A Veteran’s Guide to Civil Disobedience
When you spit into the wind, expect a wet face. When you shit where you eat, expect to be shown the door. All’s fair and whatnot. Just like when I finally opened up to my VA headshrinker, I knew it came with consequences: like the end of my career.
I knew that as soon as I opened my mouth about using cannabis in the civic leadership circles I was in, my time at the sponsored dance was over.
No worries. I’m used to being thrown in front of grenades by people who run from them.
Fact is, I needed some place to be. Somewhere to lick my wounds from a political war I had Forrest Gumped myself into, to figure out what my next moves were.
The Doctrine Begins
Civil disobedience isn’t what you think it is anymore. Forget the grainy footage of Bull Connor’s dogs or some kid standing in front of a tank. The institutions have evolved—they’ve grown calluses. Outrage, protest, hashtags—just background noise now, like Muzak in an elevator to hell. The bureaucrats sip their coffee and nod sympathetically while the system grinds forward, immune to the noise. So the rebellion has to mutate.
It’s not Molotov cocktails—it’s absurdist theater in waiting rooms. A joint lit in a VA pharmacy. Not for spectacle, not for YouTube views, but as a precise act of sabotage: a reminder that the rulebook and reality are at war. The pharmacy tech can’t arrest you, can’t heal you, can’t reconcile the contradiction. All they can do is blink. That’s the power. Not the riot, but the paralysis.
And then the bigger question: who are veterans supposed to be in this country? …
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Author: Ricardo Pereyda / High Times
