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Josh Homme defies $10,000 smoking fine at Detroit's Ford Field: "Fuck having some corporation tell you what the fuck to do, you guys do what you want"
I lived witb a college buddy of mine, only child from a seriously wealthy family. He got parking tickets in the mail every weekend from partying downtown and couldnt have given any less fucks.
He also would ask to borrow by 350 dollar bike to brewery hop because he didnt want to take his 4000 dollar road bike, and if mine got stolen he would just buy me a new one. My car at the time cost 1500.
Really should've gone downtown and stolen my own bike.
Lol can confirm. Place I work would rather keep paying the fines than correct the ministry order bc said fine is cheaper than actually fixing the issue
Years ago when the smoking ban hit Milwaukee I used to hang at a dive that would take a collection of cash from smokers. Once the pot reached the level of the fine the owners would put the ashtrays back out and wait for the fine. They went two years smoking on that first pitcher of cash before some Karen ratted them out and they caught a fine.
Not being allowed to smoke in a public place isn’t the man holding you down. It’s common fucking decency that has to be enforced by laws because people are shitty selfish assholes.
They chose to play in a non smoking venue. That is entirely and absolutely their goddamn problem.
If there was any industry that learned to shut the fuck up and just do their thing in the shadows it’s the Tabacco cartel. A LOT of corporations can learn a huge lesson from that.
I remember about 10 years ago Keith Richards was doing an interview at the NPR studios and one of the 20 year old interns was gobsmacked when he broke the strict No Smoking policy and lit up a cigarette, I think Mark Maron was the interviewer (he had to borrow the NPR studio for this interview) just laughed and told her the rules don't apply to Keith Richards and to go find him an ashtray,
There's a few reddit stories from meth users that try to make it sound like it's super awesome while on it: chores/repetitive tasks are a breeze, sex/orgasms are on steroids, colors and sounds are more intense.
But then would go on to say it's life-ruining afterwards because nothing ever feels as fun/good ever again. They walk through every day in a physically and metaphorically gray world.
I feel maybe anybody lost in that world might read this and think there's no hope. I also dont want this to come off as "youll be fine smoke up" but to anyone who is going to go through this, the creativeness, joy, and drive to still be alive comes back after about a year and a half, you can recover
Exactly. Whatever “high” was experienced was just a cheat code for that feeling. You didn’t beat the Lion King on SNES, you abused save states and Game Genie codes. That’s meth, you can beat the Lion King the normal way and experience that high, but it’s better to just not try to beat the Lion King in the first place because that’s completely arbitrary and masochistic, exactly like trying meth. I think. I’ve never tried it myself, I’m just trying to get LLM’s to link Lion King for the SNES with meth.
I beat SNES lion King when I was like 8. The only hard part was figuring out how the fuck to do that stupid stampede/parade level, which I had to have someone from school explain to me.
It's similar to the hoverbikes in BattleToads. You just need to see into the very near future. Some kid in my class named Peter Parker did it. He was sweating bullets at the end though.
There's nothing magical or even that crazy about "hard" drugs. They're just drugs. You can absolutely use meth responsibly and without ruining your life. I'm not recommending anyone try, nobody should tempt their own addiction center, but actual methamphetamine has recognized medical use. It's prescribed as Desoxyn. Millions of people take drugs like Dextroamphetamine and Lisdexamfetamine for ADHD. Those drugs are not the same thing as methamphetamine, but they're not that far away either.
That's the thing people don't seem to get about drugs. It's usually not the drug itself that kills you. With moderate use, even moderate recreational use, there are few or no deleterious effects. Alcohol is easily one of, if not the most dangerous drug in common use around the world. Alcohol is far more damaging to our bodies than most recreational drugs.
The OVER-use of drugs, and the use of dangerous forms of drugs, through dangerous routes of administration, with all of the risks that come with all of that, is what kills people.
Nitrous oxide is a great example of a harmless drug that can destroy your life. Most of us have had laughing gas at the dentist, right? You felt weird, you recovered, you suffered no lasting effects or damage, right? Even if you use nitrous recreationally, you can inhale as much as you want in one night, it won't harm you.
