Home (theory of the ego death and rebirth experience)
Drug Policy Reform & Entheogens
Contents
Politics of Consciousness author Kubby
Sacred and Constitutional right to
dangerous drugs
How improving the world helps
entheogen research
Liberate the drug-war prisoners
Drug-war imperialist bully takes a
blow
Conflict of interest: science
association, prohibition
Prohibition Propaganda Increases Teen
Drug Use
Normal people in U.S. clueless and
easily shocked
Unrefined cannabis
"decriminalized" in Belgium
Earth Day: Hemp will save the world
Book: Saying Yes: In Defense of
Drug Use
MAPS journal: complete change of style
Steve Kubby was arrested by Canadian authorities today based upon US charges. He is facing trial tomorrow which may decide whether he is deported to the U.S., home of the drug-war prisoners.
The Politics of Consciousness: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom
Steve Kubby, Terrence McKenna (Introduction)
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/189362644X
My review:
5 stars
Correct thinking about mushrooms and freedom
The Politics of Consciousness covers cannabis, mushrooms, entheogens, and the meaning of democracy. It promotes a respectful view of entheogens and other psychoactives. Many books covering entheogens have dismissive attitudes toward other psychoactives, but like Jonathan Ott, Kubby is one of the few authors who present truly enlightened ways of thinking about psychoactives, religion, and freedom.
There are many books on entheogens, but few that are enlightened about political and religious issues. Therefore I strongly recommend this book for entheogen scholars and activists.
>-----Original Message-----
>From: owner-freerenee~at~drugsense.org
>[mailto:owner-freerenee~at~drugsense.org]On Behalf Of renee boje
>Sent: Tuesday, April 16, 2002 7:04 PM
>To: ccc-members~at~yahoogroups.com
>Subject: RB: Steve Kubby & Steve Tuck arrested today!
Please spread this information far & wide...
For Immediate Release: April 16, 2002
US MEDICAL MARIJUANA PATIENTS ARRESTED TODAY IN CANADA
Edit Reply Posted by chris Bennett (Pot-TV Station Manager)
http://www.cannabisculture.com, http://www.pottv.net
Posted on 04/16/02 11:39 AM
American med-marijuana patients Steve kubby and Steve Tuck were arrested by Canadian authorities today based upon US charges. Both are being held with out the medicine they require for their well-being and are facing trial tomorrow which will likely decide as to whether they are deported. Besides the RCMP and immigration, a plain clothed unidentified individual, which eyewitnesses suggest may have been an American authority, was also present. They are being held in a Sechelt jail pending trial. Please Contact as much press and media as you can about this.
For more information contact : Renee Boje (US Med MJ Refugee) 604-886-6662
Michele Kubby (Wife of Steve Kubby) 604-740-2103
Lucy Tuck (Wife of Steve Tuck) 604-740-5755
Related websites: http://www.reneeboje.com, http://www.kubby.com
Our sacred
and Constitutional right to dangerous psychoactive drugs
Nic posed
the question:
How could
it be right for people to put themselves in danger just because they simply
*can* do something to expand their consciousness, even if it damages or hurts
them?
It is our
right as citizens of a (purportedly) free society to endanger ourselves,
whether or not there is something to be gained, and whether that gain is
religious, recreational, pleasurable or hedonistic, philosophical, aesthetic,
or emotional.
People
have the right to do things that are dangerous. High school students in a free society should be taught this
principle of being a citizen in a free society.
Practically
everything is dangerous. Danger is
existence, and existence is dangerous.
People have the right to drop a 10-strip of doses and test whether they
are a potential chronic schizophrenic.
People
have the right to skydive, to mountainclimb.
I lost a friend mountainclimbing -- do I then join some "Mothers
against Mountain Climbing" group, to make mountainclimbing illegal or
intensely ostracized by society? That
would result in a society of slaves, sheep, or subhuman wimps, and would not be
freedom, would not even be a human state of existence.
Freedom is
dangerous. If you remove the danger,
you kill freedom. Safety is not by any
means the only consideration when shaping and guiding society.
___________________
Books
Our Right
to Drugs. Thomas Szasz
http://www.promind.com/bk_ord.htm
Publisher:
In Our
Right to Drugs, Thomas Szasz shows that our present drug war started at the
beginning of this century, when the U.S. government first assumed the task of
protecting people from patent medicines.
By the end
of World War I, however, the free market in drugs was but a dim memory, if
that. Instead of dwelling on the familiar impracticality or unfairness of our
drug laws, Szasz demonstrates the deleterious effects of prescription laws,
which place people under lifelong medical tutelage.
