Music

Major Lazer want to talk about responsible drug use

by Tyler Munro

via Rolling Stone

The EDM world has come under fire of late after a string of deaths and arrests at festivals in Boston and New York. The drug of choice is MDMA, or Molly, which kids are doing in droves. But as veterans of the scene will tell you, there’s a right and wrong way to do drugs. Illegal or otherwise, they’re a vice that can still be done safely.

Let’s make one thing clear: when Major Lazer’s Jillionaire told Rolling Stone that he thinks kids need to learn to do drugs responsibly, he’s not advocating that they do them at all. But bandmate Diplo says, “they’re going to do them anyway,” and if that’s true, they might as well be safe about it.

What Jillionaire is advocating isn’t that kids do drugs, it’s that we teach them the realities if they chose to. He’s saying that we need to teach kids about responsibility like we would with alcohol or safe sex.

“If you’re going to go to a festival, drink water for six days before you get there; don’t drink no alcohol. If you’re going to do a pill and a half, don’t do four more and then pass out, overheat, and die of cardiac arrest,” he said. “Instead of acting like drugs don’t exist, acknowledge that drugs will be at a festival and address them.”

There’s obviously some pigeonholing going on here. It’s not fair to paint EDM festivals as smoke cloaked drug fueled extravaganzas. To deny that illegal substances are prominent at festivals like Electric Zoo and Digital Dreams would be idiotic; equally stupid would be acting like they’re the only reason people attend them. There are abusers and idiots at every event. In most cases, these kids just want to dance.

There are plenty of factors that go into why kids are dying from drugs. They’re doing too many or they’re doing the wrong ones; substances culled from strangers and untrustworthy dealers looking for nothing more than a quick buck. In many cases, they’re being exploited, straight up.

Diplo thinks the negative attention being put on EDM festivals is because of a generational gap. He might be misguided when he calls music writers old (nuh-uh!) and says “it’s the first time [they] can have something to write about,” but he’s right to note that drugs and music are an age old combination, especially in club culture.

“[Drug use is] going to happen; you can’t control it,” he said. “Persecuting a festival is not going to help it because kids are going to do them regardless. Hell, they’ll do them in their houses.”

“Drugs are a big problem in America, because we have money to spend and a culture that wants to be turnt up all the time,” he adds.

Do you agree? Read both Jillionaire and Diplo’s statements in full at Rolling Stone. They’re part of a very valid argument fans, writers and parents alike all need to be engaged in.