Hallucinatory Drugs - MDMA

What is 'MDMA' or 'Ecstasy'?

MDMA is a chemical Methylenedioxyme thylamphetamine. It's a methamphetamine based chemical. But it's got a ring substitution on it that makes a little bit more like a hallucinogen. So it's somewhere between a hallucinogen and a stimulant. And, this is a chemical that was patented back in 1912, 1914. So it's not available to be a prescription medicine today, but it turns out that it can be useful in the context of psycho therapy. Where a psychiatrist can administer it to there patient, and have the psycho therapy go deeper and faster and be more efficient.

What was the original purpose for Ecstasy?

The mythology is that it was patented as an appetite suppressant back in 1912 or 1914. That is absolutely not correct. There was no need for an appetite suppressant back then and that wasn't at all what happened. The German pharmaceutical giant Merck patented a process for making a medicine called Hydrosteinen. Hydrosteinen is something that stops bleeding, what's called a styptic medicine. MDMA was a by-product in the synthesis of Hydrosteinen. It was basically a link in the chain. And Merck patented every single link in the chain, which included MDMA. So, because it was involved in the process for making hydrostinen, it was patented. The patent was applied for in 1912 and it was received in 1914. Because it's been patented you can not patent it again but there was no use patented, there was no use ever mentioned for MDMA and back in 1912, 1914 no one knew about MDMA or what it was useful for.

How did Ecstasy become famous?

Well I first heard about Ecstasy in, I think, 1985 when I really think it was, initially--all through the 70's therapists were giving it to their patients. It was very underground. Nobody really knew very much about it, but eventually it did sort of leak out to the club scene. I think what really broke the story was when Ecstasy was being sold in Texas, over the counter at the bars in Texas. And then, it started showing up in magazine articles. The magazine articles were primarily about this big rave, well, club scene in Texas -- but also about how it was being used therapeutically. So that's really how it became famous, was when it turned from MDA into Ecstasy, which is really what happened about '83, '84', '85, was when Texas was getting going.