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Skateboarding => USELESS WOODEN TOY BANTER => Topic started by: tkp on January 23, 2023, 09:49:31 AM
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The Killer of a Skateboarding Legend Went Unnamed for Years. Could Deaths Have Been Prevented?
Written by David Sjostedt
Published Jan. 23, 2023 • 5:00am
Source:
https://sfstandard.com/public-health/the-killer-of-a-skateboarding-legend-went-unnamed-for-years-could-deaths-have-been-prevented/
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When it was reported that San Francisco skateboarding legend Jake Phelps died peacefully in his Bayview home on March 19, 2019, the legions of global fans familiar with the brash counterculture icon knew there had to be more to the story.
Phelps, who would rather crack his head on the concrete than walk away from a skateboard trick he couldn’t land, wasn’t known for being peaceful.
Found with the neck of a guitar still resting in his hand and traces of fentanyl in his bloodstream, it was hardly the first time that Phelps’ family and friends felt the need to cover up his addiction. And over three years later, the official cause of death for the 56-year-old Thrasher Magazine editor-in-chief remained unpublished until now: acute fentanyl intoxication.
His death is part of a troubling trend that finds renowned skateboarders dying from fentanyl overdoses without public acknowledgment of how they really died.
Some now wonder whether the secrecy shrouding these deaths is preventing lives from being saved, given pervasive drug use in the skateboarding community.
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Jake Phelps at the Thrasher Magazine offices in Hunters Point neighborhood of San Francisco, Calif. in January 2016. | Andrew Paynter
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Jake Phelps at Potrero Del Sol skatepark in San Francisco in January 2016. | Andrew Paynter
Phelps’ overdose occurred as the number of American fentanyl deaths exploded, with such fatalities increasing 1,000% from 2016 to the time Phelps died, marking a national toll of more than 18,000.
In San Francisco, the city’s annual overdose deaths doubled in the years since Phelps’ passing. Among over 2,000 lives lost to drug overdoses in San Francisco since 2019, there were at least two other prodigious skaters, Mark Dillard and David Abair, whose names and faces are emblazoned in artwork across the city.
The use of drugs in the skate community combined with the deadliness of fentanyl makes it likely that there are other skaters among those thousands of names.
“It’s like they tried to hide the truth,” said Marcos Castro, a friend of Dillard and Phelps. “Nobody cared how they died.”
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A composite image of skater Mark “Nosey” Dillard. | Courtesy Cam Ennis/Thrasher Magazine; Tom Shattuck/Thrasher Magazine
Surviving a rough upbringing in the Portrero Hill neighborhood, Dillard—or Nosey, as his friends called him because he was always asking questions—died in his Mission District apartment just as his life was taking a turn for the better, Castro said.
By the time he was 22 years old, big skate brands were sending Nosey free gear, and he was touting a sponsorship from the brand Blood Wizard. But with his local popularity came an inherent danger.
On Sept. 18, 2020, before leaving his apartment to meet friends at a bar, Nosey fatally overdosed while using cocaine that he didn’t know was laced with fentanyl. His friends and family didn’t find his body for several days.
“We’re in San Francisco, where everything is available and the city swallows people up,” Castro said. “I was telling him, your life will be gone so [a drug dealer] can have a couple bucks.”
Abair also ingested cocaine that was laced with fentanyl. His family declined to be interviewed to avoid revisiting his death.
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A skateboarder makes a turn on a bowl featuring a mural of Marc “Nosey” Dillard at Potrero del Sol/La Raza skatepark. | Benjamin Fanjoy/The Standard
Even within the tight-knit San Francisco skating community, the cause of the skaters’ deaths has gone largely unmentioned.
The cruel double-edged sword of the sport’s unwritten doctrine, which preaches ruthless individuality, is that it sometimes discourages its members from influencing one another’s behavior or caring about what other people think.
“They don’t hold people accountable. Nobody’s going to tell you, ‘Oh no, don’t do that,” Castro said.
Tony Vitello, owner of Thrasher Magazine and a lifelong friend of Phelps, said that skaters are unusually disposed to using drugs because of the culture’s marriage with partying, the likelihood of injury and the ubiquity of open-air drug markets in San Francisco, where many world-famous skate spots are located.
“It’s a naturally dangerous lifestyle, and you do it in the streets,” Vitello said.
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Tony Vitello, the owner of Thrasher Magazine, on Dec. 21, 2022. | Brian Feulner for The Standard
The spread of overdose deaths comes as illegal drugs are increasingly cut with fentanyl, which at $3 per pill costs about one-tenth the price of a dose of heroin or cocaine.
Jeff Grosso, another famous skater in Los Angeles, died of a fentanyl overdose in 2020, and many more lower-profile skaters have died in the community of dedicated skateboarders.
Alexander Tsai, a researcher at Harvard University who published a study about how stigma is hindering society’s response to the overdose crisis, said that families withholding this information are likely anticipating the shame that could be placed upon people associated with the victim of an overdose.
Tsai noted that shame and secrecy also enabled the surge in cases of AIDS and crack addiction during the 1980s and 1990s. Both of those affiliations were subjects of shame, which resulted in secrecy surrounding victims’ cause of death, thereby ensuring that the suffering flourished. Today, secrecy surrounding fentanyl is having a similar effect.
“Were these overdoses not stigmatized, you can imagine family members talking to their friends about what happened,” Tsai said, “and other people who are on the same precipice might benefit.”
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A skateboarder walks to attempt a trick at a SoMa West skatepark on Dec. 1, 2022. | Benjamin Fanjoy/The Standard
‘Jake Didn’t Bail; He Ate Shit’
While many of his friends either quit the sport or stopped pushing themselves due to injuries, Phelps kept going.
He couldn’t walk away from a trick, no matter how many times he fell. And though he was hobbled by broken bones and concussions, friends say that he was more tormented by his inability to skate the way he used to.
Phelps was the top editor of Thrasher Magazine for 26 years, but he was unsure about how to write the rest of his own story, Vitello said.
“He needed skateboarding. It was his fucking lifeblood, and he just kept doing it when he was hurt,” Vitello said.
(https://sfstandard.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/INLINED008_ODDeathsSpecial11102022-1536x1136.jpg)
Jake Phelps during the Day of Hell Contest at Hilltop Parka, aka The Dish Skatepark, in San Francisco on Oct. 5, 1985. | Courtesy Mofo/Thrasher Magazine
He would never jump off his board to escape injury; he would rather be badly hurt than give up.
“Jake didn’t bail; he ate shit,” Vitello explained.
Marie Phelps, Jake’s sister, said that she noticed a shift in Phelps’ behavior after he had surgery on a repeatedly injured elbow a few years before he died.
A gruesome video from 2010 shows Phelps filling his elbow with a synthetic fluid to treat a popped bursa—a fluid-filled sac that protects the elbow bone from impact.
“I’m going to show you what it takes to keep skating for a long time,” Phelps said in the video, unwrapping his bandaged arm to reveal a two-inch deep hole in his elbow. “This is just another monster.”
Following the surgery, Marie remembers receiving phone calls from the pharmacy, notifying her that Jake was attempting to refill his pain pill prescription before he was due.
