Thursday, December 13, 2012

Chapters 17-20

Kesey and his group were becoming a huge sensation all throughout California.  The outsiders were progressively becoming the insiders.  The hip new fad that all the young adults were grasping with the up most respect.  Only problem is that they were getting too well known, not just by the rebellious young culture but the authorities as well.  These "Acid Tests" that the Pranksters put on were publicizing the fact that they take Acid and the promote the use of Acid.  They wanted to test the young uprising culture by seeing how they would handle a trip with the high amounts of authority figures around.  If one could have a good trip while this is going on than they have passed the Acid Test.

Kesey hooked up with the Grateful Dead and this was even better than the Pranksters experience with the Hell's Angels.  The use of Acid was unbelievable while partying with the Dead, the kids on Height-Ash bury that weren't accepted into the middle class society.  Well you know what, fuck the middle class wine drinkers, lets drink beer and trip on acid and show these people who we are and what we stand for.  Lets start a revolution, lets start our own form of music.  That is what they did, and it became known as "Acid Rock."  Which also influenced the Beatles, Jefferson Airplane, and several other artists during the time.

Unfortunately all this publicity for the Pranksters had negative effects.  I had mentioned that law enforcement became more concerned with the Pranksters, eventually leading to Kesey's second marijuana offense.  He was going to serve at least 5 years in jail so he decided to fake his death and flee to Mexico.  This fucked up the Prankster group completely.  I question the idea of the Pranksters in general after this happens.  They do not act like Pranksters anymore, they shun Pancho out of the group and the question Maggie.  Their mindset is all fucked up and a decent amount of them even end up splitting up.  Everyone takes their own paths in this crazy new world, they are not a whole anymore, they are dissolving into the outsiders that they were before this whole movement, before this whole revolution.     

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