VLVL the war on drugs

[jbor]

>> I suspect the word "'volunteers'" is put into scare quotes because that is
>> how Bopp has described them on the news (222.14, 221.19-22), with the
>> implication being that some or all of them were in fact also on the
>> government payroll.
> 
> It could.  Of course, it also suggests coercion, especially when it concerns
> someone whose "old profession" (221.28) inspires him to don the "Nazi drag"
> (222.13) while working with said "volunteers."  And the use of scare quotes
> in the context of a former Nazi officer has echos of phrases like "special
> treatment" and other such pseudonymous terms.

It seems to me that the people who are described as being "under contract to
CAMP" -- "a private vigilante squadron of student antidrug activists,
retired military pilots, government advisers in civvies, off-duty deputies
and troopers" (221.19-22) -- haven't been coerced at all.

It's strange that Bopp could appear in "the full regalia of his old
profession" as a German WWII pilot, and in "Nazi drag" on tv (221-2), and
not cause controversy and outrage. His dress and demeanour, his name, and
the acronym CAMP itself, are all pretty cartoonish imo.
 
>> The description of what was happening at Holytail (220-222) again shows
> how
>> commonplace it was for these people to sell out on their friends, and it
>> repeats the theme of betrayal which drives Pynchon's narrative.
> 
> Well, maybe.  Perhaps some textual support would help this position,
> however.  

Sure:

    [...] Once-carefree dopers got up in the middle of the
    night, hearts racing, and flushed their stashes down
    the toilet. Couples married for years forgot each other's
    names. Mental health clinics all over the county reported
    waiting lists. Seasonal speculation arose as to who might
    be secretly on the CAMP payroll this year, as if the monster
    program were by now one more affliction, like bad weather
    or a plant disease. (222.15-21)

Cf. also 221.29-34.

best