May 29, 2012

With "bath salts" — "the new LSD" — there have been 3 or 4 cases in Miami like the naked cannibal.

According to Armando Aguilar, head of the Miami Fraternal Order of Police:
[H]e said the people have all taken their clothing off, been extremely violent with what seemed to be super-human strength, even using their jaws as weapons....

In many of the cases, [emergency room Dr. Paul] Adams said the person’s temperature has risen to an extremely high level, they’ve become very aggressive, with logic and the ability to feel pain lost in their reactions. Some have used their jaws as a weapon during attacks.

Dr. Adams said the patients were in a state of delirium.

“Extremely strong, I took care of a 150 pound individual who you would have thought he was 250 pounds,” Dr. Adams said. “It took six security officers to restrain the individual.”

99 comments:

Ron said...

uh oh....let folks know to stop mainlining potpourri before even worse things happen....

Sue D'Nhym said...

I have a sneaking suspicion that those claiming these are like LSD have never taken LSD.

TWM said...

I don't want to alarm anyone but I can name a half dozen good zombie books that begin with exactly this kind of thing happening. Just sayin'.

KCFleming said...

Shit. The zombie apocalypse.

chickelit said...

One report names mephedrone and methylone as the causative agents. Like many small molecule pharma compounds, these things are cooked up as salts for easier handling.

It's wrong to tar things like Epsom salts in this case.

John Adams said...

Well what will those crazy kids think of next??? We have trayvon drinking some sort of hallucinatory drink made with Robitussin and now this...weee.

edutcher said...

Back to the days of meth monsters.

Methadras said...

Great. Now I'm going to become scandalized.

Revenant said...

Reason Magazine's blog has done quite a few posts debunking the whole "bath salts" scare.

Seven Machos said...

What Sue said. It's probably "the new LSD" in that it makes you hallucinate. Which is like saying that the Segway is the new automobile because it gets from one place to another.

Titus said...

Sounds like fun.

Take a drug and feel like you are on fire and then eat someone.

Lovely.

chickelit said...

Revenant said...
Reason Magazine's blog has done quite a few posts debunking the whole "bath salts" scare.

Well there's a dead cannibal and probably nobody stopping a full blown tox screen on him so time will tell.

Mary Beth said...

There were scare stories about marijuana and LSD too. "Bath salts" have been around for a while and we are just hearing about how they turn people into crazed zombies...it couldn't have anything to do with Senator Schumer's bill banning the drugs, could it?

Revenant said...

so time will tell

But it is so much more FUN to publish empty speculation that the attack was caused by the latest super-scary not-illegal-yet alternative drug!

Waiting to actually find out what (if any) drugs the guy was on, or even if he had a history of violence and/or psychotic episodes apart from drug use -- that's boring, and doesn't sell ad space.

KCFleming said...

Maybe he was just sucking face and got carried away.

NTTAWWT.

Seven Machos said...

I have to say that I think that any drug that raises your body temperature perilously and makes you crazy and super strong should probably be illegal.

I know. I'm the bad guy.

NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...

Zombies! They're finally here!

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

Its a good thing Obama's evolution was so timely.

Darrell said...

But still no coverage of the guy who cut his abdomen to throw his intestines at the police! Why the blackout? Hmmm?

We are waiting to use all our "It takes guts to do that!" jokes and such...

Revenant said...

any drug that raises your body temperature perilously and makes you crazy and super strong should probably be illegal.

Perhaps so. Maybe this will be the first time in history when the "ZOMG, the drug makes you super-strong and crazy" claim actually holds water, even though it didn't for alcohol, pot, LSD, cocaine, ecstasy, PCP, or meth.

Or maybe scary stories sell papers, get police extra funding, and help congresscritters pass laws.

Paul said...

Never fear! I have my 'zombie' gun for my CHL carry gun!

For such insane people I suggest a CNS shot.

Dante said...

This is simply darwanism at work. I wouldn't read anything more into it than that. Intellectually, perhaps, the guy could have been contained by the horrified cop, watching a person eat, among other things, another man's eye, but the physics of the situation probably overcame some internal intellectual argument about what possibilities were available.

The simple answer, don't consume bath salts.

Seven Machos said...

Rev -- I don't think we need a federal law.

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

I've seen signs at fast food restaurant about not serving people w/o a shirt.

At a Causeway?

They are not messing around.

KCFleming said...

When I take a bath, I usually get a craving for ice cream, not homeless faces.

Wally Kalbacken said...