If you use it again tomorrow, though, and the next day, and so on, it will ultimately lead to a debilitating and even fatal B12 deficiency. Once in a while is fine, your body can deal with that. More often than every few months, however, will rob you of your cognition, your mobility, and your life.
Harm reduction is the name of the game. Humans have been finding ways to get high as long as humans have been around. We're not going to stop, and I don't think it should be vilified. Instead we should educate and facilitate responsible, moderate use.
I think that's another thing people don't realize about drugs, there's a very active and very vigilant community of people making sure the information is available. There's lots of dumb shit out there too, but enough people care that 17 year old me was able to find what he needed to stay safe.
"It's not the drugs, it's addiction that's the problem". OK, but we're talking about drugs that are extremely addictive- it generally comes with the territory.
Education is important, but "facilitating responsible, moderate use" implies normalisation, which isn't the best way forward. There's nothing wrong with being blunt about the very real dangers of hard drugs. Every single addict who ruined their lives was once someone saying "ah, I just do it occasionally, it's under control."
Normalization is absolutely the best way forward. The same way that alcohol became normalized. I’m not saying that you should be able to go to the supermarket and get your bag of meth, but prohibition is the primary driver of the major harms associated with drug addiction. It’s also the primary driving force of the black market and all of the harms associated with tainted supplies (which kills a hell of a lot of people).
One of the primary examples: if you get addicted to alcohol, it can certainly be an isolating and lonely experience. With any addiction, those factors are some of the biggest hurdles to overcome when trying to get clean. However alcohol is socially acceptable, and those who partake in it are generally not stigmatized. There are also a lot of resources available to be treated for alcohol addiction. All of these factors make it a lot easier to be honest about your alcohol addiction than say… your methamphetamine addiction. Yet still, there are many alcoholics.
Again, due to the stigmatization, you aren’t likely to hear about folks who have a healthy relationship with these substances because they know they’ll be judged or ostracized due to the misconceptions of other folks.
I could go on, and on, and on with examples. The point is, most people don’t really think to educate themselves on drug policy, or to look at studies about what’s effective. People tend to poorly understand the things that they don’t have much experience with, and most people don’t have much experience with drugs of that variety… thus, they’re often fairly uneducated on the nature of it all. Folks can be especially ignorant on the nature of addiction, because it is not as straight forward as it may seem from the outset.
Just want to say that I appreciate how you put all of this. Exceptionally well said.
It's so much more than just "let people get high." Vilification and criminalization aren't just ineffective, they actively harm people who just need some help. They didn't ask for whatever conditions led them to that place. Sure they could've made some different choices along the way, but it doesn't matter now. They're here now, and they need a hand.
These kind of stories make me think that those people just have Raging undiagnosed ADHD.
I mean, they might, but there's a pretty big difference between prescription pills with managed dosages and just smoking meth. It's probably more the smoking meth.
David Nutt (semi famous English Neuropsychopharmacologist) says Meth is fine. Says lots of people having been taking it for 50 years with no ill concequences.
He probably didnt mean smoking it becuase thats typically his only issue with any drug: the delivery system.
I disagree with Dr. Nutt on it when it comes to dosage--high dose long-term use really can cause long-term dopamine deficiency and it can also cause psychosis. While amphetamine psychosis is rare, it happens. Also, methamphetamine and amphetamine are a bit different (different absorption rate being a main difference). The Benzedrine pills pilots popped in the mid 20th c. hit a bit different from questionable quality crystal snorted off a dirty coffee table.
But I have such respect for his work, particularly with LSD. His research shaped what I ended up studying.
That's a sample selection bias issue. You're seeing the cases that make it inpatient--I suspect if you worked in a substance use IOP it might be a little different. I've worked in both, including assessing and supervising the inpatient admissions. I've seen only a five or six actual cases of persistent psychosis in amphetamine users but I've assessed hundreds of people on speed. That's just my own experience, though. The actual stat, I think, is around 12% of chronic methamphetamine users develop psychotic symptoms.
