Weekend Retrospective | Anti-LSD Propaganda in Prime Time
Posted by SANDY RAVAGE
In the late 60s Jack Webb's television police drama "Dragnet" was the "Law and Order" of its day, so to say. "Dragnet" can be classified as one of television's most infamously effective vehicles of furtive propaganda ever to be unleashed on the American public.
Of all the episodes "Dragnet" has to offer the episode which touched upon the "growing" LSD problem, entitled "The LSD Story," in middle America might be the most hysterical and at the same time the most successful in shaping society in the image its creators and sponsors wanted it shaped. In fact the episode is the series' pilot. It originally aired January 12, 1967. LSD was still legal at that time - much to the dismay of the ensconced establishment wishing to promote a wholesome America void of any subversive influences. This episode (as well as the rest in the series) seems to have literally been written by the burgeoning police-state-industrial complex as it contains one of the most ridiculous scenes ever aired on television: the "Blue Boy" scene, depicting a wild out of control teen tripping balls on acid.
The "Blue Boy" scene is meant to depict the "horror" of what could happens when good middle-class white youth Americans start experimenting with lysergic acid diethylamide - and it is quite hilarious. Incidentally, after America was injected with this stupidity by way of their televisions the groundwork for outlawing LSD was in place, a bill was introduced to make it illegal, and by the Fall of 1968 possession of the compound was a felony. " 'umurica! Fuck yeah!"