The Entourage Effect At Finnegans Wake - Free Downlaod PDF

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Steve Fly

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Steve Fly - As If True (My first magic mushroom experience)

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Robert Anton Wilson meets Steve Fly

Yes i get high

yes i get high, they call me the ....

i used to have a problem with a turned in eye

now i just sigh, and usher words by

if send me an email i'll probably reply

swim don't fly, do don't try

take the good vibes and bake em' in a pie

dig family stone, and my man, called, Sly

like a fountain on a mountain you're wet and high

like i said to you before many people call me...

feet in the sky and head in the bed, that's what he said

a bed of flowers soft and dreaming hours, 

the rhyme don't lie or the pigs would fly

the cats say that, you're not a cat without a hat

the lion don't lie indeed she keeps it raw

the funks with the elephant, the heads with the Bore

Pup music for the dogs, jump up for frogs

prickly on the microphone like a herd of hedgehogs

I sneak up like a spider, and then i do provider

a little funky beat, and spliff and some cider

go back to my web, in my crib with Deb

hanging out for flies, then i wrap em' with my thighs

jump out from the tree with a weapon of surprise

Im busy like a badger, and badger till your dizzy

i ask so many questions that i'm leaving google dizzy

off the top of the dome, take a taste of my fizzy

it's easy, the politics is sleazy

artists like ice cream and galleries try to freeze me

a nice chord after G is C

me after the class with the spider in the glass

sitting in detention cuz' i let off all the gas

--Steve Fly

02/05/2017

The backdoor remains ajar, and the regulations deregulated.

The backdoor remains ajar, and the regulations deregulated.

By Steve Fly

'...regulate so that crops are under the control of the Dutch Food Safety Authority state'

"who regulates the regulators?"--Anonymous.

     The ongoing debate surrounding Dutch coffeeshops, as you might expect has ignited in 2017, an election year in Holland. This article attempts to summarise, and make sense of the different questions, and the various different answers proposed by politicians, regulators and coffeeshop owners, in unbiased and fair language. Cough cough.

There are a number of recurring themes and buzz words used in the debate, often stylized and sexed up by different reporters and various news outlets. These include, but are not limited to different degrees of regulation on both the cultivation of the cannabis sold in coffeeshops, and the so called 'back door' paradox, whereby it is technically illegal to bring cannabis into the coffeeshop. Technically. Technically?

Currently the Dutch authorities, in different municipalities exorcise various degrees of tolerance toward coffeeshops and the activities they engage in. This tolerance is difficult to describe, like Zen, or a meme, and to understand can be a real pain in the butt for those from other countries and cultures and, i think, makes up for a large part of the confusion often associated with coffeeshops and their legality. Add to this the coalition model that makes up the Dutch parliamentary system, and you can begin to see the complexity of the puzzle. M.C. Escher could see it, and share the vision.

The main points of debate, however, can be broken down into binary terms, i hesitate to say. For example. new laws to regulate cultivation, or for it to remain unregulated without laws? And new laws to regulate the 'backdoor supply chain', or, for it to remain an unregulated enigma? Another binary debate concerns the more general question of keeping coffeeshops open, or closing them all. And by extension to this question, should coffeeshops become private members clubs requiring a 'weed pass' or continue to be open to anybody with I.D proving they are over 18 years old, and, so long as long as the coffeeshops abide by the strict controls enforced on them by the authorities. Lots of questions.

The successful experiment with cannabis coffeeshops in Holland, successful based on a fall in 'hard drugs consumption' and 'drugs related crime' in Holland, leads by example in this debate. 'If it’s not broke why fix it' is a common argument here, based upon comparing statistics with surrounding countries, who still enforce the laws on scheduled substances that include cannabis, yet show higher rates of serious drug addiction and drug related crime.

