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Those of Us Who Study History are Condemned to Watch the Rest of the World Repeat It — By Norman B
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
– George Santayana
“Those of us who study history are condemned to watch the rest of the world repeat it.” — Me.
Here I am in the liberal bastion of Amherst, Massachusetts. Yet Islamophobia and related hatred of people who are different is in full bloom. I am not Muslim or Arab, but you can’t tell that from looking at me, because I have a long gray beard that can strike fear into the 10,000 or more Freshmen in this University town, who’ve never before lived in such a multi-cultural Mecca (if I can still use that term). Lots of times during my daily walk across the UMass campus, a new Freshman has seen me, and turned to run away in terror. It will probably happen again next week. I can laugh at it, but it hurts immensely.
Earlier this year, a mosque was proposed, but the haters – I mean "the neighbors" – prevented it, falsely claiming that the traffic would be a problem.
And even at the most liberal place in town, Hampshire College, I am severely discriminated against. To put into perspective just how liberal Hampshire College is: For several years Saturday Night Live aired a continuing skit with a running gag about Hampshire students: No grades, no tests, no departments, students openly smoking pot. It’s all true; and it’s alright with me.
As it happens, I am a Minister in a radical church, the Church of the Tree of Life. Hateful opportunist politicians have attempted (unconstitutionally, I think) to ban the Church by illegalizing its Sacraments, the most famous of which today is Salvia Divinorum, an herb that doesn’t hurt anyone, but makes most of its users uncomfortable and scared, because it takes them to the place of prophecy. The Church began in San Francisco around 1970, and has operated without problems here in Amherst more than 15 years. Three-quarters of the attendees at our events have been Hampshire College students.
So when a local newspaper ran a disinformation article about Salvia, I was compelled to act, including placing fliers at Hampshire College, as I’ve done for more than a decade. Ah, but I don’t look like a college student, even a Hampshire student, and I don’t dress like a professor. So, as I was boarding the bus to leave, a Hampshire College policewoman approached me with her hand on her gun, trembling profusely. I felt like I was facing that poor McCain rally attendee who, speaking of Candidate Obama, stammered “He’s – he’s a – a Arab!” John McCain, of course, said “No he’s not; he’s a good man,” as if the two are mutually exclusive.
Well, I was banned from Hampshire College, despite my history there. (I had worked there, I had performed there, had been involved in political organizing there, and my activist/performer career had been the subject of a student’s dissertation, among other connections.) And if you think that’s bad, you should see what happens if I try to get onto a plane.
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
– George Santayana
“Those of us who study history are condemned to watch the rest of the world repeat it.” — Me.
8 Comments
“Just how ‘radical’ is this Church of the Tree of Life?” you may ask. We are non-dogmatic: It doesn’t matter to us what beliefs or practices you have or reject: None of that disqualifies you. We believe simply this: We are not children, we are not stupid, and adults have the right to sacramentally use substances legal where they are.
““Those of us who study history are condemned to watch the rest of the world repeat it.” — Me.” ; personally, I’m bored with the same stories being repeated with just differing actors,places,and rationales since the beginning of recorded history. Makes one wonder if homo sapiens are intrinsically insane.
“because it takes them to the place of prophecy.” ; just another manifestation of the brain; if you get a chance, see the documentary ‘Finding my Mind’.
Norman Nonsense.
Norman,
I have a nephew who will soon be at UMass, studying linguistics.
I have urged him to seek out any opportunity of seeing and hearing Chomsky.
I intend to suggest to him, this Friday, at his “send-off” evening, that he would also be very lucky, indeed, if you and your ideas were to cross his path.
I appreciate your perspectives, and agree with your well-said and honest title to this diary.
DW
Before you encourage your nephew, please look at some videos of young people who take Salvia Divinorum. They suffer. And I don’t see any insight that results. It’s a nasty weed. Some places have outlawed it because people suffer so. There are other hallucinogens that are far less nasty. Would you point your nephew to someone dispensing LSD? That would probably be a better trip.
I don’t think Salvia Divinorum is all that Norman is about, Dearie, but I will add you concerns, as a caveat, to my suggestion that my nephew not turn away from those whom others may disparage.
As to LSD, Dearie, I encountered it early, even before Leary and some of his disciples were praising it, while it was still “legal” and in liquid form, and in that more pure form, I think it does have actual value for those who do not seek thrills or oblivion but understanding and appreciation.
That may not be “politically correct”, but then I am hardly politically correct about much of anything.
I would rather, personally, be humanly understanding and compassionate, empathetic, as it were.
However, I do appreciate your perspective, and thank you for sharing it.
DW
Other people’s religions are by definition dumb, wrong, bad, and strange.
A Massachusetts state legislator saw some YouTube videos of people using Salvia Divinorum, and that inspired him to introduce legislation that is in fact from the Spanish Inquisition: In 1508, Inquisitors outlawed Salvia Divinorum, Marijuana, and many other Sacramental herbs. They banned all religious practices not their own, because they are dumb, wrong, bad and strange. As a result, S. divinorum (hereinafter called “Salvia”) was brought inside, and survived into the 20th Century thanks to 26 families of what we in the US call “shamans.” The species atrophied. It no longer exists outside, and can’t even stand direct sunlight or growlights. It almost never flowers, and doesn’t produce viable seeds. It is propagated solely from cuttings.
In 1963, Albert Hofmann and R. Gordon Wasson met with one of those 26 families in Oaxaca (in Southern Mexico), and brought back Europe’s first Salvia specimen. Around 1970, another of the Shamanic families initiated a Church of the Tree of Life member, who brought back the first specimen to the US. All Salvia in the US, including the entire Hawaiian subspecies, is descended from cuttings from that one mother plant, which lived at the Church of the Tree of Life in San Francisco for many years. While she lived, the Church allowed members donating $100 or more to get a cutting.
The Church of the Tree of Life does not encourage anyone to use Salvia or any other Sacrament. It encourages people to learn everything science has to teach about a Sacrament, as well as the traditional uses and beliefs about it, if one chooses to experiment with a Sacrament.
Some people have incorrectly identified Salvia as a recreational drug. It is not. It is not fun. This Sacrament was somehow genetically manipulated by shamans long before the Spanish arrived in the West: Unstable crystaline polyhydric alcohols are the psychoactive ingredients of Salvia. But the genus Salvia includes all Sage plants, though none of the others carry these active ingredients (as far as anyone knows so far. Some of the active ingredients of Salvia have finally been identified, after many years of study. Coleus Blumei [Solenostemon scutellarioides] holds similar or the same chemicals, but through their instability, and because of much less scientifed study and interest, they haven’t been found in C. blumei.)
So, here we have a Sacramental practice that has survived hundreds or thousands of years, among Native Americans and other, since long before YouTube was invented. But now that YouTube shows people trying to have fun with it, many others are ready to reinstate prohibitions from the Spanish Inquisition against those who use it religiously.
The federal Analog Drug Law requires that, if Salvia divinorum is outlawed, then so would be all other Salvia species of sage. So, in states where it has been outlawed, that action conflicted with federal law, and would therefore theoretically be struck down, if someone hired a good enough lawyer to fight it.