Newsgroups: alt.drugs,talk.politics.drugs From: jpg8b@Virginia.EDU ("Jamie G.") Subject: Re: Why We Should Stop Trying to Legalize Psychedelic Drugs Message-ID: <1993May19.102404.29055@Virginia.EDU> Date: Wed, 19 May 1993 10:24:04 GMT While "Why We Should Stop Trying to Legalize Psychedelic Drugs" may make some valid points, all of those points can be addressed by other means rather than allowing drug prohibition. The obsession over the legal aspects of prohibition to the detriment of discussing the psychedelic experience itself could be dealt with through deliberately focusing a conference on that. This may be hard since the persecution of millions of people for thoughtcrime may overshadow any discussion on the topic. Likewise it is hard to discuss Hitler and the Nazis without mentioning the Holocaust- one can't separate the topics. Furthermore, I have seen the paranoia of prosecution ruin many trips in one way or another. As for the threat of licensing psychedelics or some other form of control, this may be yet another battle for Captain Libertarian to fight. We shall always be fighting for our rights- any amendment, law or change in law that protects liberty will never really guarantee liberty permanently, but they are one of the best means of expanding our painfully gained sphere of autonomy against social control, formal and informal. An even better way is the political empowerment of the drug culture, but that is easier said than done. We will eventually have to build a political force that can back up our demands with some juice. Not having our rights to vote taken away by felony convictions would really help this. Sometimes I wonder if the only way we can guarantee our freedom is to secede from this country and form our own nation, like Israel, that can defend itself against the "Straight People" and act as a harbor for refugees from drug persecutions from around the world. Even tolerant nations such as the Netherlands cannot be completely trusted as sanctuaries. The Netherlands, for example, is not overly enthusiastic to accept immigrants, especially those with felony convictions and could always, with a change of government, potentially become less tolerant of drug use. In an extreme crisis, such as the mass internment of anyone suspected of drug use or even the genocide of all drug users (if say Ross Perot or Darryl Gates, respectively, took power in this country), foreign nations may cold-heartedly turn us away. The British Navy's forcibly turning back ships, filled with Jews fleeing Europe for Israel, when the British government was perfectly aware that the Final Solution was already underway comes to mind. This may all seem very pessimistic and paranoid, but sometimes you are not paranoid, you're RIGHT. The legal position of Drug Users in this country is spookily comparable to the situation of Jews in Nazi Germany in the late thirties- we are marked, tracked, documented, banned from many professions, subject to property confiscation, imprisoned, etc.. I suggest Richard Rubenstein's The Cunning of History for anyone who wants a reason really to worry. Excuse my digression. As for instilling anti-social ideas, the absurdity of drug prohibition does help as I must admit it did with me. However, I think that probably no society will ever be so completely free of hypocrisy that one will not be able to find a reason to be anti-social. If there ever is such a society, well, why be anti-social? My experience with drugs and drug prohibition has led me to realize the hypocrisy is widespread throughout our society and may even be inherent, but this very widespread nature of the horror within the political system could be revealed many ways. One may be a soldier in a pointless vicious war, be beaten by a cop, etc..The main point is that while the Drug War may show the foul heart of darkness at the core of mass organizations, it is precisely such atrocities as the Drug Witchhunt that cause the suffering which causes the phenomenon to be considered horrible. Vietnam may have shed light on hypocrisy in American foreign policy, but it was such things that made that foreign policy condemnable. Granted a lot of folks in the late Sixties may have gotten to see the ugly side of their government through Vietnam, but was worth the napalming of babies and the mass bombing of cities to give a lesson in human nature. The fact is that the Drug War creates suffering, certainly not as much as the Holocaust or Vietnam did but real suffering nevertheless, and it is just not worth it at all. This does not make me any sort of hero or martyr or anything, but I served 343 days in a federal prison of a thirteen month sentence for two goddamn doses of LSD- five dollars worth, for chrissakes- first offense! This time last year I was just a little over halfway through my time and counting every second. Anybody who has done time can tell you that the time drags on longer than you could conceivably imagine. Furthermore, I was doing one of the shortest sentences in that place- guys my age were serving three, five, ten, twenty, thirty-some year sentences, no parole, for non-violent drug sentences. It's absolutely insane! Every day that they serve in prison is intolerable and an atrocity. We acnnot allow them to suffer. I am still under "supervised release"- urine tests, random searches, constant monitoring, etc. for the next two and a half years, and I am a felon with no right to vote or to arm myself. Yeah, I guess this has all made me "anti-social"- my home was seized by the Feds, all of my fraternity brothers were kicked out and made homeless, I've seen friends of mine betray me to the thoughtpolice, I've been railroaded through the court system- I've become so anti-social that I still have nightmares about the raid, I feel close to vomiting everytime I see a police officer, and I feel trapped, unable to emigrate from a nation ruled by a government I absolutely hate with every iota of my being. Anti-social?! Yeah, I guess I'm anti-social! Not to mention paranoid, cynical, nihilistic, hate-filled, walking around feeling like I am going to burst. The Drug War and its personal consequences for me have taught me that humans are fundamentally crazy, evil, and vicious, and I just want to go somewhere where I far away from the rest of humanity and be left alone. Some great little lesson in human nature, eh? Some little experiment. I not only think that it is absolutely mandatory that we legalize drugs immediately and guarantee our freedom over our minds and body by all means necessary- Constitutional amendments, whatever it takes, but I wonder what should we do with the war criminals responsible for this outrage. The drug law enforcement bureaucracy has been responsible for the trashing of our Constitution, breaking every oath they made to protect it and they should be held accountable for their crimes against humanity. They willfully and knowingly execute laws that are obviously at odds with our self-evident, inalienable rights, and if the Nazis could excuse themselves by claiming they were just following orders or carrying out the laws of the Nazi regime at the time, I see no reason why DEA agents should be at least called to account for their personal involvement in fascist persecution. We may never really address this guilt- the Nazi War Crime trials were a historical anomaly as the vast majority of official terror in the world is never punished- but I personally hold agents of this intolerable persecution of my culture and people morally responsible for the suffering caused. If there were any justice, the Drug Culture would not only be freed from oppression but even fully compensated for every dollar seized and every day served. I may be obsessed by the issue of legalization to the detriment of other psychedelic issues, but the suffering of millions demands immediate action.