes, better than dr strangelove. fight me.
NotMax
@ColoradoGuy
Use (and overuse) of Pervitin was widespread among the general populace and the military in Germany before, during and after the war, Even humble chocolate bars were laced with the stuff.
However the allies’ hands weren’t unblemished either. Trailer from several years back for a program looking at the situation.
A fuller documentary film focusing on Pervitin and related substances in Germany, Blitzed: Nazis on Drugs, is currently available for streaming on both Prime and on Pluto.
sentient ai from the future
@ColoradoGuy: i am still skeptical of the science behind Olney’s lesions but i wouldn’t make a fuss if that made it into popular narrative around this chucklefuck.
sentient ai from the future
@Gloria DryGarden: i think anything can be abused in the service of distancing oneself from others if that is your fundamental goal.
Geminid
Senate Republicans passed their budget bill last Friday. Apparently, this week is the House Republican’s turn.
Yesterday, Capitol Hill reporter Jamie Dupree reported complaints from several Republicans who are balking at their budget bill because it allows for deficits in the $1.75 to $2.2 trillion range over each of the next ten years.
Dupree wrote:
I think Dupree said the Congress has to pass something by March 15. That’s when the current continuing resolution expires.
NotMax
@Geminid
Seen this production. They’ll end up kicking the can down the road with another 2 to 3 month CR.
eclare
I took LSD once with a boyfriend, had a great time, but then once I sobered up I realized that I had wasted an entire Saturday when I could have gotten stuff done. Never did it again.
Maybe early 30’s employed person is not that drug’s demographic.
Geminid
Meanwhile on the Democratic side, Dupree posted a screen shot of this note-to-colleagues from Hakeem Jeffries, Minority Leader:
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@sentient ai from the future:
*sigh* I don’t wanna fight. Just bearing witness to the atrocities from the other side of the planet takes more energy than I’ve got.
prostratedragon
In this inaugural episode of Hard to Sing, Roberta Flack: “Ballad of the Sad Young Men”. Inspired by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Gloria DryGarden
@sentient ai from the future: it’s rather that I don’t like that anyone can be abused, that creating dissociation in service to such abuse of a population, or a nation..
i don’t care if people get high. Just don’t harm a bunch of others in the process.
grew up w an alcoholic
sure, self medication, to get distance from your troubles.
Darkrose
@sentient ai from the future: I know one internet acquaintance who uses ketamine to control their Type 1 Bipolar disorder. They’re under the care of an actual psychiatrist though, not woo grifters.
Geminid
@NotMax: That seems the most likely outcome. This would raise the stakes for the next vote, because the Debt Ceiling problem could be very acute by then.
We also might be entering a recession. That would add to the political pressure on Republicans. And if the CBO recalculates those deficit numbers based on updated economic conditions, they could be substantially higher.
Gloria DryGarden
@Bruce K in ATH-GR: people are calling it national suicide. Except those guys hold themselves separate from us.
So , murder. I’d call it fratricide, if it seemed we were brethren.
glad you could understand past the typos I missed.
sentient ai from the future
@Darkrose: back in the day, one of my parents, a polydrug abuser, charm-captured a psychiatrist who would prescribe them medications that actually worsened (in my experience) their pathologies.
the patient-provider relationship can be extremely complicated, but there are more than enough providers out there who can wittingly or unwittingly enable their patients to be their worst selves. michael jackson’s prescription meds that killed him were legitimately prescribed too.
it’s a fraught area, is all i’m saying.
sentient ai from the future
@Gloria DryGarden: heems was calling it “suicide by cop” back in 2015
https://youtu.be/0SiukxFVCBk
Nukular Biskits
Good mornin’, y’all.
Was that Wired excerpt I just read real? I mean, seriously?
satby
Well, ketamine dick explains why almost all his kids were IVF.
sentient ai from the future
@satby: no, “noone with a womb would touch this grody mayonnaise goblin” adequately explains it, without referencing his drug habits. though those would also support the general assessment if things got that far.
NotMax
@Nukular Biskits
Lifestyles of the Rich and Tarnished.