The result
is that most Americans today prefer a coercive and corrupt command drug economy
to a free market in drugs. Szasz stresses the consequences of the fateful
transformation of the central aim of U.S. drug prohibitions from protecting us
from being fooled by "misbranded" drugs to protecting us from harming
ourselves by self-medication-defined as "drug abuse."
And he
reminds us that the choice between self-control and state coercion applies to
all areas of our lives, drugs being but one of the theaters in which this
perennial play may be staged.
A free
society, Szasz emphasizes, cannot endure if its citizens reject the values of
self-discipline and personal responsibility and if the state treats adults as
if they were naughty children.
In a
no-holds-barred examination of the implementation of the War on Drugs, Szasz
shows that under the guise of protecting the vulnerable members of our
society--especially children, minorities, and the sick--our government has
persecuted and injured them.
Leading
politicians persuade parents to denounce their children, and encourage children
to betray their parents and friends--behavior that subverts family loyalties and
destroys basic human decency.
And
instead of protecting blacks and Hispanics from dangerous drugs, this holy war
has allowed us to persecute them, not as racists but as therapists--working
selflessly to bring about a drug-free America. Last, but not least, to millions
of sick Americans, the War on Drugs has meant being dep
Chapters:
Drugs as
Property: The Right We Rejected
The
American Ambivalence: Liberty vs. Utopia
The Fear
We Favor: Drugs as Scapegoats
Drug
Education: The Cult of Drug Disinformation
The
Debate on Drugs: The Lie of Legalization
Blacks
and Drugs: Crack as Genocide
Doctors
and Drugs: The Perils of Prohibition
Between
Dread and Desire: The Burden of Choice
Drugs
and Rights. Douglas Husak.
http://shop.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?isbn=0521427274
Do adults
have the right to use drugs for recreational purposes? The first serious work
to address the question argues that the war on drugs violates the rights of
adults wanting to use drugs for pleasure, and that criminal laws against this
use are incompatible with moral rights.
[format:]
Chapters:
Drugs,
drug use, and criminalization
The war
on drugs
Medical
and legal definitions of drugs
Legal
regulation of drugs
Constitutional
issues
Recreational
drug use
The
decriminalization movement
Arguments
for criminalization
Drugs
and harm to users
Consequentialism
and drug use
Autonomy
and drug use
Analogies
Addiction
and autonomy
Addiction,
slavery, and autonomy
"Soft"
paternalism and drug use
"Hard"
paternalism and drug use
Conclusion
Drugs
and harm to others
Utilitarianism
and drug use
The
evaluative assumptions in utilitarianism
Harm and
disutility
The
nature of criminal harm
Anticipatory
offenses
Drugs
and crime
Conclusion
Restrictions
on drug use
Local
controls and the importance of community
Reasonable
regulation of drug use
Special
cases: Pregnant drug users
Adolescents
and adults
A moral
right to use drugs: Misinterpretations
Drug
Control in a Free Society. Bakalar
& Grinspoon.
http://shop.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?isbn=0521357721
Publisher:
A
provocative analysis of the philosophical, sociological, and historical
background of the attempt to control the distribution and usage of
consciousness-altering drugs in modern industrial societies.
Chapters:
Questions
of risk and liberty
The
meanings of addiction and dependence
The
historical direction of drug policy
Varieties
of drug control
Solution
or dissolution of the drug problem?
The
Politics of Consciousness. Steve Kubby.
http://www.promind.com/bk_poc.htm
Mindbooks:
Speaks to
external freedom from voodoo drug laws, and then to internal freedom using the
wisdom of psychedelic plants. Forward by Terence McKenna.
Topics:
Molecular
Theology
Exopheromones
Downloading
the Cosmic Design
Mushrooms
as Manna from Heaven
Visionary
rites-of-passage
How
belief creates reality
Healing
cancer
However, a
more compelling book that all of these is Drug War: Covert Money, Power &
Policies, by Dan Russell.
(drugwar.com). It shows what
really drives prohibition -- persecution for profit. It is the best expose of how thoroughly, totally and absolutely
foul, dirty, and corrupt the sham "war on drugs" is, including its
motives and strategies -- for example, the last thing the leading prohibitionists
want is to reduce drug use. If drug use
ended today, they would hasten to reinstate the situation.
How
entheogen research can improve the world, and how improving the world can help
entheogen research
I suspect
that the ego, and the whole Christian medieval/modern society built around it,
couldn't have happened with ego-dissolving entheogens readily available. By suppressing psychological maturation,
artificially holding down our consciousness into a psychological
ego-child-animal-demon level, we sought fulfillment through substitute means,
per Ken Wilber's early books.
