Essay date: May 31, 2020

Drug War Copaganda

How cop shows reinforce drug warrior lies about Mother Nature's plants




Comedy routine showing how cop shows are full of drug war propaganda about Mother Nature's plant medicines

MCEE: Live from the DEA Lounge, let's give it up for comedian Johnny O'Clonnapan, brought to you tonight by Paraquat, the only weed killer recommended by America's DEA.

[applause]

JOHNNY: Before I start to be funny, my lawyer has asked me to read the following FDA warning. Ahem. And I quote.

"The FDA played a randomly chosen comedy routine of mine to 2,000 lab rats and discovered that every 92nd one of them blew a gasket during the funniest parts of my material."

Personally, I think that study was flawed. First of all, how do we know for sure that my audience has the same comedic predilections as the species Rattus rattus? Be that as it may, we have replacement gaskets available at the bar tonight, just in case, for just $2 apiece, with any qualified purchase of a house cocktail worth $9 or more.

So, gaskets in the full upright position, folks. I'm about to unload.

[gasp]

With my humor that is.

[laughter]

FUNNYSHORTS

You ever stop to wonder what television would have been like over the last 50 years if America hadn't gotten the harebrained idea of criminalizing plants? Cop shows would not exist. I kid you not. All the violence that fuels the cop show plots would be gone. What a bummer for the police. Then they could only arrest people for actual bad behavior instead of for the pre-crime of possessing plants that had been demonized by politicians.

Cops would be like: "Damn, we've just got to sit on the sidelines now and let people go about their lives as they see fit. This is no fun."

^{How many Drug Warriors do we have in the house? Let me see a show of dunce caps.}{

[drum]

[laughter]

I mean hands. Let me see a show of hands.

You Drug Warriors are lucky. You've got so much working for you, propaganda-wise. Seriously. Almost every single cop show is free Drug War propaganda.

SAY THAT AGAIN!

Almost every single cop show is free Drug War propaganda.

Think about it.

Have you finished thinking? Oh, I'm sorry.

There are several Drug Warriors in the back there who still haven't quite wrapped their brains around it. That's okay. No hurry. Keep thinking about it, guys.

[laughter]

Be nice, folks. I'm sure the Drug Warriors are doing their best.

When have you ever seen a debonair genius like Sigmund Freud, casually employing coke on a cop show to render themselves prolific, and thus achieve self-fulfillment in life?

Never. That's when.

[applause]

That would violate Drug War superstition, which says that criminalized plants can cause nothing but evil.

You only ever see coke used by greedy Wall Street prodigies and morally rudderless young people, at stag parties and the like. As for the coke itself, it generally appears in a small white mountain on a card table in a dimly lit room, alongside a pile of bloodstained money, a razor blade, and a recently fired handgun.

And the dimwit viewers are all like:

"Oh, isn't cocaine just terrible? Honestly. The bullets, the blood and the razor blades! Oh my!"

And I'm like: Hello, folks. The bullets, the blood and the razor blades (Oh my!) didn't arrive on the scene until we criminalized cocaine and thereby placed its distribution in the hands of the underworld.

Boy, I'm glad I'm not a mean person, or else I would be seriously tempted to refer to Drug Warriors as idiots, I mean just utter morons who have about as much philosophy in their brain pans as I have in my little toe... let's say the one on my left foot for the sake of argument.

But I'm better than that, folks. There's nothing to be gained by trashing Drug Warriors personally, no matter how stupid their arguments might be in favor of criminalizing God-given plants - plants which God himself said were "good," in the Book of Genesis no less.

[applause]

Yes, there's no point in calling such people morons, that's for sure. Is it tempting to do so? Yes, of course it is.

But I wasn't raised that way, folks. I just wasn't raised that way.

[applause]

Speaking of TV cop shows, how many fans do we have of "The Republic of Doyle" here tonight? You know, that show about the family of Irish private detectives up there in Newfoundland of all places.

I just watched an episode in which Jake was getting all self-righteous about his niece Tinny's involvement in selling some marijuana plants. Jake was like,

"I expected more from you Tinny. Tsk tsk tsk."

And of course Tinny bows her head, knowing that she has committed heresy against the Great Western religion of Christian Science when it comes to mood disorders.

[Tinny sobbing]

Of course, in the next scene, Jake is in a bar, hypocritically throwing back a brewski, with which he has no moral problems whatsoever.

[burps] "Jake, please!"

[laughter]

Then there's another episode where Jake self-righteously tells a drug researcher that he (Jake) is not "into" drugs.

