[worik]

Drugs like LSD and Mescaline are not, primarily, intoxicants. Technically they get you intoxicated, but that misses the point by a wide margin.

These drugs should be important in our society, the experience is indescribable and not necessarily fun - but mostly.

If it were not for the culture wars of the 1960s, and corrupt lecherous idiots like Timothy Leary and Ken Keasy scaring the bejesus out of the establishment , many lives would not have been ruined by these outrageous laws.

The same cannot be said for hairdressing

[andybak]

Any sources for your comments about Kesey and Leary? I've always found them both fairly interesting (if flawed) characters but my knowledge mainly comes via Tom Wolfe, Robert Anton Wilson and some pop-history books.

[worik]

I read their works. They were on about the ability of LSD to undermine the establishment. (They may have been right). The result of their success was a vicious clamp down.

My view was crystallised by HST in his "Looking west from Vegas with the right kind of eyes..." monologue in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (it is in the film, if reading books is not your thing. The film is, IMO, a faithful portrayal of the book)

When it comes to drugs, I am more of a follower, not a imitator, of HST than Leary. Drugs should be fun. When they stop being fun, stop doing drugs. Real simple!

[numtel]

Aren't they psychoactive, not intoxicating?

Alcohol is intoxicating because it damages cells but there's very little evidence that classical psychedelics are damaging in this way.