zabkat support forum

Too simplistic - what's mere chemical dependency compared to the vicissitudes and illusions of true free will?

The answer is simple. Drop the chemistry.

Ah, but people being people, they aren't much interested in doing anything constructive with their lives (and why should they?).  There's a lot to be said for the masochistic approach most humans take to life - there's a reason the dolorous sleepwalk peacefully in oblivion.

So what is wrong with misusing natural psychedelia instead?

Nothing at all - I'm a great advocate.  But I've done my time in that dungeon, and learned everything I wanted to know about the emptiness therein.  Too bland to ever represent anything "true" - so rather easily dismissed as irrelevant.  Which pretty much explains its popularity.

This decision obviously makes you a boring, grumpy old pal.

A curious thing about natural psychedelia is that they are actually of more value for what they represent, rather than for what they pretend to do for the acolytes themselves.  Unfortunately, this fact is oft lost upon the acolytes in their youthful desperation.

And, I might add, grumpy and boring are compliments to a bastard like me.  I could not aspire to more.  I always hated the cold cruel world of your civilisation anyway - its necrosis feeds its own delusion.

Is your civilisation so much different, except that your beer is a pain for my taste?

Do not confuse culture with civilisation.  The only useful thing about the celts is that they are not a truly civilised people - which will inevitably be their saving grace, when the music finally stops.  After Beethoven went to sleep, it took you lads a whole bloody century to fully appreciate the late quartets for what they actually were: polychromatic freedom.

I would not call the Germans "civilised" either. Beethoven, however, preferred to live and work in Austria, and Austria is still famous for its great musicians, but except for the 70s (krautrock) and 80s ("Neue Deutsche Welle"), music was never really important in Germany.