
Honest People Might Be Dangerous - lionhearted
http://www.sebastianmarshall.com/?p=1416
======
droithomme
I find most interesting how he is permanently banned and there is, in order to
enforce this, obviously now a federal searchable record tied into his SSN
noting him as a liability that should be avoided for all future secure
employment.

This reminds me of the parallel system used by "health insurance companies".
If you have some minor issue you later don't disclose on an application form,
then if you do later become ill with something expensive to treat like cancer,
your records are searched (held by private companies who collect this
information), and your policy undergoes rescission, a form of legal annulment.
A couple years ago I had some heart pains and got an EKG. It was nothing and
proved to be indigestion after eating too many onions. I discussed it with the
doctor and he agreed to take cash for that one and make no record of it with
my name due to the risk of later being denied health care should I ever
actually have heart disease for not reporting a possible preexisting
condition.

Of course all this is only possible because of the work we engineers do for
the powers that exist for profit and work the angles to make sure their
systems don't provide health care and deny honest people the ability to work
for law enforcement.

~~~
wazoox
What's interesting in your case, and particularly frightening, is that any
preventative care or examination is actually forbidden, which is the most
counter-productive possible choice both for your health and the cost of
maintaining it in the long term. It's strikingly brain-dead.

------
micheljansen
Not to intend to hijack this thread with a sideline, but I find it interesting
that the author's problems were caused by the mushrooms he consumed in
Amsterdam, at a time when doing so was presumably still legal in The
Netherlands. In other words, he did nothing illegal at all.

I spent some time in the US as an intern at a large corporation and part of
the admission procedure (on the day of arrival) was a drug test. My contract
clearly stated that my employment was contingent on a negative outcome of that
drug test.

I happen to be from The Netherlands, a country where as an adult I am allowed
to smoke weed should I choose to (even though I don't). Apart from the
legality of this, would they really have sent me back for doing something that
is legal in my country?

The test would actually have detected any weed consumed up to 6 weeks in
advance if I remember correctly. I got the notice perhaps 4 weeks before the
test, so if I would have been a regular smoker, it would have been a quite
likely outcome.

Can you really be held accountable for doing nothing wrong?

~~~
Swizec
Drugs are a touchy subject in the US. I imagine nobody in Europe would do a
hire/don't-hire decision based on a drug test. In fact everyone I've ever
worked for here in Slovenia where weed is illegal were pretty open about their
history (or not so much history) of weed use.

It's very culturally accepted in most of Europe that you smoke weed or have at
least at some point in your life. If you claim to have gotten through high
school and college without at least _trying_ weed ... I don't think anyone
will take you seriously. Even less so if it happens to be true.

Why are americans like this when it comes to drugs? I don't know, and I think
most noncorporate types aren't like that in the US either.

As for being held accountable for doing nothing wrong ... would you hire
somebody who drinks half a bottle of vodka a day? They're doing nothing wrong
mind you.

~~~
micheljansen
> If you claim to have gotten through high school and college without at least
> trying weed ... I don't think anyone will take you seriously.

Interestingly, I know a lot of people in The Netherlands who have not and will
never smoke weed, whereas in the USA I had the feeling that nearly everyone
(especially the college crowd) was a stoner. If I were to give my non-expert
experience, I would guess that about 50% of the people I met in the USA had
ever smoked weed, compared to 25-30% in the NL.

> As for being held accountable for doing nothing wrong ... would you hire
> somebody who drinks half a bottle of vodka a day? They're doing nothing
> wrong mind you.

Someone who drinks half a bottle of wodka a day is doing something wrong. They
are alcoholic and probably not able to function in any job, let alone a job
that expects someone to behave responsibly. Wrong <> illegal.

~~~
droithomme
I'll assume a bottle is a fifth gallon, or 750ml. Half that is 375ml, about 12
ounces, and thus about 12 shots.