We have to
especially look at the early, Radical Enlightenment such as Decartes but
especially Spinoza -- that is the critical turning point where
Christian-originated culture flew past other cultures. Also consider Islamic science prior to the
Enlightenment that happened later within Christian culture. Islam may have had some amount of entheogenic
inspiration, as did Christianity to apparently a small degree.
How often
were entheogens used in ancient Israel, in Christianity, in shamanism, in
Islam, in Asian religion and culture?
Imagine a global parallel graph showing different religions over history
and how strong entheogen use was in each religious thread over the centuries --
you'll find an appropriately detailed storyline. We won't get far with overgeneralizations like "Christian
culture is scientific but not entheogenic".
So to
begin your discussion we need a reasonably dynamic model of which
religions/cultures used entheogens when, and which supported scientific
development, when -- to find what the patterns and correlations in fact were,
between religions, entheogens, and scientific development, over time.
Perhaps
Christianity was the most unfulfilling religion because it suppressed
entheogens the most, and this led to an ill-aimed backlash: science ignorant of
entheogens. Maybe the "right"
solution that most cultures would have taken is to reject Catholic culture by
taking entheogens. Instead, in
Christian culture, the Radical Enlightenment and then the Moderate
Enlightenment generally rejected religion and created modern science.
Entheogens
are valuable because they bring enlightenment.
Entheogens are also valuable because they are tools for studying
cognition and are also general tools for thinking and creative production. Therefore they have great potential to
contribute to any projects such as developing a sustainable society. We have barely begun discovering entheogens
in modern Christian culture, and you could say we haven't even given them a
chance and haven't even discovered them yet, given that they are still being
suppressed and persecuted with full force.
It's much
too early to evaluate achievements and contributions of entheogens in modern
Christian-originated culture; we can just speculate on how Western culture
might develop now that we have transcendent knowledge (metaphysical
enlightenment about ego as illusory controller), understand mythic experiential
allegory and socio-political allegory, and have cognitive loosening agents as
general-purpose information-age tools.
Keep
fields distinct and differentiated even as you try to cross-apply them. Entheogen technology is a general tool
applicable to other fields. One such
field is scientific development for learning more about the world and for
developing a better world. You cannot
subsume all tools into the assumed master project of scientifically improving
the world.
Improving
the world such as better sustainability is one area of human activity and
concern. Improving our understanding of
mind and entheogens is a distinct area of human activity and concern. Per Ken Wilber's book A Theory of
Everything, the two domains are distinct and they interact; you cannot collapse
one into the other -- that would be a form of reductionism.
From the
point of view of the entheogen realm considered in isolation, sustainability
and improving the world is totally irrelevant and worthless. From the point of view of the modern
scientific progress realm considered in isolation, entheogens and enlightenment
and cognitive research tools are totally irrelevant and worthless. The two realms are distinct and
differentiated and must not be collapsed and distorted, whittling away one
domain so that it is "reduced" and artificially crammed into the
other.
There are
many ways the mushroom makes us a better race, increases the carrying capacity
of the planet, and helps us develop fusion power, and helps us promote
republics rather than hierarchical empires or domination systems -- but
mushrooms cannot be assessed only in those terms. To do so is as misguided as blaming the sustainability movement
for failing to bring us metaphysical enlightenment and ego death and rebirth,
and failing to provide a microscope ideally suited for studying cognitive
processes.
The
sustainability movement, and modern scientific progress, certainly can assist
the goal of metaphysical enlightenment and help support my project of systematizing and mapping out the ego death
and rebirth phenomenon -- but I would never evaluate the value of the
sustainability movement purely in terms of the light it sheds on metaphysical
enlightenment; to do so is a form of reductionism, distorting domains, and
misusing tools.
Per
Wilber's approach of Integral Studies, the correct question is, what is the
ideal relationship among the domains of entheogens, sustainability, science,
and politics? What are some ways
entheogens can help sustainability?
What are some ways sustainability can help entheogens? Neither domain's value can be measured
solely in terms of the other domain's value-system.
As just
one example, mushrooms clean up oil spills -- but that is hardly the central
reason why psychoactive mushrooms are of interest. Domains must be kept distinctly differentiated even when we aim
to maximize their interpentration and mutual support.
People ask
"But what use is metaphysical enlightenment for improving ordinary daily
life?" That is reductionism:
assuming that one domain subsumes another.