There are those who wish to close all coffeeshops and those who wish to keep them open, and those who want to allow new coffeeshops to open. Those who wish to increase regulations but keep them open, and those who wish to impose regulations as a stepping stone to the closure of all of them. Those who want to legalize recreational use in separate municipalities, and those who wish to legalize country wise, and those who wish to re-criminalize, increase the punishments associated with cannabis. And each of the individuals putting forward these various positions has their own nuance and methods for strengthening their argument, and weakening that of their political opponents. This kind of dialectic has come to define political debate all over the place, and due to the coalition government in Holland the bong water can seem to be getting murkier and murkier. Free the weed!

I hope these quotes help shed some light. Forgive my opinionated introduction. I felt it best to write what i thought without much editing

--Steve Fly

14/03/2017
Amsterdam

D66:
'Vera Bergkamp sees the bill as a step toward legalization, she told Steven Kompier Cannabis News Network. Bergkamp: "We're going to get it right, with a baseline, see how that goes. And when we can show that it is better for public health, public order and security, then the step to possibly legalize, although that step right now is a very big one.'https://www.rollingstoned.nl/na-de-wietwet-wat-gebeurt-er-met-thuisteelt/


MAYOR ROLE:
The mayor will have an important role not only determines who is allowed to grow, but also what the maximum stock of a coffee shop and "may also designate one or more repositories for storing the stock market." The Minister of Justice decides whether formal or professional breeder tolerated and is not prosecuted as long as the criteria are met. The law will be evaluated after periods of three and five years. -- https://www.rollingstoned.nl/na-de-wietwet-wat-gebeurt-er-met-thuisteelt/

OPIUM ACT - TOLERANCE
'And no, he says, it is not just a semantic difference. Under regulation, the municipality would have to grant a license stating that the weed grower is relieved of the Opium Act, and is therefore not punishable. By tolerating, the producer remains punishable but, he avoids prosecution if he meets the conditions of the tolerance decision. "It's the same tolerance construction already applied to the front door, so parties can be hard against it. Unless they are also against tolerating coffee shops. "--https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2017/02/13/nederlandse-oplossing-voor-een-nederlands-probleem-6677476-a1545886


SMARTER REGULATION?
'There Bergkamp hopes on the support of the VVD, which already has shifted sharply in recent years, mainly driven by Southern VVD and youth organization JOVD.
There was nothing about adapting the policy on cannabis cultivation in the draft election program of the VVD. But a motion was adopted at the party congress in November to adjust the program. Now does it say that the VVD wants to put an end to the "strange situation" that the sale of cannabis is tolerated indeed, and not purchasing. That the VVD says, we have "smarter regulation".--https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2017/02/13/nederlandse-oplossing-voor-een-nederlands-probleem-6677476-a1545886


SELF DETERMINED
'Or as Hauptabteilung writes: "Departments themselves are free to decide whether they themselves also test products in the coffee shops." http://www.geenstijl.nl/mt/archieven/2017/01/democratisch_stoned_worden_van.html


AGAINST
'VVD, CDA, SGP, Christian Union and the PVV, which Wednesday stayed away from the debate, are against the toleration of cannabis cultivation.--http://www.rd.nl/vandaag/politiek/wietwet-nog-voor-verkiezingen-door-kamer-1.1372236


BACK DOOR
'patrons may soon only be able to buy weed in legitimate businesses that are allowed to grow. However, this provision is not immediately going to enter into the force of the Law. D66 wants to include a transition period in the law; while stocks of legally grown cannabis are grown, as of now, they can continue to buy from illegal growers. "The back door remains ajar," noted CU MP Segers "But for how long then?" http://www.rd.nl/vandaag/politiek/wietwet-nog-voor-verkiezingen-door-kamer-1.1372236


MEDICAL
'The big question now is: what will happen to the home cultivation ?!--https://www.rollingstoned.nl/na-de-wietwet-wat-gebeurt-er-met-thuisteelt/
In the explanation writes Van Tongeren: "The petitioner believes that certain patients should be allowed by law to cultivate your own medicinal cannabis under strict conditions. More and more countries (including Australia and Germany) and Dutch municipalities (including Tilburg and Vlissingen) allow this, but medical home cultivation of cannabis regularly leads to evictions by landlords. An explicit legal basis to prevent this type of misunderstanding and enshrine the right to access to cannabis products.

