3 Things You Need to Know About Science

I love science and have tremendous respect for scientific inquiry. I have studied science. I know a few scientists, and I generally like them. However, I know a few things about science, and scientists, that more people need to know, especially now. So today, I offer you a few really important things you need to know about science and scientists.

1. Scientists know almost everything about physics, and almost nothing about life. That’s why physicists can build a reliable nuclear weapon but doctors can’t cure the common cold. Objective science works well for calculating the trajectories and velocities of objects in space and time. Organisms, however, are not objects, and so objective science is completely inadequate for studying them.

Most scientists don’t know this, but it is true. Sadly, many scientists, especially in the US continue to study human beings as though we were objects, or piles of objects called atoms. This has led to a medical system that dehumanizes and objectifies us more effectively than it treats disease or promotes health. It also means that there’s a hell of a lot that doctors don’t know. One thing doctors do know, however, is how to talk down to you in such a way that you won’t question their bullshit.

Physicists know how to blow shit up, and they don’t argue about it. Physicians, on the other hand, barely know what they are looking at, and there’s a lot of disagreement among them about practically everything. Doctors don’t like to let on that they really don’t know what they are doing, so they formed the American Medical Association in order to put up a consistent front that makes it look like they have everything figured out and know what to do in every situation. They do this so that people will trust them, and unfortunately, it works entirely too well. The AMA works very hard to quell dissent within its ranks, and banishes doctors who refuse to tow the party line, but renegade doctors persist, and many of them have better success treating patients than doctors who follow AMA guidelines.

2. Almost everything we know about science, we learned from the pursuit of war. We learned physics in the development of ever more lethal weapons, and we learned medicine from patching up the survivors. Today our weapons kill people far more effectively than our doctors cure disease, and much of the advance in modern medicine has been in improving survival rates of people who suffer the kinds of traumatic injury that only technology can inflict.

3. Plebes worship “Science,” while scientists worship money. You can’t do science without money, and finding money to do science isn’t easy. Unless somebody thinks they can make a lot of money on it, or the military thinks they can kill people with it, you are probably going to have a hard time finding money to study it. On the other hand, if you don’t really care what you work on, as long as it pays well, your opportunities as a scientist multiply. Scientists spend a lot on their education, and they expect to be rewarded for that, so many scientists look for the higher paying jobs.

That’s why, when you need a scientist to do something really terrible, like design a nuclear weapon that kills all of the people in a city, but leaves the buildings standing, or turn a minor statistical anomaly into a smoke-screen argument against global warming, or bio-engineer a bat corona-virus so that it infects humans, you can always find a meek and obedient scientist who is happy to do it for you so long as you have the money.

Plebes, on the other hand, have disavowed the creation myth of their Judaeo-Christian heritage in favor of an even bigger pile of bullshit called the Big Bang Theory, and they now embrace “Science” the great spirit from whom all new technology flows, as a religion. They traded the clerical collar for the white lab-coat of scientific authority. Now they believe anything the doctor tells them, just like they used to believe the priest, and of course they take their vaccines as a sacrament to their faith in “Science.” I hope they’ve at least learned not to leave their kids alone with a scientist either.

People have always believed a lot of stupid stuff. As I’ve so eloquently said before, “Stupid and wrong is the natural human condition, and it has never stopped us before.” That said, the human body is smarter than science can comprehend, and its natural tendency to heal, especially when supported by good nutrition, proper exercise and a non-toxic environment, tends to make doctors look good, if they can somehow take credit for it, but the miracle is you, not the medicine, and your body knows more than your doctor.

That’s why you should be very careful about messing with that miracle, or trusting “Science.” Science is not some noble pursuit of the truth. Science is about warfare, money, power and greed, and any scraps of truth that emerge from it are purely coincidental. Science is a tool of exploitation and control. In fact, psychologists are studying you right now, and the people paying those psychologists intend to use the knowledge they gain to control and exploit you. That’s what you need to know about science.

SoHum’s Post-War Potential

Some people will tell you that the people of Southern Humboldt are too stupid to do anything but rape the environment, deal drugs, or both. I’m not one of those people. Despite our inglorious legacy, we have a lot to be proud of in our past, and we have a lot of potential for the future, but we have a lot of work to do right now to get there.

Change is coming. It’s happening as we speak. As the War on Drugs comes to an end, the cannabis industry will undoubtedly go through dramatic upheaval. We should expect difficulties and challenges we’ve never faced before, and we should expect that these challenges will be made more challenging because of what the War on Drugs has done to us as a community.

