The Church of the Most Holy and Righteous Drug War
by Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher
April 22, 2020
.....And there went out from Judaea, a commandment forbidding the possession of psychoactive plants, for the King was sore enraged that his people might thence derive thoughts that did not conduce to the seamless governance of his dominion. And among these dangerously enlightening flora, henceforth to be stigmatized evermore with the pejorative epithet of 'drugs', were, in no particular order: the kava-kava root of the South Pacific Isles, the bark of the Virola tree of South America, the roots of Tabernanthe ibigoa of equatorial Africa, the Psilocybe cyanescens mushroom of the Pacific Northwest, and all manner of "sacred fungi" from Central America. Neither shalt thou cure thy depression with coca, nor decideth for thyself how much pain relief thou needest in this life, but rather shalt thou pay through thy nose so that ye doctors can tell you how you feeleth and decideth what you needeth..."
Wow! Powerful stuff, folks. I mean, I LOVETH that stuff. Can I get a 'selah' on that? How about you, Goody Pimpkin? Can I get an amen? Yes, indeedy!
And may the anti-drug lord give his blessings to today's scripture reading.
Looks like we have some newcomers in the pews today. Welcome one and all. Please remember to sign the register in the narthex as you leave later this morning. For those who would like to become a full member of the church, it's a simple process. Just bring a notarized urine sample to our mini lab located in the Sunday School building on the second floor. Once we verify that you are free of plant substances created by the devil, we will send you a formal invitation to join the Most Holy and Righteous Church of the Drug War on the Hill.
I know, I know. That name is a little confusing. It makes it sound like the Drug War itself is on the hill, whereas, as we all know, the Drug War is a universal struggle against evil plant medicines and thus is omnipresent. But the church had spent a small fortune on signage before someone brought these ambiguous connotations to the attention of the budget committee. And if I haven't confused you already, how about this? The true name of the church is not just the Most Holy and Righteous Church of the Drug War on the Hill. It is the Most Holy and Righteous Church of the Drug War on the Hill, Cathedral, Tabernacle, and Church Agape Fellowship and Daycare Center and Pillar and Ground of the Truth.
What can I say? That name was decided by committee during a very lengthy and acrimonious brainstorming session, indeed.
OK, get your hymnals out and in the full upright position, folks. We are now going to hold forth with that eternal classic, Rock of Ages, hymn number 295 in the New Drug War Edition of your songbook. Don't hold back now, folks, let me hear you warble!
Just as sober as a judge
Through this wretched world I trudge
Full of sadness unalloyed
Leaving nature unemployed
But for my addictive pills
I renounce all hippie thrills.
Though my parents groan in death
Pot is never on their breath
Nor do mushrooms grow their brain
Nor the sacred ibogaine
Monkey see and monkey do
I am sober, how 'bout you?
Comes the sad man to a rope
When he gives up all his hope
But he could do worse than die
By deciding to get high
Let him go with drug-less breath
There are worser things than death.
"Worser things than death"? Oh, dear. Well, it's the first edition of the New Drug War Hymnal. I'm sure they will be making improvements as time goes on.
Shout out to the doctors by the way who fought to outlaw cocaine on behalf of racists and militarists everywhere. Yes, cocaine may have been able to basically cure the depression of hundreds of millions of people -- but what about the 400 souls who had difficulty using the drug wisely back in Freud's day! Yeah, what about THEM?! Besides, if we cure depression, then who's going to come to the church to solve their problems and pay tithes. Narthexes don't build THEMSELVES, you know? By the way, what exactly is the difference between a narthex and a nave? But that's neither here nor there. Meet me after church, ye who knows!
You guys may be seated, by the way. Jesus Christ... if you'll pardon my French. I just realized that you guys were still standing. Down, boy, down, please! You too, Mrs. McGillicutty. Yes, please, don't stand on ceremony with ME! You know better than that.
(Whenever you're ready.)