“He had so many close calls. I think he thought he was invincible,” Marie said.
(https://sfstandard.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/INLINED009_ODDeathsSpecial11102022-1536x1025.jpg)
A skateboarder makes a turn in a bowl below where Jake Phelps is written at Potrero del Sol/La Raza skatepark. | Benjamin Fanjoy/The Standard
Still, she was surprised when her brother died and recalls seeing him in good spirits and clean from alcohol only a week earlier.
Until a September phone interview with The Standard, Phelps’ uncle Clark Phelps said he thought that Jake had died from a bad heart or a stroke.
“He was in a lot of pain, and I assumed he took pain pills, but I didn’t know,” Clark said. “He was discreet about everything, and he didn’t have anything to hide ’cause I didn’t judge.”
Unlike Abair and Dillard, Phelps died with only fentanyl in his system.
Once Phelps was gone, Marie said that her parents’ deteriorating health initially swayed her to keep her brother’s cause of death secret. But having gone through recovery herself, she expressed hope that his story could now have a positive impact on the skate community.
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Tony Vitello remembers Jake Phelps with another Thrasher employee at the magazine’s offices on Dec. 21, 2022. | Brian Feulner for The Standard
Vitello also struggled with the decision to withhold Phelps’ cause of death, admitting that he still carries guilt for covering for Phelps while he was alive.
“He couldn’t really form a sentence. He was slurring his words and drooling,” Vitello said. “I can’t totally dodge the idea that I had somebody working for me that was a danger not only to himself, but to other people.”
Phelps long prided himself on being the smartest person in the room, a title that Vitello said his addiction stripped from him. He said that the stigma and shame for Phelps didn’t come from the pressures of society, but rather what his drug use turned him into.
“I felt bad for Jake because I knew that wasn’t a fair representation of the brilliant person that he was,” Vitello said. “It just wasn’t him. It wasn’t what he wanted to put forth. But he couldn’t stop.”
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Jake Phelps walks down Division Street in San Francisco in January 2016. | Andrew Paynter
David Sjostedt can be reached at [email protected]
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Tough read but a good article.
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This was word on the street from day one after his passing, but to read it as a published article hits different.
The fent epidemic is still raging and its fucked.
My heart is with anyone who has been affected by that abhorant substance.
RIP Phelper
RIP Nosey
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this article is very well written for how heavy the subject is, wow. It's hard to read for sure but being able to openly discuss addiction, or at least attempting to converse about it, is a step in the right direction and will hopefully rid the stigmatization of drug addiction.
Damn we have lost too many people:(
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If you suffer from addiction, reach out, get help, get treatment
If you haven't ever tried opiates, don't. Shit is no joke and it will fuck up your life
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I am unfamiliar with The Standard but why did Vitello give an interview to them about the death of Phelps as apposed to other media sites?
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Thanks for posting. I worry a lot about my friends still getting high on Mission Street coke, but I try and always tell them so.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
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Pretty much my whole highschool crew struggled with opioid abuse. Some are clean, some are in jail, some died. I really hate this shit.
Thanks for posting. I worry a lot about my friends still getting high on Mission Street coke, but I try and always tell them so.
Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
for real. i dont even get the reasoning behind that, you're just gonna kill your clientele, they dont have an opiate tolerance that can handle that. Most people dont, thats why it even kills heroin junkies.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
I try to tell everyone, you can’t do coke anymore. It sucks but you are risking death for sure these days.
This place is to blame for covering up Phelps too, everyone was so pissed at people telling the truth when he died. People should be telling everyone when friends and family die from this shit, it’s fuckin terrible.
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(https://i.ibb.co/hXB1X03/Viper.jpg) (https://ibb.co/3fpYfKg)
if it's a powder say no
if you need to use tin foil to enjoy it say no
if you need to inject it say no
my father is a medical examiner and he always finds a way to say
"if it weren't for Harleys and Fentanyl...i'd be out of a job"
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Please get fent test strips and test your drugs before using, many pharmacies and health clinics offer them for free or low cost
Edit: even if you don't use, I'd highly recommend learning how to administer narcan/naloxone and carrying it with you
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Pills and powders are wack. Beer weed and shrooms for life.
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i don’t understand the reasoning behind lacing shit with fenty, as another poster before me said you’re just going to kill your clientele. i’m sure that people who actually do sell hard drugs don’t really care about the well-being of their clientele, but isn’t it kind of counter-intuitive? i don’t get it at all.
fortunately this shit isn’t so common where i live and most of the people i know who use hard drugs aren’t skaters, but that story was still scary and alarming. i had an acquaintance who overdosed on fent or some other opioid and i had some closer friends lose their fucking minds from abusing drugs and that shit scared me off any hard drugs, even the safer ones like amphetamine, haven’t done that in years. hopefully reading this will have the same effect on some other people, especially the skate community. just fucking stick to weed if you need to get high
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Heavy stuff. I appreciate the way it is handled in the article. Didnt know fentanyl could be found in coke and also that Grosso died because of it. So fucking sad!
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Heavy stuff. I appreciate the way it is handled in the article. Didnt know fentanyl could be found in coke and also that Grosso died because of it. So fucking sad!
I was mostly shocked on that news if any from this article. I thought he died from a heart attack.
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wtf i thought he died trying to slappy hollywood high
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Heavy stuff. I appreciate the way it is handled in the article. Didnt know fentanyl could be found in coke and also that Grosso died because of it. So fucking sad!
I was mostly shocked on that news if any from this article. I thought he died from a heart attack.
Really? I know nothing about the skate industry, but the moment he died, I immediately assumed it was an opioid overdose or otherwise related to opioids.
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The writing on the wall was pretty clear for both Phelps and Grosso but it's still fucked up to get confirmation. Fentanyl and meth are such big fucking issues right now and it's just getting worse because the country is so divided on how to address it so nothing actually gets done.
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Great article, pretty heartbreaking read. It really hurts to hear that Grosso succumbed to an overdose after struggling with his addiction his whole life. I had forgotten that he had been dealing with surgeries in the year or two prior to his death, that must have been what led him to relapse. Does anybody else have more information regarding his passing?
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Heavy stuff. I appreciate the way it is handled in the article. Didnt know fentanyl could be found in coke and also that Grosso died because of it. So fucking sad!
I was mostly shocked on that news if any from this article. I thought he died from a heart attack.
Really? I know nothing about the skate industry, but the moment he died, I immediately assumed it was an opioid overdose or otherwise related to opioids.
I just Googled it and it's all over the place how Grosso died from an autopsy. I guess for whatever reason, I never saw that.
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Was afraid about overdosing from the beginning
with Jake and Jeff. Fucking Fentanyl.
Getting the confirmation hurts, this fuck me up
we shoud speak out!
Drugs destroy your friendship, possible sexlife, your family and finally will kill you.
We have two main problems in our society- mental health issues and drug consume. Often both is connected. You can get help. You just need to ask and need to want to change.
No more silent - speak with your friends and family about mental health and drug consum.
Lost to manny to early - was not able to help back then.
Woud I be able to help today - I dont know - people need to want to make the change happen.
At least you can stay off shit yourself and creat a healthy circle around you. If people want to get off - you and your circle can embrace them and gave an opportunity to change.