Wow. On one end of the spectrum you've got people insisting on perfectly organic vegetables. At the other, these fools who take adulterated cleaning products and industrial chemicals to get high. Sheesh!

chickelit said...

So beyond enhanced exfoliation, what is the upside to taking "bath salts"?

Anybody?

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

Maybe he wanted a sad meal.

Cedarford said...

I start with skepticism that there is a new super-evil drug that makes people eat other people, according to a Law Enforcement Person of Authority dressed in a splendid uniform .....who tells us we need more laws and more Heroes of Law Enforcement to save us all.

Meanwhile, Al Sharpton ponders....it WAS another unarmed black man that was shot in Florida. Was he shot by a "white hispanic" cop? Were there civil rights related to the black cannibal that were violated? Is there money to be made jetting down and appearing with the bereaved cannibal's mother and family spokesman/NAACP member/minister?

MadisonMan said...

I am suspicious that this story is not all it seems.

Palladian said...

Phenethylamines I Have Known and Loved.

bagoh20 said...

I do believe that set of tags constitutes a full house of mayhem.

Florida is a special place.

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

I am suspicious that this story is not all it seems.

You mean this story is not all it's cracked up to be?

bagoh20 said...

There is a photo of the victim online now. I made the mistake of viewing it. The man has no face whatsoever. Probably the most devastating injury I have ever seen with a living person. I don't see how he can recover.

Chip Ahoy said...

Turns out it was suicide by bath salts zombie. When asked, the dying man's last words were to explain himself, he lifted his own head up and spitting through his torn apart mouth and bleeding tongue, and with great difficulty managing his esses he said, " the cocaine psychosis cannibal wanted an arm and a leg," and then he dropped dead.

Guildofcannonballs said...

The only logical answer is to ban both baths and salts, the whole lot of them.

Unless, you evil bastard, hating children and wishing them harm is just what you do.

Drug pusher.

Either way, unless you are soft on crime and criminals, because you are one one supposes with, in many cases, some cause, we must decide the Buckley question after all:

Kill the drug users or allow a level of drug use which is then monitored or controlled to some extent -- which is always of course going to be lacking in many areas but which has proven better than many alternatives?


Or something like that.

Hell, you go to https://cumulus.hillsdale.edu/Buckley/ and start trying to paraphrase the man. Even done poorly it's harder than one imagines in many cases as the substantive points built flawlessly abound to the point of overwhelmtion

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

Has anybody seen the Naked Cowboy lately?

MadisonMan said...

One of the major problems with synthetic drugs like bath salts is that they do not show up on blood tests.

How convenient. We'll just take you at your word, then, and let you pass a bunch of laws to protect us. I certainly don't want my face chewed off.

Here. Have some more power.

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

You people are so insensitive..

A homeless man was eaten alive and all you want to know is how much salt did it take?

SukieTawdry said...

I don't recall this kind of shit going on with "the old LSD."

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

Here. Have some more power.

If you see something.. say something.

Rabel said...

Is there a correlation between the absence of garage mahal and the unfortunate Zombie event?

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

The title for the movie is Naked Lunch.

D'oh!

Glen Wishard said...

Cannibals generally cook their food, and fix it up with roots and vegetables. So properly, this is anthropophagy.

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

Is there a correlation between the absence of garage mahal and the unfortunate Zombie event?

The impending Walker victory.. Obama trailing in the polls.. (dots connected)

It was just too much for one guy to take ;)

Michael K said...

"even though it didn't for alcohol, pot, LSD, cocaine, ecstasy, PCP, or meth."

Have you ever seen a PCP or meth user on a high ? Ecstasy causes permanent brain damage with chronic use. cocaine makes people hyperactive and paranoid, a bad combination. They also have a lot of sudden death. Alcohol and pot are low on my scale of hazards. The "purple drank" that Trayvon was using also causes permanent brain injury.

When I was a senior in medical school, 1965, the Dean asked to meet with me (I was student body pres.) . He told me that about half the sophomore class were on LSD. They had medical students crawling around in the dorm barking like dogs. One of the kids explained his flashbacks to the Dean. Some of them never finished medical school and others never did an internship and got licensed. I knew a lot of them. It was the peak of the 60s nuttiness. We don't need the latest version.

It was a disaster.

bagoh20 said...

Political anxiety and a love of road kill is a dangerous combination.

bagoh20 said...

This subject appears to be as hyperbole inducing as a Palin post.

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

Dr. Adams said the patients were in a state of delirium.

Jason said...

Does anyone know where the funeral service for the cannibal will be held?

I'd like to send something.

