Ecstasy: A Trend or A Growth

[Alekseev]

It seems that ecstasy has already lost alot of its popularity in Europe and the Middle East as many switch over to cocaine and other substances. My question is: Is ecstasy a trend that will die down like LSD and GHB have in the US, or is it here to reign along with cocaine, heroin and marijuana? Please explain your reasoning...

[Alekseev]

I'll just throw in that I think it's here to stay; however, I'm disappointed in the quality. Swim wishes that there was some consistency as well as decent manufacturers who would give ecstasy a better reputation for purity than some of the other drugs out there...Right now, it seems that even heroin is ahead of ecstasy (at least where Swim is...)

[Bajeda]

Still don't see alot of cocaine in the Middle-East these days. North Africa maybe, but not the Middle-East.

[Alekseev]

Originally Posted by Bajeda

Still don't see alot of cocaine in the Middle-East these days. North Africa maybe, but not the Middle-East.

You're correct... Swim has *heard* that many are sick of MDMA and are moving on to other substances like speed and coke. Coke in the Middle East is overpriced baking soda with a little dash of cocaine for effect. The Middle East is alot more restricted, but it seems like they would dive into another substance if it became more available. Do you think that ecstasy is here to stay as a major drug? I'm also curious about the US market. Do you think that the ecstasy and rave scene will pass over and lose their popularity? It seems that some in Europe have already moved on from ecstasy to 2CT2, CT2, 2CT7, BZP and whatever the other ones are...

[enquirewithin]

MDMA is peculiar in that the first few times people take it it is very 'special' and has little hangover. (As well as that, if you take more than about 200-300 mg at a time, the effects change and the hangover can be much worse.) You cannot take it more than once a week at most and get much positive effect out of it. The more often you take it, the less the famous 'magic' becomes, the more the unpleasant amphetamine-like after effects become. This may even be die to some physiological change.

"Ecstasy" will remain popular because more young people will discover it. None of the RCs will ever have that popularity (although mthylone has its enthusiasts). Coke and speed were there long before.

[Pondlife]

Originally Posted by enquirewithin

"Ecstasy" will remain popular because more young people will discover it. None of the RCs will ever have that popularity (although mthylone has its enthusiasts). Coke and speed were there long before.

I agree that MDMA is here to stay. In time I expect that it will become one of the classic drugs.

However, I'm not sure that none of the RCs will ever match it in popularity. This is something that noone knows at the moment, but I suspect that in the future we'll develop more classic drugs that started life as RCs. Sure, most RCs will end up being dead-ends, but I suspect that there are essentially infinate number of psycoactive chemicals, and I think that we've only just scratched the surface of what's possible.

[bluecow]

SWIM reckons that over the 20 or so years that they have been taking Es that the quality has gone up and down. Recently swim had a two and a half year break from all substances and on swims returm they hoped to have their mind boggled as they had taken such a long break. swim was hugely dissapointed that the quality at the moment is utterly appalling. Swim likens finding good quality es to searching for the Holy Grail.
Swim reckons that the minute that some high quality es become available demand will increase. Swim reckons it would be false econimy to manufacture poor quality Es. I they whoever it is that makes the bloody things made good ones the demand would increase drastically.

[Nacumen]

Ecstasy already is a classic drug in SWIM's opinion.

As for all the 2T chemicals Alekseev listed... those are 'tripping' chemicals, one could say. They're hardly candidates to replace chemicals intended primarily to induce some kind of euphoria.

[Vysas]

Ecstasy will stay!Young people always coming,and discovering this magical drug,music,rave,clubs...E is integral part of all that.
But is stil far from classical drugs such as cocaine and marijuana,and maybe is better to always stay in underground.

[zera]

I think understanding the differences between the ecstasy market and other classic drug markets helps one to understand the dichotomy in culture. First off on the demand side even the heaviest X users arent rolliing more than twice a month for extended periods of time, compare that to marijuana or cocaine where there is a core demographic who is consuming very large amounts on a daily basis. There is a rule of thumb in economics called 80/20, where for most products 20% of the buyers are consuming 80% of the supply, this is most likely true with the classic drugs, but most likely not true for drugs like xtc or acid where there is little benefit to the user from heavy use. This core constituency of heavy users is a fundamental component of drug markets, most of the non-heavy users dont acquire directly from enterprise level dealers directly but rather go through their heavy using friends. Thus these people serve a bridge between professional dealer and casual user, and help buffer the supply. When the X trend goes down, X availability will go down because less dealers will be able to stay in business, however when less people smoke weed, these heavy pot smokers will most likely continue smoking ensuring a continued supply for their friends.

On the supply side ecstasy also fundamentally differs, because unlike cocaine, marijuana or heroin it is produced in large complicated labs in very large batches. Cocaine moves in a constant flow, a processor in Mexico can easily adjust quantity and keep a daily flow, a MDMA manufacturer might produce 10 batches a year and it is hard for him to scale up without making large fixed investments. Since MDMA moves in discrete, rather than continious, flow it appears heavily trend base. In smaller markets, like a 1000 person liberal arts culture with a large hippy population, MDMA may come around 4-5 times in the year and when it does it tends to be heavily consumed in the immediate weekends following its arrival, then its supply dries up until the next shipment. The fact that prices are so sticky in the MDMA market (that is people are loath to buy/sell for a price different than the traditional cost per hit) doesnt help because it removes arbitrage opportunities for people to buy up the hits when the market is flooded and hold them until the dry period.

All of this means that MDMA is going to seem much more cyclical than something like cocaine. For the above mentioned reasons you will find time periods when it seems like everyone and their brother is either selling and/or taking X and then it dissapears (especially in smaller markets), while with cocaine the proportion of people using will remain much more constant. In fact X is also helped by the fact that people on ecstasy like being around others who are rolling. With cocaine it is fun to do a few lines in the bathroom at a part or club, but with MDMA people like going to raves where the dominant drug is MDMA itself (I cant even the disaster that a cocaine rave would produce).

Reputation Comments on this post:

Great post!

[KeGbErT]

I belive that E is here to stay but as Zera said the supply is never steady and will probably never really stabalize. It is also a bit of a fad drug too, well atleast in my area. The E fad started at my school/city (when i was goin, im now graduated) when bay area rapper Mac Dre got really big. I know it sounds stupid, but one rapper had enough influence on these kids to make them want to try E. The bad thing was is that they didnt respect it for what it was and more or less treated it like ppl treat alcohol, just somthin to get fucked up on. It wasnt unusual for ppl to pop like 8-12 in one night and do it like 3-5 nights in a row, ya needeless to say those kids are just a lil bit slower because of it. This went on for about 6 months then everyone just kinda stopped. The ppl that actually respected the drug and used it as it should be such as Swim and Swims friends still enjoy it to this day even though its not the Hip drug now. Mac Dre is the guy who coined the word THIZZIN and started the Thizz music movement in CA. One of my fav rappers actually, you guys should check him out next time you're rollin/thizzin. I bet itll get your head bobbin.

[kumar]

"Lots of Papers"

[triple_stack_smoke]

Of course excstacy is gonna stay because of the perfect high u get

Its an orgasm in heaven