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My coworkers grandpa od’d on coke with some fentanyl a couple months back, 70 years old shit is crazy. A bump of shitty 2023 coke is definitely not worth dying over, I’ve dabbled but I wouldn’t touch it nowadays
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Pretty much my whole highschool crew struggled with opioid abuse. Some are clean, some are in jail, some died. I really hate this shit.
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Thanks for posting. I worry a lot about my friends still getting high on Mission Street coke, but I try and always tell them so.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
for real. i dont even get the reasoning behind that, you're just gonna kill your clientele, they dont have an opiate tolerance that can handle that. Most people dont, thats why it even kills heroin junkies.
My thinking is that nobody purposely is putting fentanyl in coke, the contamination is occurring when dealers are packaging the drugs back to back on the same table or with the same tools and little or no cleaning between. That is the only answer that makes sense to me.
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it's all over the place how Grosso died from an autopsy
We got bad news: you died by our hands
we got good news: atleast we know how it happened
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Painful to read but important to start this discussion in skateboarding.
Talk to your friends, check in with them, & don't be afraid to speak up before it's too late
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i don’t understand the reasoning behind lacing shit with fenty, as another poster before me said you’re just going to kill your clientele. i’m sure that people who actually do sell hard drugs don’t really care about the well-being of their clientele, but isn’t it kind of counter-intuitive? i don’t get it at all.
fortunately this shit isn’t so common where i live and most of the people i know who use hard drugs aren’t skaters, but that story was still scary and alarming. i had an acquaintance who overdosed on fent or some other opioid and i had some closer friends lose their fucking minds from abusing drugs and that shit scared me off any hard drugs, even the safer ones like amphetamine, haven’t done that in years. hopefully reading this will have the same effect on some other people, especially the skate community. just fucking stick to weed if you need to get high
The producer don’t care about you, the consumer or the pusher.
He just produce fast and cheap as possible - the main distributer will find new pusher and the pusher clientel…
Selling drugs is like selling weapons- people will die sooner or later - you need to keep up running the traffic not making happy the final client.
El Chapo Didn’t get rich with customer relationship and satisfaction.
Sorry to say - dope and alcohol is the same system just lower risk / margin.
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Why is Tony giving an interview to a low level SF blog instead of putting an article in Thrasher? This information could have saved lives in the community. Just weird when the conclusion was ' this should have been publicized' then have the #1 guy who could have gotten the word out confirming it.
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Lost to manny to early - was not able to help back then.
RIP
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
I try to tell everyone, you can’t do coke anymore. It sucks but you are risking death for sure these days.
Aren’t you mr no fun
Edit- I’m mostly kidding, like I said not a big fan- feels OK for a little while and then the next day I’m a wreck. Not really worth it.
That being said not every dealer is a terrible person who doesn’t mind killing customers but I’ll still be more careful going forward. I’d never buy shit off the street. Really we should legalize so at least people don’t OD like this.
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drugs used to be so much simpler back then, now people can die from weed dipped in PCP. stuff like that would never have crossed my mind. it feels too crazy to do anything.
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If it weren’t for my homie being a responsible and educated user, I wouldn’t be here posting this.
narcan saves lives*brayden voice*
Please get fent test strips and test your drugs before using, many pharmacies and health clinics offer them for free or low cost
Edit: even if you don't use, I'd highly recommend learning how to administer narcan/naloxone and carrying it with you
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Sad to read but glad it's out there - hope it makes people think twice.
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I still miss Phelps. A tragic for sure. Cocaine is just not doable anymore. It's not worth it.
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wtf i thought he died trying to slappy hollywood high
The only reason they should cover up Phelps death is if he died skating a socal spot
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Pretty much my whole highschool crew struggled with opioid abuse. Some are clean, some are in jail, some died. I really hate this shit.
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Thanks for posting. I worry a lot about my friends still getting high on Mission Street coke, but I try and always tell them so.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
for real. i dont even get the reasoning behind that, you're just gonna kill your clientele, they dont have an opiate tolerance that can handle that. Most people dont, thats why it even kills heroin junkies.
My thinking is that nobody purposely is putting fentanyl in coke, the contamination is occurring when dealers are packaging the drugs back to back on the same table or with the same tools and little or no cleaning between. That is the only answer that makes sense to me.
This is exactly what is happening. unintentional cross contamination. face drugs are like playing russian roulette
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They don’t give a fuck about you. They only give a fuck about your money. Stop asking how or why the shits getting cut with fent. Get help, get test strips, or both.
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They don’t give a fuck about you. They only give a fuck about your money. Stop asking how or why the shits getting cut with fent. Get help, get test strips, or both.
test strips cannnot be relied on either as the fent is too small and will be unevenly distributed.
just get help. stay safe friends
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This was to be expected, not to go into too much personal detail it’s hard to read this, my fiancée is addicted to smoking pain pills…. While she wants to get help she refuses to believe half of the info that is out there about this epidemic. Some of it, is strait up truly fear mongering, the cops saying a pill or powder can absorb the light he skin, I get they are lying to try and scare people from drugs, but you lie about things and it makes it hard for people to know what is really something to be scared of, my fiancée is not stupid, she knows fentanyl unless on a patch can’t be absorbed through the skin on contact, now the problem is she refuses to believe anything related to the risk of it. I get why the family’s don’t want the true cause of death out there, but all they do by hiding things in increase people ignoring it
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wtf i thought he died trying to slappy hollywood high
The only reason they should cover up Phelps death is if he died skating a socal spot
While riding Trackers.
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Pretty much my whole highschool crew struggled with opioid abuse. Some are clean, some are in jail, some died. I really hate this shit.
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Thanks for posting. I worry a lot about my friends still getting high on Mission Street coke, but I try and always tell them so.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
for real. i dont even get the reasoning behind that, you're just gonna kill your clientele, they dont have an opiate tolerance that can handle that. Most people dont, thats why it even kills heroin junkies.
My thinking is that nobody purposely is putting fentanyl in coke, the contamination is occurring when dealers are packaging the drugs back to back on the same table or with the same tools and little or no cleaning between. That is the only answer that makes sense to me.
No, it's definitely intentional. It used to be chinese labs producing it and it got smuggled in via Mexico, but latest Intel I've seen is the cartels set their own labs up or shifted meth production to fentanyl. Its literally just a matter of numbers - you don't have to have a sophisticated network anymore, any jackoff with 5k and a smart phone can get a kilo of it shipped domestically and we aren't talking about savvy, low profile lifers here. We're talking street dealers mixing their batches up in a coffee grinder who just want to make a wad of cash to flash on social media. When someone dies they just "chalk it up to the game". It's not a long term business plan... it's a get rich quick scheme.
So nah, it's intentional and despite what the article implies/suggests in my experience it's usually not tainted coke, it's fake oxycodone 30s or "heroin" that's far stronger than intended. I know thats what it was in at least one of the cases they mentioned. I think people seem to cling on to the "tainted coke" idea so they don't have to think of their loved one as a junkie which is, ironically, a symptom of the cultural stigma of addiction. It definitely happens but the number of times I've seen actual like police reports or reliable testimony that the person was only seeking coke pales in comparison to the number of times I've seen a functional junkie have their secret exposed by ODing. Having lived in that world for too long and still having plenty of secondhand exposure through my program, I'd say most users are at the very least aware of the danger but when you're gettin it in that's not really a concern. You just never think it's going to be you... until it is.
