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Patrick - question about drugs in the 60's

Patrick, You rightly criticize the characterization of 60's radicalization as just a hippie drop-out culture.

Many factors converged, and I'd say the most important was the Black insurgence.

But I've often wondered why, though, drugs and in particular psychotropics are almost absent from left or alternative culture these days, compared to the 60's. Of course people didn't organize and protest the war because they were all high. But it's also the case that tens of thousands of young people took acid (stronger then than today) and that pot and acid weren't done so much for fun but more like experiments in breaking-down habituated understandings and seeking alternatives to the bourgeois dulldrums.

Hallucinogens, of themselves, don't a revolutionary make. On the other hand, I think they're mostly good and should be used more. LSD in fact is known to be really helpful in addiction therapy - it may help those addicted to individualism and the "American way of life."

One thing that's impressive about the 60's is that so many adopted a generalized refusal of bourgeois society and social norms. Guess you could say that's what happens in any mass radicalization - but what role would you assign relatively popularized usage of LSD and other psychotropics during that time? Thanks and I look forward to parts 2 and 3.

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