I have often enough drunken half that, 1/4 bottle a booze, three double-shot
drinks over the course of an evening 4-6 hours. It's definitely not enough to
be drunk at that rate or even tipsy. I function just fine. Double that I would
be rather tipsy and not enjoy it. But I have known people that polish off a
half and even a whole fifth in a single evening. I suppose those are the
drunks. They usually function perfectly fine at work and are often top
contributors.

I've never smoked pot myself but I know plenty who do and a lot of them are
really fine developers, even though they get completely wasted every single
evening.

The people that seem to be negatively affected in work are the amphetamine and
narcotic users, both of which are often legally prescribed to them for ADHD or
back pain. Those folks can get a bit edgy.

As far as flashbacks, I did know one LSD user who had them. But this guy had
been very irresponsible and done several dozen hits one day which landed him
in an insane asylum for over a year, after which he remembered nothing. He was
definitely messed up. Casual users I know of hallucinogens have told me
they've never had a flashback. I have noticed though that long term casual
users tend to become more and more flaky so I would consider that a negative
in a job interview, except that I don't ask such questions of people in that
situation. I am skeptical of the claim the authorities made that the person in
the referenced article is genuinely at risk of flashbacks because of a single
incident of mushroom use years ago.

~~~
defen
FYI a shot is actually 1.5 ounces, so half a bottle would be about 8 shots,
not 12.

~~~
dhimes
Actually, a _jigger_ is 1.5 ounces. A shot is 1 ounce.

~~~
defen
I guess it depends on the country. In the U.S. it's 1.5 ounces.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shot_glass#Sizes>

~~~
dhimes
More likely it has changed over time.

[http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&biw=135...](http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&biw=1354&bih=531&q=what+is+difference+between+jigger+and+shot)

I'll admit, I'm old and my learning (through bartender's school, no less)
reflects that. Most shot glasses will hold a jigger, but you don't fill it for
a shot. Further down the page you linked, under "jigger," shows a tool we
use(d). A "shot" was a drink, the "measure" was a jigger (1.5 oz) or a shot
(1.0 oz). In programming terms, the word "shot" was overloaded.

------
bilbo0s
I hate being THAT GUY, but I can tell you with authority that the quickest way
out of PLC is an Integrity Violation. The Marine Corps will work with you on
youthful indiscretions like drug use. Integrity Violations? Yeah...not so
much. That will get you an all expense paid ticket out of Quantico, from
Reagan I think.

So...I don't know...police in California may think honesty is less than
useful, but I would be careful about painting all law enforcement, military
and intel agencies with too broad a brush.

The only thing one can reasonably conclude from your experience, is that there
is a chance that certain California police forces could be corrupt. Which,
frankly, comes as little surprise to people outside of California. Though I
can understand the consternation it may cause to people in California.

~~~
tomjen3
What exactly is an integrety violation? Cheating on you spouse?

~~~
bilbo0s
Yes and No. Basically it is ANY kind of lie.

Saying you didn't do drugs when you did. Etc, etc.

~~~
pavel_lishin
I assume that it's the same sort of thing as talking to a federal officer -
even an accidental lie would count against you? Such as, say, getting blackout
drunk in college and taking a hit off of a joint, and then passing out in your
bed with no memory thereof - but the incident being clear in the memory of
someone they're interviewing about you.

------
sivers
Great quote by an Australian immigration officer:

“You give us the papers _we_ want. We give you the papers _you_ want.”

Meaning:

“Just make the form look the way you know we want it to look, and we'll give
you the resulting documents you want.”

~~~
mechanical_fish
When making jokes about bureaucracy, or constructing poorly-written fiction
about bureaucracy, or - most dangerous of all - attempting to implement a
bureaucracy as a computer program, there's a tendency to take the risk of
deadlock too seriously. If you get the system into a state of logical
contradiction, the theory goes, it will grind to a halt, or possibly explode.

But in the human world _deadlocks don't happen_ , at least not for as long as
you think. They resolve - sometimes peacefully, sometimes fitfully, but they
resolve. The vast majority resolve so quickly that you barely notice they
happened, because once a person has tried a particular deadlock-resolution
strategy once or twice, and nothing has blown up as a result, they make a
_habit_ of that strategy and get really good at it. Eventually the strategy
might even get _institutionalized_ ; it becomes part of the on-the-job
training that everybody gets but that nobody ever talks about or writes down.

