Miley Cyrus sees smoking salvia as no big deal
Miley Cyrus thinks that the video showing her smoking salvia is something not to fuzz about. The Hollywood actress reasoned that she was just having fun and attributed the incident to her youth.
"Miley...has been saying, she's just young and having fun ... this, according to friends in direct contact with her," reports the entertainment Web site TMZ.
In a video obtained by TMZ, Cyrus can be heard saying she was having a "bad trip" after spotting a lookalike of her former boyfriend, Liam Hemsworth. Reports say that the teenage star was hallucinating after she smoked salvia, a herb known to have psychedelic effect.
It was later discovered that publicity team for Miley tried to cover up the incident by preventing the release of the video. In one reported case, a man from Cyrus' publicity team exchanged a brand new Macbook Air for one that contains the video.
Cyrus had not been doing anything illegal as she was of legal age at the time of the incident and salvia can be legally obtained in the state of California. However, calls for finally banning of salvia in California had mounted after there has been a spike in sales of the herb following the buzz over the video.
Anthony Adams, a former California State Assemblyman, has already called for the outright ban of salvia whicle castigating the former Hanna Montana star as irresponsible, saying she should have not smoked salvia because kids emulate her.
But friends close to Miley say that the star does not care about the controversy sparked by her latest stunt. Cyrus is keeping herself busy working for her project So Undercover with Kelly Osbourne.
Salvia belong to the same family as mint. The herb can be smoked like a cigarette, chewed, or smoked in a pipe or bong as what Miley did. It produces an intense effect similar to marijuana and LSD, which is the reason why sellers say that salvia should only be tried once because of its intense effect. It can be legally obtained in California with some people just walking in at stores asking for "the stuff the Miley Cyrus was smoking."