One of the movie critics I usually like to read has completely gone off the deep end. Lately it has become quite clear that he’s a Hollywood-type, leftie, wiggler nutcase but this little comment really takes the cake:
“‘ve always been grateful that I was reckless enough to “drop” a few times during my wayward youth. Whatever spiritual glimpses or understandings I’ve managed to absorb about the cosmic unity of God’s infinite kingdom, I owe to LSD. I saw in a flash what sad, regimented fantasies organized religions are. I felt wowed by the awesome beauty of the celestial scheme, turned on by molecular energy pulsing around and within everything, sensed currents of anxiety and quiet dread in people sitting next to me on the subway. I became an instant devotee of Jesus, Buddha, the Bhagavad Gita, Hermann Hesse, etc.”
Oh hoo-ray. Your life is so spectacularly empty that the only time you’ve ever had a “spiritual glimpse . . of God’s infinite kingdom” was while under the influence of a singularly powerful hallucinogen? Peachy for you. One might suppose that the mere fact you were taking a hallucinogen might preclude any chance you had of really glimpsing God’s kingdom. Woo. People are entirely too full of themselves.
Where the hell do drug users/abusers get off thinking they are on a somewhat higher plane than the rest of us? I can respect the people who smoke a bowl or something to mellow out and relieve the stress of the day. It’s a crutch, certainly but so is a glass of wine or a pint of stout or the occasional pipe. They’re all chemical ways to adjust mood. Where I get bent is when people say, as that fellow certainly did, “If you’re not turned on you’re really missing out.” Just what, exactly, am I missing out on? The chance to turn into a drooling automaton in the corner until the drugs wear off? The chance to wear Birkenstocks, stop showering and chant “Give peace a chance” while I toss bricks through the windows of Starbuck’s franchises in a pointless fight against “Globalization?” Bollocks to all that. There was a time when man was granted his pint in peace and thereby decreased the heavy load of the day and then went on about his business, blissfully free of worry and as relatively clean and sober as he wished. Oh for the good old days.