Philip K. Dick and Methadone Kliniks in Orange County

[stalin]

His publisher posted a letter that PKD, a raging tweaker, mailed to a clinc in the OC asking to do some research for A Scanner Darkly. PKD always had a weird stance on drugs, not surprising being a tweaker. A lot of his essays deal with LSD, but he is always unbearable when he writes about acid, and A Scanner Darkly explicitly anti-drug, but that was his Fear and Loathing literary depiction of the fall out from the drug scene in the 60's.


http://www.philipkdick.com/new_letters-scanner4.html

EDIT: At least the last paragraph is an honest, pragmatic, and hopeful approach to HR, not something I've seen outside of Burroughs, but he was full of shit about apormorphine treatments and other "cures", just look at his life.

[TheTalkingAsshole]

I am familiar with permanent residence and therapy, in which case the addict is no longer on any drug, but can never leave the rehabilitation center for more than a few hours

the fuck?
does he mean what is more commonly known today as inpatient? except that it was permanent?
that was written in 1972 so it's not like there were much more reasonable alternatives at the time than permanent commitment to a psychiatric facility

interesting though that he supports the concept of MMT after reading his books

[stalin]

If I'm remembering correctly, he was involved with Synanon for a few years, and they were (are?) fucking barbaric. That guy wrote about speed crashes better than anyone else, it's strange.

I was most surprised by him being interested in MMT, but there wasn't, and still aren't that many options when it comes to maintenance for any drug.

[Duckfeet]

Just because they write good, doesn't mean they are sane. I'd always heard PKD was somehow involved with Synanon too, and Snynanon had the most insane barbaric practices you could get away with...of course, there are still defenders...reminded me of another 'movement' going on around the same time, which was the Hare Krishnas, who also got in a mess...well, some of it's leaders did...some people just can't handle liberty...they give up their minds and want to be led around like sheep. I've met them, they spook me.

Love the man's writing tho, glad I didn't know him....

[TheTalkingAsshole]

Syanon, founded by this guy?

"We're not going to mess with the old-time, turn-the-other-cheek religious postures...our religious posture is: Don't mess with us. You can get killed dead, literally dead...these are real threats," he snarled. "They are draining life's blood from us, and expecting us to play by their silly rules. We will make the rules. I see nothing frightening about it...I am quite willing to break some lawyer's legs, and next break his wife's legs, and threaten to cut their child's arm off. That is the end of that lawyer. That is a very satisfactory, humane way of transmitting information. I really do want an ear in a glass of alcohol on my desk."-Charles Dederich

[nick]

You gotta place Dick and his life in historical context.Plus,he always seemed far more anti to societies attitude to drugs and treament than drugs themselves.

Either way,I don't care.Dick was a fine,fine writer and if I can put up with Pound and Celine's bullshit then I can put up with Dick's occasionally eccentric views.

See you guys at Nupath.

[stalin]

You gotta place Dick and his life in historical context.Plus,he always seemed far more anti to societies attitude to drugs and treament than drugs themselves.

Either way,I don't care.Dick was a fine,fine writer and if I can put up with Pound and Celine's bullshit then I can put up with Dick's occasionally eccentric views.

See you guys at Nupath.


I think that's what I was trying to say before the benzos temporarily lobotomized me. And to PKD's credit, he didn't treat drug addiction as a moral deficiency, his view on drugs was based on what certain drugs did to himself and to his friends.

What I meant by "Dick was involved in Synanon" was that he went to Canada and went to one of their treatment centers up there.

[Ryouge]

Stalin, can you back that up? I'm interested!

[stalin]

I was wrong on him going up to Canada for Synanon, although he did go up there for mental health treatment. He did go in the 71(I think) to the large Synanon center in Marin. In the first chapter of VALIS he calls them fascists: "It's a technique to break down the personality. It's a fascist therapy that makes the person totally outer-directed and dependent on the group. Then they can build up a new personality that isn't drug-oriented.'" (VALIS 10)

From what I know anecdotally, he got himself too deep into speed, and a friend recommended it. Which led to PKD having a brief flirtation with it, kinda like Burroughs and Scientology.