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The propagandists has it correct, there is a war on. And the biggest weapon being used is words. The war on drugs personifies a deeper issue - the nature of ourselves, our culture, our reality.
For the last hundred years we have been taught that drugs are bad. And so many believe. But this is just dogma, spells spoken by a priestly class who, for their own purposes and to their own ends, have cast their own linguistic magic into the culture, concretizing social policy with their words.
In Schrödinger's Cat, Robert Wilson spells it out plainly: "Reality is the place where rival gangs of shamans fought to a standoff." The arbiters of culture are themselves shamans (consciously or no) crafting the rules and realities of society through the careful exercise of power, defining the frame for "rational" debate on "important" issues. The ability to control language imparts another capability - the control of reality itself.
Language creates reality. Those who control language control what we define as "real." To undo the linguistic magic of the "war on drugs," I believe a counter-spell is required. The war on drugs isn't being fought by governments against narcotics traffickers, although it is frequently presented within such a neat, black-and-white frame. The war on drugs is going on underneath your own skin, during your every waking moment.
The profound nature of the struggle within which we find ourselves engaged can not easily be overstated. The way we think of who we are, how we define our roles and expectations, whether we feel guilt or glory for our actions, none of these are called into being (or question) by forces outside ourselves. We are our own constant judge and jury, weighing each of our actions against an internal sense. That sense, whether or not we recognize it as such, is built up from the linguistic magic of cultural construction.
From the moment we learn the difference between good and bad (that which pleased or angered our parents) we have each been building intricate models of the "correctness" of our behavior, growing into socially adept beings who can navigate the peculiarities of culture by a careful obedience to the dictates of right and wrong, moral and immoral, legal and illegal. Thus, we ourselves have crafted the "mind forg'd manacles" described by Blake.
But we should not hold ourselves responsible for our imprisonment. We all need to understand the human drive to socialize is inherent, biological, and pervasive. We constantly internalize the linguistic assignments of culture, translating them into consensus reality. However, once we understand the nature of the cage that binds us (quite literally, the words which imprison us) it is incumbent upon us to undo the unconscious work of culture, and create something that we can consider wholly ourselves.
We must attempt to reformulate the essence of our thinking about our sense of culture and reality itself. The issue of drugs in general and more specifically psychedelics are effectively (and traditionally) an effective tool. We need to reprogram ourselves not only for our own well-being, but also (and more importantly) so that each of us can become culture workers, reframing the language which so polarizes any discussion of not just drugs, but also liberal issues making it effectively impossible to broach these subjects at all.
The propagandists do have it correct; this is indeed a war. Its a war for our minds, our very essence. And in this war we need to consider ourselves the shamans in a war of words which define reality and we much not stop until we've reset the parameters of the real.
:rant:
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