The War on Our Mental Health- How the Psychedelic Renaissance is Amplifying Calling-In instead of Calling-Out

By Bernadine Fried, LMFT

Canceled Culture Tragedy

In January 2024, Alexander Rogers, a 20-year-old student at Oxford University, died by suicide after being ostracized by peers due to unfounded rumors. An inquest revealed that he was a victim of pervasive cancel culture, leading to profound distress.

Eugenia Cooney, a YouTuber known for her fashion and makeup content, faced significant online criticism due to concerns about her health and appearance. In 2019, after a period of absence, she returned to address her struggles with an eating disorder. The public discourse around her health, often lacking sensitivity, exacerbated her mental health challenges. Cooney has since spoken about the impact of online shaming and the importance of supportive conversations around mental health.

When Calling Out Turns Inward

For years now, we’ve been watching a modern ritual unfold on social media: people being "canceled" or "called out" online. Sometimes it’s warranted. Sometimes it’s devastating. Either way, the impact is real.

Take Natalie Wynn, a popular YouTuber better known as ContraPoints. After being called out by members of her community, she described spiraling into depression and experiencing suicidal thoughts. Or Caroline Calloway, who disappeared from public life after being blasted for promoting a fake writing workshop. Or Chrissy Teigen, who admitted that her public shaming led to profound emotional distress.

These aren’t isolated cases.

According to Meredith Clark, assistant professor of media studies at the University of Virginia, public shaming on social media has become a powerful—yet deeply flawed—tool for enforcing norms. “It evokes apology from things and places that wouldn’t normally enter into that sort of dialogue,” she notes. “But it often leaves people with no recourse to influence their own experience.”

And that’s just it: there’s no way back.

The Counterculture of Compassion

Which brings us to Professor Loretta J. Ross, a veteran activist and visiting professor at Smith College. Ross has a radical idea. Instead of calling people out, what if we called them in?

“Calling in is like calling out, but done privately and with love,” Ross explains. “It’s a call out done with care.”

In her popular course at Smith, Ross teaches students to recognize the limits of shame. “It really does alienate people,” she says. “And makes them fearful of speaking up.” She challenges students to confront injustice without cruelty—to have uncomfortable conversations without humiliation.

Ross, who once helped coordinate conversations between incarcerated rapists and Black feminists, knows something about uncomfortable conversations. “We need to stop making the world crueler than it needs to be and calling that being ‘woke,’” she says.

The Science of Shame vs. Safety

Psychologically speaking, Ross is on solid ground. Research from Yale University professor Molly Crockett suggests that public shaming often makes people more resistant to change, rather than less.

In contrast, “calling in” mirrors techniques from evidence-based practices like:

• Motivational Interviewing, which promotes change through empathy and collaboration.

• Restorative Justice centers on dialogue, accountability, and reintegration.

• Trauma-informed care emphasizes psychological safety, not punitive measures.

In all of these approaches, the goal is not to punish, but to invite growth.

What If We Kept a Seat at the Table?

Calling someone in doesn’t mean excusing harm. It means creating space for people to return, to repair, to redeem.

“You can’t be responsible for someone else’s inability to grow,” says Ross. “But you can keep a seat at the table for them if they come back.”

That’s the essence of "calling in."

Because let’s be honest: none of us is perfect. We’ve all said the wrong thing, hurt someone, and made a mistake. The question isn’t whether people will fail. It’s whether we’ll give them a path to come back.

Maybe the real failure is a system that offers only exile—and no return.

So what if, instead of amplifying shame, we amplified connection?

Are We All Just Looking for Connection?

The Psychedelic Renaissance and the Search for Meaning in a Shaming World

In 1967, a 20-year-old college dropout wandered through Golden Gate Park with a flower behind his ear, chanting about love. Across the country, another 20-year-old was being drafted to fight a war he didn’t understand. And somewhere in between, Timothy Leary was urging young people to “turn on, tune in, drop out.”

It was an era of protest and possibility. But it was also a response—a reaction to something more profound. Alienation. Conformity. Trauma.

Now fast forward.

It’s 2025. Instead of draft cards, we cancel each other with screenshots. Instead of marching in the streets, we wage culture wars in comment threads. Instead of Woodstock, we have Coachella… with ketamine.

So here’s the question:

Is today’s psychedelic renaissance a response to digital persecution? A cultural immune reaction to the psychic bruising of social media?

The Age of Judgment

We live in a hyper-visible age.

Every tweet, every photo, every late-night thought can be screenshotted, misinterpreted, and weaponized. We’ve created a surveillance culture where we’re both the watchers and the watched. It’s exhausting. It’s isolating. It’s traumatic.

People aren’t just afraid of being misunderstood. They’re afraid of being obliterated—socially, professionally, sometimes even existentially.

In this kind of world, a trip into the self—a journey beyond ego—starts to look less like escapism and more like rescue.

A New Psychedelic Wave

From veterans in VA clinics to Silicon Valley execs in ayahuasca circles, psychedelics are back—but with a twist.

Unlike the 1960s, where the focus was on rebellion and cosmic awakening, today’s psychedelic movement is grounded in mental health. Clinical trials at Johns Hopkins, NYU, and Imperial College London show that psilocybin, MDMA, and ketamine may reduce symptoms of depression, PTSD, addiction, and even end-of-life anxiety.

But if you look closer, you’ll see something else:

A generation drowning in self-surveillance is reaching for medicine that dissolves the self entirely.

The drugs aren’t just therapeutic—they’re symbolic. They offer a temporary relief from shame. A break from identity. A pause from performance.

And, for many, a path to forgiveness.

Then and Now: Echoes of the ’60s

In both the 1960s and today, psychedelics surged during periods of social upheaval:

• The Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement then.

• Climate crisis, culture wars, and mass loneliness now.

But where the ’60s were about breaking free from rules, today’s movement is about healing from wounds. The emphasis has shifted from outer revolution to inner resolution.

It’s not about dropping out—it’s about integrating.

The Twist: What Are We Really Searching For?

Maybe the psychedelic renaissance isn’t just about chemicals. Maybe it’s a referendum on our cultural nervous system.

Because what are people saying after their journeys?

Not “I saw God,” but:

• “I forgave myself.”

• “I saw how connected we all are.”

• “I’m not alone.”

And that—right there—is the antidote to cancel culture. Not amnesia. Not absolution. But integration. A way to metabolize pain, reconnect to purpose, and return with a deeper understanding of self and others.

A Final Thought

We might not be able to stop the tide of judgment, the algorithms of shame, or the raw noise of the internet.

But we can ask:

What if, instead of policing each other into perfection, we created spaces for people to heal?

What if this moment-this strange, psychedelic-infused, post-pandemic, digitally anxious moment—is not the end of something, but the beginning?

Not a culture in collapse…

But a species remembering how to connect.

Sources & Further Reading

• Jessica Bennett, “What if Instead of Calling People Out, We Called Them In?” (NYT, 2020)

• Crockett, M. J. (2017). Moral outrage in the digital age, Nature Human Behaviour

• Meredith Clark, “Drag Them” study on call-out culture and media shame (University of Virginia)

• SAMHSA’s Trauma-Informed Care Guidelines

• Ross, L. J. – Calling In the Calling Out Culture (forthcoming)