I'm thinking some fava beans and a nice Chianti.

Thp thp thp thp thp thp thp thp.

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

"The New LSD".. unlike Facebook and New Coke.. is a big hit with sunbathers.

Speaking of Facebook..

rcommal said...

In the case of these types of stories, the word "predisposition[s]" always jumps to mind.

rcommal said...

Also: Gross! I mean, yuck.

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

even using their jaws as weapons....

Don't tell me.. He was a 1/16 Cherokee.

Seven Machos said...

My sense would be that we don't need to ban bath salts. Just as we don't ban computer cleaner, though you can get higher than a kite off it.

What we could ban is the production of this thing and its sale for use as a recreational drug.

Icepick said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Icepick said...

In the case of these types of stories, the word "predisposition[s]" always jumps to mind.

I'll buy that, and I'll participate. I wonder if Eugene is an Islander of some sort, perhaps Haitian. I haven't seen anything about that in the stories I've read so far. If Haitian, perhaps he got his Haitian Zombie Lore confused with his American Movie Zombie Lore. Cross-cultural polination isn't always a good thing!

Icepick said...

Also, this story just confirms what I wrote earlier in the day on the other post about this: This kind of thing isn't quite as unusual as one might think! (Or hope....)

Icepick said...

Maybe he was just sucking face and got carried away.

NTTAWWT.


Uh, NO, there is something VERY MUCH WRONG WITH THAT!

Revenant said...

When I was a senior in medical school, 1965, the Dean asked to meet with me (I was student body pres.) . He told me that about half the sophomore class were on LSD. They had medical students crawling around in the dorm barking like dogs

To sum up: in 1965, the drug about which authority figures told implausible and poorly-sourced stories was LSD. Today, it is "bath salts". Who knows what it'll be tomorrow?

I'm curious what your reason is for considering alcohol a minor threat, though, considering that (a) it kills more people than all the illegal drugs combined and (b) it causes:

- birth defects
- liver disease
- heart disease
- cancer
- mental illness
- brain damage
- violent mood swings
- obesity

And so on. You can tell a horror story about almost anything if you focus solely on the worst effects on the worst abusers.

My point isn't that "insert scary drug of the moment here" is harmless, but that self-interested authority figures have been peddling bullshit about them for generations. The old "this drug makes people super strong and crazy" line is one of the classics. Expect follow-up about how it is "even worse than [insert previous scary drug here" and is a massive contributor to everything about the underclass that the middle class doesn't like. :)

Revenant said...

What we could ban is the production of this thing and its sale for use as a recreational drug.

What is the "this thing" in that sentence? There are quite a lot of meth-like chemicals ostensibly known as "bath salts". The federal government has identified at least 18 so far.

Seven Machos said...

Rev -- I make no claim to be an expert on getting high on bath salts. I merely suggest that a local government could make an intelligent law against selling or using the product that this person used.

As usual, you and I are basically coming from the same liberty-loving philosophical place. I just have much more common sense. ;]

Synova said...

I doubt if either of these guys cared one bit if this was legal or not. I doubt if making it illegal would do anything to make either of those guys care if it was legal or not. Making drugs illegal doesn't seem to have kept them off our streets or kept idiots from trying to get high.

Might as well try outlawing stupid.

Synova said...

I think, too, that most drug laws are about avoiding having legality seen as approval. It's *legal* you know! If it was bad it would be illegal.

Right?

But what horror have we created when we have to be sure we haven't missed any bad thing in our ever growing, expanding, impossible web of laws?

Every good thing compelled, every bad thing forbidden.

Revenant said...

I merely suggest that a local government could make an intelligent law against selling or using the product that this person used.

Yes, I understood that.

I'm just pointing out, again, that (a) we don't know he was on anything at all, let alone "bath salts" and (b) fashioning an "intelligent law" banning a specific form of commerce without causing unforeseen and unwanted side effects is easier said than done. And by "easier said than done" I mean "frequently said, seldom if ever done".

Look at the host of laws and regulations aimed at tightening up access to meth precursors. The only effect has been to make it harder for non-druggies to get medicine.

Seven Machos said...

Making drugs illegal doesn't seem to have kept them off our streets or kept idiots from trying to get high.

This notion is commonly thrown around and it's just atrociously wrong. You assume that all the idiots of the world who want drugs can get them. This assumption is invalid. The world is filled with idiots. If it was also filled with drugs, think about how many more idiots would consume drugs.

Whenever this sentiment overtakes you, as it apparently does a lot of people, just envision something like ExxonMobil Cocaine Corporation. Because that's what you would have.