(And, sometimes, eventually something _does_ blow up. But the proximate cause
of that explosion won't look like a deadlock. If you investigate it, however,
you may find that the root cause _was_ a deadlock, one that got resolved in an
unhappy way. So maybe it's wrong to say that the risk of deadlock is less than
it appears; instead, we say that deadlocks are very risky, but the risk is not
that the system will halt, but rather that it will grind forward in the wrong
way.)

There are rules that are on the books that everyone pledges to follow, but
that nobody actually follows. There are forms that everyone knows must be
filled out a certain way, regardless of the surrounding circumstances. There
are signatures that are consistently signed by underlings, but almost never by
the person whose name is being signed. There are shortcuts that, if the
engineers knew about them, would be cause for suspicion, but they make the job
go faster, and the engineers _don't_ know about them, perhaps because whenever
they see one in progress they cover their eyes and mutter "oh, wow, I didn't
see that", so let me just show you this trick very quietly, and please don't
talk too loudly about it.

And obviously this can become pathological - I'm heard that, in particularly
corrupt societies, bureaucrats can make a living by explicitly and openly
_manufacturing_ deadlocks which they will resolve for you for a fee, and
everyone understands this and just travels around with a stack of bills - but
it's also the essential lubricant that makes bureaucracy work at all. I'm not
sure we have any evidence that, say, an enterprise on the scale of a
corporation can work _without_ such quintessentially human intervention.

------
Alex3917
There is actually research showing that police officers are vastly more likely
to lie about their past drug use than the general public. In fact, this is one
of the reasons we know that surveys of drug usage are generally accurate.

Erowid explains it here, I think in part 2 of the article:

[http://www.erowid.org/psychoactives/statistics/statistics_ar...](http://www.erowid.org/psychoactives/statistics/statistics_article1.shtml)

------
ImprovedSilence
Going into college, I had a scholarship with the Air Force ROTC program. I was
honest about one specific allergy I had, and was denied my medical exam, thus
I couldn't join the Air Force. I still did it for one semester, while applying
for a medical waiver, and found out that several of the other cadets
(especially those wanting to be pilots) had lied about particular issues.
Several of those who did came from military families, who more or less knew
how much you could fudge, and what you could get away with, and were open
about lying about several more severe issues than mine.

Also one of my friends was rejected, because he was honest and said he smoked
weed more than their arbitrary limit of 10 times in the past.

------
phaus
Fortunately for me, I have led a boring life and therefore I didn't find it
difficult to tell the truth when I joined the Army.

On the other hand, I did have a friend who was told by his recruiter to be
"honest." My friend didn't pick up on the recruiter's sarcasm so he told the
entire truth about his past adventures with narcotics. He even told them that
he has acid flashbacks a few times a year.

They still let my friend enlist(Hell, we were in the middle of a war), but it
took him nearly all of his 4 year enlistment to get the Top Secret clearance
he required to do his job. All of our supervisors acted like he was an idiot
for actually telling the truth.

------
alexandros
Ah yes, the eternal argument by anecdote.

So let's say you've shown that 'Honest People Might Be Dangerous'. How about a
few anecdotes where a trivial lie led to a disaster? There, I've proven that
'Dishonest People Might Be Dangerous' too. What does this add up to? The ever-
insightful 'People Might Be Dangerous' lemma. Now, given a choice between the
'Honest' and 'Not-entirely-honest' model of human, which one would you choose
to work with?

~~~
dodedo
Well, that's not what he's saying, did you read the article? His point is that
these employment questionnaires are designed to filter out people who tell the
truth about fairly common drug activities, which creates a bias towards hiring
liars.

The title "Honest People Might Be Dangerous" is sarcastic and tongue in cheek.
He did not argue that they are actually dangerous.

