Drugs & Philosophy

Some people believe that drugs can give them a spiritual experience. They think that a blend of chemicals can take them on a journey to a faraway place where they can discover what they are searching for.

I call bullshit.

The intelligent person always waits for an explanation, which is why only the intelligent will keep reading after I divulge the fact that I am vehemently against the use of drugs for recreational and spiritual purposes, period. As applied to current events, the only people who benefit from this despicable habit are the drug lords worldwide who kill both with their own machetes and diamond-studded glocks and indirectly through uncontrolled, massive overdoses of benzoylmethylecgonine and the like. I personally don't care if people overdose, I really don't; it is more the innocent victims in other countries that I do not see deserving of its effects.

Personally I would prefer that some of the minor substances be legalized and heavily monitored and taxed. This would disassemble a primary source of unnecessary death in all corners of the Earth, allow idiot potheads to kill themselves off in the same sense as those who worship big tobacco, while allowing the occasional blunt-sucker to escape the guilt of killing Columbian school children. But I digress, this is a political shitstorm not fit for this conversation.

Now, if you aren't an idiot pothead totally offended by the carpet-bombing of reasons that I call you an idiot pothead, I shall now explain.

There is always talk about "meaning," and "finding the meaning of life" and the "meaning of the universe" and "the meaning of Swiss cheese." It is nothing but blabber. Rather than attempting to find meaning, it is better to try and make it. Has it never occurred to anyone that they are worthless? We are, in the scale of things, absolutely worthless. However, on a fluffier note, we do have meaning in relation to each other. It is for this reason that we see Galileo and da Vinci, Voltaire and Gandhi as great men, and crackhead Jimmy as useless. In relation to the world, in relation to the rest of humanity, we have gauged the worth of their actions and their lives. They used the time they were given (by god or whomever) as a chance to create a persona that they could take pride in, and that others could value. Those who spend all of their time searching for meaning are wasting their time, and will fall into the category of people deemed worthless by society (a moderate number, although not the majority.) The language here is important: "all of their time..." It is human to look to the sky and ask open-ended questions, so long as we turn towards each other and make ourselves useful from time to time. The "useless" refers to those who lie for days on end on their backs in the grass of Central Park in a thick haze of pot smoke, staring at where the stars should be and call themselves "philosophers."

This is where the drugs kick in, so to speak. Aside from the violence of the drug trade, and, oh, other effects like the destruction of families, increase in crime, the tax money put aside for recovering addicts and other things I despise, I loathe drugs because of their pointlessness. "But marijuana lets me see the light," and "ecstasy amplifies life," and other blithering statements. In the same manner that Tylenol eases headaches and Bayer can stop a heart attack, drugs in general affect the non-thinking body and occasionally the limbic system, not the frontal cortex and rational mind. Therefore, everything you experience due to the effects of drugs is...due to the effects of drugs. Should you have somehow leapfrogged the "searching for meaning" argument and suggest that drugs assist spirituality, allow me to retort. Cannabis does not have the truth, it has Tetrahydrocannabinol. Acid does not have the secrets of the gods, but it does have lysergic acid diethylamide. So you see, if you think you're philosophical adventures are the result of your god-given ability to rationally think, you're wasting your time. And mine.

Current Mood: Aggravated

Listening To: "Mehr" by Rammstein