Turning to church notices. The Royal Order of Self-Righteous Buffaloes will be holding free drug testing 1 from 9:00 to 5:00 at the old firehouse on Stubbins Road from Monday through Friday of this coming week. Names of those who pass the test will be featured prominently in next week's bulletin. Remember, folks, if you pass ten certified drugs tests during a calendar year, you are eligible for our church sainthood program, which confers posthumous sainthood upon any congregation member who passes a minimum of 75 notarized drug tests during their lifetime.
I should mention, there is a nominal registration fee for the program: $50 per candidate per sainthood. There's also a $50 processing fee for anyone who fails a drug test since our staff then has to go back and recalculate your morality score while taking your lapse of sobriety into account. That may sound easy, but this requires a subjective determination by our Board of Bishops, and, well, our Board of Bishops can't even agree on what brand of toilet tissue to buy for the Sunday School building rest rooms. And we all know what a hash they made of the church moniker.
That's all the time we have time for. I'll ask our organist, Goodie Temperance Babcock, to take us out of here with a big 'un everybody's kind of diggin'. It's Bach's Concerto for Orchestra and Drug Warrior in D Minor. It's all yours, Goodie!
This is why "rock stars" use drugs: not just for performance anxiety (which, BTW, is a completely UNDERSTANDABLE reason for drug use), but because they want to fully experience the music, even tho' they may be currently short on money and being hassled by creditors, etc.
When we place the FDA in charge of deciding whether a psychoactive drug should be re-legalized or not, we are asking them to decide on things like the relative importance of appreciating a sunset, a task for which the FDA has no expertise whatsoever.
Jim Hogshire described sleep cures that make physical withdrawal from opium close to pain-free. As for "psychological addiction," there are hundreds of elating drugs that could be used to keep the ex-user's mind from morbidly focusing on a drug whose use has become problematic for them.
Just saw a People's magazine article with the headline: "JUSTICE FOR MATTHEW PERRY."
If there was true justice, their editorial staff would be in jail for promoting user ignorance and a contaminated drug supply.
It's the prohibition, stupid!!!
Many people take antidepressants believing their depression has a biochemical cause. Research does not support this belief. --Dr. Noam Shpancer, Psychology Today
The press once again hauls out the easy answer. Reiner's son was using drugs! Aha! Of course, that explains EVERYTHING! [sigh]
Timothy Leary's wife wrote: "We went to Puerto Rico and all we did was take cocaine and read Faust to one another." And there is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING WRONG with that!!! The drug war is all about scaring us and making illegal drug use as dangerous as possible.
You can get a master's degree in healthcare today and not learn a thing about the power of hundreds of outlawed drugs to inspire and elate.
AI is like almost every subject under the sun: it takes on a very different and ominous meaning when we view it in light of the modern world's unprecedented wholesale outlawing of psychoactive medicine.
I thought mycology clubs across the US would be protesting drug laws that make mushroom collecting illegal for psychoactive species. But in reality, almost no club even mentions such species. No wonder prohibition is going strong.
Unless otherwise indicated, no AI is used in the creation of site content. These essays represent the original ideas of their author and not the ideas that the author SHOULD have based on an algorithmic parsing of existing data. For more on this subject, consider the AI-related viewpoints to which the author subscribes as delineated in the New York Times opinion piece entitled "What 370,000 College Essays Tell Us About A.I.’s Effects on Creativity" by Rebecca Winthrop of the Brookings Institution.
.....And there went out from Judaea, a commandment forbidding the possession of psychoactive plants, for the King was sore enraged that his people might thence derive thoughts that did not conduce to the seamless governance of his dominion. And among these dangerously enlightening flora, henceforth to be stigmatized evermore with the pejorative epithet of 'drugs', were, in no particular order: the kava-kava root of the South Pacific Isles, the bark of the Virola tree of South America, the roots of Tabernanthe ibigoa of equatorial Africa, the Psilocybe cyanescens mushroom of the Pacific Northwest, and all manner of "sacred fungi" from Central America. Neither shalt thou cure thy depression with coca, nor decideth for thyself how much pain relief thou needest in this life, but rather shalt thou pay through thy nose so that ye doctors can tell you how you feeleth and decideth what you needeth..."
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