Sacred Drugs in the Sea of Information: The Intersection of Drugs, Religion, and Media Technologies

The intersection of religion, drugs, and media technologies is fertile ground for scholarship, yet it has remained relatively underexplored, even with the recent rise of the psychedelic humanities. Phenomena such as online trip reports, the intersection of 60s psychedelic culture and cyber-utopianism, and media portrayals of drug use tied to spiritual experience all indicate subtle yet significant connections between religion, drugs, and media. This roundtable discussion will touch upon explicit manifestations of religion and drugs in media as well as more esoteric phenomena such as psychedelic sex work, drug-inflected spirituality on social media, and the ways in which certain online religious communities gravitate toward drugs and religion. Panelists will also discuss the implications of these topics for the current Psychedelic Renaissance, offering necessary critiques that demonstrate the potential for scholars of religion to contribute to larger interdisciplinary discussions surrounding psychedelics and beyond.