MAP Forum

Fragment wrote: Fri Apr 04, 2025 3:37 am Wouldn’t you rather go down fighting?

I’d rather die a martyr, killed by antis, than kill myself.

Suicide is their victory.

Not like we will ever win anyway and even if we do it won't happen during our lifetime.

mrlolicon93 wrote: Sun Apr 06, 2025 10:40 pm Not like we will ever win anyway and even if we do it won't happen during our lifetime.

As I wrote elsewhere, evidence clearly favours the notion that change is possible. Our foes react against us with such fanaticism precisely because they know, consciously or not, that the whole oppressive edifice they've built over the centuries ultimately rests on flimsy foundations.

It probably won't happen in our lifetimes, granted. But only if we remain steadfast in our determination will it ever happen at all. I'd much rather give hope to the MAPs of the future: even if we don't reap the full rewards of our efforts, others eventually will, and they will celebrate us as heroes, much as we now look toward the first heroic pioneers like Tom O'Carroll.

Engaging in activism for unpopular causes means playing the long game and never giving up. The best comparison I can see in recent history is with psychedelics legalization. After the cultural and legal backlash of the 1980s, social acceptance of psychedelics in the West seemed entirely out of reach and many activists of the day believed they'd lost the war. Still, others persisted... and nowadays, we're seeing the very first jurisdictions that legalize some of those drugs, vast resources being poured into research into their therapeutic potential, and even a trend of young creative professionals "microdosing" and writing about it in mainstream media. My bet is that social acceptance of MAPs (and eventually AMSC) will follow a similar trajectory, and we're just barely out of the most oppressive period.

mrlolicon93 wrote: Sun Apr 06, 2025 10:40 pm

Fragment wrote: Fri Apr 04, 2025 3:37 am Wouldn’t you rather go down fighting?

I’d rather die a martyr, killed by antis, than kill myself.

Suicide is their victory.

Not like we will ever win anyway and even if we do it won't happen during our lifetime.

So? Spit in their eye and stomp on their foot.

WavesInEternity wrote: Sun Apr 06, 2025 11:37 pm

mrlolicon93 wrote: Sun Apr 06, 2025 10:40 pm Not like we will ever win anyway and even if we do it won't happen during our lifetime.

As I wrote elsewhere, evidence clearly favours the notion that change is possible. Our foes react against us with such fanaticism precisely because they know, consciously or not, that the whole oppressive edifice they've built over the centuries ultimately rests on flimsy foundations.

It probably won't happen in our lifetimes, granted. But only if we remain steadfast in our determination will it ever happen at all. I'd much rather give hope to the MAPs of the future: even if we don't reap the full rewards of our efforts, others eventually will, and they will celebrate us as heroes, much as we now look toward the first heroic pioneers like Tom O'Carroll.

Engaging in activism for unpopular causes means playing the long game and never giving up. The best comparison I can see in recent history is with psychedelics legalization. After the cultural and legal backlash of the 1980s, social acceptance of psychedelics in the West seemed entirely out of reach and many activists of the day believed they'd lost the war. Still, others persisted... and nowadays, we're seeing the very first jurisdictions that legalize some of those drugs, vast resources being poured into research into their therapeutic potential, and even a trend of young creative professionals "microdosing" and writing about it in mainstream media. My bet is that social acceptance of MAPs (and eventually AMSC) will follow a similar trajectory, and we're just barely out of the most oppressive period.

That's it. As we have previously commented in other threads, it's an excellent comparison. If this can help cheer up mrlolicon93, I think we can talk more about it. The way I see it, we have this situation:

1. Throughout almost all of History, in almost the entire world, psychedelic drugs have been allowed.

2. However, they have certain dangers. Sometimes, they can cause harm to people.

3. To avoid these dangers, the idea has emerged that the best idea would be to ban them completely and pursue them with strict laws, in addition to the fact that they face a very strong social rejection, exacerbated by the media (and, well, also, many people love lynchings).

4. The US government leads a global crusade against drugs, convincing the rest of the world to prohibit them: even enemy countries accept their premises. They use all kinds of fallacies and exaggerations, even claiming that science supports their crusade; when, in reality, science shows rather the opposite.