The key, as with anything, isn't legalization. It's exactly what to make illegal and what to regulate, and how.

Seven Machos said...

Look at the host of laws and regulations aimed at tightening up access to meth precursors.

Those laws are tremendously stupid. But just because we some stupid laws doesn't mean that laws are stupid. We also have some really good laws.

Reason was great for me when I was 20. I would consume every available back issue at the library. But I see it as too often trite now. Yes, it's good to expose bad law and be wary of more bad law. But some of that energy would be much better spent trying to create good law.

bagoh20 said...

I'm pretty sure that most of what that guy did that entire day was illegal. Laws are not real helpful with some people. Some people just need a more powerful incentive, which the cop provided.

frank said...

It starts out as 'reefer madness' but it's so gay as to be queer.

Palladian said...

"But I see it as too often trite now."

That's because you've sold your soul to the Man...

Seven Machos said...

The older we get, the further we see...

I believe in these people
I believe in this age...

Palladian said...

It's a fool's errand to try to make an ever-spiraling list of substances "illegal". Look at a list of phenethylamines, some with only a simple alteration of an atom or group here or there in the molecule, yet with sometimes completely different effects, from decongestants to psychoactive agents to anti-Parkinson drugs to stimulants to antidepressants. every rearrangement fresh fodder for more and more ineffective laws and regulations, laws and regulations that hurt no one except "legitimate" users.

Try buying pseudoephedrine when you're congested.

Seven Machos said...

Palladian -- I think your argument is no good. There's probably a name for it, but what you are doing is taking a heinous, awful law and then generalizing that other, perfectly reasonable laws are bad because they fall into the same category as the bad law. Your argument is like saying that we should strike all traffic laws because the speed limit on empty stretches of highway is too slow.

Obviously, it is absurd to make Sudafed -- or whatever -- so hard to buy. That's a dumb law. But it's not a dumb law to make illegal the cooking and processing of stuff to make meth, or to make the sale of meth illegal.

I am with everyone who wants to rethink the drug laws. Could we have, for example, highly regulated LSD and mushroom markets? Yes. Marijuana markets? Yes. It brings up a host of terrible externalities, such as driving, but it's doable. How about cocaine and meth and other drugs that are very addictive? That's much more problematic.

The problem with live and let live is that people's lives get all fucked up. The other problem is that people should be able to organize their societies however they want within very, very wide limits -- but that problem cuts both ways on the authoritarian-vs.-libertarian scale.

Revenant said...

Those laws are tremendously stupid. But just because we some stupid laws doesn't mean that laws are stupid. We also have some really good laws.

Well, sure. For example, laws against murder, theft, rape, etc.

We have no good laws aimed at curtailing mutually consensual economic activity. Governments have been trying to figure out how to regulate human nature for as long as there have *been* governments, but no luck so far. :)

Seven Machos said...

We have no good laws aimed at curtailing mutually consensual economic activity.

Let's look at crack cocaine. It's a product that gives you a very nice rush for about 20 minutes -- with diminishing returns on repeated use -- and is also obscenely addictive and absolutely ruins peoples' lives. Or let's take heroin. It's a similar product except the feeling you get is apparently the best possible feeling in the world and it's even more addictive and it will kill you.

I am radically for the prohibition of these products in society. The thing that libertarians lose sight of in the world is the fact that the decisions of individuals have a macro effect on the fabric of society.

The other issue, that I harp on, is that people in free societies are free to organize their societies. Organization matters. Aesthetics matter. Society matters. What's around even the most hardened libertarian matters. If most people don't want to live with a bunch of crackheads, why should they?

Revenant said...

There's probably a name for it, but what you are doing is taking a heinous, awful law and then generalizing that other, perfectly reasonable laws are bad because they fall into the same category as the bad law.

Well, no.

What he's doing is taking a law we were all assured was perfectly reasonable and necessary, and pointing out that it turned out to be heinous and awful.

He isn't comparing it to your law, because you aren't proposing one. You're proposing that the government should Do Something, because clearly Something can and should be done. Ah, the audacity of hope!

Seven Machos said...

What he's doing is taking a law we were all assured was perfectly reasonable and necessary

Assured my whom? The crappy legislators who made the bad law? Then change the law. But, in order to do that, you have to craft a better law. I'm sure the libertarians will get right on that. And I'm sure they'll do the same bang-up job that the communists did.

Revenant said...

Let's look at crack cocaine.

Your idea of a good law is the laws against crack cocaine? Good grief.