'A majority of MPs now seem likely to back draft legislation from the Liberal democratic party D66 which would regulate legalised marijuana cultivation under government control. The bill, drawn up by MP Vera Bergkamp, was backed by Labour, GroenLinks, the Socialist and pro-animal PvdD. But now two MPs who left the anti-Islam PVV to form a breakaway right-wing party have said they too will support the measure, the AD said on Friday. Bergkamp hopes that introducing licenced marijuana production will remove the grey area between illegal cultivation and licenced cannabis cafes or coffee shops, where small amounts of marijuana can be bought for personal use. -- The Netherlands comes a step closer to legalised marijuana cultivation - http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2016/09/the-netherlands-comes-a-step-closer-to-legalised-marijuana-cultivation/


'The municipality of Amsterdam took away on January 1st of eight coffee shops the grace statement because they sold within a radius of 250 meters from a high school - http://revu.nl/nieuws/reportage-amsterdam-vs-de-coffeeshops/

The most pronounced is the Pirate Party. The Pirates are not only for the regulation of the back door, but also carry home cultivation and industrial uses of hemp, a warm heart. They also believe that the government should no longer blinded by the THC percentage and more attention should have for the relationship between cannabinoids. It is clear that experts here have participated. - https://tk2017.piratenpartij.nl/2016/12/20/piratenpartij-denk-populair-cannabisliefhebber/

Digital Heroin, Electronic Cocaine and computer chocolates

How about
'Screen Smack'
Computer crack
Microsoft drugs
Silicone Sugar
Apple Crack
Mathamphetamine

McLuhan & P.K Dick got here to this question of drugs and computers way earlier. I wish more people would pay attention to 'Understanding Media' and seeing drugs as another type of media, especially in the age of VR, AR and MR (Mixed reality) a cocktail of neurological affects delivered down the mainstream digital vein: internet.

--Steve Fly

"We now know that those iPads, smartphones and Xboxes are a form of digital drug. Recent brain imaging research is showing that they affect the brain’s frontal cortex — which controls executive functioning, including impulse control — in exactly the same way that cocaine does. Technology is so hyper-arousing that it raises dopamine levels — the feel-good neurotransmitter most involved in the addiction dynamic — as much as sex.

This addictive effect is why Dr. Peter Whybrow, director of neuroscience at UCLA, calls screens “electronic cocaine” and Chinese researchers call them “digital heroin.” In fact, Dr. Andrew Doan, the head of addiction research for the Pentagon and the US Navy — who has been researching video game addiction — calls video games and screen technologies “digital pharmakeia” (Greek for drug).

http://nypost.com/2016/08/27/its-digital-heroin-how-screens-turn-kids-into-psychotic-junkies/

What LSD tells (some) of us about human nature

"What was most remarkable about the research is that the degree of ego dissolution reported by the participants correlated with a specific neural transformation. To get through the pragmatics of day-to-day life and the demands of survival, brain activity naturally differentiates itself into several distinct networks, each responsible for a particular cognitive function.

The three networks most closely examined by these scientists include a network for paying attention to what’s most salient, a network for problem-solving, and a network for reflecting on one’s own past and future. There is also a natural segregation between high-level (abstract) cognitive areas and low-level (concrete) perceptual areas, most notably the visual cortex. These distinctions are thought to be an essential design feature of a functional human brain.

The impact of LSD was to diminish connections within each of these networks, relaxing the bonds that kept them intact and distinct, while increasing the cross-talk among them. In other words, the normal etiquette of the brain requires segregation among networks that have different functions, and that etiquette was blown to bits.

