SXSW Is Taking Votes On Dozens Of Marijuana And Psychedelics Panel Proposals For 2026 Festival

Voting is now open for panels to be part of next year’s South by Southwest (SXSW) festival, allowing anyone with an opinion to weigh in on what topics the event covers and whose views are featured onstage.

And once again, like in past years, there are dozens of marijuana- and psychedelics-related panels up for consideration.

There are 16 proposed panels touching on cannabis and more than 40 on psychedelics, though that’s a decline compared to what’s been offered in recentyears.

The marijuana-focused proposals fall into broad categories such as culture, criminal justice, agriculture and business.

Overall, the drug policy panels run the gamut—with discussions on the need for marijuana clemency, putting cannabis products in convenience stores, the therapeutic potential of ibogaine to treat head trauma in athletes and even a psychedelic “puppet show.”

Here are summaries of some of the noteworthypanels being considered for SXSW 2026:

Marijuana

Cannabis Prisoners in the Era of Legalization, featuring Last Prisoner Project’s Stephanie Shephard and former NFL player Ricky Williams

As cannabis becomes legal across the country, tens of thousands of Americans remain incarcerated for the same plant. This panel brings together advocates and directly impacted leaders—Ricky Williams and Stephanie Shepard—to examine the state of cannabis legalization, expose how cannabis prisoners are being left behind, and offer solutions. From clemency to re-entry, the panel will share strategies to ensure justice is at the center of cannabis reform, not just profit.

C-Stores and the Mainstream-ification of Cannabis

Cannabis is no longer confined to dispensaries and head shops—it’s riding shotgun at the local gas station. From THC beverages and gummies to hemp pre-rolls and vapes, convenience stores are becoming the frontline of cannabis normalization. This panel will explore how C-Stores are becoming the unlikely accelerators of the cannabis industry’s march toward mainstream acceptance. We’ll examine the intersection of regulation, retail innovation, and consumer demand-and what this means for CPG investors, functional beverage brands, and legacy cannabis players eyeing broader distribution.

The Censored Playbook: Marketing When You Can’t Advertise, featuring David Downs

Marketing in industries like cannabis, psychedelics, and sexual wellness means playing a high-stakes game of strategy, creativity, and compliance. With mainstream advertising channels off-limits and social media platforms quick to censor, how can brands in regulated spaces break through the noise without breaking the rules? This panel brings together leading marketers from highly regulated industries to explore how to build brand credibility, navigate evolving legal landscapes, and engage audiences through education-first content, community-building, and boundary-pushing creative campaigns.

Marijuana & Monopolies: The Fight for Free & Fair Markets, featuring Shaleen Title, founder of the Parabola Center

This panel explores the risks and consequences of monopolization within markets through the lens of America’s evolving cannabis industry. Leaders engaged in the fight against monopolies will provide a closer look at their process for implementing regulatory frameworks designed to ensure emerging industries are built on a foundation of fair competition; opportunities for small businesses and entrepreneurs across all communities; and the empowerment of consumers through true choice in how they spend their money.

The Wellness Revolution: Living and Leading For Good, featuring JoJo Simmons, Andrew DeAngelo & Steve DeAngelo

Join JoJo Simmons, host of the acclaimed For Good Podcast, for a live and candid conversation with legendary cannabis reformers Steve & Andrew DeAngelo. They’ll explore the evolving role of cannabis and psychedelics in a wellness-driven future focused on health, inclusion, and liberation for historically marginalized communities. With decades of advocacy, innovation, and healing behind them, the DeAngelo brothers offer a powerful lens on what it truly means to live—and lead—for good. Don’t miss this rare opportunity to listen, learn, and grow with two of the movement’s most influential voices.

Psychedelics

The Psychedelic Puppet Show: Tripping Down the Art Hole, featuring Paul Stamets

Get ready to tumble down the rabbit hole in the trippiest way possible! The Psychedelic Puppet Show is a panel extravaganza featuring visionary artists, mischievous puppets, and wild stories collected from global psychedelic communities. We’ll discuss tales, and creative explorations—with felt, foam, and far-out ideas—to spotlight the future of psychedelic art, celebrate the storytellers behind the scenes, and ensure that artists are paid as well as the mushrooms’ therapist.