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im not even gonna front, i'll do meth like once a year. especially if im getting pussy on it, that shit is pure magic when you're fucking. everything beyond that is pretty miserable tho.
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This was to be expected, not to go into too much personal detail it’s hard to read this, my fiancée is addicted to smoking pain pills…. While she wants to get help she refuses to believe half of the info that is out there about this epidemic. Some of it, is strait up truly fear mongering, the cops saying a pill or powder can absorb the light he skin, I get they are lying to try and scare people from drugs, but you lie about things and it makes it hard for people to know what is really something to be scared of, my fiancée is not stupid, she knows fentanyl unless on a patch can’t be absorbed through the skin on contact, now the problem is she refuses to believe anything related to the risk of it. I get why the family’s don’t want the true cause of death out there, but all they do by hiding things in increase people ignoring it
You need to get her help while she's only smoking them. If she won't actually go get help then you need to walk away (for your own sake) until she does. Don't sit on your hands and hope it will get better on its own because it won't. I lost the love of my life by not being proactive about this, don't make the same mistake I did.
If there's a silver lining here it's that she's destroying the majority of the active drug just via her ROA so her habit is likely very manageable with medical treatment and detox actually shouldn't be that bad. This shit isn't crack, most opiates don't tolerate heat well and what does get through has awful bioavailability, like 10-20% of what it would be if injected. She's mostly smoking inert binders and wax. People used to smoke fentanyl patches just because there was no other convenient way to abuse them but it's far from a "good" way to get high. So, if she's buying them off the street and not picking them up directly from the pharmacy itself then she's probably already had fake ones and had her life saved simply by the fact she's choosing the most inefficient way possible to get it into her bloodstream.
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This was to be expected, not to go into too much personal detail it’s hard to read this, my fiancée is addicted to smoking pain pills…. While she wants to get help she refuses to believe half of the info that is out there about this epidemic. Some of it, is strait up truly fear mongering, the cops saying a pill or powder can absorb the light he skin, I get they are lying to try and scare people from drugs, but you lie about things and it makes it hard for people to know what is really something to be scared of, my fiancée is not stupid, she knows fentanyl unless on a patch can’t be absorbed through the skin on contact, now the problem is she refuses to believe anything related to the risk of it. I get why the family’s don’t want the true cause of death out there, but all they do by hiding things in increase people ignoring it
Try to convince her to switch to kratom. It's a life saver for opiate addiction. A lot of people manage to successfuly get off opiates by switching to kratom and then weaning off. Her addiction seems manageable at this point. Don't wait for it to get worse. I'd also wait to get married until she's been clean for a while. Good luck and I hope everything works out for you two.
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im not even gonna front, i'll do meth like once a year. especially if im getting pussy on it, that shit is pure magic when you're fucking. everything beyond that is pretty miserable tho.
Be so fucking careful dude. I have had several friends go from 'once a year' to 'once a month' to 'only on weekends' to being full blown iceheads. It happened out of nowhere too. Just give that shit up, it's an evil drug
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Shame about Grosso, was hoping it died from heart issues, such a shame he turned back to drugs especially having a young son
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wtf i thought he died trying to slappy hollywood high
The only reason they should cover up Phelps death is if he died skating a socal spot
While riding Trackers.
Heavenride
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Pretty much my whole highschool crew struggled with opioid abuse. Some are clean, some are in jail, some died. I really hate this shit.
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Thanks for posting. I worry a lot about my friends still getting high on Mission Street coke, but I try and always tell them so.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
for real. i dont even get the reasoning behind that, you're just gonna kill your clientele, they dont have an opiate tolerance that can handle that. Most people dont, thats why it even kills heroin junkies.
My thinking is that nobody purposely is putting fentanyl in coke, the contamination is occurring when dealers are packaging the drugs back to back on the same table or with the same tools and little or no cleaning between. That is the only answer that makes sense to me.
No, it's definitely intentional. It used to be chinese labs producing it and it got smuggled in via Mexico, but latest Intel I've seen is the cartels set their own labs up or shifted meth production to fentanyl. Its literally just a matter of numbers - you don't have to have a sophisticated network anymore, any jackoff with 5k and a smart phone can get a kilo of it shipped domestically and we aren't talking about savvy, low profile lifers here. We're talking street dealers mixing their batches up in a coffee grinder who just want to make a wad of cash to flash on social media. When someone dies they just "chalk it up to the game". It's not a long term business plan... it's a get rich quick scheme.
So nah, it's intentional and despite what the article implies/suggests in my experience it's usually not tainted coke, it's fake oxycodone 30s or "heroin" that's far stronger than intended. I know thats what it was in at least one of the cases they mentioned. I think people seem to cling on to the "tainted coke" idea so they don't have to think of their loved one as a junkie which is, ironically, a symptom of the cultural stigma of addiction. It definitely happens but the number of times I've seen actual like police reports or reliable testimony that the person was only seeking coke pales in comparison to the number of times I've seen a functional junkie have their secret exposed by ODing. Having lived in that world for too long and still having plenty of secondhand exposure through my program, I'd say most users are at the very least aware of the danger but when you're gettin it in that's not really a concern. You just never think it's going to be you... until it is.
i can say with total certainty i had a friend die from fentanyl in his coke. it’s a cheap cut. i’m not saying it’s in all of it, but it’s in enough of it
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I have a friend who’s a nurse at a live in care home for the disabled and elderly who’s got a serious coke issue and he knows it. He’ll talk to us about how he wants to stop the bullshit, 3 beers later he disappears into the bathroom to make a discrete phone call and comes back all “I fucked up guys I’m gonna go meet someone in a few”
Rest of the night he’s an insufferable dickhead who doesn’t let you get half a sentence in before he either interrupts you or starts talking loudly about a wildly different subject to someone sitting nearby so EVERYONE in the room has to listen. Then the euphoria hits after a few more beers and he starts making plans to get breakfast the next morning, go golfing, go on a hike, get good food and come back later on and play some Gran Turismo and watch a movie or some shit while we grill. Never happens cause he stays up all night shoving shit up his nose and doesn’t get out of bed until 6pm because he’s so fucked up from the night before and can’t answer his phone.
Cokeheads are seriously the most annoying motherfucking people I’ve ever had to deal with but that doesn’t mean I want my boy to die. I’ve told him about this shit and tried to have a conversation about how he’s changed since he started hitting the snow, how much of a pain in the ass he is having us wait on him for plans he makes on top of various other shit he’s done, and he swears up and down he gets pure shit and shuts the whole conversation down after that, then drives away to the bar when 3 hours prior he’s crying about not wanting to lose his fiancee and his house.
YOU HAVE TO WANT THE HELP.
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I used to smoke pain pills in the 90's. I don't remember it having any particular upside, wasn't even a decent high, pretty pointless.
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im not even gonna front, i'll do meth like once a year. especially if im getting pussy on it, that shit is pure magic when you're fucking. everything beyond that is pretty miserable tho.