We might as well reply with the question "But what use is ordinary
daily life for providing metaphysical enlightenment?""
How would
I like to be honored for my inspired discoveries after my framework is
vindicated? Selling lots of books? I would consider it a high honor if we would
release the drug-war prisoners with full amnesty and repentant apology, and
complete restoration of all voting rights and other rights, and complete
legalization and complete decriminalization of all psychoactive drugs and
plants, including cannabis, psychoactive mushrooms, coca, LSD, opium, ecstasy;
and unhindered applications of all plants, such as hemp products; and eliminate
the prescription system, that deathly fountain of iniquity (per Thomas Szatz).
The schedules
of prohibited substances themselves should be made illegal, in the name of the
freedom that the U.S. is, in principle, really about. I dedicate today's postings at the Egodeath discussion area to
Steve Kubby, saint and martyr.
The
Politics of Consciousness : A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom
by Steve
Kubby, Terence McKenna (Introduction
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/189362644X
http://www.kubby.com,
http://www.mapinc.org/sknews/v02/n740/a03.html?101 -- "These raids seem to
have started because of the recent media attention on Canadian national TV,
local papers, and FOX TV news. Steve is
again in a life and death situation while in custody. What worked before was
massive intervention. We need your
help. Steve's life is on the line. The officers who arrested Steve K. are ... Please call and tell these people
that Steve is in serious danger, and that he is not a flight risk and will show
up for his appearance. Thank you for
your support. We had hoped that all of
this was over, but it is not. As
Benjamin Franklin said..."
Because of
my research related to Reformnav.org, a major rescue organization asked my
advice on quickly setting up an online donation channel for the 9/11/01 New
York situation. I had to resist saying
"I recommend donating to drug policy reform organizations before donating
to any other charities. As compensation
for my advice, I hope you donate to these organizations at reformnav.org."
"Poor,
poor America, never did anybody any harm" does not compute, especially in
light of the very much *American* WOD.
America was forced to take a little time out from dumping planeload
after planeload of poison on Central America, to cry and solicit sympathy. What is embarrassing to the American leaders
is that this terrorism raises a question that the leaders want kept under the
rug -- why would anyone dislike America?
Why, indeed. As the articles
below demonstrate, I am not the only American citizen who the terrorists have
successfully caused to investigate what America looks like to those who
evidently hate it. Do they have such
hatred for no valid reason? Just what
exactly *is* their point of view?
The
terrorists have succeeded to a degree in cracking the facade kept between the
U.S. international policy and the awareness of the U.S. citizens. Are we *really* righteous? Are we civilians *really* innocent? Or are we guilty of acquiescing in our
government's own terrorist oppression and brutal killings. The U.S. trains "intelligence"
operatives to commit terrors in the name of the bunk, make-believe War on
Drugs. The intellectual laziness and
gullibility of the U.S. citizen is a moral failing and ignorance does not mean
innocence. The average U.S. citizen is
ignorant, but *not* innocent.
Are we
U.S. citizens innocent of the evil scheming and lawless murderousness of their
own government, that has the audacity to lecture other countries about human
rights, but was recently kicked off the UN committees on illicit drugs and
human rights? Ignorance and apathy are
no excuse. Joe American does arguably
have blood on his hands. Columbian
cannabis has blood on it, from U.S. taxpayer-purchased bullets, even if Joe
American permits himself to be shielded from awareness of this fact.
Did America
deserve a retaliation? The bogus Drug
War has been *central* to America's imperial scheming. I love freedom, but to American imperialism
(or Ott's etymologically correct term "Usan" imperialism), I just say
No, and I say that as an entirely 100% product of America. I love what my country *claims* to be about,
but I hate much of the reality of what America has been in actuality, as the
founders would -- they did not mean to found a devouring empire.
Are people
who hate America largely right and righteous?
After reading Dan Russell's book Drug War, the answer is "Yes,
obviously, if your awareness is at all greater than the American
propaganda." I'd love to see
9/11/01 lead to self-doubt on the part of Americans, an interrogation of what
our politicians are *really* doing with our international policy, which is so
well represented in our very much American (that is, Usan or USAn) b.s.,
forked-tongue "War on Drugs".
http://www.reformnav.org
-- rapid-navigation portal for drug policy reform sites
If anti-terrorism
is "The New War" according to CNN, then what is "The Old
War"? Last night (Sep 14) in a CNN
talking-heads discussion, they suddenly were comparing the drug war and the
anti-terrorism war, warning against never-ending actions that were never really
intended to be brought to a conclusion.