Expediting psychedelic research to qualify for Right To Try, featuring Sue Sisley, principal investigator at the Scottsdale Research Institute Field To Healed Foundation

This session explores intersection of psychedelic science & federal Right to Try (RTT) law, which allows patients with life-threatening conditions to access investigational treatments outside of clinical trials. Focusing on ibogaine research for treating PTSD and opioid dependence, session will examine scientific, legal and ethical considerations involved in making this powerful but under-researched compound accessible under RTT. Experts in medicine, law, policy will discuss current state of ibogaine research, pathways to FDA authorization, how to qualify ibogaine for compassionate use.

Building Bridges: Psychedelics and Conflict Transformation, featuring Rick Doblin, president and founder of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS)

In a world plagued by polarization, division, rupture, and war, could psychedelic-assisted therapy help build bridges? While not a panacea for complex, systemic issues, psychedelics, when used carefully in therapeutic settings, may support willing participants on the road to repair. Explore the potential of MDMA-assisted therapy in conflict transformation—across ideologies, identities, and borders, and in couples therapy. Discover international efforts at MAPS and beyond aimed not at simple solutions, but at nuanced processes of transformation.

What Psychedelics Reveal About Creating Anything, featuring the University of California San Francisco’s Robin Carhart-Harris and Zoe Wilder

This panel explores how insights from psychedelic experiences can inspire innovative design approaches to today’s social, environmental, and existential challenges. Psychedelics teach us that set and setting—our mindset and environment—shape every outcome. As non-specific amplifiers, they show how context influences experience. What if we applied this to creativity? Drawing from science, design, and culture, we explore how altered states can reframe process and deepen awareness. What if we learned to listen to a river before building space around it?

Ibogaine: A Hail Mary for Pro Athletes with Head Trauma

Concussions and brain injuries are a silent epidemic in pro sports. With few treatment options, many players are now heading to Mexico seeking ibogaine, a powerful psychedelic that is proving to repair the brain. This session brings together pro athletes and clinicians to reveal how ibogaine is emerging as a powerful intervention for traumatic brain injury and what it could mean for the future of care in professional sports, neuroscience, and people with brain injuries and illness once thought irreversible.

Broken Barriers: The Texas Ibogaine Initiative & Its Impact, featuring Texas Rep. Cody Harris (R)

This panel will spotlight the Texas Ibogaine Initiative, a groundbreaking legislative effort aimed at using psychedelic-assisted therapy to address PTSD, TBI, and opioid use disorder among veterans. Attendees will hear from key leaders who made the initiative a reality, including veterans, legislators, and advocates. The session will explore the bipartisan support behind the bill, the science of ibogaine, and the broader national impact of Texas’ leadership in psychedelic policy. This conversation will inspire hope for the future of mental health care for veterans.

Healing the Helpers: Psychedelics, Police & First Responders

Police and first responders carry invisible wounds from years of service – trauma, loss, moral injury–that conventional care often fails to treat. Psychedelics are emerging as transformative therapies for those on the front lines. This panel brings together a former SWAT officer, a retired federal agent, a nonprofit leader, and a pioneering psychedelic treatment provider to explore how ibogaine and other plant medicines are helping first responders reclaim their lives, challenge stigma, and shift the conversation around trauma, resilience, and recovery.

Cosmic Trip: Unlocking the Power of Psychedelics—in Space

Psychedelic drugs like ayahuasca are known for their potential to boost mental health. Can they also treat or even prevent neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s, ALS, & Parkinson’s? Could they ease functioning for those with neurodevelopmental conditions like autism & ADHD? Hear from Alysson Muotri, PhD, a scientist who’s taken the question to outer space; an Amazonian indigenous leader who has witnessed the drugs’ transformative power; & a former MTV VJ-turned-psychologist—all of whom are on a quest for answers that spans the globe & beyond.

Rewiring the Brain: Psilocybin and Neurological Healing

Join former NHL player Daniel Carcillo as he shares how psilocybin-assisted therapy helped him overcome traumatic brain injury (TBI) after years of failed treatments. Highlighting real-world cases and emerging clinical research, Daniel discusses psilocybin’s potential to heal TBI, Parkinson’s, and neurodegenerative disorders through neuroplasticity and inflammation reduction. This conversation reveals a hopeful frontier in brain health recovery.

Image element courtesy of Kristie Gianopulos.

Marijuana Is A Gateway Drug To…Growing Tomatoes, Poll Suggests

Opponents of marijuana legalization often suggest—without good evidence—that cannabis is a “gateway drug” to using more dangerous substances such as cocaine and heroin. But a new poll suggests that growing marijuana at home is a “gateway crop” to other kinds of gardening.