Be so fucking careful dude. I have had several friends go from 'once a year' to 'once a month' to 'only on weekends' to being full blown iceheads. It happened out of nowhere too. Just give that shit up, it's an evil drug
Agree don’t fuck with meth, this is no joke.
And having the right pussy - is magic too.
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I have a friend who’s a nurse at a live in care home for the disabled and elderly who’s got a serious coke issue and he knows it. He’ll talk to us about how he wants to stop the bullshit, 3 beers later he disappears into the bathroom to make a discrete phone call and comes back all “I fucked up guys I’m gonna go meet someone in a few”
Rest of the night he’s an insufferable dickhead who doesn’t let you get half a sentence in before he either interrupts you or starts talking loudly about a wildly different subject to someone sitting nearby so EVERYONE in the room has to listen. Then the euphoria hits after a few more beers and he starts making plans to get breakfast the next morning, go golfing, go on a hike, get good food and come back later on and play some Gran Turismo and watch a movie or some shit while we grill. Never happens cause he stays up all night shoving shit up his nose and doesn’t get out of bed until 6pm because he’s so fucked up from the night before and can’t answer his phone.
Cokeheads are seriously the most annoying motherfucking people I’ve ever had to deal with but that doesn’t mean I want my boy to die. I’ve told him about this shit and tried to have a conversation about how he’s changed since he started hitting the snow, how much of a pain in the ass he is having us wait on him for plans he makes on top of various other shit he’s done, and he swears up and down he gets pure shit and shuts the whole conversation down after that, then drives away to the bar when 3 hours prior he’s crying about not wanting to lose his fiancee and his house.
YOU HAVE TO WANT THE HELP.
That’s it - agree 100%
Your text gave me goosebumps- you totally describe my youth- I was surrounded by to manny coke heads.
Good people I grow up skating with- but sooner or late the disappearing in the bathroom starts- and then it was going down with them..
Nobody of them is in a loving and healthy relationship to a partner and family, build up career to feed kids - and of course is not skating with me.
I am only skating with the people who stoped fucking up themself latest in the late 20s.
If you already in your 30s and still consuming - get off.
Or you will end alone and fucked up sooner or later.
I don’t judge. It’s just my observation of myself and my friend cycle. I have done it all - intensive or just once - but between 16-25 - since 20 years I am off everything- having 2-4 beer and 2-3 per year.
Everyone who got off shit in the early late 20s was able to build up a proper life. And we still have a good relationship and enjoy each other.
People who never get off still consuming frequently in the late 30s - are all fucked up. Calling me once a year and talking about a glory / dream past - the have already slept half the day- and I was already skating with other guys. Or even worse begging for money.
I keep the contact to all of them - pick them up early in the day, invite them for a proper lunch. That’s all I can do for them.
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Why is Tony giving an interview to a low level SF blog instead of putting an article in Thrasher? This information could have saved lives in the community. Just weird when the conclusion was ' this should have been publicized' then have the #1 guy who could have gotten the word out confirming it.
Going to take a guess that Phelps' family are only speaking publicly about it now but didn't want to initially?
I thought Grosso died of covid. Bummer.
Fentanyl in coke is a grim prospect that I hope doesn't make it to where I live.
Smoking pills sounds weird. How is it done? Freebasing? It doesn't seem like the powder would burn well. Is it because they put the anti-crush components in pain pills so you can't sniff them?
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And though he was hobbled by broken bones and concussions, friends say that he was more tormented by his inability to skate the way he used to.
This part is scary for an old guy. I can relate.
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Didn’t phelps suffer quite a serious head injury at one of those hill bomb events? That could have been the trigger for using street drugs to medicate for pain……or was there always the suspicious he was using opiates ?
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Unpopular opinion- hill bombing, especially in yours fifties, is risky like street meth
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bombing hills is pure but you can get severely fucked up/killed doing it. i have to stop bombing hills after my knee heals and i’m distraught over it.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
I try to tell everyone, you can’t do coke anymore. It sucks but you are risking death for sure these days.
This place is to blame for covering up Phelps too, everyone was so pissed at people telling the truth when he died. People should be telling everyone when friends and family die from this shit, it’s fuckin terrible.
People in that thread were acting like Phelps' family were browsing SLAP and needed to be protected. The amount of power and influence slap pals think they have sometimes is embarrassing. This is an online forum and it's no longer the 2000s, nobody gives a shit about your post count or opinion on anything.
RIP Phelps
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Why is Tony giving an interview to a low level SF blog instead of putting an article in Thrasher? This information could have saved lives in the community. Just weird when the conclusion was ' this should have been publicized' then have the #1 guy who could have gotten the word out confirming it.
You put one on aluminum foil and heat it up from underneath with a lighter. The pill melts and you inhale the smoke with a straw. It's tricky to inhale all the smoke since it's not much and disappears quickly. A lot of people like doing it this way but I think it's dumb. Just snort it.
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Positive vibes going out to anyone dealing with an addiction either personal or with a loved one. Stay strong and stay smart out there.
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Could coke ever be legalized?…actual question. Could people handle legal/safe/guaranteed cocaine? Or would that create a demise in itself
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Why is Tony giving an interview to a low level SF blog instead of putting an article in Thrasher? This information could have saved lives in the community. Just weird when the conclusion was ' this should have been publicized' then have the #1 guy who could have gotten the word out confirming it.
You put one on aluminum foil and heat it up from underneath with a lighter. The pill melts and you inhale the smoke with a straw. It's tricky to inhale all the smoke since it's not much and disappears quickly. A lot of people like doing it this way but I think it's dumb. Just snort it.
I agree it is dumb, used to do this back in 2010-2011 when Oxys were everywhere. Very low bioavailability with this ROA, but hey when I eventually switched to heroin and all I could get was tar I knew exactly what to do lol.
I stopped fucking with opiates in 2019. I’d only snort heroin when I’d get powder or smoke it if I could only get tar. First tried H in 2015 after falling in love with oxy for years.
Fuck fentanyl, that shit doesn’t even feel good. All nod, no euphoria, but people seek it out bc their tolerances are jacked. I’ve stupidly have even purposely tried those fentanyl counterfeit M 30s. Shit fucking sucks and I was considered an “old head” bc I only wanted heroin and no fentanyl.
I’ve had many friends die from this shit. The fact that it’s in coke now, seriously everyone who uses recreational drugs should have fent test strips and narcan.
Anyone out there addicted to this shit rn, there’s light at the end of the tunnel but you have to want it for yourself. Kratom is your friend and will help you weather the storm. I was on it for 1.5 years after quitting dope before I stopped that too. Used kratom basically as my suboxone for the 8 years I was on opiates.
Also, you don’t have to be sober the rest of your life like rehab/recovery says. I’m clean from heroin 3.5 years, still smoke weed, drink a couple times a week, and take psychedelics. Hell I even did coke once last year. It’s not end all be all but the sooner you get off the junk and take accountability for yourself, the sooner life starts improving.
