[lbo-talk] Marxism and religion

[John Thornton]

Marx was not claiming opium was very bad as James claims. I think James 
is projecting his opium fears onto Marx.
Marx was not considering opium as a recreational drug primarily either.
I know more about opium than Marx but his claim always seemed to me to 
be more consistent with the idea that opium did much good and much harm. 
Neither exclusively and neither more than the other. Opium was a mixed 
bag in his days. It worked wonders relieving pain and was considered a 
miracle substance but it was beginning to be understood as capable of  
causing pain as well.

John Thornton

Chris Doss wrote:
> I always thought he had in mind not the Opium Wars,
> but the use of opiates as anesthesia and as a
> high-society recreational drug (or did that not start
> until later?).
>
> --- James Heartfield <Heartfield at blueyonder.co.uk>
> wrote:
>
>   
>> the 'opium of the people'. Marx was no 'sixties
>> druggy. He thought opium was 
>> very bad indeed. The image he had in mind was not Wm
>> Burroughs but the opium 
>> that the British Empire had used to get the Chinese
>> addicted, so they would 
>> be forced to give up their tea.
>>
>>