Fear and Loathing in a Madman's Mind
Hunter S Thompson is an unsung rebel, who used his status as a disillusioned outsider, to give the world his unique opinion on the degradation of American values in our politics and culture through his writing as well as his actions.
The man was born in 1934 in Louisville Kentucky to a middle-class family. His life drastically changed when he was fourteen when his father passed forcing his mother to raise three sons alone. Hunter believed that because of his father's death, his mother became a heavy drinker. Being left impoverished during his teenage years did not stop Hunter from enjoying writing fiction and poetry. He was at the age of sixteen accepted into the Athenaeum literary society. To the protest to many of the members due to the fact that it was seen as an elite society and Hunter was seen as low class and obscene. Regardless he was accepted due to the quality of his works and was one of the steppingstones that lead to his life as a writer. Although, he was an exceptional writer before he was able to graduate college he was arrested for accessory to robbery as he was in the car with a friend as he robbed a local gas station. Earning him a sixty-day sentence and the inability to graduate high school. The day after he got out of county jail, he joined the United States air force. After basic training, he was stationed at Eljin Florida where he got his start in sports journalism. He began writing a sports page for Florida State University. He did this until the Air Force gave him an honorable discharge. In his official discharge, all they had to say about Private first-class Hunter S Thompson was that he was an excellent soldier but his rebelliousness and his belief in self-worth infected the others in his unit.
After his start in writing for the Florida state newspaper and the army, Hunter went on to take odd jobs in journalism. Throughout the late fifties and early sixties, he traveled all over North and South America gaining the knowledge and experience that later gave him the inspiration for his only full novel “The Rum Diary”. In the sixties, he moved to Aspen, Colorado where he set up his permanent residence nicknamed “The Owl Farm”. In 1967 he wrote his award-winning book “Hell's Angels: The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs”. This was Hunter's first work that gained fame from the public. The book told Hunter's experience as an informal member of the Hells Angels Motorcycle club. It was of his shining accomplishment even while not his most famous pieces it was a shining example of his idea of what his radical new journalism would be like.
Two years later his magnum opus was released “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas”. The book is an account of Raoul Duke and his Lawyer Dr. Gonzo as they cover an off-road during a drug and booze-filled journey that ends up having them looking for the American dream. The book, which was adapted into a movie saw Johnny Depp play Raoul Duke and has become a classic pop culture movie. Two years after “Fear and Loathing” He went on the campaign trail of Richard Nixon. He became one of his fiercest critics of Nixon who he considered one of the evilest people he had ever known. When he died in 1994 Hunter wrote that “his casket [should] have been launched into one of those open-sewage canals that empty into the ocean just south of Los Angeles. He was a swine of a man and a jabbering dupe of a president.”. After his stint on the political trail, he tried his own luck on the political circuit running for the sheriff of aspen Colorado on his “Freak Power” platform which advocated the idea of a lack of drug law enforcement. He also wanted to forcibly stop the “rape and destruction of mother nature”. The story of his campaign was covered in the article written in rolling stone called “The Battle of Aspin”. Hunter lost the race by a slim margin mostly due to a bipartisan conglomerate that used their combined non-Thompson votes to stop his ascension to political office.
The waning years of Thomson's life were one that saw people believe that his writing had gone and taken a turn for the worse. He took sporadic jobs for Rolling Stone magazine who he had a falling out with due in large part because of the editor of the magazine left him in Saigon shortly before it became Ho Chi Minh city. He became more reclusive and mostly stayed in his Woody Creek estate. He died on February 20, 2005. Thompson called his wife who was at the Aspin club asking her about help with one of his articles for ESPN. at the end of the call, his wife heard a click she thought was the sound of typewriter keys. The sound she actually heard was the sound of a gun cocking. On the typewriter, he had a piece of paper with the date “Feb 20, 2005” and a single word “counselor”. At his funeral, his ashes were loaded into a cannon atop one-hundred-foot-tall tower and shot into the sky all while the song “Spirit in the Sky” and “Tambourine Man”.