Sad shit for sure. I almost think it’d be better if it was still the pill mill days of 2009. Definitely the lesser evil compared to fentanyl
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I have a friend who’s a nurse at a live in care home for the disabled and elderly who’s got a serious coke issue and he knows it. He’ll talk to us about how he wants to stop the bullshit, 3 beers later he disappears into the bathroom to make a discrete phone call and comes back all “I fucked up guys I’m gonna go meet someone in a few”
Rest of the night he’s an insufferable dickhead who doesn’t let you get half a sentence in before he either interrupts you or starts talking loudly about a wildly different subject to someone sitting nearby so EVERYONE in the room has to listen. Then the euphoria hits after a few more beers and he starts making plans to get breakfast the next morning, go golfing, go on a hike, get good food and come back later on and play some Gran Turismo and watch a movie or some shit while we grill. Never happens cause he stays up all night shoving shit up his nose and doesn’t get out of bed until 6pm because he’s so fucked up from the night before and can’t answer his phone.
Cokeheads are seriously the most annoying motherfucking people I’ve ever had to deal with but that doesn’t mean I want my boy to die. I’ve told him about this shit and tried to have a conversation about how he’s changed since he started hitting the snow, how much of a pain in the ass he is having us wait on him for plans he makes on top of various other shit he’s done, and he swears up and down he gets pure shit and shuts the whole conversation down after that, then drives away to the bar when 3 hours prior he’s crying about not wanting to lose his fiancee and his house.
YOU HAVE TO WANT THE HELP.
Cokeheads are so draining to be around. I can relate to all of this so much. They need to take full control of the conversation and just talk AT you nonstop until they fade out. Combined with the skeevy disappearing to places to call and cop/reup, to disappearing to the bathroom to ingest said substances. It's fucking exhausting. My partner did all these same things and she's even in the same line of work as a care aid. I'll go through hell to stop her from going down that path again though.
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Why is Tony giving an interview to a low level SF blog instead of putting an article in Thrasher? This information could have saved lives in the community. Just weird when the conclusion was ' this should have been publicized' then have the #1 guy who could have gotten the word out confirming it.
Going to take a guess that Phelps' family are only speaking publicly about it now but didn't want to initially?
Maybe then sure, but how about now? Hardly any of the greater skate community at large is seeing this article. Signal boost from Thrasher could save lives.
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And though he was hobbled by broken bones and concussions, friends say that he was more tormented by his inability to skate the way he used to.
This part is scary for an old guy. I can relate.
im not even that old (30s) but I can relate, as injuries are keeping me from skating and physical activity, which used to give me joy and peace…now that’s coming from a bottle and occasionally other things more than I know is good for me. Can’t imagine how someone like Phelps or Grosso must’ve felt dealing with injuries when skating had been basically your whole life… I hope they have peace now.
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Could coke ever be legalized?…actual question. Could people handle legal/safe/guaranteed cocaine? Or would that create a demise in itself
Cocaine was sold over the counter and legal in the US until 1914.
But no, I don’t think people could handle it…
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I am unfamiliar with The Standard but why did Vitello give an interview to them about the death of Phelps as apposed to other media sites?
Could know the writer or respect the publication. Could be a timing thing, too. Maybe he just felt comfortable opening up about it and happened to be contacted by the writer at the right time.
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Man, what's wrong with just skating
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It seems like partaking in hard(er) drugs these days is, even moreso, legit playing with your life.
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Just say no.
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Pretty much my whole highschool crew struggled with opioid abuse. Some are clean, some are in jail, some died. I really hate this shit.
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Thanks for posting. I worry a lot about my friends still getting high on Mission Street coke, but I try and always tell them so.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
for real. i dont even get the reasoning behind that, you're just gonna kill your clientele, they dont have an opiate tolerance that can handle that. Most people dont, thats why it even kills heroin junkies.
My thinking is that nobody purposely is putting fentanyl in coke, the contamination is occurring when dealers are packaging the drugs back to back on the same table or with the same tools and little or no cleaning between. That is the only answer that makes sense to me.
This. this is exactly how it happens.
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I appreciate this article and think the conversation around any skater's death should be straightforward rather than shrouded in secrecy. The idea that Dave Abair and Mark Dillard both died from Fentanyl-laced coke in shocking to me. Knowledge of the specifics of their deaths can save lives.
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Could coke ever be legalized?…actual question. Could people handle legal/safe/guaranteed cocaine? Or would that create a demise in itself
Cocaine was sold over the counter and legal in the US until 1914.
But no, I don’t think people could handle it…
there's no way we could get "safe" coke, none, ever.
basically every doctor was a cokehead at the time it was a medical product, with all the symptoms a hard addiction can give you, just dunno how many OD cause its pretty easy if you like the stuff....
I live in the border with Bolivia and this shit its everywhere and cheap, but even here it gets mixed up with baby powder to last more/more income... now the reality its that this stuff its traveling half of the world to some dealers and they dont care about you, so clearly they are cutting it with whatever they find
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I appreciate this article and think the conversation around any skater's death should be straightforward rather than shrouded in secrecy. The idea that Dave Abair and Mark Dillard both died from Fentanyl-laced coke in shocking to me. Knowledge of the specifics of their deaths can save lives.
I agree, but I also respect the people who were close to him and to give them space…I’m happy this rolled out now, maybe less impact, but I can only imagine the pain his friends and family had…..
As someone who has posted on here for awhile….we love our car wrecks….but we don’t necessarily need all the gory details right away…it doesn’t help.
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Can't say I'm shocked, although I find the Gross "revelation" to be far-superior in the waterworks department.
I've already said my peace on this board about my own struggles with addiction, no need to beat the dead mini-horse.
But I'll say one thing, heroin was a whole heckride a lot safer than fentanyl could be even under the safest of circumstances.
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From my understanding you kinda can’t get Heroin anymore…..
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My first serious arrest was in the North Philly Badlands in 97. 14 bundles of double sealed stamped bags (just under 200 bags total). The stamp name was Volcano and was a widely known stamp being in newspapers in central PA for over a year or two by then. When I got to court, the case was thrown out because I refused to give a statement at any time, and the test was negative for heroin. I’d always assumed I was getting a heroin/ fentanyl mixture, and was surprised there was 0 heroin. Having become exposed to hard drugs through Grateful Dead tour, it was widely discussed that the “China White” everyone had been doing since the late 70s was not derived from poppies, and was completely synthetic, aka fentanyl. It’s my belief that the more recent wave of deaths is from benzo analogs becoming mixed in, as well as Xylezine, an animal tranquilizer.
On a positive note, I’m 6 years removed since my last relapse, and 2 weeks out of the methadone clinic after 24 years of maintenance. Slow taper works with professional counseling.
Does anyone know where to get the Dave Abair shirt that Walker Ryan was wearing recently?
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Never done heroin but it was my understanding fentanyl od rates are much lower on the west coast for actual heroin users because it’s mostly tar and not powder. Guess all those guys who passed could have been taking pressed pills but bad coke isn’t as implausible as people think
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I appreciate this article and think the conversation around any skater's death should be straightforward rather than shrouded in secrecy. The idea that Dave Abair and Mark Dillard both died from Fentanyl-laced coke in shocking to me. Knowledge of the specifics of their deaths can save lives.
I agree, but I also respect the people who were close to him and to give them space…I’m happy this rolled out now, maybe less impact, but I can only imagine the pain his friends and family had…..