//
NotMax
@Ksatby
If ever I own a racehorse, gonna name it Ketamne Dick.
//
NotMax
#38:
Missed that errant K sneaking in before your nym.
Apologies aplenty.
The Thin Black Duke
I remember a bad night years ago when I was tripping off of the wrong kind of drugs and I wound up calling a friend of mine at stupid o’clock in the a.m. to help me touch base back with reality. We talked for hours and she didn’t charge me a dime. None of these rich sociopaths can say that. All of them are surrounded by greedy vultures who will pick their bones clean once they drop dead. Financially speaking, I’m broke, but Musk could never afford to buy my precious circle of friends.
NotMax
@The Thin Black Duke
Not in any way directed at you, but triggered memory of the late Phil Ochs.
;)
Shalimar
@satby: His oldest children are twins and triplets born 19-21 years ago, so I am guessing the need for IVF predates his ketamine misuse.
Gvg
@Martin: I think that it’s that the only 2 they could get to interview sort of on the record only charge that modest amount. These 2 are not the ones that are serving people in Musk’s income bracket, they are serving other CEO’s of I guess I would say lower range. So the super rich are even stranger than this. I don’t think the ones making money off the super rich are going to risk their income stream to talk to reporters, especially since even this seems to skirt the laws really and I bet the doctors of the mega rich are not really following medical ethics at all.
montanareddog
@YY_Sima Qian: You mention “the Magnificent 7”. I am guessing this will be Musk, Bezos, Zuck, etc.?
We are talking about 7 hyper-wealthy individuals, then?
I am not an economist but I presume economic models depend upon stats, and stats depend upon sufficiently large population samples. Which makes me fear that the traditional economic models may not be wholly inadequate for a world of extreme wealth concentration.
But, then again, can 7 individuals have a noticeable impact against the aggregate wealth of the US, the EU and China? I am just thinking out loud and have no idea, actually.
Nukular Biskits
Not judging here but, other than alcohol, I’ve never partaken of any other means of temporarily altering brain chemistry. Part of that is a “control” thing, I suppose, in that I don’t like to lose control of myself.
Plus, at my age (not to mention the requirements of my job) it’s probably not a good idea to start now.
Having said that, however, I’ve already told Ms. Biskits when I retire, we’re going to take a trip (no pun intended there … LOL) to CO or elsewhere which has legalized recreational marijuana. Like Huey Lewis sang, I think I’d like to try a new drug.
Geminid
@Bruce K in ATH-GR: Hey, Bruce K! I’m curious. I remember there being a lot of tension between Greece and Turkiye in the early years of this decade. It seemed like the Turkish Air Force was rattling windows all of the Aegean Sea.
Then in the Fall 2023, Prime Minister Mitzotakis(sp?) hosted President Erdogan for a visit. The leaders signed some minor agreements. Mitzotakis was smiling. That’s always hard to tell with Erdogan, but he must have in a good mood, because he called the Aegean “a Sea of Peace and Cooperation.”
So I’m wondering how Greeks think this new phase in relations is going?
Shalimar
@montanareddog: Musk’s wealth as an example shouldn’t have as much impact as the topline total would suggest since most of it is tied up in highly volatile Tesla stock that he can’t sell. On the other hand, he isn’t that far now from taking over control of the entire US government and treasury, which magnifies his influence a hundred thousand fold.
The Thin Black Duke
@NotMax: That was the first Phil Ochs song my first girlfriend introduced me to!
satby
@The Thin Black Duke: I think of his song “When I’m Gone” as something that reminds me of you.
The Thin Black Duke
@satby: I always preferred Ochs to Dylan. “Pleasures of the Harbor” is a shamefully underrated LP.
satby
@The Thin Black Duke: agree. In fact, I love that particular song so much I’m sharing all the lyrics for people who are unfamiliar:
YY_Sima Qian
@montanareddog:
Meta, Alphabets, Apple, Amazon, Nvidia, Tesla & Microsoft. Their stratospheric valuations have buttressed the U.S. stock markets for years, the market cap of U.S. equities are heavily concentrated among these stocks.