5. Through a series of mechanisms (self-fulfilling prophecies, nocebo effect, suffering caused by repression, the fact that having to hide pushes people to the margins of society...), the war on drugs actually makes them much more dangerous than they are intrinsically.

6. We enter a vicious cycle: drugs are now more harmful. This justifies stricter laws, which make them even more harmful, which justifies even stricter laws, and so on...

7. Voices are beginning to be raised saying: Hey, most of the harm attributed to drugs is actually caused by how persecuted they are. Drugs cause less harm if they're not persecuted: if anything, perhaps regulating them and being careful with them would be better, but strictly persecuting them and socially condemning them is much worse than allowing them.

8. In some places, there are timid attempts to roll back the laws and become more permissive again.

9. The results are good: indeed, drug persecution caused more suffering than the drugs themselves. "Anything goes" may not be a good idea either; we must be careful because there are real dangers, but permissive regulation and social acceptance make people suffer less.

10. In the future, it would be logical for the persecution to gradually dissipate until it disappears completely (or almost).

Now replace "drugs" with "AMSC". It makes sense to me. I think it's a perfectly logical development of events; on the drug issue we would be somewhere between point 8 and 9, and on the AMSC issue we would be somewhere between 6 and 7. Probably, the persecution of AMSC is more intense and violent than the war on drugs has ever been, and the hatred that MAPs have to face is greater than that which drug users have had to face, but, in general terms, the two situations are very similar.

It's also important to note that evolution isn't entirely linear; there are some setbacks, some moments when it seems the situation is about to improve and then ultimately doesn't. But, overall, there is progress. Notice that we have gone from point 6, the peak of the persecution, to point 8 in just a few decades.

mrlolicon93 wrote: Sun Apr 06, 2025 10:40 pm

Fragment wrote: Fri Apr 04, 2025 3:37 am Wouldn’t you rather go down fighting?

I’d rather die a martyr, killed by antis, than kill myself.

Suicide is their victory.

Not like we will ever win anyway and even if we do it won't happen during our lifetime.

That mentality is precisely the reason we are in the abyss that we are, the story changes constantly and faster than what it seems, if they gave the appropriate conditions in our community we will achieve both legal and social advances in question of months, the reason that this has not happened it is precisely that most of our community prefers to hide (without success) and live a life under fear, rather than fight against the abuses of antis and organize us as a community.

If you look at our story as a community you will realize that when our community was a real and functional lobby (in the late 1960s until the 1990s) it was because there were real activists who risk their lives to fight for our community and there were people who supported them (both inside and outside our community) and even today there are activists willing to fight, the difference (with respect to the activists of the 1970s) is that our community does not support them enough, we lack of people willing to any kind of help or to invest any money in activist initiatives (Both of that can be done anonymously btw)

aeterna91 wrote: Mon Apr 07, 2025 8:56 pm ...

Now replace "drugs" with "AMSC". It makes sense to me. I think it's a perfectly logical development of events; on the drug issue we would be somewhere between point 8 and 9, and on the AMSC issue we would be somewhere between 6 and 7. Probably, the persecution of AMSC is more intense and violent than the war on drugs has ever been, and the hatred that MAPs have to face is greater than that which drug users have had to face, but, in general terms, the two situations are very similar.

It's also important to note that evolution isn't entirely linear; there are some setbacks, some moments when it seems the situation is about to improve and then ultimately doesn't. But, overall, there is progress. Notice that we have gone from point 6, the peak of the persecution, to point 8 in just a few decades.

I strongly agree with everything you wrote. Indeed, I think it's the best analogy available that doesn't pertain to other "abnormal" sexualities.

There are many more similarities, such as the fact that giving psychedelics through force or coercion to people who don't want to take them is always wrong (like sexual assault and obtaining sex through deception or manipulation), that many conservative voices still demonize those substances despite overwhelming scientific evidence of their therapeutic power and low risks, and that it's immensely difficult to explain the psychedelic experience and its benefits to someone who has never taken such substances (like explaining minor-attraction—as a form of love—and consensual AMSC to the normies).

Of course, "anything goes" isn't the way forward. We need to craft a careful equilibrium between personal freedoms and harm reduction. Many drugs (e.g. dissociatives like ketamine and PCP) have proven therapeutic uses but also higher risks of harm than classical psychedelics, and others should remain very strictly regulated (e.g. fentanyl and analogues). Our laws must be based on sound science and a rational assessment of risks and rewards.

