An official drug booklet used in some Australian secondary schools for two years has been withdrawn after an uproar in the community over its mixed messages. The New South Wales state government booklet -- Choosing To Use … But Wanna Keep Your Head Together? -- suggests young people should not experiment with drugs until they are over 18, know their family medical history and “use only small amounts and not too often”. It says: “The best way to keep your head together is not to use drugs at all. But, if you choose to experiment … remember some people will react badly and become seriously unwell after using only a small amount of a drug.”
State health minister Reba Meagher said that “the refe
rence to what young people should choose to do if they ignore anti-drug advice or information is simply not acceptable.” However, the booklet was defended by a state health executive, the deputy director-general for schools, and the head of a charity whose son died of a heroin overdose. “We know from ongoing school surveys that up to 50 per cent of young people have experimented with alcohol and illicit drugs by the time they are 16,” said the health official. No wonder.
The harm minimisation approach of the booklet was condemned in a Daily Telegraph editorial, which pointed out that 170,400 people aged 14 and older claimed to have used the highly destructive methamphetamines (or “ice”) in NSW in just one year. It noted how “Just say no” has evolved into “Just say maybe” among “certain bureaucracies”, and noted the need for vigilance against creeping drug tolerance.
3 comments:
Harm Minimisation is an all encompassing policy of brilliance. The tiny vocal minority is the same moral doom saying camp that are present in all leaps within democracies. Prohibition has failed, and we now enter a period of reviewing legislation, regulating drugs mistakenly prohibited by the Harrison tax act and Nixons 'war on drugs' - actually a war on drugs effecting his troops in Vietnam. In over a century all efforts have shifted drug abuse from 1.3% to 1.3% of the population. IE; no effect bar punishing people and creating a global criminal industry, worth more than the oil trade. It is clear, with Supreme courts and the worlds health, human rights and illicit drug experts slamming the UN's 1998 absurd "Toward a drug free world by 2008, we can do it" - and much more - we must accept prohibition is the problem, not drugs.
Australia can "boast" a 5% IDU population within our HIV population. We have 1.3 infections per 100,000. The USA is now rushing to implement HM. They have 33% and 14, respectively. Russia, have 90% and more - having ignored HM mandates.
The booklet was a one page bullet point list. Reading it places the moral panic in context. There is naught but opinion behind the attack on HM, or the "hedonistic delirium of modern society", as one abstinence only proponent put it. The religious right in Australia is instantly recognisable as driving the attacks on such a sound pamphlet, as are the vigilante haters of humanity who enjoy exploiting ill and marginalised human beings.
The pieces criticising HM are deceptive and misleading on the pamplet's content. This is what keeps our children alive. If the class was traffic safety the equivalent would be criticising 1st AID lessons because they "are pro-accident". What an absurd concept, and how incredibly bizarre anyone took notice of a few biblical fundamentalists. The pamphlet is easily accessible.
Read about it here. There's also audio on prohibition here. Check Firesnake for more.
We must learn to remove ourselves from the subjectivity of these issues, no matter how strongly we feel. Critical thinking demands a type of internal political incorrectness such that we do not taint reality with our own biases. This is especially true of morality. History shows us we are usually wrong on moral issues that demand we marginalise or deny the existence of certain fellow human beings.
The evidence markedly favours HM as reducing the uptake of drug related harms. The alternative is not a policy. It is the apportionment of blame toward a policy for the presence of the ubiquitous "drug problem". Given we have the lowest levels of drug related harms per drug user one can only stand stupefied at the ignorance and self sabotage apparent in those armchair critics. This latest attack on an honest and evidence packed pamphlet is fallacious in that it presents the wrong impression. More so, the authors concerned are long established finger waggers rejoicing in every "scandal" they can create from the dust of ill informed opinion. Yes, the booklet sounds to have disconcerting advice. Read in context, this impression is absent - hence the moral panic team did not report in context.
Essentially the pamphlet addressed one question that upset people, who prefer to "hope for a perfect world". The question was "what if I use drugs?" Given most Aussies do at some time, it would seem those who criticise this would have us answer "don't think about it".
Imagine having to explain to someone their child was dead, because basic, simple advice - such as that on prescription medicine - was with-held, because someone else thought it "inappropriate" for the type of medieval society our fundamentalist neighbours desire?
It is an insult to our children to suggest we shall educate them based upon the assumed malignancy of predators or upon the improbability of worst case scenarios.
Don't be fooled by subjective and emotive opinion pieces. Seek evidence, understand science and know that Australia is a most fortunate nation based solely upon the principles of Harm Minimisation and Harm Reduction.
The guiding light of our health policy is Harm Minimisation and this advice is no more capable of causing harm, than other advice the same groups attack. Condoms "cause AIDS", needle exchanges "cause drug use", methadone "creates addiction" or most ambitiously "prayer and faith cure addiction". Equal rights causes family breakdown, etc. As stated, this dynamic is present at all leaps in progressive civilisations.
Sadly, these very people enjoy a quality of life not seen in most regions of our planet. To lie, misrepresent and slander honest people and brilliant work is a deeply embarrassing symptom for Australia, and all Aussies are ashamed to have such "Howard years" reminders of intolerance, conformity and human rights abuse so easily spread onto the world stage.
We do not lie to our children. We trust them to be responsible and in doing so gain their respect. This achieves far more than any scare tactic or punishment. We are pro Harm Minimisation - our families are, our schools are, our children are, our churches are, hospitals, employment places, health centres, phone boxes and even trees. There is no problem with HM, never has been never will be. What does exist, is a vocal minority.
I feel obligated to apologise for being a member of any HM driven prosperous nation, populated with dangerous self serving people who harm innocents in the quest to influence society, much less mislead less fortunate nations over the quality of and efficacy demonstrated by, Harm Minimisation.
All nations have those within who would kill and maim just to exercise power. In Australia, no militias exist. In order to usurp and overthrow a progressive democracy, opponents aim to undermine it by discrediting it's most notable signifiers - those of democratic progression - and thus forcing politicians to act to secure votes in the glare of public misinformation.
Those who attack Harm Minimisation are such people.
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