The Thin Black Duke
@satby: Here’s another favorite of mine.
Matt McIrvin
@sentient ai from the future: The ketamine users I’ve encountered sometimes described their experiences in science-fiction terms involving visits with sentient AIs from the future. Of course you’d have no great need of that.
(But I can’t help noticing how into the 1990s SF Singularity stuff all these guys are into. Millions now living will never die!)
satby
@The Thin Black Duke: He was a great, underrated songwriter. And unabashedly liberal. As my bio on most social media says, I see that as practical.
no body no name
@sentient ai from the future:
This is something that baffles me. When I was young I was heavily into EDM (house, trance, d&b) and went out regularly. MDMA, ketamine, LSD, mushrooms, and mescaline were the party drugs of choice. At the LGBTQ (and let’s be honest it was mostly the Gs) clubs crystal, coke, GHB, poppers were also all the rage. I’m straight but people hung out at whatever club was open that night regardless of orientation. Same crazy crew was out almost every night during the week.
That was about 20 years ago. To this day I could summons up anything I wanted in one phone call. It is not exactly rare in any major city and you don’t need a major connection anybody with any semblance of a social life at least knows someone or someone who knows someone as it’s all over the place. The notion of needing a professional and safe space to get loaded on ketamine or DMT is sort of asinine.
Everyone sort of grew out of that though. Nobody goes clubbing five nights a week anymore. We’ve got jobs! Many have kids! It’s not workable anymore and good lord does it take longer to recover. But that doesn’t mean those relationships dried up and that people don’t go out maybe four times a year. Or go out and just not drug it up. It’s not hard to find.
I know why it’s always ketamine and DMT with these assholes. Ketamine and DMT will not only hit like a freight train and put you in another reality you can abuse them. With MDMA or LSD it lasts a long time and then there is a recovery period before it will work again. If you take a metric ton of Ketamine it will fuck you up good and proper and when it wears off you can do it all again almost immediately. DMT is now sold pretty openly and you can go visit the elves for 20 mins or so come back completely sober and then do it again. It’s like nitrous.
I get the distinct impression none of these people were ever at a club. Where everyone is feeling everyone up and dancing around and most people go home with not just someone but a few someones at crack of dawn. So it’s just a bunch of dorks hanging around in a room with some crank who’s fleecing them for money and they are all miserable. They’re so socially awkward I can’t imagine them in that situation.
Geminid
@Nukular Biskits: The first place I bought legal weed was near Alamosa, Colorado. Alamosa County is “dry,” and I had drive to dispensary Ft. Garland. It was very well-stocked.
Alamosa is a really nice place to visit. It’s in the San Luis Valley, right next to the upper Rio Grande. There’ a book store, restaurants, brew pubs etc. It’s a great place for walking, flat with wide sidewalks, and there’s a park and nature preserve that extends six miles along the river.
And spectacular views! Blanca Peak, one of the four sacred mountains of the Navaho, is to the east (Fort Garland’s at its base, on the road to Walsenberg.
Great Sand Dunes National Park is to the north of Blanca. It’s 25 miles from Alamosa, but the valley is so flat you can see the dunes from the edge of town.
The Baca National Wildlife Refuge is next to the national park, and Alamosa County has several smaller reserves. I think a lot of birders use Alamosa as a base. They have a Crane Festival every April.
I stayed at the Lamplighter Inn, an oldy-but-a-goody motel in the old downtown.
kalakal
Their clientele sound like the miserable people ever, paying to retreat further into their self selected solitary confinement.
Betty
Quote: “Here are the loneliest people.” That says it all. They have chosen money and status above personal relationships and are suffering because of it. Too lost to understand their predicament and any genuine solution.
prostratedragon
@satby: There’s a weekly radio show in Chicago that often winds down with that song.
no body no name
@kalakal:
I had never heard of taking loads of ketamine outside of a club playing electronic music until these people started talking about it.
Then again I hadn’t heard of micro dosing on mushrooms at work or taking DMT trips in sleep pods at work either until these assholes started advocating it. I’ve heard of drinking at work lunches or office parties towards close of business but not taking LSD.
