Consuming e: Ecstasy Use and Contemporary Social Life

Abstract

Research and popular commentary on Ecstasy often frames users as rebellious youth reacting against mainstream society via hedonistic rave parties and reckless intoxication. Critical consideration of the complex social and economic foundations of Ecstasy use is lacking in much of this youth-based research. Growing evidence, for example, suggests that a wide range of people take Ecstasy in a variety of contexts. Through the lens of anthro-economic approaches to consumption this article suggests that although Ecstasy is an illicit drug popular among youth, the symbolic meanings surrounding its use are also connected to the every-day. Accounts of 12 Ecstasy users from Canberra, Australia show how their experiences of Ecstasy, and the value the drug gives to their social relations, are firmly situated within the aspirations and confines of late capitalist consumer society. Participants' narratives were associated with ideologies about vitality, leisure and the importance of being social and energetic without impinging on one's other social responsibilities. Their patterns of Ecstasy consumption were not only connected to subcultural tastes and desires but changing values of leisure and consumption in wider contemporary life.