Now most parts of the brain were communicating with most other parts of the brain. Concrete sensory experiences, like vision, intermingled with cognitive abstraction, and cognitive abstractions reshaped visual imagery. Perhaps that’s what explains the intricate fractal elaboration that people see in the branches of a bush while tripping on acid. The perception of salience and refinement of a sense of self are hashed together like potatoes and gravy. The brains and their owners no longer distinguish between what is most important, how to get stuff done, and who in fact is the arbiter of the importance of the stuff that needs to be done."--Guardian. 
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/15/lsd-research-brain-neuroscience-human-nature-psychedelic

The Future of AR is Already in Your Pocket - SXSW Convergence 2016

In the Great Reality Debate, battle is waged between headsets — Morpheus versus HoloLens, Vive versus Rift. Which device holds the key to our next "real" world? But what if the future of augmented and virtual reality does not rest on the success of a single piece of head-strapped hardware and instead is already in your pocket? John Hanke, founder of Niantic Labs, the innovative studio behind Ingress and pioneers of ”real world gaming,” will examine the future of augmented reality and its next big platform: the smartphone. John will examine AR rooted in enhancing mobile and location-based technology bridging the gap between the real and virtual worlds and how developers can harness it.
Subscribe: http://www.youtube.com/user/sxsw?sub_...
About SXSW:Started in 1987, South by Southwest (SXSW) is a set of film, interactive, and music festivals and conferences that take place early each year in mid-March in Austin, Texas. SXSW’s original goal was to create an event that would act as a tool for creative people and the companies they work with to develop their careers, to bring together people from a wide area to meet and share ideas. That continues to be the goal today whether it is music, film or interactive technologies.
Connect with SXSW Online:Visit the SXSW WEBSITE: http://www.sxsw.comLike SXSW on FACEBOOK: http://www.facebook.com/SXSWFestival Follow SXSW on TWITTER: http://www.twitter.com/SXSW 

Some evidence for Cannabis cures:

• 20 Medical Studies That Prove Cannabis Can Cure Cancer
• Teenage Girl Uses Cannabis To Treat Leukaemia & Great Results Were Seen
• Molecular Biologist Explains How THC Completely Kills Cancer
• Studies Show Cannabis Relieves Symptoms of Parkinson’s Disease
• Cannabis is Key to Good Health When We Eat it vs. Smoke it
• Oregon’s Youngest Medical Cannabis Patient is Curing Her Cancer – See How She’s Doing It

http://www.getholistichealth.com/42566/heres-the-homemade-cannabis-oil-recipe-that-people-are-using-as-a-chemo-alternative/

Stuxnet and Crack Cocaine - Intelligence Horror

Like the spread of Crack Cocaine across the world, and other drugs, and other terror, an all too familiar story. These spooks have a hell of a lot to answer for IMHO.

"It was that second, Israeli-modified version that escaped from containment, infected computer networks all over the world, and introduced all of us to the idea that cyber-warfare was more than a metaphor or a science-fiction plot device. That was the one that became known as Stuxnet, after an enterprising computer engineer in Ukraine identified it and technicians at Symantec spent months picking it apart. And as with nuclear weapons and chemical weapons and drones, once the genie was out of the bottle there was no way to put it back."

http://www.salon.com/2016/07/13/science_fiction_cyber_war_is_here_alex_gibney_on_zero_days_and_stuxnet_the_secret_weapon_that_got_away/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=socialflow
http://www.salon.com/2016/07/13/science_fiction_cyber_war_is_here_alex_gibney_on_zero_days_and_stuxnet_the_secret_weapon_that_got_away/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=socialflow

The Origins of Consciousness in the Technological Age

Published on Jan 20, 2014

Panelists:

Graham Hancock is the bestselling author of The Sign and the Seal, Fingerprints of the Gods, Keeper of Genesis, Heaven's Mirror and other investigations of historical mysteries. His books have been translated into twenty-seven languages and have sold over five million copies worldwide. His public lectures and broadcasts, including two major TV series, Quest for the Lost Civilisation, and Flooded Kingdoms of the Ice Age, have further established his reputation as an unconventional thinker who raises controversial questions about humanity's past. In 2005 Graham published Supernatural: Meetings with The Ancient Teachers of Mankind, an investigation of shamanism and the origins of religion. While researching Supernatural Hancock travelled to the Amazon to drink visionary brew Ayahuasca - the Vine of Souls - used by shamans for more than 4,000 years.