I shudder to think what the death toll and economic damage from a *bad* law would be. :)

Seven Machos said...

I really don't know how else to deal with crack cocaine but to make the sale and distribution illegal. It's the worst product ever.

What happens if it's legal? The price will come down, I guess. Better packaging and savvier marketing. A chance for the trial lawyers to get rich. What else? Do you foresee less death and economic destruction? It's difficult to imagine.

Eric said...

I have a sneaking suspicion that those claiming these are like LSD have never taken LSD.

I've never taken LSD, but I've been around people who took it a whole lot. They didn't act anything like this.

These are the kinds of stories you used to hear about PCP, especially the part about pain tolerance.

Revenant said...

Then change the law. But, in order to do that, you have to craft a better law

Ok, I admit you had me going for a minute there, but that line gave away the game. :)

Alex said...

Sounds like typical PCP usage.

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

A cartoon by B. Kliban:

One cop is talking to another cop.

I tried marijuana, once. It made me want to rape and murder.

Lem Vibe Bandit said...

"Bath Salt" can devolve you into something less than a homosapien..

But a whack in the head can turn you into a "savant".

Solution?

Beat the crap out of drug users ;)

viator said...

finally, real zombies...

Ralph L said...

I heard a few states are claiming success against meth use by making Sudafed by prescription only (sux). Which means the addicts just moved out of state.

Glad I only need it a few months a year, since Walmart has me on a 10 day fix--I mean ration.

gerry said...

Is there money to be made jetting down and appearing with the bereaved cannibal's mother and family spokesman/NAACP member/minister?

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored Cannibals might be interested, too.

Carnifex said...

So one group proposes to ban every product that can be used by anyone(because if it's there someone will figure out how to get a high off of it), and the other side proposes no laws at all, because see above.

Did anyone ever think to test that chimpanzee last year to see if he had ingested bath salts? Maybe he ate that womans face because he couldn't get bath salts?

Maybe, just maybe, you can't regulate all behavior, and have to live with a certain amount of risk in a free society?

Maybe, we should teach morality in our schools so idiot kids didn't think it was cool to shoot up heroin, or huff paint, or any of the societal ills afflicting America today. Naaaww! That's crazy!

TMink said...

Rev wrote: "Maybe this will be the first time in history when the "ZOMG, the drug makes you super-strong and crazy" claim actually holds water, even though it didn't for alcohol, pot, LSD, cocaine, ecstasy, PCP, or meth."

Exactly!

Trey

virgil xenophon said...

"Bath Salts?" I didn't know Bed, Bath and Beyond was a corporate drug pusher! Society really IS headed downhill, lol.

Peter said...

"Reason Magazine's blog has done quite a few posts debunking the whole "bath salts" scare.

Reason Magazine was more interesting before it became obsessed with drug legalization.

jungatheart said...

I think it would take about two generations of observation for society to internalize it's not good to do the really hard drugs. I think it was Heinlein who said legalizing drugs would be would yield natural selection.

amnyc said...

Here's a delightful story from last year which first made Bath Salts prominent in the world of weird news:

http://www.waspsnest.com/2011/05/05/cross-dressing-pygmy-goat-killer-was-high-on-bath-salts

Synova said...

"You assume that all the idiots of the world who want drugs can get them. This assumption is invalid."

I don't know where a person would go to not be able to get illegal drugs. Certainly there were "druggies" at my tiny rural high school, though I suppose it was mostly pot. Everyone talked about "acid." My sister called the cops when she was an apartment manager to tell them one of her tenets was dealing Meth and was told that there "was no meth" in that city. And anyone can get glue or whatever (skittles and ice tea?) and there are always deaths from alcohol, either poisoning or drunk driving.

If there isn't some of the "harder" drugs, is it because people can't *get* it, or because the population is so sparse that there isn't enough demand?

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

Really All anyone cares about is this stupid drug either your all for it, or your against it, what about the poor guy who's face was eaten. I don't see why people wast their time on drugs oh wait it's america all we care about is sitting on our butts, getting high or drunk and whats that last one oh wait it's getting everything handed to us. This man did nothing to deserve his fate do you guys really have no compassion, LSD is this and Bath Salts are that. How would you really feel about them if this had happened to your child or husband or mother?

Revenant said...

Reason Magazine was more interesting before it became obsessed with drug legalization.

Reason magazine, like all libertarian media outlets, has been pro-legalization from the beginning.

same said...

Maybe "anthropoppophagy"?

Unknown said...

There is obviously a lot to know about this. I think you made some good points in the Features also.
bath salt