The Bag of Drugs Symbol Analysis

Duke and Gonzo secure a large bag of “very dangerous drugs” before heading off to Las Vegas. This stash symbolizes 1960s American counterculture, as well as Duke and Gonzo’s own resistance to mainstream American society and government. Drugs, especially psychedelic drugs, were central to the countercultural movement, and while Duke is openly critical of the movement and its failure to produce a better America, he is still very much committed to its anti-establishment agenda. Each time Duke and Gonzo dip into their (mostly) illegal stash of drugs and “run amok” in Vegas, they are effectively resisting the establishment and society they are so deeply at odds with. As the bag of drugs begins to dwindle near the end of the book, Duke heads to the drug store to replenish the stash. Despite the failure of the counterculture and the decline in popularity of psychedelic drugs, Duke’s dedication remains as “a matter of life-style, a sense of obligation and even duty.”

The bag of drugs is also another form of the capitalist excess and greed implied in the American Dream, and it includes, among other things, “two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, [and] laughers.” The overindulgence of the drug bag is mirrored in the Las Vegas backdrop, and it parallels broader American society as well. Through the bag of drugs, Thompson implies that Americans are needlessly and selfishly drawn to excess, no matter the cost. “Once you get locked into a serious drug collection,” Dukes explains, “the tendency is to push it as far as you can.”