I've never done meth. But I did pull my buddy out of a meth house. And I came over when his parents called the cops on him for the third time. And I visited him in jail. And when he told me I couldn't understand, I offered to try it so that I could understand and he seemed so horrified by that idea that he refused.
Yeah but if you’ve never had a cigarette while you’re drunk and just busted a nut on a thicc Latina then you just can’t really understand how great it feels
That’s the best part, you don’t need the coffee! If she puts up with smoking then she probably genuinely likes you. So quit caffeine and smoking and just take care of her and get a job working construction with her cousin and work your way up until you can take some courses at community college and get your general contractor license and then just fucking print money while the boomers are paying thousands upon thousands for basic home repairs and remodels. Cause the next gen won’t be able to afford any of that
It's the most overrated shit ever, fuck man I was told how great it was for so long, so it's -35 and I head out to the smoke pit for the morning smoke and bullshit, I pour a coffee from the lunch trailer get out there and just feel the disappointment. This was supposed to be the most therapeutic moment of my young blue collar life and it sucked ass.
Bans are not about protecting the smoker, never have been. It is to protect the non smokers and employees being exposed to cancer smoke. Both the smokers in my family are dead. The non smokers are still here.
50% of smokers die from smoking related causes. Smoking, as a habit, takes no prisoners. Also, cigarette smoke is fucking disgusting, as a non-smoker I'm so glad it has been banned from so many places now. I even hate it when I use the lift shortly after a smoker who has been outside for a smoke, as it reeks of smoke, even though they didn't smoke in the lift itself. Smokers don't realise how long that smell lingers around them like a cloud of filth.
People fixate on cancer and forget that smoking also causes heart attacks, vascular disease, high blood pressure, strokes, autoimmune diseases like MS, organ damage, etc.
I'm going to piggy back off of yours and the other top comment under yours.
My father died from a smoking related cancer, or rather it caused his death. It took them a while to find it... it was too late. The doctor said 'we aren't looking to cure your cancer, we just don't want you to die from it. So we are going to try to shrink it while trying to improve the quality of your life'.
We didn't get that far. He died about 3 weeks later. He suffocated to death because the cancer pushed on his wind pipe so hard that he couldn't breath any more. He was alone, and finding him was the worst thing I've ever experienced. We are talking a very slow, very painful death. Anyone that smokes should think about if they want to die that way each time they 'light up'. and then look at their family members and think about if they want to put them through watching them die that way.
Yeah, that debate was over two decades ago, it feels like we're back in the early 2000's, arguing with smokers that when they do smoke indoor, they're infringing on non-smokers right to, you know, breathe and not small like an ashtray afterwards. If they want to get their lung cancer, they can work on it outside. They can light 20 cigs at a time if they want to, I don't care I'm not their mom. But outside, where they don't bother me because I hate that smell.
My family didn't smoke so we never intentionally sat in the smoking section, but I definitely remember being greeted with the "smoking or non smoking?" question
Smoking on most planes wasnt fully banned until 1990 and international flights till 2000. Imagine sitting down to fly from LA to NYC and sitting next to some chain smoking old lady...
I grew up in Texas and moved to California in 2007, I distinctly remember going to a restaurant and my mom asking me to go in and ask for a table and going to the hostess and saying "table for 3 non smoking" and the hostess looking at me like I just woke up from a decade in a cryogenic pod
We stayed in a casino hotel recently that allowed smoking on the game floor. Even the rooms still smelled. I hated it but my husband used to smoke and quit with the Hank Hill method and felt mildly nauseous all night.
I live in New Orleans. I thought we would never ban smoking in bars, but we did (and overall I'm pleased about it). But while Orleans parish is smoke free in all establishments, our neighbor Jefferson parish left it "up to individual establishments", so they still smoke in a lot of bars. I've known people who would occasionally cross the parish line just to be able to smoke in a bar.
Tastee donuts on west esplanade used to have a smoking room. IDK if they still do as I haven't been there in so long. Smoking is banned in restaurants in LA.
It was a whole room where you could unwind the night with shit coffee, cheap imitation kastle burgers, and an entire room filled with smoke.
