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This file is a part of the 1999 Hyperreal Drug Archives Snapshot.  
This snapshot is hosted by Erowid and will not be updated after 
October 1999.  The information in these files may be out of date.  
See Erowid's Psychoactive Vaults for more current info.
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The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:

> O mighty Oracle, endowed with the wisdom of the Universe and one
> _really_ nasty babe for a main squeeze,
>
> Why do people think legalizing drugs is The Answer? I thought The
> Answer was 42.

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

} The great and mighty Oracle has deigned to give you an answer to this
} question. You should offer thanks.
}
} Throughout time immemorial, it has been asked: What is the purpose of
} human existence?
}
} At first this was easy. The answer was food
}
} You see, back in the Paleozoooliphic, the answer to everything was
} either food or rock.
}
} What do you want? "Food" Where do you live? "Rock" Look, that guy is
} making off with your stuff, what will you do? "Rock make him food!"
}
} As you can see, conversation wasn't too stimulating, and philosophers
} were stuck with saying things like "rock is rock" and "food is not
} rock" Luckily rock candy had not been invented yet.
}
} Many years passed, vocab increased, and finally the ancient greeks got
} back around to the question. Socrates explained how the question had no
} meaning. He of course was wrong, but he was such a great pain in the
} ass that people agreed with him to shut him up. Finally, they slipped
} some hemlock in his tea, and that was that.
}
} Later, once the vocabulary had gotten all settled, the
} Romans came up with another answer, one which many of us would agree
} with today. This, of course was sex. It was later found, however, that
} sex could not be the answer. Sex was the question. Yes was the answer.
}
} This whole issue got more confused around the time of Jesus. You see,
} Jesus was convinced that Love was the answer. By this, he did not mean
} what most people think of as love, because then he could have just
} said that sex is the answer. That would lead to the problem above,
} Now, Love might be a possible alternative to sex, but the Romans
} were so upset by the idea that sex wasn't it, that they nailed Jesus
} to a couple of planks.
}
} The Roman empire fell to the barbarians, and it was back to food for
} most of the dark ages.
}
} When the Renaissance finally hit, the answer was Painting. Later on
} they decided that that was just too silly, and changed it to
} Enlightenment.
} This worked fine for the aristocracy, but, at least in France, the
} peasants revolted, and settled firmly on food again.
}
} Not too much after this, drugs spread out through western culture.
} Some people at this time suggested that drugs were the answer, but
} Opium isn't really powerful enough to blot out all other questions, so
} it was quietly shelved for a later date.
}
} At one point this century, the proposal "Coke is it" was widely
} spread, but if Coke was it, what was New Coke? It flat and too sweet?
} No, that idea was also disregarded.
}
} In the '60s, everything disregarded came back with a vengeance (except
} painting, it was still too silly) "Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll."
} The Republicans hated this (They thought the answer was Money), and
} they conspired to break the idea at its weak point; Drugs. So went the
} revisionists (who ignored the fact that George Washington grew
} Marijuana), and they outlawed drugs. Outlawing sex would have been
} nice for them, but even they realized that Republicans, at least, had
} to reproduce.
}
} In 197something, Douglas Adams decided that the answer to Life, the
} Universe and Everything was 42. Being irrational, it made it difficult
} to refute, and so was popular among young Democrats (Who had lost so
} many brain cells due to drugs that they were equally irrational), and
} science fiction fans (who were so weird that they could just accept
} it).
}
} You now see where your question fits in. Some people think that the
} solution is to legalize Drugs, and some think that the answer is 42.
} Others think it is sex, a few still believe in Coke, and food is a
} perennial favorite. Of course the true answer is there, and has been
} for a while...
}
} The answer is....
}
} Painting. Of course.
}
} You owe the Oracle a Velvet Elvis.