26 years ago i lived in san diego where i met steve mcwilliams, a medical marijuana user and activist. California had recently legalized medical marijuana, but it was still criminalized for recreational use in the state and criminalized under federal law (as it still is), so it's legality was somewhat contested. I myself at that time used it to treat depression and insomnia (as i still do). This was without a prescription or medical authorization. I had simply discovered on my own that it's use was beneficial, therapeutic, so i used it illegally. This was an easy choice. It was obvious that the law was stupid and / or unjust. By this time i was 40 years old and had learned that many laws were stupid and or unjust, as was the whole political and legal establishment in america, if not the world.
anyhow, that's how i came to meet steve. I was interested in finding a doctor who would authorize me as a bonafide medical marijuana patient. In addition to advising me in this matter with a reference, steve and i talked more broadly about our worldviews, which were fairly compatible. We were both anarchists vehemently opposed to state power over our bodies and intimate personal choices. Steve had even written a pamphlet outlining his views that called for revolution, if i recall correctly. I wish i had saved the copy of it he gave me. I wish i had spent more time with him, gotten to know him better, developed more of a relationship. But i didn't. I didn't remain in san diego very long either. After i left i didn't forget him and was saddened to learn some time later that he had killed himself, largely because the government he had so opposed had persecuted and prosecuted him for being an outspoken activist.
my most memorable time spent with him was at the gay pride parade that year (1999) in san diego. It was quite an affair, a fairly big parade to a fairly big and enthusiastic audience. We were in the parade as part of a small medical marijuana contingent. Steve's usage was for chronic pain and to treat it he smoked a lot more than i, who could get by well on just a 'hit' (single inhalation) or 2 a day. So i didn't smoke at all during the parade, while steve would stop briefly about every 10 minutes to light up / take a hit. I had never seen anyone do this so publicly without fear of being busted (arrested), and i thought it was pretty cool.
i wish i'd spent more time with him because maybe i'd have become more like him, someone with more courage and resolve, more likable and relatable and relevant to the world. Otoh, maybe i'd have also met a similar fate as steve and some other more prominent critics / victims of the establishment, like peter mcwilliams (no relation to steve), author of a popular and very well written book that was also very critical of excessive governmental interference / control over our private lives, titled AIN'T NOBODY'S BUSINESS IF YOU DO. Peter didn't commit suicide; his government killed him by persecuting / prosecuting and jailing him while also denying him access to medical marijuana.
there has been plenty written about both of these men and their tragic deaths. to find out more all u need to do is google them. Here is a link to an article about the persecution (but not the death by suicide) of steve mcwilliams:
https://marijuananews.com/articles/federal-prosecution-of-activist-steve-mcwilliams-for-just-25-plants-relevant-to-american-refugees-in-canada-being-outspoken-is-the-real-crime-being-deprived-of-medication-is-the-real-punishment/legacy
and taken from that article, another link to a much less prominent (and thus more representative) medical marijuana user and his own troubles relating to wanting to use a natural drug or medicinal plant which our incredibly callous, cruel, and corrupt government (acting partly on behalf of a greedy pharmaceutical industry which sought / seeks to eliminate competition against it's own very expensive patented and often less effective artificial medications) has saw fit to make war on (which in effect is of course a war on all who use it). This article ends with the statement which is the title of this missive: "My country is killing me"
https://marijuananews.com/articles/a-medical-marijuana-user-says-that-marinol-rescheduling-is-worthless-for-him-he-simply-cannot-afford-it-my-country-is-killing-me
i just composed this because this is pride month, and being so made me think of that parade i marched in with steve 26 years ago. I think victims of the war on drugs have much in common with those who suffer from the persecution of the LGBTQ (and some more letters) community. In fact, all civilized sheeple / people are victims to some extent by having to live under arbitrary repressive ignorant and bigoted authoritarian attitudes, laws, and regimes the world over; products of dogmatic puritanical cultures designed to facilitate the oppression and impoverishment of the masses and the enrichment / empowerment of the elites who rule over us.
this is the best article i've read about the very determined, courageous life and death of a largely unknown american martyr, steve mcwilliams. No doubt there are others like him we aren't aware of:
https://www.420magazine.com/community/threads/steve-mcwilliams-medical-marijuana-activist-fallen-warrior.85905/
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epilogue (or should this be a prologue?) to this post: the first time i slept after posting the above, i had the following dream:
i'm at home, with the company of a few select guests, fellow potential activists i hope to educate. My guests are outside my home, while i'm inside. I look out a window and see an enormous tornado, sky to ground, very nearby on the opposite side of the house from where my guests are. I rush out to warn them but am so frightened i have great difficulty getting out the words (or maybe the difficulty is from being asleep dreaming): "Tornado!!! Get inside, take cover now!" They rush to follow me indoors, while i think of the best place to take shelter in my small home without a cellar. I decide it's in the bath tub. I look out the same window where i'd seen the tornado and now it appears to be right by it, a dark cloud of wind whipping madly by from one side to another, and am terrified as i take shelter among my guests, 1/2 expecting to die momentarily. But we don't die, as the danger just misses and spares us. Could this be a clear warning or admonition from a god whose existence i'm firmly agnostic about? I and my guests are enormously relieved to have been spared. Perhaps they, like me, are taking this harrowing brush with death as an omen to be extra careful about how we should proceed as activists seeking to radically change our world.