Would somebody please tell Jake that the word "drugs" is just a code word for "mother nature's plant medicines," and he should therefore stop preening his feathers, insisting that he wants nothing to do with them. That's just plain stupid: God gives us this wonderful pharmacopoeia that's full of psychoactive plants that can help us screw our heads on straight, and the ungrateful Jake says he wants nothing to do with them.

I sincerely hope that 50 years from now, when Jake is in an old people's home and feeling blue, that his Canadian caregivers will be allowed to provide him with psychedelic plants that will help him make his peace with death and rejoice once again in the wonder and the mystery of existence.

[applause]

Hopefully by that time, Jake will no longer be talking about: "I'm not into drugs."

I tell you, if I were God and I heard that, I would take it personally. I can hear God right now.

[gong sounds]

"Here I make all these wonderful medications for you that, when used wisely, can be godsends, and you tell me that you're not 'into' them? I mean, Earth to Jake: that's what some of us would call base ingratitude on your part."

How about that? God has a British accent. Who knew?

[laughter]

Before I go, I'd like to remind you all to pick up a bottle of Paraquat Weed Killer, located in the poison aisle of your local lawn and garden center. It's the only weed killer recommended by America's Drug Enforcement Agency. This is the exact same formula that the DEA used in the 1980s to poison pot users in the United States.


[boo]


And talk about long-lasting, it's still working to this very day, causing Parkinson's Disease in the scofflaw Americans who unwittingly inhaled it four decades ago, courtesy of DEA Chief and Master Poisoner John C. Lawn.

[boo]

Is John C. Lawn in the house? Why doesn't he stand up and take a bow? I'm sure that those pot users forgave him years ago for screwing up their lungs.

[dog snarls]

[gasp]

Although it would appear that the seeing-eye dog at table 5 still remembers the outrage like it was yesterday. I guess the details got passed down to him by some kind of oral tradition peculiar to the canine tribe.

[dog barks]

Besides, let's face it, the ones who survived are too disabled by Parkinson's Disease to think about vengeance.

[boo]

What? They told me to plug Paraquat, and I plugged Paraquat.

[drum]

[applause]

Keep me in your prayers, folks. I'm going to get a proper tongue lashing from my agent the second that I get off this stage.

Oh, no, here she comes now!

[hysterical agent babbling]

I know, I know. Well, you're the one who told me to plug Paraquat.

[laughter]

EMCEE: You've been listening to Johnny O'Clonapan, live from the D E A Lounge.

Brought to you tonight by Paraquat, the only weed killer recommended by America's DEA, who reminds you to turn in your loved ones today if you discover them using any plants of which politicians disapprove. Together, we can all just say no to each and every one of Mother Nature's godsend mood medicines.

NARRATOR: For more information about America's bogus Drug War, which is a violation of natural law and responsible for thousands of unnecessary deaths around the globe every year, visit AbolishTheDEA.com.

Author's Follow-up: February 3, 2023


The Clinton Administration broke the law in the late 1990s by colluding with the media to fashion TV show narratives to place "drug use" in a bad light.1

Next essay: The Racist Drug War killed George Floyd
Previous essay: So, Your Faith Votes?

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You have been reading essays by the Drug War Philosopher, Brian Quass, at abolishthedea.com. Brian is the founder of The Drug War Gift Shop, where artists can feature and sell their protest artwork online. He has also written for Sociodelic and is the author of The Drug War Comic Book, which contains 150 political cartoons illustrating some of the seemingly endless problems with the war on drugs -- many of which only Brian seems to have noticed, by the way, judging by the recycled pieties that pass for analysis these days when it comes to "drugs." That's not surprising, considering the fact that the category of "drugs" is a political category, not a medical or scientific one.

A "drug," as the world defines the term today, is "a substance that has no good uses for anyone, ever, at any time, under any circumstances" -- and, of course, there are no substances of that kind: even cyanide and the deadly botox toxin have positive uses: a war on drugs is therefore unscientific at heart, to the point that it truly qualifies as a superstition, one in which we turn inanimate substances into boogie-men and scapegoats for all our social problems.

The Drug War is, in fact, the philosophical problem par excellence of our time, premised as it is on a raft of faulty assumptions (notwithstanding the fact that most philosophers today pretend as if the drug war does not exist). It is a war against the poor, against minorities, against religion, against science, against the elderly, against the depressed, against those in pain, against children in hospice care, and against philosophy itself. It outlaws substances that have inspired entire religions, Nazifies the English language and militarizes police forces nationwide.