The War on Drugs has done terrible things to this community, and, like soldiers returning from war, we won’t know how profoundly the War on Drugs has affected us, until it is really over. Some of us may find successful careers in the post-war cannabis industry, but we’re all still bleeding from wounds we got from thirty years of the War on Drugs, and a lot of people around here simply cannot imagine any other way to live.

Humboldt County may or may not own the future of the cannabis industry, but we do own the War on Drugs. No one can take that away from us. What Lexington and Concord are to the American Revolution; what Gettysburg is to the American Civil War, Humboldt County is to the War on Drugs.

The War on Drugs lasted for more than 30 years, and you would be hard pressed to find a community anywhere in the US on whom the War on Drugs has had a more dramatic and lasting effect. No one likes to dwell on anything so terrible as war, but people die in them, people suffer through them, and they define people’s lives. We shouldn’t just try to brush it under the rug.

The War on Drugs has affected us all. We need to understand what happened to us in the War on Drugs more than anyone else. We need to understand how the War on Drugs impacted this community, and how it effected the whole country. We need that understanding this to heal ourselves. If we can find that healing for our own community, we can offer it to the millions of survivors carrying trauma from the War on Drugs.

Seriously. A Drug War Museum. It should have a plaque or something with the name of every American who died in the War on Drugs. Make it a place where Drug War Vets can be honored for the time they served… in jail. Tell the story of what happened to this community, honestly, but make it a compelling narrative, and don’t skimp on the details. Honor the herb, and honor the people who risked their lives in a war zone to keep America high during the War on Drugs. I’m not kidding. That is our claim to fame, as a community, and it’s our wisdom to share.

Take tourists on day-hikes that simulate the treks guerrilla growers had to make deep into the woods to tend their hidden patches. Have exhibits showing some of the sneaky tricks people used to hide their plants. Make each tourist carry a sack of chicken manure in their backpack for the whole hike, and hide some speakers in the woods that intermittently play the sounds of helicopters, to simulate an impending CAMP raid, for added realism . Show people what it was like here.

A trip to Southern Humboldt could become a therapeutic part of healing the traumas inflicted by the War on Drugs. When people come here, we should remind them that there’s nothing wrong with consuming cannabis, but that the War on Drugs is a crime against humanity that has taken a toll on all of us. We should show the War on Drugs for what it is: a dark chapter in American History that must never be forgotten because it must never be repeated.

Garberville should become the place where people come to heal the wounds of the War on Drugs, but we can also make Garberville a place to explore the healing powers of cannabis as medicine. We have a strong community of healers here who already have a lot of experience with cannabis as medicine. I imagine that we’ve barely scratched the surface of cannabis’ many therapeutic uses, and that the potential for new products, therapies and treatments involving cannabis is huge. Look, cannabis feels good. Feeling good is good for you. Therefore cannabis is good for you. If you ask me, that’s all the recommendation anyone needs to enjoy cannabis. Now that cannabis is going to be legal, and cheap, let’s see how many imaginative new ways we can find to use it.

Cannabis is not wine. It is not a decadent luxury for the well-to-do. Cannabis is medicine. Cannabis is tonic. Cannabis is good for you. That’s why everyone needs cannabis. We can’t possibly grow enough cannabis here for everyone, and we shouldn’t even try, but we can dream up new ways to use it, and we can use it to heal ourselves, our economy, and our community from the traumas inflicted by the War on Drugs.

Prohibition Kills

Prohibition Kills

Marijuana is a beautiful plant, but marijuana prohibition is an ugly thing. Sadistic, racist cops all over the country use marijuana prohibition to target minorities, especially minority youth.

Violent drug gangs use marijuana prohibition to finance their weapons purchases.

Bloodthirsty corporations use marijuana prohibition to sell dangerous, addictive and synthetic substitutes,

and many otherwise law abiding citizens have been lured into using it to supplement their income, despite the risks involved

By now, marijuana prohibition has gone on so long that it has become an institutionalized evil. Lots of people have gotten used to making a good deal of money from this one very bad law. At the same time, millions of people go to jail, lose their jobs, suffer needlessly, and pay exorbitant prices for a harmless, hardy weed that, despite over 10,000 years of human consumption, has never killed anyone.

Thanks to marijuana prohibition, however, lots of people lose their lives in the marijuana black market. In this small rural community alone, at least three people have been murdered, and a couple more have gone missing in marijuana prohibition related circumstances in the last few months. They were by no means the first prohibition related murders in Southern Humboldt, nor will they be the last.

