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How the Drug War Banned my Religion



by Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher

May 4, 2021



ot only is the Drug War the establishment of a religion (namely, that of Christian Science), but it bars me from practicing my own religion, for my religion holds that the mind can gain metaphysical insight through the use of psychoactive plant medicines and that it is my responsibility as a human being to pursue that insight. Why? Because I believe with Plato that the unexamined life is not worth living. The Drug War, however, prevents me from living this examined life by denying me access to precisely those plant medicines that I hold to be sacred and inspiring in this regard, plant medicines that have inspired entire religions in the past and been the source of metaphysical inspiration for such western icons as Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, and Plutarch.

The Drug War is therefore intolerable to those who believe in freedom of religion, not to mention the Natural Law upon which America was founded. For if anything is truly a natural law as defined by Jefferson and Locke it is an individual's right to access the plant medicines that grow at their very feet.

Religion






The Hindu religion was created thanks to the use of a drug that inspired and elated. It is therefore a crime against religious liberty to outlaw substances that inspire and elate.

Prohibition is a crime against religious freedom.

William James found religious experience in substance use. See his discussion of what he calls "the anesthetic revelation" in his book entitled "The Varieties of Religious Experience."

The drug war is a meta-injustice. It does not just limit what you're allowed to think, it limits how and how much you are allowed to think.

The Drug War violates religious freedom by putting bureaucrats in charge of deciding if a religion is 'sincere' or not. That is so absurd that one does not know whether to laugh or cry. No one in government is capable of determining whether the inner states that I achieve with psychoactive medicine are religious or not. This is why Milton Friedman was so wrong when he said in 1972 that there are good people on both sides of the drug war debate. WRONG! There are those who are more than ready to take away my religious liberty and those who are not. If the former wish to be called 'good,' they will first need a refresher course in American democracy and religious freedom. They need to renounce their Christian Science theocracy and let folks like myself worship using the kinds of substances that have inspired entire religions in the past. Until they do that, do not expect me to praise the very people who have launched an inquisition against my form of experiencing the divine.

There would be no Hindu religion today had the drug war been in effect in the Punjab 3,500 years ago.

"They have called thee Soma-lover: here is the pressed juice. Drink thereof for rapture." -Rig Veda



  • Addicted to Christianity
  • America's Puritan Obsession with Sobriety
  • Drug Testing and the Christian Science Inquisition
  • Freedom of Religion and the War on Drugs
  • Heroin versus Alcohol
  • How the DEA determines if a religion is true
  • How the Drug War Banned my Religion
  • Introduction to the Drug War Philosopher Website at AbolishTheDEA.com
  • Libertarians as Closet Christian Scientists
  • Meister Eckhart and Drugs
  • Psychedelic Cults and Outlaw Churches: LSD, Cannabis, and Spiritual Sacraments in Underground America
  • Take this Drug Test
  • The Christian Presuppositions of the Drug War and Why They're Important
  • The Church of the Most Holy and Righteous Drug War
  • The Drug War = Christian Science
  • The Drug War as Religion
  • Using Ecstasy in Church
  • Why the Drug War is Christian Science Sharia
  • Why the Drug War is Worse than a Religion





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    Next essay: The Christian Science SWAT Teams of the Drug War
    Previous essay: Capitalism and the Drug War

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    Some Tweets against the hateful war on drugs

    Magazines like Psychology Today continue to publish feel-good articles about depression which completely ignore the fact that we have outlawed all drugs that could end depression in a heartbeat.
    "If England [were to] revert to pre-war conditions, when any responsible person, by signing his name in a book, could buy drugs at a fair profit on cost price... the whole underground traffic would disappear like a bad dream." -- Aleister Crowley
    Mad in America publishes stories of folks who are disillusioned with antidepressants, but they won't publish mine, because I find mushrooms useful. They only want stories about cold turkey and jogging, or nutrition, or meditation.
    If there were no other problem with antidepressants, they would be wrong for the simple reason that they make a user dependent for life -- not as a bug (as in drugs like opium) but rather as a feature: that's how they "work," by being administered daily for a lifetime.
    Your drug war has caused the disappearance of over 60,000 Mexicans over the last 20 years. It has turned inner cities into shooting galleries. It has turned America into a penal colony. It has destroyed the 4th amendment and put bureaucrats in charge of deciding if our religions are "sincere."
    Getting off some drugs could actually be fun and instructive, by using a variety of other drugs to keep one's mind off the withdrawal process. But America believes that getting off a drug should be a big moral battle.
    Laughing gas is the substance that gave William James his philosophy of reality. He concluded from its use that what we perceive is just a fraction of reality writ large. Yet his alma mater (Harvard) does not even MENTION laughing gas in their bio of the man.
    To put it another way: in a sane world, we would learn to strategically fight drugs with drugs.
    News flash: certain mushrooms can help you improve your life! It's the biggest story in the history of mycology! And yet you wouldn't know it from visiting the websites of most mushroom clubs.
    A law proposed in Colorado in February 2024 would have criminalized positive talk about drugs online. What? The world is on the brink of nuclear war because of hate-driven politics, and I can be arrested for singing the praises of empathogens?
    More Tweets



    The latest hits from Drug War Records, featuring Freddie and the Fearmongers!


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    3. O Say Can You See (what the Drug War's done to you and me)






    front cover of Drug War Comic Book

    Buy the Drug War Comic Book by the Drug War Philosopher Brian Quass, featuring 150 hilarious op-ed pics about America's disgraceful war on Americans



    You have been reading an article entitled, How the Drug War Banned my Religion published on May 4, 2021 on AbolishTheDEA.com. For more information about America's disgraceful drug war, which is anti-patient, anti-minority, anti-scientific, anti-mother nature, imperialistic, the establishment of the Christian Science religion, a violation of the natural law upon which America was founded, and a childish and counterproductive way of looking at the world, one which causes all of the problems that it purports to solve, and then some, visit the drug war philosopher, at abolishTheDEA.com. (philosopher's bio; go to top of this page)