DISMAYED BY EDITORIAL

Dismay might best describe the effect your March 29 editorial on
crystal meth left me feeling.

Not dismay over the futility of trying to stop a miniscule number of
human beings from damaging themselves with cheap, synthetic drugs,
but dismay brought on by the realization that we, as a society, have
progressed so little since the 1960s and '70s in coming to terms with
the issue of drug use and misuse.

Your latest shot, in a drug war, which began with the strategic
stupidity of the Reagan era, is a poignant example of how the
mainstream press continually maintains a complicit relationship with
the government, the corporations and any and all related agencies
when it comes to the "war on drugs," and never comes to terms with
the real, fundamental issue of why this phenomenon is occurring.

Your editorial leads the reader to surmise it was the slack-assed
attitude of the hippies that is at the root of all the problems we're
facing today.

As such, it differs in no way, shape or form from any of the
countless generic editorials of its kind I've been reading since the 1960s.

Let's get it straight (again).

Marijuana, LSD and the rest of the array of psychedelic
(mind-expanding) substances were precursors of a new age and the
birth of a new consciousness - one which still exists and still holds
the greatest promise of being able to save this beleaguered planet
from the violence and insanity the forces of greed and war have
created everywhere.

In other words, it was an experiment that is still ongoing for those
who are participants.

Readers need to be reminded it was the hippies who first experimented
with speed (meth) and it was they/we who realized only too quickly
the deleterious effects of long-term use of this drug and quickly
spoke out against it in an effort to educate not only the freak crowd
but the population at large.

There will always be a tiny minority of people who will end up doing
this drug just as there is a tiny minority of people who do many
other weird drugs, but trying to wage war upon these troubled souls
is not the way to deal with the problem.

It never was and never will be. Only knowledge and truth given in a
non-judgmental manner will help this situation to improve.

If pot and all the other psychedelics had not been turned into
criminal substances by the very forces which own and benefit from the
control of government - i.e. the banks and corporations (like the
pharmaceutical drug ones), this world would be in a much better place
today than the hell hole it's now becoming.

Arthur Topham

Cottonwood