Microsoft Paint

Yellow Stars and Black Eyes In The Psychedelic Re-emergence

The psychedelic renaissance is splintering into roving bands of wounded banshees.

Itā€™s a good thing that mushrooms grow on rot, because thereā€™s a lot of decaying infrastructure underlying the psychedelic community at the moment.

To quote the great poet T.S. Elliot, ā€œThis is the way the world ends - not with a bang, but a whimperā€

The whimper in this case emanated from a particularly inauspicious source: Microsoft Paint.

Before we go any further, letā€™s establish that Iā€™m not qualified, interested in, or taken seriously enough by the psychedelic community at large for my opinions on this highly delicate matter to hold much water. So instead of offering another opinion in a quarrelsome comment thread (there are hundreds already) - allow me to offer some nuanced perspective instead. And please, for your own well-being, donā€™t take anything I say or do seriously. Alas, I am a court jester ā€” historically, the only member of the halls of power able to deliver bad news without being beheaded.

Last weekā€™s psychedelic community controversy du jour may in fact be our current eraā€™s Altamont - except instead of methed up hells angels stabbing people while Mick Jagger sheepishly challenges and subsequently backs down from their ruthless authority, we have a bunch of peanut gallery missionaries slinging mud at each other in social media comment threads.

Decriminalize Nature is a group that typically provokes strong reactions in support of or defense of their agenda and actions - which are generally traced back to their polarizing and charismatic founder, Carlos Plazola. Iā€™ve never met Carlos, but Iā€™d love to host him on the podcast sometime.

I have met several of DNā€™s national board members in person on multiple occasions, and have great respect for those individuals.

This most recent controversy DN finds themself encumbered by marks a particularly formidable challenge to the Decriminalize Nature legacy and cultural legitimacy, which has come under fire before for perceived infractions.

This controversial incident also marks a particularly South Park-esque episode in their life cycle, and in the ā€˜psychedelic re-emergenceā€™ (we need to swap out the ā€˜renaissanceā€™ part already) that they mirror and amplify.

Before we unpack a little bit of the context and fallout surrounding the current controversy DN finds themselves embroiled in, letā€™s examine this particularly cartoonish excerpt from the official public statement made by DN leader Carlos Plazola, in which he defends his brand of design aesthetics and cultural unawareness.

The TL;DR of why the psychedelic villagers are up in arms at the moment can be traced to this graphic, and itā€™s inclusion of six-pointed yellow stars accompanying a berating of David Bronnerā€™s financial entanglement in the psychedelic movement. Bronner is of Jewish ancestry, and if anybody by now doesnā€™t understand the significance of six-pointed yellow stars to the Jewish community, you can read more here.

When we find one of the most visible and invested leaders of the psychedelic re-emergence qualifying the design limitations of Microsoft Paint amidst a shit storm of allegations and angry Instagram comments, the party is over.

If you ask me, the real crime here is that DN uses Microsoft Paint for their graphic design in the first place. Who the fuck uses Microsoft Paint? Are they delivering a Power Point presentation on psychedelic investment opportunities to a retirement community in Boca Raton?

As legendary media and communication theorist Marshall McLuhan stated in his 1964 tome ā€œUnderstanding Media: The Extensions of Manā€ in 1964

ā€œThe Medium Is The Messageā€

In other words, the communication medium itself, and not the message it carries, should be the primary focus of study.

Microsoft Fucking Paint.

Somebody get Carlos an Adobe Creative Suite subscription and an encyclopedia.

The more that the undercurrents driving the course of the psychedelic re-emergence bubble up to visibility in the public eye, the easier it might be for people to understand why an ongoing series of my satire videos are set in the post-apocalyptic future among the ruins of civilization.

The psychedelic community continues to dovetail towards dueling carnival barker rhetoricians, showing extreme vulnerability to elementary level media manipulation and astroturfing along the way.

Since my arrival on ā€˜the sceneā€™ in January 2021, Iā€™ve cringed through dozens of petty squabbles and interpersonal conflicts between  supposed leaders and revolutionary organizations within the community ā€” and witnessed a revolving door of alliances turn sour, with finger pointing and ad hominem attacks outweighing any real substance or value.

Weā€™ve officially departed the theater of the absurd, and entered the funerary chambers of the psychedelic re-emergence.

And the writing on the wall is limited by the design options available within Microsoft Paint.