~~~
dwyer
I wouldn't say it's designed to filter out honest people, it's designed to
filter out people whose past drug use could be a liability. Is it really so
ridiculous to assume that anybody can honestly answer no to those questions?
While marijuana use is certainly common where I've lived most of my life, I'm
well aware it's not as common in other places, and I know plenty of people who
have never used it.

In any case, the article says nothing to imply that the author's past
marijuana use was the problem. The issue was with hallucinogens and I would
assume that most people can honestly say they've never taken any.

~~~
kevinpet
It's ridiculous to assume that such a screening will reliably exclude drug
users. It's also quite plausible that the screening will increase the number
of heavy drug users you hire. Consider:

1\. Some people haven't ever used drugs. These people can safely answer
honestly.

2\. Some people have experimented with drugs in the past, but were never heavy
users. These people may naively assume that your screening criteria align with
modern societal norms that smoking pot in college is forgivable, but you
shouldn't continue to use drugs once you move into the real world. These
people will answer honestly and be excluded.

3\. Some people may be current users, or former heavy users, and expect that
they would not be hired if they answer honestly. Given that they are already
active criminals (drug users) they may be more likely to lie.

Net result is that you exclude only 2, and your workforce is populated only by
1 and 3. I think most people, even those who created these policies, would
prefer a workplace populated by groups 1 and 2.

~~~
Psyonic
"I think most people, even those who created these policies, would prefer a
workplace populated by groups 1 and 2."

The people that created the policies... sure. Most people? Why? I have no
problem with current drug users. Silicon Valley is chock full of semi-regular
to regular pot smokers. And who knows how many take a few hits of ecstasy or
mushrooms at their annual Burning Man or Coachella outings. You really see
this as an issue? To be honest, I actively prefer to work with these people.
You wouldn't have hired Carl Sagan?

As long as it's not affecting the quality of their work, why do you even care?

~~~
HalibetLector
did you bother to read the article? we're not talking about hiring for
startups. We're talking about hiring for police/emergency services. Having a
selection bias against hiring honest cops sounds like a problem to me.

~~~
Psyonic
I read the article, and I still disagree. I shouldn't have limited myself to
the startup scene. A good friend of mine is a paramedic in training in Austin,
and not only has he done hallucinogens a fair amount of times, but many of his
coworkers have as well. Yet I'd challenge you to find someone more reliable or
dedicated. He's since stopped smoking pot, but primarily because of drug-
testing, not because it affects his on-the-job performance. He'd never work
high, of course.

I get the liability issue, even if I think it's dumb, but I honestly don't
think occasional drug use should have any bearing on even emergency service
jobs. Yes, I am ok with my potential ER surgeon smoking a spliff to relax
after a long stressful day.

If we as a society were more open and accepting of this, responsible users
wouldn't feel the need to lie and we wouldn't have this problem.

------
DrJokepu
This is not legal advice or anything, but if anyone ever asks you whether
you've broken the law or consumed drugs etc in the past, you say no,
regardless whether you're telling the truth or not.

~~~
splat
I wouldn't do this if that person were a federal agent. Lying to a federal
agent is a serious felony. (Of course, you shouldn't ever say anything of
substance to a federal agent without a lawyer.)

~~~
praptak
> Lying to a federal agent is a serious felony.

Not legal advice or anything but lying to protect one's own ass is a very
special case of lying and gets much more protection than plain vanilla lying.

~~~
DanBC
Depending on the situation you should either just decline to comment, or
answer truthfully. Lying is usually bad.

~~~
TheAmazingIdiot
I remember reading that federal agents are a special case.

You're screwed if you lie. You're screwed if you tell the truth. You're also
screwed if you choose to remain silent, as that's used against you.

The only safe answer is "I cannot discuss that until I discuss it with
counsel.

