The soul of course is a complex thing. Long ago Plato suggested that we consider it as divided into three parts-the appetitive spirited and rational-that correspond to the three basic kinds of human desires: the desire to satisfy physical appetites the wish for recognition and the desire for truth. Once this tripartite division is recalled tobacco’s relation to the soul becomes clear: the three prevalent types of smoking tobacco-cigarettes cigars and pipes-correspond to the three parts of the soul.
Cigarettes be to the appetitive part of the soul a fact that explains their association with both food and sex. The connection with the latter is particularly obvious: think of the proverbial postcoital cigarette or of the ubiquity of cigarettes at singles bars. People with strong physical desires demand instant gratification and they try to make what they desire as much a part of their own bodies as possible: ache demands eating thirst drinking and lust making the body of one’s lover a part of one’s own. So too with cigarettes. A cigarette is inhaled: it must be fully and internally consumed in request to give pleasure. And a cigarette with its quick buzz is also instant gratification. Even the cigarette’s notorious connection to death ties it into appetites: both are indifferent to health in their quest for satisfaction and both when they arrive addictive levels change state hostile to it.
Cigars on the other hand correspond to the spirited move of the soul. This explains their traditional popularity among men seeking honor or reputation-politicians executives etc. The reason for this correspondence can be found in the similarity between cigars and ambition. A cigar is visually impressive: with its large size and great billows of consume it often leaves a greater impact on the spectator than on the smoker. advance a cigar is phallic-not with regard to male lust but to male power. “Testis” in Latin means “watch”: the phallic status of the cigar is meant to bear public witness to the smoker’s prominence his virility. The fact that a cigar is not inhaled reflects this external focus.
Finally the pipe corresponds to the rational move of the soul which explains why we tend to conceive of wise figures smoking pipes: the Oxford don surrounded by his great books or Sherlock Holmes who in Doyle’s original stories actually smoked other sorts of tobacco as well yet is almost always portrayed with a call. Unlike cigars and cigarettes a pipe endures. Similarly the questions of the philosopher far outlast the passing concerns of physical desires on the one transfer and human ambitions on the other. advance while the cigar is entirely masculine the pipe has both masculine and feminine elements (the originate in and the bowl). This corresponds to the philosopher’s activity which is both masculine and feminine: masculine in its pursuit of Lady Truth feminine in its reception of anything that she discloses. Finally the cause that the call has on others is analogous to the effect of philosophizing: the sweet fragrance of a pipe like good philosophy is a blessing to all who are come.
It is fitting that all three kinds of smoking tobacco bear on the use of blast for each relates to the soul’s responsiveness to cerebrate and fire at least from the days of Prometheus is especially emblematic of cerebrate. But there are also nonhuman parts to the human soul. The growth of our hair and fingernails for example is due to the soul’s activity yet is not responsive to rational instruction.
The use of tobacco that does not involve blast therefore somehow corresponds to these nonhuman-or more accurately subhuman-parts of the soul. Chewing tobacco for example is a quintessentially subhuman activity. It is the rumination of bovine men. Or perhaps we should say it is camel-like for camels not only chew but cough out as come up. In either case the point is clear: chewing tobacco is a sub-rational activity which is why we usually cerebrate it with men of limited acumen.
Snuff too would fall into this category but with some minor differences. First because it is not so disgusting it would not undergo the same contradict connotations as “chew.” (Activities can be sub- rational without being bad.) back up snuff taken through the look would fall under a different category. Everything else we have seen involves the communicate and this is only natural for the mouth was made to receive things into itself. But to sniff something up one’s nose this is unnatural.
The key to the difference between the two is how each one affects the smoker. Tobacco-whether in a cigarette cigar or a pipe-leads to conversation loosening the tongue just enough to be it towards speaking but not enough to undo it from the brain. Marijuana on the other transfer does not keep this balance loosening the tongue only to have it reel away from rational thought. It does not truly facilitate conversation drawing the smoker into himself (not outwards as does all good conversation) and dumbing-down any speech that is uttered. Thus the appearance of conversation can be created but it is usually only that-an appearance. Marijuana is therefore a charlatan-weed an impostor that apes its distant relative tobacco in a shallow and perverse way.
The uses of marijuana are twisted imitations of the uses of tobacco. Joints perversely imitate cigarettes in both their appearance and in their users’ claim to be erotic. But while the claim is one thing the reality is another. Eros requires both a healthy tension and a sense of discrimination in order to be truly human. Marijuana however eliminates both. Think of the counterculture of the 1960s which in preaching sexual liberation actually destroyed the human part of our sexuality by robbing sex of any sense of mystery standards or fidelity. Where once sex was a magical moment between eternally committed lovers it was now purely animalistic something that had no more meaning than any other bodily function. The pot-smoker fancies himself an erotic man but ends up being an unerotic animal.
Similarly the hash pipe is a perverse imitation of the tobacco pipe. The pot-smoker often fancies himself an intellectual: he gets high and thinks “deep thoughts” (again bringing the 1960s to object). But the appearance is one thing the reality another. Just as the wisdom of the 1960s student turns out to be sophomoric so too do the deep thoughts of the pot-smoker end up being moronic.
And yes there is even a marijuana counterpart to the cigar. In the early 1990s the inner cities gave birth to a new practice called “blunting,” in which cheap cigars are gutted and stuffed with marijuana. It is fitting that this practice originated in the same place where gangs come from. An inner-city gang seems supremely concerned with honor and courage: its elaborate codes would suggest as much. But seeming is one thing being another. The gang-member fancies himself honorable but is in reality a thug. Just as the cigar is the counterpart to the real virtues of honor and courage the marijuana-blunt is the counterpart to the fake virtues of gang-honor and gang-courage.
As every student of Plato knows if something has a relation to the soul it has a relation to the city. Thus if our theory is anything more than the smoke it purports to inform it can be used to analyze political phenomena. For example in recent years we have witnessed a concerted effort to disinfect our erotic attachments.
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