Dwelling in the Realm of Stupidity

SOMETIMEIN THE LATE NINETEEN SEVENTIES, before i had even tried smoking marijuana, a friend of mine from college announced that after years of inhaling, he was giving up the herb. I asked why, and he replied "because it makes me stupid."

My thought was "if you have been smoking it for a long time, presumably it has been making you stupid for a long time. Why now have you suddenly decided that temporary stupidity is no longer worth pursuing?" But instead I said "good for you". One often fares better if one does not articulate  one's thoughts out loud , most of us learn, eventually, often at great cost.

the thought also came to me "I spend every waking moment of my life attempting to be as intelligent as possible. I read, study, and go to class. I exercise, meditate, and indulge in what to me seems contemplation of the deepest sort. And yet what, in the end, does it ever get me, other than a painful awareness of the stupid, banal, tragedy of the world in which i regretably dwell?"

If life is a comedy to those who think, and a tragedy to those who feel, it seems to me that whether I think or feel, it is a tragedy. Not so much my own life, but the life of the society i see all around me.

The very notion that marijuana makes one stupid was for me  nearly enough incentive to give it a try. But then I thought, alcohol does the same thing, and in any event, is less likely to land you in jail. But, oh, those hangovers.

I have also heard that using marijuana, in moderate amounts, on an occasional basis, does something other than trigger stupidity. I had  heard that it can at times, again when used quite sparingly, inspire highly creative states of mind, and this from such notable intellectuals as dr carl sagan.

The same with alcohol. Very modest doses of the drug can be quite relaxing, comforting, and indeed mentally stimulating, but woe to those who over do it, either by imbibing an escessive amount at a single sitting, or by imbibing too frequently.

So maye its the same with marijauna, and with all drugs; that when used in proper, restrained amounts, they are truly theraputic, and bring healing, but that too much of a good thing is a bad thing.

Our culture hurls stupidity at us in overly abundant quantities, primarily through our seductive, sedative, salacious stupid media. this, for the obvious purpose of rendering us passively open to instruction and manipulation. The aspects of our modern culture which would make us more intelligent are available, but not nearly as readily. We must seek those out.

But in a world which preaches intelligence but practices stupidty, maybe an occasional self induced stupidity is a good healthy diversion for the erstwhile intelligent among us, while an occasional visit to a good research library, or to public broadcast television, might serve as an illuminating palliative to those among us who dwell mainly in the realm of stupidity.