As someone who has posted on here for awhile….we love our car wrecks….but we don’t necessarily need all the gory details right away…it doesn’t help.
I think you're wrong. Abair and Dillard died a year apart from the same apparent accidental cause. They meant to take coke but somebody cut it with fentanyl. Effectively they were murdered, and you want to say, "woah, woah let's not ask any questions about who killed them, on account of their friends and families".
Everyone I know who partakes of blow does so very casually. No one thinks of it as dangerous. Apparently it's dangerous now. At least in San Francisco. It might be cut with something that can kill you. It's fucking stupid to sweep shit like this under the rug. If I died in the same way I would want it to come out and potentially make a difference.
Somebody in the thread suggested using fent test strips. I mentioned it to my girlfriend and she laughed out loud. That's how much of a new concept it is to her.
I call bullshit on the so-called respectful silence around preventable deaths. I think it's the opposite of respectful.
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My guy, are you ok?
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Finally someone has the balls to write about this. I don't get how skaters can claim to embrace partying and be so weird or silent about the consequences. You wouldn't have seen that in any other sport or in music.
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Pretty much my whole highschool crew struggled with opioid abuse. Some are clean, some are in jail, some died. I really hate this shit.
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Thanks for posting. I worry a lot about my friends still getting high on Mission Street coke, but I try and always tell them so.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
for real. i dont even get the reasoning behind that, you're just gonna kill your clientele, they dont have an opiate tolerance that can handle that. Most people dont, thats why it even kills heroin junkies.
My thinking is that nobody purposely is putting fentanyl in coke, the contamination is occurring when dealers are packaging the drugs back to back on the same table or with the same tools and little or no cleaning between. That is the only answer that makes sense to me.
This. this is exactly how it happens.
I recall seeing some sort of special about Fentanyl and they interviewed many dealers of various drugs and all admitted to knowingly mixing it and other benzo analogs with literally everything you can think of and specifically called out coke. Their logic was a that it's so addictive and pleasurable that the right amount would bring back more return customers. At one point in Oakland there was a story about police seizing an ounce on someone during an arrest and it came back for Fentanyl.
If I recall the problem is particularly bad in California and in Canada. In California a lot of the Fentanyl or analogs are mixed in in Mexico even or large quantities are created in labs and smuggled across the border.
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damn, off laced coke
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Today at my local grocery store a dude died in the dairy section from fentanyl. People are dropping like flies. Rip to the lost souls.
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steer clear of drugs and alcohol. and choose ur homies wisely
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Today at my local grocery store a dude died in the dairy section from fentanyl. People are dropping like flies. Rip to the lost souls.
Damn, mooment of silence
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Pretty much my whole highschool crew struggled with opioid abuse. Some are clean, some are in jail, some died. I really hate this shit.
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Thanks for posting. I worry a lot about my friends still getting high on Mission Street coke, but I try and always tell them so.
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Fucked up they’re putting it in coke. I don’t even like coke that much but I’d rather not feel like I’m risking death on the rare occasions I have some.
for real. i dont even get the reasoning behind that, you're just gonna kill your clientele, they dont have an opiate tolerance that can handle that. Most people dont, thats why it even kills heroin junkies.
My thinking is that nobody purposely is putting fentanyl in coke, the contamination is occurring when dealers are packaging the drugs back to back on the same table or with the same tools and little or no cleaning between. That is the only answer that makes sense to me.
No, it's definitely intentional. It used to be chinese labs producing it and it got smuggled in via Mexico, but latest Intel I've seen is the cartels set their own labs up or shifted meth production to fentanyl. Its literally just a matter of numbers - you don't have to have a sophisticated network anymore, any jackoff with 5k and a smart phone can get a kilo of it shipped domestically and we aren't talking about savvy, low profile lifers here. We're talking street dealers mixing their batches up in a coffee grinder who just want to make a wad of cash to flash on social media. When someone dies they just "chalk it up to the game". It's not a long term business plan... it's a get rich quick scheme.
So nah, it's intentional and despite what the article implies/suggests in my experience it's usually not tainted coke, it's fake oxycodone 30s or "heroin" that's far stronger than intended. I know thats what it was in at least one of the cases they mentioned. I think people seem to cling on to the "tainted coke" idea so they don't have to think of their loved one as a junkie which is, ironically, a symptom of the cultural stigma of addiction. It definitely happens but the number of times I've seen actual like police reports or reliable testimony that the person was only seeking coke pales in comparison to the number of times I've seen a functional junkie have their secret exposed by ODing. Having lived in that world for too long and still having plenty of secondhand exposure through my program, I'd say most users are at the very least aware of the danger but when you're gettin it in that's not really a concern. You just never think it's going to be you... until it is.
I’ve known of 4 deaths off of tainted coke in my extended friend group alone, so idk where you get that it’s not occurring with coke
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Has anyone here actually done coke that was laced with fentanyl? Doesn't seem like something anyone would knowingly do but i'm wondering if you would do the coke and then immediately be like 'oh fuck' or if you wouldn't even realise
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I appreciate this article and think the conversation around any skater's death should be straightforward rather than shrouded in secrecy. The idea that Dave Abair and Mark Dillard both died from Fentanyl-laced coke in shocking to me. Knowledge of the specifics of their deaths can save lives.
I agree, but I also respect the people who were close to him and to give them space…I’m happy this rolled out now, maybe less impact, but I can only imagine the pain his friends and family had…..
As someone who has posted on here for awhile….we love our car wrecks….but we don’t necessarily need all the gory details right away…it doesn’t help.
I think you're wrong. Abair and Dillard died a year apart from the same apparent accidental cause. They meant to take coke but somebody cut it with fentanyl. Effectively they were murdered, and you want to say, "woah, woah let's not ask any questions about who killed them, on account of their friends and families".
Everyone I know who partakes of blow does so very casually. No one thinks of it as dangerous. Apparently it's dangerous now. At least in San Francisco. It might be cut with something that can kill you. It's fucking stupid to sweep shit like this under the rug. If I died in the same way I would want it to come out and potentially make a difference.
Somebody in the thread suggested using fent test strips. I mentioned it to my girlfriend and she laughed out loud. That's how much of a new concept it is to her.
I call bullshit on the so-called respectful silence around preventable deaths. I think it's the opposite of respectful.
Sorry about that….I shouldn’t have quoted it because TBH I don’t know anything about those deaths….I was talking about Jake’s within the context of the article.
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Has anyone here actually done coke that was laced with fentanyl? Doesn't seem like something anyone would knowingly do but i'm wondering if you would do the coke and then immediately be like 'oh fuck' or if you wouldn't even realise
I drank a coke whilst wearing fenty, but I don’t think that helps here
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The irony here is that the skateboarding industry has been piggybacking off of this partying mentality to present an exciting image of skateboarding to impressionable teens. If you make this your life, chances you also have an addictive personality and there you go.
TWS tried to pedal a family friendly version of skateboarding and went under. With olympics now in the picture and a new generations of nyjah-like kid robots training for the contests, Thrasher will probably have to keep peddling "the street lifestyle" to stay relevant for the "core" skaters. Thrasher did address mental illness quite extensively, but now it has to come clean about drugs/partying too.