The
implication in this CNN discussion seemed to be that the con-artists who really
run our government have written off the drug war as no longer managing to fool
anyone; people don't want to give the drug-warrior con artists money anymore in
the name of the WOD. So now the con
artists are having to change their game, their story. Now it's, fund our scheme so we can protect you from our, I mean
the, terrorists.
Knowing
how the "intelligence" scam works, I assume until disproven, that the
people who are *ultimately* behind terrorism are the same people who claim to
protect us from terrorism, just like
the people who are ultimately behind illicit drug running are the same people
who claim to be trying to stop drug running.
All drug
policy reformers should study the mind of the con artist, because the WOD is
not essentially about health or ignorance; it's essentially a giant con
swindle.
http://www.reformnav.org
-- rapid-navigation portal for drug policy reform sites
>Michael Hoffman has written the MOST lucid email on the debate on what has happened and what to do I have seen in days.
I certainly do not recommend violent acts in the original posting in this thread. I am not particularly in favor of any group committing any violent acts against anyone. I suspect the terrorism is a ruse and I suspect the retaliation is a ruse; I don't buy any of it as simple and directly reflecting reality.
As we have seen so clearly in the fake, so-called "war against drugs", nothing is as it seems. The U.S. media is in league with the military-industrial establishment. I believe the buildings fell, but I maintain total skepticism about who is really behind that and who the bad guys are -- given these doubts, there can't be even the beginning of talk about committing punitive violence against the bad guys. If you want bad guys who may need to be stopped by force, look for the word "Intelligence".
The establishment is eager for violence to stop people from asking "What is really going on here? Let us investigate who has been good and who has been bad."
The CIA and related "intelligence" groups should be immediately dismantled and some of these "intelligence" people locked safely away in jail -- I mean the kind of people who came from the OSS and may preach democracy but actually are power-mad con-artists.
>In the
wake of 9/11/2001, has anyone else experienced certain levels of ego-death? I'm
experiencing some of the same emotions by watching the news as I would via
mushrooms.
I had the
feeling of a melatonin dream for 48 hours after 9/11 a.m. The notion of giant planes flying through
giant buildings, and a network of other highjackings at the same time, is too
extremely *weird* and *disturbing* to be real.
If someone asked me why melatonin dreaming is so disturbingly creepy, I
would now say, "You know the feeling of 9/11/01? Melatonin dreaming is exactly that same feeling."
I dream
about procuring and taking psychoactives very often. It is one of the most dominant themes in my dreams. This includes some ego-death type
experiences, but usually more ordinary psychoactive experiences in the dreams.
Lately,
melatonin has not produced bizarre and disturbing dreams that feel like a
psychic invasion. Maybe I am used to
melatonin.
From:
TRoberts
Sent:
Friday, October 04, 2002
To:
maps-forum
Subject:
MAPS: It's hard to convince someone ...
To
paraphrase Upton Sinclair: It's hard to convince someone of something when
their salary depends on not believing it.
It's time
science journals broadened their conflict of interest standards to cover
situations such as this and source of funding.
>Here's
a telling bit that may help explain why Science published this paper [the
famously and literally scandalously bunk "Ricuartegate" paper on E, I
guess -mh] even with the evident problems:
>"Alan
Leshner, former director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) and
chief executive of the American Association for the Advancement of Science,
which publishes Science, agreed. "This says even a single evening's use is
playing Russian roulette with your own brain," he said."
>Mmmm,
so the CEO of AAAS is the former director of NIDA. Interesting.
The teevee
is, first of all, propaganda. TV news
is not "what's happening", but rather, "what the Establishment
wants you to think is happening and to know about." Much tv news (media news) is actually decoy
news, of 3rd-rate importance, designed to prevent you from being aware of truly
1st-rate importance news. The goal is
to fill up an hour of "news" (McNews) with a man cutting up a few
people and eating them, with alas no time left over to show the U.S. funding
mass murder of thousands of people all around the world.
It's like
sending the entire police force for a candybar shoplifting while a crime
syndicate is out robbing a hundred banks at once.
Put a big
bumper sticker over your tv and over every newspaper: PROPAGANDA AND
DISINFORMATION. This is why alternative
news sources are so important.
>Good
news on the drug war front: White House drops post-911 "drugs =
terror" campaign after studies show the ads "fostered so-called pro-
drug beliefs among teens."
http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0310f.asp
>Apparently,
the connection between anti-drug laws and opportunities for black marketeers to
fund terrorists in the first place was just too clear to even the average
befuddled American. After all, they
know that their marijuana comes from the back yard, or Uncle Paul, or at most
from someone in Mexico.