It bans the substances that inspired William James' ideas about human consciousness and the nature of ultimate reality. In short, it causes all of the problems that it purports to solve, and then some, meanwhile violating the Natural Law upon which Thomas Jefferson founded America. (Surely, Jefferson was rolling over in his grave when Ronald Reagan's DEA stomped onto Monticello in 1987 and confiscated the founding father's poppy plants.)

If you believe in freedom and democracy, in America and around the world, please stay tuned for more philosophically oriented broadsides against the outrageous war on godsend medicines, AKA the war on drugs.

Brian Quass
The Drug War Philosopher
abolishthedea.com

PS The drug war has not failed: to the contrary, it has succeeded, insofar as its ultimate goal was to militarize police forces around the world and help authorities to ruthlessly eliminate those who stand in the way of global capitalism. For more, see Drug War Capitalism by Dawn Paley. Oh, and did I mention that most Drug Warriors these days would never get elected were it not for the Drug War itself, which threw hundreds of thousands of their political opposition in jail? Trump was right for the wrong reasons: elections are being stolen in America, but the number-one example of that fact is his own narrow victory in 2016, which could never have happened without the existence of laws that were specifically written to keep Blacks and minorities from voting. The Drug War, in short, is a cancer on the body politic.

Rather than apologetically decriminalizing selected plants, we should be demanding the immediate restoration of Natural Law, according to which "The earth, and all that is therein, is given to men for the support and comfort of their being." (John Locke)

Selected Bibliography

  • Bandow, Doug "From Fighting The Drug War To Protecting The Right To Use Drugs"2018
  • Barrett, Damon "Children of the Drug War: Perspectives on the Impact of Drug Polices on Young People"2011 IDEBATE Press
  • Bilton, Anton "DMT Entity Encounters: Dialogues on the Spirit Molecule"2021 Inner Traditions/Bear & Company
  • Boullosa , Carmen "A Narco History: How the United States and Mexico Jointly Created the 'Mexican Drug War'"2016 OR Books
  • Brereton, William "The Truth about Opium / Being a Refutation of the Fallacies of the Anti-Opium Society and a Defence of the Indo-China Opium Trade"2017 Anna Ruggieri
  • Burns, Eric "1920: The year that made the decade roar"2015 Pegasus Books
  • Carpenter, Ted Galen "The Fire Next Door: Mexico's Drug Violence and the Danger to America"2012 Cato Institute
  • Chesterton, GK "Saint Thomas Acquinas"2014 BookBaby
  • Filan, Kenaz "The Power of the Poppy: Harnessing Nature's Most Dangerous Plant Ally"2011 Inner Traditions/Bear & Company
  • Griffiths, William "Psilocybin: A Trip into the World of Magic Mushrooms"2021 William Griffiths
  • Hofmann, Albert "The Encyclopedia of Psychoactive Plants: Ethnopharmacology and Its Applications"2005 Inner Traditions/Bear & Company
  • Irwin-Rogers, Keir "Illicit Drug Markets, Consumer Capitalism and the Rise of Social Media: A Toxic Trap for Young People"2019
  • James, William "The Varieties of Religious Experience"1902 Philosophical Library
  • Mariani, Angelo "Coca and its Therapeutic Application, Third Edition"1896 Gutenberg.org
  • Mortimer MD, W. Golden "Coca: Divine Plant of the Incas"2017 Ronin Publishing
  • Partridge, Chiristopher "Alistair Crowley on Drugs"2021 uploaded by Misael Hernandez
  • Rudgley, Richard "The Encyclopedia of Psychoactive Substances"2014 Macmillan Publishers
  • Shulgin, Alexander "PIHKAL: A Chemical Love Story"1991 Transform Press
  • Shulgin, Alexander "The Nature of Drugs Vol. 1: History, Pharmacology, and Social Impact"2021 Transform Press
  • Smith, Wolfgang "Cosmos and Transcendence: Breaking Through the Barrier of Scientistic Belief"0
  • Smith, Wolfgang "Physics: A Science in Quest of an Ontology"2022
  • St John, Graham "Mystery School in Hyperspace: A Cultural History of DMT"2021
  • Szasz, Thomas "Interview With Thomas Szasz: by Randall C. Wyatt"0
  • Wedel, Janine "Unaccountable: How the Establishment Corrupted Our Finances, Freedom and Politics and Created an Outsider Class"2014 Pegasus Books
  • Weil, Andrew "From Chocolate to Morphine: Everything You Need to Know About Mind-Altering Drugs"2004 Open Road Integrated Media
  • Site and its contents copyright 2023, by Brian B. Quass, the drug war philosopher at abolishthedea.com. For more information, contact Brian at quass@quass.com.