ZEALOTS USE MORALITY TO HOBBLE OTHERS

Jerome Kellner's campaign in "Letters" against marijuana has no
balanced evaluation of scientific, psychological or social pros and
cons. All it serves is his personal moral stance, which impels him to
make absurd extrapolations (Letters, Aug. 22) about brain damage and
criminal behavior resulting from smoking pot.

Throughout history zealots have used morality to impose on others
their own joyless ways. Witness the Taliban. Morality is a loveless
and frequently punitive substitute for learning to appreciate
humanity, including one's own. It requires no inner quest, no
self-awareness. It self-righteously decides what is right and wrong
for everybody, without seeing anybody. Wrapped up in its own beliefs,
it has no capacity to feel or understand.

There was a time - long ago - when smoking marijuana helped me heal
psychological wounds that had been inflicted on me as a child by very
moral people. It also helped me open to life's spiritual dimension.
When that happened I gave up smoking marijuana, but I am deeply
grateful for all it gave me.

Second, all over the world I have had the privilege of meeting many
generous, compassionate, warm-hearted, wise and often quite brilliant
individuals for whom smoking marijuana was a sacred, conscious
practice and a deeply benevolent social ritual.

Alan Lowen
Paia