>In the
spirit of the study that showed Americans who watch Fox News had more erroneous
beliefs about the world than others, I propose that Americans would in general
become smarter if they turned off the TV and increased their drug use. (Tune out, turn on) This would be consistent with M. Hoffman's
observation that the Classical World (still officially considered the
"Golden Age" by rightwing blowhards promoting a return to the glory
of our Dead White European forefathers) was "awash in hallucinagens"
>my
self-identity as a law-abiding citizen is solid. so i went to a different country, where the laws are different.
People
should obey the laws and work to change bad laws.
As Captain
Kirk in a Star Trek movie reminded his crew when visiting Earth in the 20th
Century, remember to be careful; this is a barbaric and backwards, primitive
society.
The U.S.
media has a lock grip on popular attitudes (this isn't about popular
*thinking*, just attitudes). People
think what the media trains them to think.
The media is controlled by corporate and political interests, which are
heavily distorted and influenced by the money-flow dynamics of prohibition-for-profit. Robotic zombie co-workers have the
unenlightened attitudes they have been trained and programmed to have. The fault is systemic and societal, not
simply a matter of each individual needing to be smarter and more critical and
well-informed.
A good
milestone was the movie Traffic. It's
not an enlightened movie and does not teach enlightened and historically
grounded attitudes about drugs, but it nailed down for good one fact:
prohibition is a complete failure and will continue to be a complete failure at
achieving its official goal of reducing drug use. No self-serving prohibitionist can ever be taken seriously if
they claim to be succeeding at reducing drug use, so that particular move is
pretty much unusable now.
The number
one thing to do to undermine prohibition is to show that all the Hellenistic
mystery religions including Christianity and Jewish mysticism of the era were
based on and centered around entheogens, and that entheogens continued to be
influential and commonly used in the major religions, including throughout
Christian history, and that Christianity is thoroughly entheogen-shaped --
completely entheogenic in its form.
Part of
setting this record straight is to thoroughly debunk the worldview that
"entheogens are somewhat successful at imitating genuine Christian
mysticism" (in fact, official non-entheogenic Christian contemplation is
barely successful at imitating genuine Christian entheogen-based mysticism).
I prize
offensive axioms that are too powerful for ordinary conversations: there is no
free will; Jesus and Paul didn't exist; compared to entheogens, meditation
doesn't work at all; enlightenment is rationally comprehensible; myth is
entirely about the intense mystic state, not about daily life struggles;
religion and mythology are the same thing; religions are based on and centered
around visionary plants. Before people
said "Jesus is lord, savior, son of God, redeemer and deliverer arrived in
the flesh", they formed that language to talk about Caesar.
I have
mixed feelings about the instant violent demolishing of people's limited views
of the range of liberal thinking. Most
typical is "So what do you think Jesus was really about?" "There was no Jesus." "What?" Today's evangelist and pop Buddhist is equally innocent of
knowing the Calvinist doctrine of no-free-will, and can hardly imagine such a
view being a main foundation of Protestant history and theology, or of some
schools of Buddhism (witness the scandalized shock and uproar continuing
through several issues of "What Is Enlightenment?")
What I
discuss has the power to deeply shock people -- it is not clear that we always
want to deeply shock the people around us, people who consider themselves to be
fairly open and aware.
>>
People should obey the laws and work to change bad laws.
>How
can that happen in the United States (changing bad laws)? Has it ever happened in recent history?
Yes.
>Do we
have such a system in the United States?
What are our options?
Yes.
To
research:
http://www.reformnav.org
For
cannabis to be a full-on entheogen, eating several grams of hashish is likely
most effective -- but hashish remains under the pharmacratic inquisition in
Belgium. The new policy is only
*relatively* enlightened; a partial move in the right direction. "Instead of punishing your descendents
to the 7th generation, now we only punish to the 6th generation." The paradigm of prohibition fully remains,
though that "drugs are bad" paradigm itself is the real, significant
problem.
http://www.drugpolicy.org/news/06_18_03belgium.cfm
-- Belgian Marijuana Decriminalization Now in Effect -- "As of Monday,
June 2 2003, marijuana possession was officially decriminalized in Belgium. ...
Possession of one plant or up to three grams of marijuana will draw a warning
and a fine of 15 to 25 Euros. A second offense within one year draws a fine of
26 to 50 Euros. A third offense within one year may be punished by up to a
month in jail. Decriminalization does not apply to cannabis oil or cake.
