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Comment by ticviking | Hacker News Reader

Most of the time when people call something "degenerate" it seems like they're making an argument based on the idea that progress depends on self-control and personal sovereignty.

Everything I see labeled that way, psychedelics included, has a reputation of being either a cause of loss of self-control or a consequence of lacking self-control.

If you want to be in the habit of understanding people who use words like that to describe others keeping that frame in mind may make their fears, and emotional reactions easier to understand, even when you disagree with their premise or judgements.

(edit: fix a few typos)

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That's funny, most of the time I see people call something "degenerate" it's a political slur against a group that does not align the with the users personal ideals of society. Different contexts, I suppose.

You're trying to reframe the problem around the people who call it out. That's a good way to distract from said problem but not a way to address it. That kind of drug usage is a manifestation of degeneracy, itself part of a bigger cultural trend. Fixing the symptoms (or rather, absorbing them into legality so they seem less noteworthy) won't get rid of the root cause.

edit: to respond to greyface- below since I am not longer allowed to reply. what you seem to be hinting at amounts to reasoning by extremes, a trite fallacy.

>That kind of drug usage is a manifestation of degeneracy...

Please define "degenerate". Would you consider individuals who hold successful, stable careers (they may even hold down a high-level role), have a family, no criminal records, for all intents and purposes are 'normal' people, but maybe once every few years they go camping with friends and consume psychedelics, to be a "degenerate"?

Because to me it sounds like you're making a gigantic blanket generalization.

> to respond to greyface- below since I am not longer allowed to reply. what you seem to be hinting at amounts to reasoning by extremes, a trite fallacy

The word "degenerate" is reasoning by extremes. It signals puritanical zealotry from a palingenetic perspective.

Whatever glorious past you think society is de-generating from is a myth composed by people with rosy-eyed memories and an agenda that, were it not for the justifying myth, would be obviously absurd.

hits the nail on the head, thanks!

Historically, treating "degeneracy" as a problem to be solved leads to some very, very dark places.

This sounds like a tautological argument. Can you provide your definition and/or evidence of "a bigger cultural trend of degeneracy" that does not simply point back to the decriminalization of drugs? I am reading the merriam-webster definition of "degenerate" to try and make sense of what you are saying, is it that there is some kind of society-wide or worldwide phenomenon of mass brain failure that "manifests" itself in the use of psychedelic drugs which have themselves been known to humans throughout our recorded history?

Referring back up to the earlier comments, what I read here strikes me as similar to the opinions the earlier commenter was describing, the idea that the success of society relies on some inherent concepts of self-control and personal sovereignty that are somehow threatened by use of psychedelic drugs. You are completely entitled to your own opinion, but throwing the d-word around isn't doing anything to clarify why you hold that opinion for me. It reads like an argument based on emotion.

You've rebutted an unrelated discussion about your motives without backing up your claims. What exactly makes taking psychedelics a degenerate act? What leads you to believe it is a result of degeneracy?

The only fallacy being employed here is your own. You have to provide evidence that psychedelic use is somehow morally wrong, or that it causes a problem. So far you have presented no evidence to that end.

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