Hunter S. Thompson wrote to provoke, shock, protest, and in general, piss people off. I loved him for that, even though his shotgun approach sometimes did more to obliterate than clarify what he chose to discuss. He did his job, his way. As a writer, he wasn't a watchdog. He was a watch wolf, flushing out the absurdity and rage that strangles us from the inside. I didn't read him for the facts. I read him for the truth.
Excerpt from "Kingdom of Fear" 2003...
"We have become a Nazi monster in the eyes of the whole world--a nation of bullies and bastards who would rather kill than live peacefully. We are not just Whores for power and oil, but killer whores with hate and fear in our hearts. We are human scum, and that is how history will judge us...No redeeming social value. Just whores. Get out of our way, or we'll kill you...
Who does vote for these dishonest shitheads? Who among us can be happy and proud of having this innocent blood on our hands? Who are these swine? These flag-sucking half-wits who get fleeced and fooled by stupid rich kids like George Bush?
They are the same ones who wanted to have Muhammad Ali locked up for refusing to kill gooks. They speak for all that is cruel and stupid and vicious in the American character. They are the racists and hate mongers among us--they are the Ku Klux Klan. I piss down the throats of these Nazis.
And I am too old to worry about whether they like it or not. Fuck them."
-- Hunter S. Thompson
There's a comment about his suicide circulating tonight that "he died most fittingly, in a gun fight with his most vicious enemy". If that's the case, without glorifying his end, I'd like to think he won
— not by taking his own life, but living it as a transparent voice rising from his own, inimitable dark. And I love that his 3 million dollar funeral included his ashes being fired from a cannon.
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