------
PaulHoule
The fear of hallucinogens is widespread in the blue universe. I've been told
that former LSD users aren't allowed to be pilots in the U.S. because of the
fear of "flasbacks"

You know there's some psychiatrist in Isreal who has diagnosed thousands of
cases of "post hallucinogen perceptual disorder", probably because PHPD
disqualifies a person from service in the Isreal armed forces.

~~~
Alex3917
HPPD isn't the same as flashbacks, it just consists of seeing things like
floaters, slightly breathing walls, and fringing where there are straight
lines. It probably wouldn't be safe for someone with HPPD to fly a military
plane though. When treated correctly the condition normally presents few or no
problems in everyday life at least after the first few months, but things like
stress, sleep deprivation, and all psychoactive drugs (including caffeine) can
make the symptoms much worse.

~~~
PaulHoule
Given that one doctor diagnoses most of the cases in the world and that it
happens in a country that has a draft for a self-destructive war, I've got a
suspcision that HPPD is a form of malingering.

~~~
Alex3917
While I'm sure some or even many in Israel are faking it to get out of
service, there's no doubt that it's a real condition and there are hundreds of
threads on the Internet about it. It's fairly uncommon if you only do
psychedelics once or twice a year, sleep properly before and after, don't mix
them with other drugs, are eating healthfully, and don't expose yourself to
any other major stressors. But once you start doing them 5 or 6 times a year
your chances of getting it seem to be 20-30%, and only go up from there. Here
are some Google links for you:

[https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-
instant&ix=...](https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-
instant&ix=sea&ie=UTF-8&ion=1#sclient=psy-
ab&hl=en&site=webhp&source=hp&q=site:bluelight.ru+hppd&pbx=1&oq=site:bluelight.ru+hppd&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=3&gs_upl=3711l6240l2l6413l8l8l0l0l0l2l131l631l6.2l8l0&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=cd966fbc5ee5cb60&ix=sea&ion=1&biw=1413&bih=727)

[https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-
instant&ix=...](https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-
instant&ix=sea&ie=UTF-8&ion=1#sclient=psy-
ab&hl=en&site=webhp&source=hp&q=site%3AReddit.com%20hppd&pbx=1&oq=&aq=&aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=&gs_upl=&fp=cd966fbc5ee5cb60&ix=sea&ion=1&ix=sea&ion=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=cd966fbc5ee5cb60&biw=1413&bih=727&ix=sea&ion=1)

[https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-
instant&ix=...](https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-
instant&ix=sea&ie=UTF-8&ion=1#sclient=psy-
ab&hl=en&site=webhp&source=hp&q=site%3Aerowid.org%20hppd&pbx=1&oq=&aq=&aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=&gs_upl=&fp=cd966fbc5ee5cb60&ix=sea&ion=1&ix=sea&ion=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=cd966fbc5ee5cb60&biw=1413&bih=727&ix=sea&ion=1)

[https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-
instant&ix=...](https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-
instant&ix=sea&ie=UTF-8&ion=1#sclient=psy-
ab&hl=en&site=webhp&source=hp&q=site:shroomery.org+hppd&pbx=1&oq=site:shroomery.org+hppd&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=3&gs_upl=4002l11103l0l11267l10l10l0l0l0l3l153l784l6.3l9l0&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=cd966fbc5ee5cb60&ix=sea&ion=1&biw=1413&bih=727)

For what it's worth it's also in the DSM.

------
jrockway
I had my moment of zen when some secret service agents came to my house to
question me about a 6-month-old Slashdot comment. They looked around for guns,
and finding none, needed to administer a "metal health exam". As they started
asking the questions, I realized "wait. these people are not doctors. they
don't give a flying fuck about my mental health. they need me to say the
correct answers so they can close their case." I answered the questions
correctly and they closed their case.

The moral of the story: many questions are asked to see if you know the right
answer, not because they actually want to know the answer to the question.

~~~
lucisferre
Sorry but what in the world kind of /. comment could justify a search and
interrogation?

~~~
jrockway
The thread was "things you can't say on the Internet." My contribution was, "I
am going to kill the president".

Turns out, I'm right.