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The irony here is that the skateboarding industry has been piggybacking off of this partying mentality to present an exciting image of skateboarding to impressionable teens. If you make this your life, chances you also have an addictive personality and there you go.
TWS tried to pedal a family friendly version of skateboarding and went under. With olympics now in the picture and a new generations of nyjah-like kid robots training for the contests, Thrasher will probably have to keep peddling "the street lifestyle" to stay relevant for the "core" skaters. Thrasher did address mental illness quite extensively, but now it has to come clean about drugs/partying too.
https://www.thrashermagazine.com/articles/over-it-article/
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The irony here is that the skateboarding industry has been piggybacking off of this partying mentality to present an exciting image of skateboarding to impressionable teens. If you make this your life, chances you also have an addictive personality and there you go.
TWS tried to pedal a family friendly version of skateboarding and went under. With olympics now in the picture and a new generations of nyjah-like kid robots training for the contests, Thrasher will probably have to keep peddling "the street lifestyle" to stay relevant for the "core" skaters. Thrasher did address mental illness quite extensively, but now it has to come clean about drugs/partying too.
I remember that article ... yet a lot of their media still promotes (drunken) partying (SOTY trips etc.)
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The irony here is that the skateboarding industry has been piggybacking off of this partying mentality to present an exciting image of skateboarding to impressionable teens. If you make this your life, chances you also have an addictive personality and there you go.
TWS tried to pedal a family friendly version of skateboarding and went under. With olympics now in the picture and a new generations of nyjah-like kid robots training for the contests, Thrasher will probably have to keep peddling "the street lifestyle" to stay relevant for the "core" skaters. Thrasher did address mental illness quite extensively, but now it has to come clean about drugs/partying too.
I remember that article ... yet a lot of their media still promotes (drunken) partying (SOTY trips etc.)
Tbf I don't think they are under any obligation or need to completely disavow the heckride lifestyle, just an acknowledgement of the darker side of these things occasionally and honesty about the number of skaters that have passed on, or even just piled out, through the temptations of that side of it might be timely and helpful for younger skaters every now and then.
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Credit due to Mr. Patrick O'Dell for making Epicly Later'd, mass media skateboarding content that spoke frankly about drugs and alcohol. So many episodes, basically all of the best ones, examine addicts before or after sobriety. He saved lives with those shows.
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The irony here is that the skateboarding industry has been piggybacking off of this partying mentality to present an exciting image of skateboarding to impressionable teens. If you make this your life, chances you also have an addictive personality and there you go.
TWS tried to pedal a family friendly version of skateboarding and went under. With olympics now in the picture and a new generations of nyjah-like kid robots training for the contests, Thrasher will probably have to keep peddling "the street lifestyle" to stay relevant for the "core" skaters. Thrasher did address mental illness quite extensively, but now it has to come clean about drugs/partying too.
I remember that article ... yet a lot of their media still promotes (drunken) partying (SOTY trips etc.)
as the only major skate mag left, thrasher will ultimately end up covering a wide swath of topics and approaches to skateboarding/the skateboarding lifestyle, which includes the sobriety-to-addiction spectrum. i don't think it's realistic to expect them to pretend partying on trips doesn't happen or to completely disregard skateboarders who aren't "family friendly". "sobriety coverage" has already bled its way into the mag with articles like "over it" (not-so-subtly published less than six months after Phelps' passing) and feature interviews (as more and more skateboarders embrace sobriety/a low-key lifestyle, it will inevitably bleed through into their coverage), and now the owner of the mag is very publicly addressing the circumstances that contributed to Phelps' death, which is much more than we can say for some other notable losses in skateboarding. i think these all count as big steps forward, for the magazine and for skateboarding as a whole
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Ok I’m convinced that coke is a bad idea. I was already headed in that direction so I think I’ll skip it from now on. Don’t need to orphan my son.
That being said I don’t think the Thrasher SOTY vids are a big deal. No kid needs thrasher to tell them that going to Europe, partying and skating is fun. And those vids are pretty tame-having a spritzer in the afternoon isn’t problematic drinking.
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I'm glad that this is being talked about and not being hushed up anymore. In the last year I lost one of my close friends since high school to a fentanyl overdose and watched another one of my best friends become a completely different person from getting heavily back onto opiates. That shit is no joke and will change your life in a heartbeat, no matter how hard you fight it.
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I think what's being left unsaid is that skating is an industry that depends on young people ruining their bodies. And getting broken off can often mean surgery and long-term therapy/recovery, and often that means medication, whether prescription or self-medicating with drugs and alcohol. That coupled with the party atmosphere that some companies still endorse often leads to addiction.
There's very little emphasis inside the industry on mental and emotional health, at least not until recently, so I'm glad to see this stuff finally being destigmatized, but it's got to be part of a larger conversation. Hopefully companies, especially larger ones with enough money to do so (energy drink and shoe sponsors), will start offering health insurance options.
Anyhoo, be careful out there, folks.
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Has anyone here actually done coke that was laced with fentanyl? Doesn't seem like something anyone would knowingly do but i'm wondering if you would do the coke and then immediately be like 'oh fuck' or if you wouldn't even realise
I've never done cocaine and never will, but I was at a party a few years back with friends who were doing a few bumps. Wasn't fent, but they immediately knew the stuff had been cut with something, likely meth based on the area we're in, moments after snorting. The smell or sensation must have been different.
Everyone be safe out there. Test your drugs. Festivals will usually give out free kits now. Try to get off the hard shit if you can. It's difficult as fuck, but you and your loved ones are worth it.
Fentanyl is a wonderful pain relieving drug in clinical applications. The problem is it started being illicitly manufactured in the mid 2010's and is now super super cheap to obtain. We're talking a third of the price of H.
Fentanyl has an extremely narrow therapeutic window. This means that it is therapeutic at extremely low, precise doses, and extremely toxic when you don't dose correctly. When used in clinical settings, the clinical pharmacist will literally do a dosage calculation with several mathematical factors in order to give the patient the appropriate therapeutic dose. Dealers/users are obviously not doing this. The specks of fent on the dealer's table that has been mixed in with all the other drugs is an unknown dose.
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heard murmurs that the point of cutting fentanyl into non heroin drugs is to cause addiction. can't say if it's that, ineptitude or outright murder but devious any which way. fentanyl doesn't last as long as normal opiates so it's more addicting as the user has to use more frequently.
first i heard of fentanyl killing users was about 20 years ago in philly (can't forget new jersey) and the story has come and gone a few times in the news cycle so i didn't pay too much attention. feels like it's more prevalent now.
if that carfentanyl hits the streets in any meaningful way, we're all fucked.
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Today at my local grocery store a dude died in the dairy section from fentanyl. People are dropping like flies. Rip to the lost souls.
have a gnar for that one haha
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Pops wrote this article as a response/his own commentary on the matter
https://anthonypappalardo.substack.com/p/lets-talk-about-quiet-partying?r=w1g6&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
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Pops wrote this article as a response/his own commentary on the matter
https://anthonypappalardo.substack.com/p/lets-talk-about-quiet-partying?r=w1g6&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
That's not the Anthony Poppalarado you're thinking of.