Albuquerque Journal
June 10, 2002

The article “Ecstasy and Agony” appearing Sunday, June 2, contains a lot of useful information about the drug MDMA, popularly known as ecstasy. However as a regular rave participant and director of Northern NM DanceSafe, a volunteer organization dedicated to promoting health and safety at raves in New Mexico, I was disturbed to find that much of the article was not about ecstasy, but instead about raves. By interspersing information about raves into the discussion of ecstasy, the author might easily have misled the readers into making a stronger connection between the two than the facts warrant. Let’s face it: drug use is common everywhere, and ecstasy is accessible to all segments of society. It is just as unfair today, to blame society’s problems with drug use on the devotees of electronic music and dance, as it was to blame the enthusiasts of jazz music and dance seventy years ago.

Geoff Chesshire
Los Alamos