Dennis McKenna's professional and personal interests are focused on the interdisciplinary study of ethnopharmacology and plant hallucinogens. He received his doctorate in 1984 from the University of British Columbia, where his doctoral research focused on ethnopharmacological investigations of the botany, chemistry, and pharmacology of ayahuasca and oo-koo-he, two orally-active tryptamine-based hallucinogens used by indigenous peoples in the Northwest Amazon. Dr. McKenna received post-doctoral research fellowships in the Laboratory of Clinical Pharmacology, National Institute of Mental Health, and in the Department of Neurology, Stanford University School of Medicine. He is a founding board member of the Heffter Research Institute and serves on the advisory board of non-profit organizations in the fields of ethnobotany and botanical medicines. Dr. McKenna is well known as the brother of Terence McKenna, a cultural icon in the psychedelic community. Together they are co-authors of The Invisible Landscape: Mind, Hallucinogens, and the I Ching (1st Edition: HarperCollins 1993) and Psilocybin: Magic Mushroom Grower's Guide (under the pseudonyms O.N. Oeric & O.T. Oss) (And/Or Press, 1976; 2nd Edition, Lux Natura, 1986). He has recently completed a new memoir entitled: The Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss: My Life with Terence McKenna. http://brotherhoodofthescreamingabyss...

Mark Pesce - Inventor, Writer, Educator and Futurist - Known internationally as the man who fused virtual reality with the World Wide Web to invent VRML, Mark Pesce has been exploring the frontiers of media and technology for a quarter of a century. His work has kept him on the forefront of emerging developments in science, technology and media. With a unique ability to make abstract concepts clear for lay audiences and to further the knowledge of the technologically savvy, he is a highly sought after public speaker, lecturing throughout the world on a variety of topics -- from the latest trends on the Internet, to current developments in neuroeconomics, to the future of design in an energy-conscious world. Pesce is first and foremost a storyteller, taking everyday examples from the world around us, then using these to illuminate the finer features of world that seems to be changing more rapidly every day. The author of five books and numerous articles, Pesce is widely respected as a technologist, futurist, philosopher and communicator who can translate abstract concepts into concrete explanations. Mainstream publications such as Forbes ASAP, TIME Digital, WIRED and The New York Times have profiled him and his views on the interactive era. A well-respected journalist, Pesce has written for WIRED, Feed, Salon, PC Magazine, and The Age. For the last three seasons, Pesce has been a panelist on the hit ABC show THE NEW INVENTORS. From 2003 to 2006, Pesce chaired the Emerging Media and Interactive Design Program at the world-renowned Australian Film Television and Radio School. His mandate - to bring cinema and broadcast television into the interactive era - led him to create a program that encouraged creative vision and is now producing a generation of award-winning entertainment professionals who are shaping the media of the 21st century.

Mitch Schultz began his life journey in Memphis, Tennessee and has since called Texas, Minnesota, Colorado, New York, Europe and Peru home. Guided by his lifelong love of storytelling, Mitch has cultivated a multi-disciplinary expertise in transmedia and culture hacking through writing, directing, and producing. He earned his Bachelor of Science from the University of Texas at Austin, primarily focused on media production, communication theory, and information mapping. Soon after, Mitch completed his Masters of Fine Arts at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. Following Schultz's 2011 award winning documentary, DMT: The Spirit Molecule, he launched the DMTRMX project, a multi-platform experience that serves as the model for the four-part MNTTKA Manifesto.

