It's a popular myth that LSD usage creates insanity. All empirical evidence is to the false and is a myth. (Never used the stuff)
When Did This Myth Start?
Based on feedback from people who were teens in the 1970s, it seems this myth has its roots somewhere between 1967 and 1975. Rick Doblin of MAPS reports that he remembers hearing a variant of this myth around 1970.6
LSD causing insanity became a prominent component of its public image in the late 1960s. In Storming Heaven, Jay Stevens writes, "It is difficult to pinpoint the precise moment when the LSD psychotic first entered the public consciousness, but a good starting point would be April 1966, when the FDA invited reporters in to examine its LSD dossier."7
Although we believe that there are earlier mentions, the fi rst documentation we have found for this myth is a series of Usenet posts from 1990 in which one author claims to have heard the myth as early as 1974.8 Usenet posts discussing this myth have appeared every year since 1990.
How Did the Myth Start?
As LSD use spread in the 1960s, the public meme-space was ripe for LSD myths relating to insanity.
- Widely publicized research in the 1950s classified LSD as a "psychotomimetic" creating "model psychoses" in those who took it.
- A couple of rumored and reported suicides in the 1950s associated with LSD primed negative expectations.9
- The "Reefer Madness" anti-cannabis campaign provided a backdrop for the concept of LSD-induced insanity. In early anti-LSD campaigns, cannabis was described as a "hallucinogen", often in the same sentence with LSD.10
Senate Subcommittee Hearings
In early 1966, several senate subcommittees convened hearings on "the LSD problem". Testimony by concerned psychiatrist William Frosch about the prevalence of LSD-related admissions to psychiatric wards was dramatically exaggerated in the committee's findings. He reported that a small percentage of LSD users had abreactions and that, of those, a common problem was mild to severe psychosis. The reported version, however, missed the context and simply reported that "One of the most common recurrent reactions to LSD is a psychotic breakdown of an extended but unknown duration."7
Media Hype
Of course, the real carrier of the meme was the national media. Lurid, sensational, and exaggerated stories about LSD causing insanity exploded into the national psyche in 1966. A few of the highlights are: a Time magazine article in March of 1966 which declared that psychosis resulting from LSD use was "everywhere",11 a March 25, 1966 Life magazine issue with a cover story about LSD titled "The exploding threat of the mind drug that got out of control: LSD",12 and an August 1967 Saturday Evening Post cover story titled "The newly discovered dangers of LSD".13 These were accompanied by a large number of television and newspaper stories covering the "growing epidemic".14
Erowid LSD Vault : Myth - Take LSD 7 Times and You're Legally Insane?
I can't wait to see the 2103 edition of The Game!@