~~~
sirrocco
Get ready for another visit son.

~~~
jrockway
The problem was that there was no context in the /. post. Once I showed them
the context it wasn't a problem.

So hopefully if the context is very close to the unmentionable remark, federal
agents are not dispatched.

------
xxcode
You have to be honest because you want to be. Because you dont want to project
what you're not, and because you dont want to remember for the rest of the
life the lie you said in order to be consistent.

Honesty is for yourself, and not for other people. In my opinion, it was right
that you said the truth, and that you failed. You should argue that you
shouldn't have failed, not that you dont need to tell the truth.

IMHO, and probably the contrarian view. But the contrarian view is of value
because it makes you think. Please think of that before you downvote/upvote
the comment.

------
mcantelon
Yup. The ability to deceive and manipulate is the most marketable skill on the
planet. Security forces don't want folks with principles beyond doing what
they're ordered to do. A cop that isn't willing to lie in court is going to
win a lot fewer convictions.

------
fiatmoney
The point of these questions is often to get you to lie. Oftentimes this is a
felony in and of itself (for instance, in federal background investigations),
which gives the organization requesting the information leverage over you (and
also over any references that have falsely attested to your sobriety).

------
Darmani
There's a bit more going on here.

Some companies give "honesty-integrity assessments" to predict whether
candidates may steal from the company, sexually harass employees, etc. How do
they predict whether someone would do that?

They simply ask.

People who steal gratuitously will often rationalize the behavior by
convincing themselves that "everyone steals something." When they see the
questions, they'll think that, if they mark that they would never steal
anything, they'll be flagged as a liar. And then they're caught.

The drug questionnaire presumably acts under similar principles. The people
who mark "Hallucinogens -- once in my life" tend to be the people who pop a
pill every week.

------
yabai
It is a shame that America sets the tone for much of the world when it comes
to drugs.

~~~
veb
It's more of a United Nations thing, rather than the US.

~~~
Cadsby
It is most definitely is a US thing. I say this as an American.

------
wisty
The point is not to admit liars. They genuinely _don't_ want stoners in the
service.

Now, you can argue till you are blue in the face that you will simply get more
dishonest members, and this greatly outweighs the benefits of throwing out a
few occasional users. But, ultimately speaking, these admission conditions are
designed by committees, and there's always someone on the committee who
doesn't want stoners at any cost.

------
Symmetry
Unlike most jobs, being a police officer requires a lot of lying, from "We
have proof you did it, so confess now" to "I stopped and searched him because
I saw something suspicious". Other jobs, like being a researcher on classified
projects have different requirements, and admitting to a bit of drug use there
won't get you in trouble.

------
keeptrying
This is an example of a rule that is intertwined within the fabric of American
society - Never take the blame.

At least not in a public place or where it will go on record. Even if its your
fault, you regret what happened and want to make amends. Even in that case its
better to push off all blame and then go ahead and make amends.

This goes for everything from car insurance to dealing with any government
body to dealing with corporate workplace issues to dealing with Americans in
general.

Recently I was struck by this thought when Rex Ryan took the blame for the
JETS awful season and in doing so a lot of sports writers questioned whether
that was wise because it could mean that another losing season would mean the
end of his tenure. A lot of writers mentioned casting the blame on others was
a better action for the coach to have followed. Or even to have said nothing
at all.

------
itmag
My take on honesty:

I'm not comfortable being incongruent (ie having a mismatch between my inner
state and outer communication).

Even a relatively small amount of incongruence (ie minor sucking-up to
unworthy bosses, things of that nature) causes me to become cynical and jaded.

I think this is a good thing AND a bad thing. Good thing because people know
that I am less likely to be a fake-fuck and just nod along with their
bullshit, bad thing because sometimes life requires some machiavellianism
and/or smarminess.

Solutions for this dilemma?

PS. Sebastian Marshall is my new favorite blogger these past couple of months.
I love his style. I would recommend everyone get his book:
<http://www.amazon.com/Ikigai-ebook/dp/B006M9T8NI> (full disclosure: I want to
gain some brownie-points from Mr Marshall).

------
3pt14159
Buddy of mine was getting a job where he needed to be heavily, heavily
interviewed by CSIS.

Lots of polygraphs forms, etc. Detailed political interviews. Anyways, they
get to this really thick form and the female CSIS interviewer says "please
provide me a rough explanation of your history with illegal drugs," buddy says
"Never. Not once." "Never?" "Never." One check box checked on the form the
rest left unfilled.

Oh and my buddy was being truthful, but if you have to lie do it like that.
"Never. Not once."

------
malkia
There is one great movie about this: Gattaca (1997) -
<http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119177/>

------
Herring
More like Stupid People Might Be Dangerous. If you don't know to navigate a
bureaucracy, don't expect to be anywhere near a position that might generate
liability.

------
johngalt
No police officer has ever smoked weed, yet they all instantly know and can
identify the smell?

I doubt they disqualify ex military members because of the potential for
flashbacks.

