First, I find it important to be clear that I do not loath stoners. Some of my best friends partake in the recreational use of mary jane, pot, grass, ganja, or whatever the grandchildren of the hippies are calling it these days. In fact I believe that we should, in the words of Peter Tosh, legalize it. There are a multitude of positives that would result in the legalization of marijuana. For one, despite what stoner myth you may have heard, the government can tax marijuana. I have never heard one logical reason why they would not be able to tax it. Usually the reasons are incoherent government conspiracy babble that some how leads to “meaning of life” conversations. And as much debt that this country is in, it could never hurt to have a little more tax money flowing in.

We of course could not make it full-blown legal. You would have to smoke your weed in a hash-bar and would still be charged with possession or possession with the intent to illegally sell marijuana if you are caught driving around with it or growing it in your own home. This way the government can still feel like they are maintaining some control over the situation. In fact, one would have to think that this fictitious marijuana industry that I am writing of will be heavily regulated by the government, so much so that the government would also handle the growing of the weed and the selling of the weed to hash-bar proprietors.

Legalizing it could also help the economy. Think of all the jobs that will be created from a legalization program like the one I describe. First we will need people to grow and harvest the crop. We will also have to hire people to white collar jobs to help keep the things regulated. We will have to hire truckers to transport the crop. We will have to hire people to build the hash-bars and then we will have to hire people to work in the hash-bars. So put that in your stimulus bill and smoke it.

I also feel the need to be clear as to what the exact definition of stoner is within in the context of this piece. Stoner is not anyone who simply smokes marijuana, but stoners are those whose life aspiration is to get high. The people who when they are sober there entire thought process goes toward when the next time it is that they will be high. So while you may consider me and advocate for the legalization of marijuana, I do not want to be considered as someone who condones a lifestyle that constantly revolves around the next high, because excess and overindulgence usually leads to an overcrowded shit-pool.

With that disclaimer out of the way I can now get to the gist of this argument. Since its publication in Rolling Stone magazine in 1971 Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas has been grossly misinterpreted by the pothead community, which doesn’t make sense considering how insightful and analytic these people are. The stoner community has taken this novel and used it as a flag ship work that condones excessive partying. This is perhaps best illustrated by the work of Tucker Max, who chronicles his drunken sexual encounters on his website in a similar style to Thompson’s “gonzo” works. These stories that Max writes have no themes or motifs, but simply glorify overindulgence, which is how a lot of people view Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, as well.

The fact is that the novel is not a proponent of drug use, though I doubt Hunter S. Thompson would ever say you shouldn’t do drugs, but the novel is about how the counterculture of the 60s could not prevent the “American dream” from transforming into a ghoulish version of its former self. The anger and shame that the two main characters feel over their failed generation is illustrated by their drive to destroy what they see as symbols of corrupt American culture such as the expensive cars and lavish hotels that they trash. The backdrop of the story–the dirty, wastelandish, and sluttish 1970s Las Vegas–represents how low American culture had sunk, the culture that the hippie generation failed to change. In what is one of the most eloquently written passages in American literature Thompson sums up this idea:

“…There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning. . . .

And that, I think, was the handle—that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting—on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. . . .

So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark—that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.”

The themes behind Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas are not that one can find solace in overindulgence but that one who partakes in overindulgence is looking in the wrong place for peace, and unlike many people who advocate drugs, Thompson’s depiction of his drug-use renders him an incoherent disaster not a fun, Bluto from Animal House-type character. So to any burnout that thinks that the novel still some how glorifies drug use remember, “you can turn your back on a person, but never turn your back on a drug.”