tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887440039323868659.post3638620681709106596..comments2024-03-28T14:02:00.871-07:00Comments on RAWIllumination.net: More on Timothy Leary and drinking Cleveland Okie (Tom Jackson)http://www.blogger.com/profile/07810736442596736041noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887440039323868659.post-10329704939160097182017-08-27T08:29:13.675-07:002017-08-27T08:29:13.675-07:00Michael,
I love the Ezra Pound quote. Isn't e...Michael,<br /><br />I love the Ezra Pound quote. Isn't everyone right on some ideas and wrong on others? And almost everyone has a "belief system," which almost by definition is going to be sometimes right and sometimes wrong.<br /><br />I love Leary's insight that alcohol is a dangerous drug that should be used with caution, even if he couldn't quite live up to it in his personal life. Cleveland Okie (Tom Jackson)https://www.blogger.com/profile/07810736442596736041noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887440039323868659.post-34815008364949834552017-08-26T15:21:17.505-07:002017-08-26T15:21:17.505-07:00Diana Trimble means Millbrook, not Meadowbrook, ob...Diana Trimble means Millbrook, not Meadowbrook, obviously.<br /><br />I may be repeating myself here, but the most glaring thing I got from Rbt. Greenfield's well-researched and very critical bio of Leary: alcohol was the drug that caused more problems for himself, more than weed (the small amount that got him busted in Laredo and led to a Supreme Court decision; the stuff planted on him by Laguna Beach cops), or LSD.<br /><br />And it probably goes back to genes and imprinting (ironically). His father drank, and then when Leary was binge drinking at West Point and getting caught smuggling alcohol for other cadets, and the very painful story of the "silent treatment" he got there, refusing to leave. And on. As a rising academic star during the Mad Men era, you were expected to drink and drink at cocktail parties, He never got over that. <br /><br />I appreciate what Diana says about the difference between his public philosophy and his private life. It's true. I think we all have private vs. public presentations of ourselves. This aspect of social reality was brought out most lucidly and wonderfully by the great sociologist Erving Goffman (no relation to RU Sirius... that I know of). <br /><br />And what of this disparity? Accusations of "hypocrisy!" seem, I guess, fair game, but unless it's a Bible thumper moralist or some politician whose lawmaking has effects on others' lives and well-being, I think this "hypocrisy" idea misses the point. Intellectuals are people who are in the business of producing decontextualized ideas. Inherent in this is a certain idealism, a proffering of a better world that is possible. Leary's life embodied this, in my view.<br /><br />I really like what Ezra Pound wrote late in his life (1960):<br />"Every man has the right to have his ideas examined one at a time."michaelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13526042582094867513noreply@blogger.com