Smoking in the presence of minors, near schools or army barracks is now
considered a public nuisance ... The drug will be confiscated in all cases. ...
Use of drugs in a group is no longer an offence ... Belgium now joins Italy,
Luxembourg, Portugal, and Spain on the list of European countries that have
legalized or decriminalized marijuana possession. Britain has moved to
reschedule marijuana as a less serious drug, with possession punishable only by
a fine. The Netherlands keeps its marijuana laws on the books, but tolerates
possession and regulated sales. Marijuana possession remains a crime in other
European countries, but is generally lightly punished compared to the effects
of the strict and harsh laws of the US."
Here are
pages that mention "earth day" and hemp.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22earth+day%22+hemp
This
subjects is related to the phoney drug war, which is related to psychoactives,
which is related to primary religious experiencing. It strains the mind to imagine anyone so evil as to aggressively
prohibit plants -- and in a supposedly free country, and even when those
plants, such as hemp, have tremendous environmental potentials, and are a
proven source of primary religious experiencing. King Pentheus was rightly torn to pieces by his own mother for
rejecting Dionysus, the god of psychoactive wine mixtures."
I will
scope this out to look for the entheogen theory of religion. Described
below. "Puts the erroneous claims
of prohibitionists into historical perspective."
Saying
Yes: In Defense of Drug Use
Jacob
Sullum
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1585422274
J. P.
Tarcher, May 8, 2003
Amazon.com
Sales Rank: 942 (very high)
"Jacob
Sullum has produced a thoughtful, sane, and logical analysis of our drug
laws. Is that even LEGAL?"
- Dave
Barry, syndicated columnist
"Saying
Yes is a powerful refutation of the pharmacological prejudices underlying the
war on drugs. Jacob Sullum highlights
the injustice of punishing people for their politically incorrect choice of
intoxicants."
- Nadine
Strossen, president of the American Civil
Liberties
Union; professor of law, New York Law School
"Sullum
pits the truth against the lies of the drug prohibitionists."
- Thomas
Szasz, professor emeritus of psychiatry, SUNY
Upstate
Medical University
"I've
never used a recreational drug (or even had a sip of alcohol) in my life, but
Jacob Sullum makes a great case to stop the drug wars. He exposes the tricks of the drug warriors,
who scam the crowd with huckster patter about magical substances that force
people to do evil."
- Penn
Jillette, the larger, louder half of Penn & Teller
"Jacob
Sullum shows that drug use is far from an all-or- nothing phenomenon and that
all use is not abuse. He puts the
erroneous claims of prohibitionists into historical perspective."
- Mark
Stepnoski, former NFL player (Dallas Cowboys, Tennessee/Houston Oilers);
president, Texas NORML
5/29/03
Dear
friends:
DRCNet is
pleased to announce a new book offer:
"Saying Yes: In Defense of Drug Use," a new, scholarly work by
author Jacob Sullum of the Reason Foundation.
"Saying Yes," published by Tarcher/Putnam, strives to
accurately portray the controlled responsible use of drugs that is the norm,
not for all, but for most drug users.
This is a controversial notion in our society and to some extent even in
the drug reform movement itself.
Whether you are inclined to agree or disagree with Sullum's central
point, we hope you'll read "Saying Yes" and to hear and consider
Sullum's evidence and arguments in full.
Just visit http://www.drcnet.org/donate/ and donate $35 or more, and
DRCNet will send you a copy for free.
Your
donation will help in a second, very important way. The drug reform movement is in a financial crisis of greater
proportions than I have ever seen in my nearly ten years of involvement. While some help is on the way from the
movement's major grant program, the Tides Fund for Drug Policy Reform, they
have unfortunately chosen a timetable that won't see funds disbursed until
September. That means your help is very
much needed in the meantime -- DRCNet literally will be unable to pay its bills
or payroll or keep its online petitions to Congress running through even next
month, without your support.
So please
visit http://www.drcnet.org/donate/ to make a generous donation by credit card
or to print out a form to send in with your donation by mail -- or just send
your check or money order to: DRCNet,
P.O. Box 18402, Washington, DC 20036 -- and contact us for instructions if
you'd like to make a contribution of stock.
I have
read Jacob Sullum's book and learned from and enjoyed it, and I believe you
will too. So visit http://www.drcnet.org/donate/
and donate $35 or more to make your contribution and get your free copy! (You can also request other books we offer,
as well as StopTheDrugWar.org t-shirts, mugs and mousepads.)
Please
note that donations to the Drug Reform Coordination Network are not
tax-deductible. If you wish to make a
tax- deductible donation to support our educational work, make your check
payable to DRCNet Foundation, same address.