The new survey of 1,327 home cannabis cultivators found that two-thirds (66 percent) say growing their own marijuana inspired them to start growing tomatoes in their backyard gardens as well.

Almost a fourth of respondents in the poll said they never grew tomatoes until years after cultivating their first cannabis plant.

“We’ve been saying it for years, once people experience the joy of growing their own cannabis, they can’t stop,” Jessica Hanson, co-founder and managing director of Homegrown Cannabis Co., which conducted the new survey, said in a press release. “Cannabis isn’t a gateway drug, it’s a gateway crop. Before you know it, you’ve got a backyard full of tomatoes, and maybe even a few zucchinis.”

The poll showed that following tomatoes, the top crops people were inspired to grow after cultivating cannabis were basil, strawberries, chili peppers, cucumbers and lettuce.

It also identified what the company called a “generational shift” in gardening culture.

While just 29 percent of baby boomers said they cultivated marijuana before growing tomatoes, 62 percent of millennials said the same. Homegrown Cannabis Co. said that trend was most prevalent in state that have enacted cannabis legalization laws, but it was also common in jurisdictions that have maintained prohibition—requiring people who grow marijuana to do so “discreetly.”

“Cannabis teaches patience, attention to detail, and care, the same skills you need to grow healthy tomatoes,” Hanson said. “Plus, they pair perfectly in the garden. One for your salad, one for your soul.”

Not only does it build skills, but gardening also comes with the health benefits of staying active. And to that point, a federally funded study released earlier this year found that adults are more physically active on days they used marijuana—evidence that contradicts the “lazy stoner” stereotype.

Another report from last year found that people who use marijuana take more walks on average compared to non-users and e-cigarette users. The study, published in the journal Preventive Medicine Reports, also found that marijuana consumers are no less likely to engage in basic exercise and strength training compared to non-users.

In another stereotype-busting study that was published in 2021, researchers found that frequent marijuana consumers are actually more likely to be physically active compared to their non-using counterparts.

Various other recent findings similarly challenge widely held preconceptions about cannabis users. For example, a report last year concluded that there’s no association between habitual marijuana use and paranoia or decreased motivation. The research also found no evidence that marijuana consumption causes a hangover the next day.

A 2022 study on marijuana and laziness, meanwhile, found no difference in apathy or reward-based behavior between people who used cannabis on at least a weekly basis and non-users. Frequent marijuana consumers, that study found, actually experienced more pleasure than those who abstained.

Photo courtesy of Chris Wallis // Side Pocket Images.

Slightly Stoopid Lights Cannabis Joint With Laser At Texas Concert As Lawmakers Debate Hemp Ban

As Texas GOP lawmakers remain laser-focused on passing a bill to restrict hemp sales during a special legislative session, Kyle McDonald of the band Slightly Stoopid recently had a laser of his own focused on a different objective: Lighting a joint on stage with the beam of a powerful device during a set the band played in the Lone Star State.

At a concert in Irving, Texas last month, McDonald took the audience by surprise when he pulled out a joint and held it in the crosshairs of a laser beam that successfully ignited the paper.

It doesn’t appear the Slightly Stoopid stunt had any political intent, despite taking place in a state where cannabis reform is squarely in the zeitgeist—with the Senate passing a bill last week that would ban consumable hemp products with any trace amounts of THC.

The proposal is currently in limbo, however, as multiple Democratic House lawmakers have staged a walkout, leaving the state to deny the chamber the quorum necessary to advance any legislation during the special session that ends later this month.

The California-based punk and reggae band has generally maintained an apolitical status in the music world. But Slightly Stoopid has endeared themselves to the cannabis culture world, performing with other marijuana icons such as Snoop Dogg and Damian and Stephen Marley.

For the laser joint performance, the band was playing “No Cocaine,” which starts with a verse about not needing cocaine or ecstasy that could “ruin our brains.” Because “only one thing sets us free or ease our pain, talkin’ ’bout the herb.”

The laser beam lighter became a hit on social media, with fans cheering the novel spark-up approach.

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But while not evidently a political statement, it should be noted that, in Texas, possession of up to two ounces of marijuana is considered a Class B misdemeanor, punishable by up to 180 days in prison and/or a maximum $2,000 fine.

Efforts to legalize or decriminalize cannabis at the state level have so far proved unsuccessful in the conservative legislature. However, Gov. Greg Abbott (R) did recently sign into law a bill to significantly expand the state’s medical cannabis program.

Photo courtesy of Shore Fire Media.