Pubdate: Tue, 17 Apr 2001
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2001 Southam Inc
Contact:  http://www.nationalpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286
Author: Mitchel Raphael

POSTCARDS FROM THE EDGE

Check out these drug-information cards at your next rave - It might save 
your life

Attend an all-night dance event and there's a good chance that somewhere 
between the DJ on stage and the glowstick booth you will find folks at a 
table providing sensible pamphlets on drug harm-reduction. Similar to 
safe-sex educators, their purpose is to reduce potential harm by educating 
people about the risks of illicit drug use, smoking and drinking.

Recently, some of those pamphlets have taken on a whole new look.

Twelve slick postcards covering everything from ecstasy to alcohol are 
being scooped up en masse at, clubs, raves and late-night dance parties.

The cards are from DanceSafe, a U.S. based harm-reduction organization with 
chapters in Calgary and Vancouver. They are also being distributed by other 
harm-reduction groups such as the Toronto Raver Information Project.

The cards feature the name of the drug on the front and detailed 
information on the back about effects and side effects. Each card states 
that: "DanceSafe neither condones or condemns the use of any drug. Rather, 
we attempt to reduce drug-related harm by providing health and safety 
information to those who use. No drug use is completely safe. All drugs 
contain inherent risks."

Theo Rosenfeld, 22, is the founder of the Vancouver chapter of DanceSafe 
and currently lives in California where he works for DanceSafe's national 
office in Oakland. "The idea behind the cards was basic marketing," he 
says. "The people we wanted to target are already using those drugs. We 
wanted to make it culturally relevant to those in subcultures using those 
drugs. Flyers are the biggest media form in the rave community so we wanted 
to make them look like a flyer."

There have been charges that by making the cards so attractive, they 
actually encourage the use of drugs, "but there's no correlation between 
people reading about drugs and going out and trying them," says Rosenfeld. 
"Drug education has a history of magnifying the negative. There's an idea 
that if it scares all the kids they won't use the drugs. But fear-based 
education doesn't work. We make the cards look flashy and pretty so they 
want to read them so they can make wiser choices next time."

However, says Corporal Scott Rintoul of RCMP Drug Awareness Service in 
Vancouver, "I don't think they've gone far enough.

"These drugs are psychologically addictive. That point has to get 
mentioned. A psychological dependency is worse than a physical dependency."

Rintoul, who has been monitoring DanceSafe for two years, says he doesn't 
like the "use-drugs-safely" message, but admits that nothing else is being 
done within the dance scene other than random law enforcement. "At least 
they are doing something," he says.

Most harm-reduction groups say they are made to feel very welcome at dance 
events.

"We thought we were going to have a problem with venues owned by the city 
of Calgary," says Allan Domes of DanceSafe Calgary. "But once we met with 
them they were comfortable with our presence and the information we were 
handing out."

In Calgary, not all 12 of the postcards get distributed. Domes says. For 
example, 2C-B, a psychedelic, hasn't surfaced in Calgary's dance scene.

"What you want to do with people who are using is to get them to think 
about what they are using and you want them to be informed users," says 
Stephen Meredith, a program consultant at the Centre for Addiction and 
Mental Health (CAMH) in Toronto. "It's a start if they read this card."

Meredith says much of the information found on these cards is similar to 
CAMH brochures; the difference is that CAMH pamphlets are aimed at health 
workers and do not have the visual sizzle of the DanceSafe cards.

His one criticism of the postcards was the lack of information on how to 
reduce harm once a person is on a drug.

"The most important thing we know -- and it's validated in the research -- 
is you have to give accurate, objective information with no tone one way or 
the other," says Andrea Stevens Lavigne, a regional director at CAMH, who 
feels the DanceSafe cards do not encourage more drug use. "With these kind 
of things, if they're using [drugs] in a club setting or in a group where 
you know that you already got users, it's not an issue of whether you're 
tempting them to use more. We know they are trying things anyways, 
regardless of what we tell them. And if they are going to be trying [drugs] 
we want them to have the accurate information. We want them to reduce harm."
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MAP posted-by: Beth