"God forbid that in a democratic society, we should resign the task and give the government over to experts. What are we for if we are to be scientifically taken care of by a small number of gentlemen who are the only men who understand the job? Because if we don't understand the job, then we are not a free people."
--Senator Robert F. Kennedy, in hearings before the Subcommittee on Executive Reorganization, of the Senate Committee on Government Operations, concerning federal drug research and regulation of LSD (May 24, 1966).
These comments by Robert F. Kennedy (note... not "Jr.") were recorded almost exactly sixty years ago. He was talking about how the U.S. government should think about psychedelic drugs, which at that time pretty much just meant LSD.
Other psychedelics like psilocybin, MDMA, ibogaine, ayahuasca, mescaline, bufo and ketamine, have very different historical contexts: they may come with long indigenous traditions and sacred rituals, or medical applications which predate populist recreational use/abuse in Western societies. LSD was unique or paradigmatic, as having been accidentally invented in a pharma company lab, and later widely disseminated to be used secretly and illegally within a single human generation as both a sacrament and a weapon, creating huge socio-cultural impact.
LSD started out as a psychiatric drug. It presents a simpler, historical picture of psychedelics for mental health medicine because intentions connected to it, however various from one individual user to another, have not significantly changed, but were all there in 1943 for Albert Hoffman's bicycle ride. It can be seen as one short, peculiarly Western narrative.
These days we get very complicated indeed (and political once again), with our discussions and debates about human salvation, chemical Christianity, mental health, science and brains. One recent (May 2026) editorial by several international experts almost reads like a Cold War intelligence estimate, suggesting elaborate countermeasures against an impending demise of scientific medicine.
Despite eerily reminiscent hoopla from groups like MAPS and boosters like RFK, Jr., there is increasingly significant evidence that psychedelics will only become the next discreditable dead-end for psychiatry. The "science" is all about rebranding LSD as "DT120ODT", toad venom as "GH001", or Ecstacy (MDMA) as "DT402". But the problem of researching benefits vs. risks remains intractable. Functional unblinding is finally just ignored as though it's irrelevant, completely contrary to fundamental psychological principles and experience.
However with the internet and social media, we live in a very different world from the one when an earlier generation of Kennedys dropped acid secretly, behind closed doors, while their military and security experts researched it to help save the free Christian world. The "Russian roulette" character of psychedelic drug taking has changed, and the odds are dire.
Instead of one bullet in the cylinder, there now are three or four.