Like the frequent law-enforcement caravans that snake through the hills, and the violent raids they inevitably lead to, murders and disappearances have become a fact of life around here. People have gotten used to these events, and hardly bat an eyelash when they occur, but without prohibition, we wouldn’t have the cops, and without the cops, we wouldn’t have the money, and without the money, we wouldn’t have the murders. Prohibition creates this vicious cycle of oppression, crime, and violence that destroys families, ends lives, and creates tremendous hardship and suffering for millions of people.

Prohibition costs a lot of money too. Taxpayers pay for all of those cops, courts, jails, and probation officers that process the 750,000 or so marijuana arrests annually in the US. They also pay for a lot of misleading anti-marijuana propaganda, eradication campaigns, and surveillance. Outdoor grows displace and destroy natural habitat, divert water and pollute the environment. The conversion of residential housing into indoor commercial marijuana farms makes housing more expensive, and the lights, fans and pumps used in clandestine marijuana grows contribute to global climate change, the costs of which continue to mount.

Most of these costs are born by the general public, not by the producers of marijuana. When an industry raids the public commons for profit, pollutes the environment, injures or kills employees without compensating them for their losses, we say they have “externalized” those costs. That means that they’ve managed to keep the real costs of producing their product off of their books, and foisted them onto someone else, who does not share in the profits from the business. Because of the externalized costs involved in marijuana prohibition, most of us, whether we consume marijuana or not, suffer real losses ranging from loss of freedom and income to the loss of home, career or loved ones, while a few people reap tremendous profits which mostly go unreported, undeclared and untaxed.

Yes, marijuana prohibition is a tremendously unfair, but effective method for redistributing the wealth of working, taxpaying citizens to people who don’t play by the rules and don’t care who they hurt. In this way, marijuana prohibition brings out the worst in people, and attracts the worst kinds of people.

Unfortunately, marijuana prohibition attracts these unsavory elements to our charming little rural community. We ignore it, because with this unsavory behavior and these unsavory characters, comes money. It seems that just a little sprinkle of money can make the unsavory, quite palatable, but still, we should not forget where all of that money comes from.

A lot of marijuana money comes from our nation’s youth. High school and college students buy a lot of marijuana. Most of them don’t own homes, so they have no place to grow their own.  Besides spending a lot of money on marijuana, young people disproportionately become victims of prohibition related violence, including that metered out by law enforcement and the so called criminal justice system.  Of all the things available, and attractive to young people these days, marijuana is one of the safest.  It should also be one of the cheapest and most freely available. Prohibition has turned it into an expensive luxury and made it a commodity worth fighting over.

Marijuana smokers endure a lot of workplace discrimination. Arrest records, drug testing and honesty can severely limit a marijuana smokers employment opportunities. As a result, marijuana users tend to work at lower paying jobs. High marijuana prices severely impact their lives, but they prioritize marijuana because, as Freeweelin’ Franklin used to say, “Dope will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no dope.”

Cancer patients and others who need medical marijuana to treat pain, nausea, seizures, or other conditions, form a rapidly growing segment of marijuana users. Marijuana is an effective medicine, and many argue that it makes a good preventative tonic as well. Marijuana prohibition makes healthy people sick, keeps sick people from medicine that can help them, and people die as a result.

Without a doubt, marijuana money comes disproportionately from the poor, the young, and the sick, the people who can afford it least, and many of them do without other necessities in order to afford the high prices demanded by black-market dealers.

Without marijuana prohibition, Southern Humboldt would be just another poor rural community struggling to cope with economic hardship, but just imagine how much better life would be. Murders would still shock us. The people who work for a living around here could afford to live here. We’d all still have plenty of pot, but so would everyone else in the country, and no one would drive up from the city to try to kill us for it.

Most pot consumers could afford to take a three-day weekend every week because the only reason most of them work on Friday now, is so they can afford the pot they smoke all week. Anyone who wanted to, could grow all of the marijuana they wanted in their garden, and cops wouldn’t bother anyone about it. Anyone who had to deal with serious illness or chronic pain would have access to all of the natural medicine they needed, whether they could afford insurance or not.

In a post-prohibition world, we’d work a four-day work-week, and all of us would have plenty of marijuana. When you got the munchies, you could order a pizza, and have it delivered by a laid-off cop, and when you needed a pick-me-up you could order a cappuccino, and a former drug-dealer would make it for you. Doesn’t that sound like the kind of world you want to live in?