Celebrating 100 Blog Posts: The state of the union - VR and other electronic drugs.

The state of the union: VR and other electronic drugs.

“The young today cannot follow narrative but they are alert to drama. They cannot bear description but they love landscape and action.—Marshal McLuhan, Letter to Harold Adam Innis, March 14 1951. From Essential McLuhan.

  Studies indicate that the new VR experience, can result in a deeper appreciation for the content, and message, purely due to the immersive nature of VR environments. We are dealing with complex alterations in the ratio among our senses.

One thought i wanted to express here concerns the similarities between the VR experience, and the psychedelic experience. In doing so i especially want to draw attention to what Dr Timothy Leary described with the words 'set and setting'. 

If you are under the influence of VR, your body brain system, may indeed be more open and receptive to new imprints than without being under the influence. Thankfully there are thousands of experimental designs for creative tools that hold the promise of delivering the user into a learning space, not just another world of crime, destruction and hollywood drama, a creative studio.

The same has been said about every new advance in technology, use it for the betterment of humanity, teach practical skills using television etc. And almost every time the new technology is degraded by mass consumption. And a return to revenge themes, violence and the predictable. The equivalent of alcohol, when compared with the psychedelic VR high, or heightened sensory awareness.

There will be therapy, new fields of virtual psychoanalysis, interactive explorations of the unconscious, with the goal of discovering more about oneself and the greater Universe. There will be crime scene investigation applications, law enforcement and new kinds of artist reconstructions. There will be sculpting, architectural modelling, visual geometric chemistry, physics, painting. I wonder, will there be much writing you think?

There will be torture, on many levels. Both high grade, full on US military, strapped to a chair with electrodes wired to your knackers, torture. Watch the movie Brainstorm again, and please heed the warning. VR is obviously a powerful tool to expand the goals of cruel psychological warfare operations, and usually when you follow the money trail for any hi-tech clobber, like the new VR technology, there is a somebody in the military sniffing around, looking for ways to weaponize the new breakthrough. Like the difference between the MK Ultra experiments with L.S.D vs. what the Merry Pranksters did with it. You dig?

”When technology extends one of our senses, a new translation of culture occurs as swiftly as the new technology is interiorized—Marshal McLuhan, The Gutenburg Galaxy.

  On the one hand, i hope that each individual gets as much enjoyment as he or she can get from VR worlds, however enjoyment is quantified? some people like to be scared half to death, other erotically aroused. If it makes you high in any sense, and brings wonder and a deeper connection with whatever you wish to connect with, then i say that both VR and psychedelic drugs, are useful tools in exploring unreality together. Each dissolve boundaries. And let's not forget that one of these tools is deemed illegal around the world under the United Nations psychotropic substance act. Boooo.

On the other hand, we are fools to ignore the warning label, a word to the wise that it ain't going to be pretty. Immersive news reports, celebrity updates and shoddy adverts will certainly dominate the medium of VR once it gets a foothold. But, we do not have to worry about the squares, let's get a move on, develop shared tools that enable individual expression, shared communication for all, and a message to care for the precious real-world-reality of our global ecosystem. Charitable causes. Bloom not doom. A funny love trip, not a violent horror, or better yet, a fair and balanced blend of tragedy and comedy? Art and truth are funny things these days.

And when using the two together, both VR and psychedelic agents, be careful, or extra careful, mind your heads and have a fun trip. Never force anybody else to do what you might choose to do with your VR stash, and, do not allow yourself to be bullied into any chemical experiment or VR environment against your will.

As a closing statement i would add that perhaps those with experience navigating the inner spaces of psychedelia, would stand less chance of being hoodwinked by a truck load VR sweeties, due to a built up tolerance of the weird and strange new dimensions encountered while tripping. There is a strong connection between media technology and how the human brain-body system works. And we are in uncharted territory with the latest 360 VR gear.