Just checking in on you, Mrlolicon. Feel free to reach out to our team by PM or e-mail.

BLueRibbon wrote: Tue Apr 08, 2025 10:30 pm Just checking in on you, Mrlolicon. Feel free to reach out to our team by PM or e-mail.

Thanks.

HumanBeing wrote: Mon Apr 07, 2025 10:12 pm

mrlolicon93 wrote: Sun Apr 06, 2025 10:40 pm

Fragment wrote: Fri Apr 04, 2025 3:37 am Wouldn’t you rather go down fighting?

I’d rather die a martyr, killed by antis, than kill myself.

Suicide is their victory.

Not like we will ever win anyway and even if we do it won't happen during our lifetime.

That mentality is precisely the reason we are in the abyss that we are, the story changes constantly and faster than what it seems, if they gave the appropriate conditions in our community we will achieve both legal and social advances in question of months, the reason that this has not happened it is precisely that most of our community prefers to hide (without success) and live a life under fear, rather than fight against the abuses of antis and organize us as a community.

If you look at our story as a community you will realize that when our community was a real and functional lobby (in the late 1960s until the 1990s) it was because there were real activists who risk their lives to fight for our community and there were people who supported them (both inside and outside our community) and even today there are activists willing to fight, the difference (with respect to the activists of the 1970s) is that our community does not support them enough, we lack of people willing to any kind of help or to invest any money in activist initiatives (Both of that can be done anonymously btw)

Gonna be blunt here but you are absolutely right.

I have a lot of respect for people like Tom O'Carroll because at least people like him were actually going out on the street and trying to make a difference.

It seems like the new generation of maps are not willing to die for what they believe in or even stand up for it even if they get hurt in the process.

mrlolicon93 wrote: Wed Apr 09, 2025 11:51 pm

HumanBeing wrote: Mon Apr 07, 2025 10:12 pm

mrlolicon93 wrote: Sun Apr 06, 2025 10:40 pm

Not like we will ever win anyway and even if we do it won't happen during our lifetime.

That mentality is precisely the reason we are in the abyss that we are, the story changes constantly and faster than what it seems, if they gave the appropriate conditions in our community we will achieve both legal and social advances in question of months, the reason that this has not happened it is precisely that most of our community prefers to hide (without success) and live a life under fear, rather than fight against the abuses of antis and organize us as a community.

If you look at our story as a community you will realize that when our community was a real and functional lobby (in the late 1960s until the 1990s) it was because there were real activists who risk their lives to fight for our community and there were people who supported them (both inside and outside our community) and even today there are activists willing to fight, the difference (with respect to the activists of the 1970s) is that our community does not support them enough, we lack of people willing to any kind of help or to invest any money in activist initiatives (Both of that can be done anonymously btw)

Gonna be blunt here but you are absolutely right.

I have a lot of respect for people like Tom O'Carroll because at least people like him were actually going out on the street and trying to make a difference.

It seems like the new generation of maps are not willing to die for what they believe in or even stand up for it even if they get hurt in the process.

I don't think its just a generational problem, I was a teenager when I speaked to Ad van den Berg and I still admire him for fighting until his last breath for our human rights, the real problem is the lack of will of maps to make even the smallest risks for our community because of FEAR, and no, its not only a privacy issue (as some fellow maps told me years ago) its an irrational phobia about taking any risks, the only fact of being alive as a MAP is a risk nowadays and no, nobody can live a free-risk life being a map, because that would require to repress yourself in a 100% as a map and that will completely destroy your mental health and life so its an useless effort, the only thing we can do is to take a risk, even a small one (like donating money anonymously to activists or to talk with an anonymous account) can make a difference, or if you are willing to you can also take a big risk (like being an activist in real life or to support activists with your real name).

But if we don't support our activists enough so they can live an austere life and continue doing activism without risking to being homeless then what can we expect but to be opressed?

Also as Ad van den Berg used to say "the best way to defend ourselves is attacking" with this he mean that we must attack (in a non-violent way) the antis, if we try to defend ourselves from an anti accusation we are assuming a guilty role but if we attack antis about their abuses against our community and against children (because its a fact that antis hurt children in many ways) then they have to defend themselves and the roles are reversed.