Why wouldn't you chew coca leaves? It's THE GOVERNMENT OF THE US that demonized it and for the sole reason of turning a beautiful plant into a demon specifically for THEIR OWN PEOFIT. Funny how millions and millions of people chew the stuff with no incident whatsoever and, in fact, it could be considered the oft-spoken about "soma" that Huxley was referring to.
And especially ironic that they flipped this perfect plant into a substance that ruins lives all day every day (comment if you DON'T know a crackhead or ten in your daily life) but practically never KILLS anyone. Wow. How convenient, right? That CIA
They did the demon plant things for cannabis as well.
It's one of the primary reasons I had a low regard for authority at a young age. I found it especially appalling considered how much people drank. Even in Baltimore...there's always the crack jokes, but the real killer and problem was alcohol. Sure, deaths by opioids pile up, but alcohol is a big part of the violence in the city, contributes to obesity, other health problems, etc.
I've never heard about coca in relation to soma, mainly because I don't think the location is right (wasn't soma in like afghanistan or a bit west of that?). I've never read the doors of perception or anything though, I've only read bits about soma here and there online.
I always got the vibe that soma didn't exist per-se, or Huxley wasn't speaking of a particular substance. I was one of the people who took major offense when they named the drug "Soma." It isn't.
We haven't found the drug that works perfectly for everything with no consequences or side-effects. Coca is pretty close though, as is kratom.
First you have to strip away the comparisons they make between "addiction" and "dependence." By their standards, everyone is a drug-seeker and the only thing you can be once you're that is a "junkie." An old lady can take 200 mg. of oxycodone every day and no one bats an eye, even if it KILLS her. If I have a toothache and score a couple of percs to get some sleep, I'm a junkie. Stigma is a motherfucker. I haven't taken opiates in going on seven years. I discovered Gabapentin is WAAAAAAY cheaper and works exponentially better than opiates for a toothache.
This is my opinion. Maybe a plant has tricked me and I'm addicted. Or MAYBE I need the plant to function and do my job due to untreated (more like unconcerning in every way to the doctors I've "seen.") pain issues. What do they want? For me to sit at home until I put a bullet in my head rather than take the powdered leaves of a fucking TREE because they are apparently "dangerous" even through they have literally NO PROOF OR DEATHS RELATED TO KRATOM? Sorry. I'm not going to do that.
My mom takes tramadol for extreme back pain...or she did.
But she got tired of having to go take a monitored urine test every six months for it.
So perhaps they treat those old ladies more like junkies than you would think.
Another fucked up one is kratom. One of my first girlfriends became a longtime heroin addict, and she stopped using and switched to kratom. Then out of the blue, her state pulled kratom completely, she went back to heroin, and eventually went into long-term, isolated treatment.
I have pain from various things, and cannabis has always helped me. Doesn't treat pain too much, but dissociation from pain helps. And while it might not be soma, it certainly could be the "fragrant tree" from Enoch's visions of heaven. And like you said for kratom and coca, the toxicity is non-existent. Humans and even dogs have THC receptors...they're there for a reason!
Why wouldn't you chew coca leaves? It's THE GOVERNMENT OF THE US that demonized it and for the sole reason of turning a beautiful plant into a demon specifically for THEIR OWN PEOFIT. Funny how millions and millions of people chew the stuff with no incident whatsoever and, in fact, it could be considered the oft-spoken about "soma" that Huxley was referring to. And especially ironic that they flipped this perfect plant into a substance that ruins lives all day every day (comment if you DON'T know a crackhead or ten in your daily life) but practically never KILLS anyone. Wow. How convenient, right? That CIA
They did the demon plant things for cannabis as well.
It's one of the primary reasons I had a low regard for authority at a young age. I found it especially appalling considered how much people drank. Even in Baltimore...there's always the crack jokes, but the real killer and problem was alcohol. Sure, deaths by opioids pile up, but alcohol is a big part of the violence in the city, contributes to obesity, other health problems, etc.
I've never heard about coca in relation to soma, mainly because I don't think the location is right (wasn't soma in like afghanistan or a bit west of that?). I've never read the doors of perception or anything though, I've only read bits about soma here and there online.
I always got the vibe that soma didn't exist per-se, or Huxley wasn't speaking of a particular substance. I was one of the people who took major offense when they named the drug "Soma." It isn't.
We haven't found the drug that works perfectly for everything with no consequences or side-effects. Coca is pretty close though, as is kratom.
First you have to strip away the comparisons they make between "addiction" and "dependence." By their standards, everyone is a drug-seeker and the only thing you can be once you're that is a "junkie." An old lady can take 200 mg. of oxycodone every day and no one bats an eye, even if it KILLS her. If I have a toothache and score a couple of percs to get some sleep, I'm a junkie. Stigma is a motherfucker. I haven't taken opiates in going on seven years. I discovered Gabapentin is WAAAAAAY cheaper and works exponentially better than opiates for a toothache.
This is my opinion. Maybe a plant has tricked me and I'm addicted. Or MAYBE I need the plant to function and do my job due to untreated (more like unconcerning in every way to the doctors I've "seen.") pain issues. What do they want? For me to sit at home until I put a bullet in my head rather than take the powdered leaves of a fucking TREE because they are apparently "dangerous" even through they have literally NO PROOF OR DEATHS RELATED TO KRATOM? Sorry. I'm not going to do that.
I have some good stories...
My mom takes tramadol for extreme back pain...or she did.
But she got tired of having to go take a monitored urine test every six months for it. So perhaps they treat those old ladies more like junkies than you would think.
Another fucked up one is kratom. One of my first girlfriends became a longtime heroin addict, and she stopped using and switched to kratom. Then out of the blue, her state pulled kratom completely, she went back to heroin, and eventually went into long-term, isolated treatment.
I have pain from various things, and cannabis has always helped me. Doesn't treat pain too much, but dissociation from pain helps. And while it might not be soma, it certainly could be the "fragrant tree" from Enoch's visions of heaven. And like you said for kratom and coca, the toxicity is non-existent. Humans and even dogs have THC receptors...they're there for a reason!