Some advice for concertgoers: take breaks from dancing, stay hydrated and look out for your mates.
Some advice for concertgoers: take breaks from dancing, stay hydrated and look out for your mates.
OPINION
If your child is heading to a music festival this summer, ask them what drugs they are taking.
If you frowned, and thought “no way, not my darling child, never”, then congratulations - you have ascended to the realms of another planet without the aid of drugs.
Because yourkid is taking drugs, if they are heading to a music festival this summer.
Drugs and music festivals go hand in hand - like strawberries and cream, like the crackle of vinyl on a turntable, like STIs and a burning sensation when you pee.
It’s had various names but the key ingredient is MDMA.
It’s popular for several reasons. It makes you feel “loved up” and generally, pretty good.
To paraphrase the late 20th century philosopher Dennis Denuto - “it’s all about the vibe”.
A side effect is that you feel so good that in fact repetitive electronic or dance music (in my humble view barely indiscernible between artists and genres) becomes tolerable.
Lumpen unco-ordinated regional oiks reared on Lion Red and cabbage suddenly want to audition for Black Grace.
If your child is heading to a concert ask the drug questions before they go.
As it happens, there is a fair bit of electronic music around at summer music festivals. Perfect for MDMA.
The drug has a chequered history. When it was popular among crowds at indoor raves or dance parties, there were cases of sweaty, high punters drinking too much water.
In some cases, people achieved a potentially fatal state called hyponatremia. In extreme cases, your brain swells so much, it kills you.
At an outdoor festival, with “safe” MDMA, punters can dehydrate, or take too much of a good thing. And any party drug combined with alcohol is asking for trouble
But the real risk right now is that your child is not ingesting MDMA at all.
As a product of an illegal, non-regulated industry, there are no rules around manufacture, the primary production motive is profit, and in the words of a Wellington doctor this past week: “There’s some crazy s*** out there”.
The doctor, who wasn’t named in the article, said: “They [patients] come in comatose and almost need to be intubated, then will suddenly wake up and be wildly unpredictable.
“Some hallucinate vividly and violently, others panic and think they’re about to be killed.”
This was after a Guns and Roses concert where for some, it was hardly Paradise City.
It turns out that the punters had taken eutylone, also known as bath salts.
After a few years of not rearing its ugly head, eutylone has popped up again.
Hence the call this past week for this summer’s festival goers to get their drugs checked, with on-site experts like Know Your Stuff, before they take them.
It’s an odd notion - asking people to hand over an illegal substance that a) they are breaking the law by possessing and b) they probably broke the law buying.
Kind of like offering free electrical checks to people who have bought stolen TVs, so they don’t get electrocuted.
The offer also comes with some paranoid hesitancy: “Will undercover cops spy on me, and crash out of a flax bush when I’m peaking?”. Right wingers will blame Labour for this liberal nonsense.
But it’s actually a grown-up way of approaching a health risk.
In other words: “We don’t care where you get it from, let us tell you if it’s actually MDMA”.
Because if it’s not safe, someone could die.
And summer is for living. Not dying.
The approach also raises an interesting debate about the general safety of MDMA.
Free testing of illicit drugs and handing them back to the owner sanctions its consumption, no matter which way you look at it.
But as a parent, if my kids are heading to a music festival, I’ll be asking them what drugs they are taking.
■ Check out Know Your Stuff online to see if they are coming to a town near you.
SOME ADVICE
The NZ Drug Foundation recommends drinking around 250ml of water per hour when being active, to help manage your water intake.
Don’t mix MDMA with alcohol or other drugs as this can increase harmful side effects. Drinking alcohol is also more likely to lead to dehydration.
Make sure you have a plan in case of an emergency - know how to recognise the signs of heat exhaustion and water intoxication, and be prepared to get medical help. Remember, always tell emergency responders what someone has taken. You won’t get in trouble and it could save someone’s life.
Take regular breaks when dancing, and give yourself plenty of time to cool down.
As always, avoid re-dosing as this increases the chance of overdose.