@Betty:
Maybe it’s because I learned about drugs at clubs and concerts but my impression was they were a social activity you did with your friends, your friends friends, and your soon to be friends. Not hire a consultant to go sit in a room with a bunch of weirdos.
TBone
Holee cow I’m glad I backtracked for your prose, A.L.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@Geminid: I don’t have the best feel for what the locals think about the current state of affairs with Turkey, but the newspapers I’ve read seem to be a lot less hair-on-fire about Aegean incursions and the like.
Maybe Erdogan decided that the Russian invasion of Ukraine right across the Black Sea meant that it wasn’t the best of times to borrow trouble with the Greeks.
bluefoot
“Pressure cooker” my ass. CEOs have a floor to the bonuses they get even if they run a company into the ground, then are golden parachuted to the next thing. They’re provided with all kinds of resources by the company and the board, unlike pretty much anyone below VP level. Back when I worked at a startup, I sat in board meetings and these guys know there’s no consequences for their behavior or their decision making. The consequences are always borne by others, the money and lives at risk aren’t theirs, and they don’t care.
They don’t need ketamine, they need to grow the fuck up.
ChrisJohnson
@sentient ai from the future: I’m a pediatric ICU physician and prescribe ketamine a lot — for over 45 years now. It’s a fascinating drug, useful for sedation, procedures, some other stuff. But I would never choose to take it myself just for the hell of it.
satby
@prostratedragon: Midnight Special on FMT? Not sure, but the show you’re referring to is where i first heard it.
Bill Arnold
@no body no name:
(Writing as a person not in the field(s), but have read much of the scientific literature.)
This is all driven by actually-interesting scientific research done starting roughly 2016. It was found that serotonergic psychedelics increase neuritogenesis, spinogenesis, and synaptogenesis (“plasticity”), and similar research into ketamine found similar effects. Here’s a key paper.
Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity (12 June 2018 , full, open access, (pdf))
There was other related research, some of which stalled but still has clear potential.
The techie culture picked up on these lines of research as potential ways to gain a mental edge over their competition.
Psychiatry researchers picked up on these lines of research as potential ways to rapidly change brains in certainly undesirable states, e.g. depression, with very promising research and clinical practice (haven’t been tracking the state), and there is also some focus on substances with no overt acute psychoactive effects.
Geminid
@Bruce K in ATH-GR: Erdogan made Hakan Fidan his new Foreign Minister in June of 2023. That probably helped relations with Greece. Fidan is a very intelligent and systematic man, and a much smoother operator than his undiplomatic boss.
The Pale Scot
Star Trek – Theragen Derivative Antidote
Miss Bianca
@Geminid: I really like Alamosa. Pal D was on one of those real estate sites the other day and found a couple really nice properties down there. It was kind of tempting, to fantasize about picking up stakes and moving down that way…
karen gail
@Nukular Biskits: Take a road trip and tour the country at same time; there are (at this time) a number of states where recreational marijuana is legal. One of the realtors has a sign I pass that they rent places that cater to those who want to spend time in vacation setting where they don’t mind if you use recreational marijuana. Strangely, that relator is next door to a marijuana outlet.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@sentient ai from the future: large animal tranquilizers for all. The internet helpfully says it is not a horse tranquilizer. I don’t know about horses. I do know when I was young, farmers used ketamine to knock out bulls of the bovine tribe.
I don’t get it either.
Sister Golden Bear
@Bill Arnold:
I did ketamine IV therapy to deal with chronic depression that wasn’t being helped sufficiently by meds. For me, it really worked wonders. But…. my experience was far different than what’s being described in the article (I was following what’s currently the standard practice of treatment.)
Meeting with a therapist before starting any of the sessions, and doing a debrief with her after each of the trips. Half dozen is a typical course of therapy, although a number of people do occasional follow-ups as needed. Each session had a focus about something I wanted to explore/deal with, with a doctor sitting with me the entire time to monitor and take notes. I was encouraged, but not required, to talk about things that struck me during the trip, so that I could go over them in the follow-up debrief session.