Throughout his lifetime Hunter S Thompson revolutionized how journalists report on their stories. Through his unique “Gonzo” style of journalism never before had the public been introduced to a style of journalism that read like they were living in the story. A fantastic representation of his Gonzo style was seen when he spent over a year with the Oakland chapter of the Hells Angels. He spent this time, not like many other Journalists who would try and be on the sidelines as an omnipotent observer but experienced life as an Unofficial member of the notorious Biker gang. This was so revolutionary because instead of having these impersonal interviews and reading second-hand reports Hunter threw himself into a world of savagery to try and understand why these men acted the way they did. After his time with the Hells Angels, his experience simulated with his many articles being published as a full book where he explored what made these savage men tick. In a radio interview, Hunter talked about how “this whole violent subculture came out of World War two. Where these men come back from fighting then look up and realize that they are thirsty, and they have no more opportunities. It makes them meaner it makes them want to go out and get revenge on the people who put them in this position.”. He made the American people realize that not only are these people but that their savagery is a condition of an America that left them behind. This was revolutionary because up until this point, all other news outlets failed to show what truly was like as an Outlaw Biker.
In addition, to his time with the Hells Angels he also, spent a tremendous time in 1972 on the campaign trail leading up to Nixon's second term. The collection of articles Hunter would Write for Rolling Stone magazine would go on to be one of the key pieces of political journalism that would shape the political landscape of that time period. He started off by covering the democratic challenger George Mcgovern who he saw as one of the best political candidates for office. He spent twelve months in a D.C rented apartment in what he called “an armed bunker. Always in a constant state of fear and paranoia”. He wrote intimidating and Brutally honest depictions of the tiniest rallies to the ravenous conventions. He was seen as a moral realist in the eyes of many Americans who would read his writings and hear about his drunken antics but also hear his appalling stories about the seemingly clean-cut politicians. He told the American people about the Psyudo-sexually relationships that the other political writers had with the politicians who they wrote about. They would constantly have these intimate conversation that was just an elaborate ruse of ass-kissing that benefited both sides at the expense of the other.
One of his more prominent challenges to Washington's authority was his criticisms of then-president Richard Nixon. Hunter during his time on the campaign trail learned to hate the current president. He saw him as a spineless power-hungry man who would “shake your hand and stab you in the back at the same time”. He reported on an incident where Hunter and Nixon bonded over a football game. Hunter was surprised by what he called almost “genuine interest” by the president in trying to relate to Hunter. After the event, Hunter reflected that maybe there was a shred of humanity in him but more likely his move like all of his moves was “calculated and politically motivated”. Many who have read his work have gone on to say that Hunter’s coverage of the ‘72 election was one of the most insightful and original pieces of political journalism of the 20th century.
Even without his writing, Hunter S Thompson is still seen as a cultural icon. A man who above all represented the long-lost freedom and moralism that America has seemed to lose over the last 50 years. He had a pension for Thumbing his nose at the authority that he often saw as binary and authoritarian. This can be seen by his constant antics like establishing a bizarre political party that sought to legalize drugs and stops people from destroying all the natural beauty of his hometown. He did this all because he saw that the local government's constant infighting was costing his home dearly so he decided to give the people another optimum by making a party that was as unique and unusual as its founder. Furthermore, he opened the eyes of many Americans to the ugliness found in many things that Americans perceived as pure and glamorous. He took a morally ambiguous look at things like the Kentucky Derby, our political system, and even the American dream and told the world the unadulterated flaws of these parts of American culture. In addition, he also paved the path for future Journalism like the ever so popular Vice. this news network constantly does Gonzo-style journalism that has to lead to a dramatic fan base as well as a more personal and accurate portrayal of current events.
The life of Hunter S Thompson's life was an unrelenting pursuit of the Truth. He tried to find it in every facet of American life and in that search he locked his sights on Outlaws, Presidents, and even the American dream itself. He wanted to look upon America and have his writing become a reflection of both its beauty and its ugliness, asking us to look upon ourselves and ask if we really areas sane as we think.