~~~
Alex3917
The idea that psychedelics can cause flashbacks is a myth in the first place.
It's completely impossible.

~~~
ScottBurson
Half right. They don't recur indefinitely, but they can happen within the
first week or two after the trip.

~~~
Alex3917
But that isn't at all relevant to hiring, since past psychedelic use can't
cause future flashbacks as long as the person doesn't keep using those drugs.
And plus the flashbacks that happen in the first week usually only happen if
one smokes weed or else is sleep deprived or otherwise stressed out, it's not
something that commonly happens at random. And that's being generous and
assuming that flashbacks is even the right term, since it's really just your
consciousness temporarily reacting differently to other neurological stimuli
rather than being purely endogenous.

~~~
ScottBurson
_But that isn't at all relevant to hiring_

Agreed.

Having had a flashback once -- 30 years ago, I hasten to add, for benefit of
my future employer who has dug up this comment :-) -- I think it was
endogenous.

------
rasur
Good old Hypocrisy, the Human Race's favourite past-time.

I'm not saying the article is hypocritical, I'm observing the greater issue
here. Sad, but true.

------
zupatol
It's good to stay away from an organization that rewards lying. You're lucky
to have found this out before working there.

------
count
If you've broken the law, why should you be allowed to assume a position of
trust with respect to the law?

~~~
rogerbinns
To a first approximation, 100% of people have broken speed limits at some
point. Where do you suggest we find the unicorns who have never done so?

------
dreamdu5t
Democracy at work. The majority of Americans support putting you in jail for
smoking weed and doing mushrooms in Amsterdam. Wake the fuck up.

------
trustfundbaby
welcome to life

------
Craiggybear
Honesty is seen as a liability in modern life. We never see it from
politicians, bankers or public figures and people lie constantly about their
CVs, jobs, income and so forth.

Why even bother _asking_ if someone's ever done drugs? The chances are they
will not be telling the truth anyhow, so you may as well rely on gut instinct
and make the assumption everyone is lying all the time.

Sadly, today in every walk of life, its just a matter of making the "right"
noises at the appropriate time to the right people. And that's not good. For
anyone.

Tell the truth, shame the devil, take the consequences, one time. It often
works out better than you might think.

------
rkon
Taking advice from Sebastian Marshall is dangerous. Seriously, are his
articles being upvoted by trolls or are there actually that many morons in
this community now? The kid wouldn't know the difference between a billion
dollar business and a steaming bag of shit, and 30 seconds on his blog will
prove I'm right. Shirtless homemade videos of yourself scribbling "business
strategies" on a whiteboard and insulting every major company you've come in
contact with? Classy.

I would say I pity him, but it's hard to feel sorry for someone who publicly
ridicules his colleagues by repeatedly calling them all "fucking jokers" in a
10,000 word rant on his blog.

Downvote this if you're stupid enough to take advice from a tactless wannabe
with the business sense of a doorknob.

~~~
irahul
> Downvote this if you're stupid enough to take advice from a tactless wannabe
> with the business sense of a doorknob.

I happened to have read a bunch of his articles(shirtless video, joker, pro-
win). I disliked all of them. I read this one - this is just an anecdote about
bureaucratic dance, with a cheesy title.

I can make my mind about something based on its objective measure, and your
vile comment is totally unnecessary.