McLuhan, Leary, Robert Anton Wilson and other media theorists and futurists, Philip K. Dick...have already laid out a solid foundation for better understanding both reality and unreality, yes i wrote 'unreality', to mean the staggering phenomenological realms of the unchained imagine-nation, emerging in 2016 through a range of new VR experiences.

“The inner trip is not the sole prerogative of the LSD traveler; it’s the universal experience of TV watchers.—Marshal McLuhan, Playboy Interview.

--Steve Fly

Three unwise men: The War on Drugs and Terror and Culture

"The report, 'Afghanistan Opium

Survey 2015', by Afghanistan Ministry of

CounterNarcotics and

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)

put opium production

in 2015 at

3,300 tons,

a drop of 48% from

the 2014 level of

6,400 tons.

But 3,300 tons is still enough

to feed a substantial

number of opiate addicts

across the globe.

The report estimates that about

180 tons of export quality heroin

was potentially sent out

of Afghanistan

in 2015."

Read more at:
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/50611645.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

Decline of Amsterdam Coffeeshop culture.

One of Amsterdam’s most popular coffeeshops ceased trading yesterday, as the crackdown on the red-light district continues. Gavin Haines reports.

As well as a thick cloud of smoke, there’s a sense of foreboding hanging in the air in Baba today. One of the city’s most popular coffeeshops, this institution will close its doors for the final time tonight: its misty history snuffed out like a spliff in the night.
Most punters have no idea they are smoking in a coffeeshop that has hours to live. The group of Scottish lads sucking a bong are blissfully unaware that they’re part of Baba’s final act; the awkward young couple standing at the timeworn wooden counter are equally oblivious as they question the difference between Amnesia and Silver Haze.
There are no posters announcing Baba’s closure, no banners pleading for it to be spared; just a short, digital message rolling across the bottom of a television screen like breaking news.
Unlike British pubs, which are closing as they struggle to draw in punters, Amsterdam’s coffeeshops, particularly this one, seem to be doing a roaring trade. So what gives?
“They want to turn this street into a fancy street,” explains a female employee at Baba, who asks to remain anonymous. “And we’re not fancy enough for them.”
She’s talking about Warmoesstraat, one of the oldest streets in Amsterdam, which wends its way through the city’s notorious red-light district. Lined with sex shops, raucous bars and coffeeshops, it’s a place where you can legally indulge in psychedelics or check out the latest line in pneumatic dildos. Hookers of various shapes and sizes ply their trade just around the corner.
But for how much longer? Amsterdam is renowned for its liberal values and vice, but authorities in the city are continuing their quest to “clean up” the red-light district as part of a 10-year plan called Project 1012. The initiative began in 2007 and it aims to close 200 of the district’s 480 window brothels and 26 of its 76 coffeeshops by 2017.
“A lot of the coffeeshops along this street have closed,” explains the anonymous Baba employee, her eyes heavy with weed. “Stones, which is opposite, is also closing soon, which means there will be no coffeeshops on this street anymore.”
New businesses are ready to jump into these old premises. Florists, delis and homeware shops have all opened in the neighbourhood recently, so it’s out with the dildos and in with the dishcloths.
Baba plans to open in a new location, but its association with Warmoesstraat has almost certainly come to an end. Perhaps the building will become a restaurant or a wine bar: something to attract a “better class” of tourist.
“It’s sad,” says the girl in Baba, hopelessly. “It’s a shame for the people, it’s a shame for the tourists and it’s a shame for us because now we have no job.”

http://www.worldtravelguide.net/holidays/editorial-feature/feature/smoke-postcard-amsterdam

Amsterdam Panorama

Oude Leliestraat by night.

Doug Stanhope: Acid Bootleg

A genius and brave word beater. x fly

Homegrown Fantasy Coffeeshop Closure Ceremony

John Sinclair: The Mohawk Interview

John Sinclair & Steve Fly: Mohawk:

Enjoy it. x steve fly