Again, visit http://www.drcnet.org/donate/ to join, donate and order
your free copy of "Saying Yes."
And make sure to check out issue #289 of The Week Online, coming out
tomorrow morning, to read a review of "Saying Yes" by DRCNet
writer/editor Phil Smith. Thank you for
your support.
Sincerely,
David
Borden
Executive
Director
P.S. Visit
http://www.cato-institute.org/events/030529bf.html for links to watch Jacob
Sullum's book talk live at the Cato Institute, noon today (Thursday, 5/29), and
Real Audio to listen to afterward.
I posted a
short review, or recommendation, of Dan Russell's books Drug War, and Shamanism
& Drug Propaganda. It's wonderful
that Amazon has book excerpts, making customer reviews much less critical for a
buying decision. I don't feel I can do
an adequate review summarization of Russell's books, but at least I can quickly
grant 5 stars.
http://www.reformnav.org
-- rapid-navigation portal for drug policy reform sites
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0965025349
-- Drug War: Covert Money, Power & Policy.
Dan Russell. Sep. 2000
Top-notch
content. Explains how the drug war is *fake* -- a flimsy invented excuse for
persecution for profit and for generating the funny money that the corporate
state needs.
The War on
Drugs has nothing to do with reducing drug use, and everything to do with immoral
means on the part of the authorities to gain power and money for themselves, no
matter what the cost to others. If the
so-called "drug problem" was eliminated today, the prohibition
industry would hasten to re-create the "drug problem" as quickly as
possible -- their income depends on it.
This book follows the money and shows how this evil situation came
about.
Drug
policy reformers especially should read this book, to understand how the
leading prohibitionists are incincere.
You can't take the prohibitionists seriously after reading this
book. They are fakes, actors,
manipulators, amoral liars -- con artists.
The drug war is revealed as a giant con scheme on the part of the
prohibitionists who strive to whip up fear and panic among the gullible public.
Definitely
recommended. Covers 19th and 20th century prohibition for profit.
The book
lacks statements of how the line of argument proceeds through the chapters and
sections, but the content is excellent and much needed.
See my
Amazon profile for related information.
_______________________
See also:
http://www.tripzine.com/reviews.asp?id=drugwar
-- Drug War: Covert Money, Power & Policy.
Dan Russell. Sep. 2000
by James
Kent
A review
of Dan Russell's tour de force expose of the War on Drugs
The
subtitle of Dan Russell’s epic dissertation, Drug War: Covert Money, Power
& Policy, says it all. Make no mistake, this is not a book about the
so-called "War on Drugs" we hear about in the newspapers, the one
being fought on our streets between cops and druggies or border guards and drug
smugglers. Nor is this the tale of earnest DEA agents matching wits and
military hardware in a valiant attempt to bring down international drug lords
and dope smugglers the name of the good old American social values. No, this
book is something else entirely, nothing less than a scathing expose of the
corrupt power structures which have emerged under the policy of US global drug
prohibition, and a detailed look at all the brutalities, genocidal wars, and
seedy covert operations that have been financed by the inflated value of
prohibited drugs since day one. ...
_________________________
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0965025314
-- Shamanism and Drug Propaganda"
MAPS (http://www.maps.org) is between a rock and a hard place. When they bend over backwards to act boringly scientific, they lose the interest of their supporters. When they provide information that their supporters find interesting, the journal no longer looks boringly scientific and thus no longer looks scientifically respectable.
Their previous issue was the first shift away from the usual scientific approach, to cover art. This move toward popular relevance of the journal was Sylvia's idea and then she left MAPS to join a Rave safety activist group, to underscore her call for relevance. I get the impression that supporters such as myself have voted with their feet and wallet saying that MAPS must remain relevant and not just pretend to be scientific by sacrificing relevance.
James Arthur discussed this issue with Sylvia in front of a conference audience. I'm trying to recall how the fascinating exchange went, among those present.
The new, current issue takes this approach of relevance to the extreme -- it's amazing; the issue is the extreme opposite of the journal's traditional approach. What happened to inspire such a complete turnabout? Loss of popular support? Loss of staff or even staff walkout? Change of journal leadership? Competition or inspiration from Trip magazine (http://www.tripzine.com) or Entheos journal?
Years ago, I responded to a survey. This new issue, years later, includes a quote from me criticizing sitting meditation and praising the eucharist, in the review of Saunders' recent book. I haven't found my quote in the book itself.
Home (theory of the ego death and rebirth experience)