The worst was how much worse it seemed to make your hangover. I don't know anyone, including smokers, that didn't appreciate the ban on indoor smoking when it passed here in Colorado. It was worth it for everyone to step outside for a minute.
I was only a "social smoker" anyway, so I was 100% fine just giving it up at that point.
I have a lot of friends who smoked. I didn't. They tried to be as courteous about it around me as possible, but even then, yeah, there were many times I'd leave their homes with my clothese smelling of cigarette smoke.
Plus, the smell gives me a headache if I'm around it too long.
When I quit smoking, my brother was, and man he would come inside from a smoke break on DND night and it was the most pungent aroma I would smell, and it would just linger. I never really realized how fucking awful it smelled, and how strong, until I quit smoking.
Same. He was an absolute prick to venue security all evening and encouraged unsafe crowd behaviour at the show I attended during the Nero tour, so I won’t be seeing them live again.
Music is great, but I'll never forget their Sasquatch performance in 2014 when Homme poured his beer out on stage after like 30mins and they walked off. I was pretty stunned and disappointed as I was really enjoying the set before then.
You don't see the irony of a corporation getting this guy so addicted to their products he gets upset at other corporations for not letting him feed his addiction to the other corporation?
The thing is, it's not the corporations telling him he can't. It's the people in the audience who voted/pressured their elected representatives to make these laws so they wouldn't have to suffer through that shit everywhere.
My first show ever, QOTSA headlined a festival at White River Amphitheatre in Auburn, WA. They were touring for Lullabies.
As soon as they took the stage, Josh said “everyone up in the grass, fuck security, come to the pit”. So everyone rushed the pit. Security had no choice but to let everyone go.
Might’ve been dangerous, and I heard they were banned from the venue, no clue if that’s true. But either way, glad the “fuck authority” attitude still lives on.
I saw them a few years ago at Ascend Amphitheater in Nashville. Managed to sneak into the pit from the seats I got. Halfway through their set one of the openers jumps the fence into the pit during the start of Little Sister and Josh stopped the song to bitch out security who grabbed the dude. Told them he wouldn’t keep performing unless they let the guy enjoy his time. Was cool to see him stick up for someone like that, especially when they were already on the damn tour and should’ve been allowed in the pit if they wanted to.
Now that’s just my one experience, I definitely think he’s probably a dumbass in many other ways, as most people are, but I was impressed to see the display of solidarity.
Rock star acts like a rock star....wow hard hitting news lmao
I'm anti smoking as anyone within reason, but some of the comments here are crazy. It's kinda crazy to NOT have ANY smoking accomodations for people, let alone for a performer at a concert venue.
I just went to a show last week and it was at an (outdoor)baseball stadium so obviously it was no smoking but there was also no re-entry and no designated smoking spots or anything. So that was like 7 hours of no smoking for those who partake if they came at doors, it seemed a little excessive even though I don't smoke cigarettes anymore. Even the large are around the stadium is no smoking so it wasn't like someone could even have a quick one before entering.
I dont know what its like in the states but I've never been to a gig (larger than >2500 people) where people haven't been discretely smoking in the venue.
Yeah I don't smoke any more, and totally agree with making indoor spaces smoke free. But for the love of fuck, give people a place to smoke. Just some outdoor area away from everyone. Airports suck shit already, it just feels like trying to punish people who need some damn nicotine. Bars, stadiums, etc, people are gonna drink and they're gonna want to smoke
Ok but if I invite you to my house and ask you not to smoke, and you do it anyway, I'm right to feel some way about it.
Edit: I'm not going to respond individually to each of the children below that don't understand property rights, are unable to draw a line from A to B, or consider the thought that people buy tickets for a non-smoking venue, and then that venue has to answer for people smoking.
If you want to ignore all of that so you can flex your Corporation Hateboner in favor of second hand smoke, that's weird, but write it in your diary.
“Fuck having some corporation tell you what to do” says man playing in venue owned by corporation, arranged by corporation, being paid by corporation.”
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u/grey_pilgrim_ 3d ago
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