Doors of the mind: Ghosts and thresholds in Bowie, Dickens, and the Generation Game
I’ve never been able to pass a door in an ancient wall without wondering what’s behind it. I know the truth is overwhelmingly likely to be mundane, but my subconscious mind can’t help picking out the details: the old ivy growth across it; the absence of any mechanism on the outside; the permanent silence…
What’s not cool: The UNODC’s demand-side denialism on cocaine
A very quick reaction post this one. I just read through the United Nations Office on Drugs & Crime’s World Drug Report 2014… and I’m unsure whether the writers are being disingenuous or intellectually dishonest, or how many revisions and blue-pencillings it went through on its way to publication. Consider this tweet. …
Rockin’ in the free world: Gorbachev, poppies and the death of Kurt Cobain
If you really want to know about Nirvana – from who killed Kurt Cobain to the rise of grunge and the Generation X tag – don’t listen to the conspiracy theories; ask a historian. The news of Kurt Cobain’s suicide broke 20 years ago today. The anniversary of his death – which probably…
One from the vault: Testing Salvia Divinorum for science
Back in 1998, I was part of a team of academics, medics, journalists and psychonauts who created a TV documentary series called Sacred Weeds. Over the years, the series has since become something of a cult item. First shown on Channel 4 in the UK and syndicated around the world, Sacred Weeds…
Video: “Cocaine coffee tables?!” CNN bosses, the craziest cop in Brazil, and me
It started perfectly innocently. I was out with a friend on Thursday, and the phone rang. I didn’t pick up – it was ten o’clock, and I’d worked my way through six large glasses of what I remember being an increasingly smooth Italian red, and a couple of bottles of Grolsch for good measure.…
Extract: Colombia, cocaine and the coastal paradise on a US blacklist
Today, the US finally blacklisted Belize and El Salvador for being major narcotics transhipment hubs – mainly for Colombian cocaine. Anyone who’s been to the former British Honduras, a tiny little country on the Central American coastline, will already know very well how much of it goes down there. Indeed, most are probably wondering, like…
News: Australia wakes up to Outlaws Inc after “sensational” ABC Breakfast show interview
This morning I was a guest on Australia’s no.1 breakfast show on ABC. During the link-up interview with host Mike Rowland (a still from the show, above), we talked about how the cut-throat economics of the global marketplace in everything from aid delivery to the food in our supermarkets feeds a shadow industry of mercenary…