I've undoubtedly said enough, but, WTF. Once more unto the breach!
Was it the Romans who coined this phrase: “There are lies, damn lies and statistics.” (Anyone know the Latin translation?)
Still, even mainstream research tends to be more accurate than a figure plucked from mid-air.
Let's think about this logically. Does someone just decide to inject and the next day they wake up "a junkie"? All drug use takes place along a continuum which we all move up and down along - from abstinence to chaotic dependent use (and those things don't always go together.) We all swing back and forth along that continuum, no matter what MOA we choose.
And so at any time there are going to be many injectors who are working, and are not suffering any harms great enough to impact on them negatively.
From the Curtin Study (this is from '96 and i can't find it online - I can copy and send it to people if you doubt my honesty - who can trust a junkie, after all ?
- or you're just interested.
"40% of users self-identifying as dependent are in full-time work. Of those, more than 40% are on salaries of $40K or above. "
Believe it or not, we have phones! We hold down jobs (in fact, the study goes on to point out that users often spend longer than the average in any one position, because we rely so heavily on the income for our well-being.) Check out
AIVL is the Australian Injecting and Illicit Drug Users’ League – the peak body representing state drug user organisations. Let me create a vision of our manager-level staff (all women FTR). For obvious reasons I’m not going to focus on any one of them, but rather I’ve created a profile modelled on those among them who inject opiates regularly. (We also have non-injecting meth-fans)
“Campaigning Claire” is a dependent opiate user and has been for nearly 20 years – some breaks in there obviously, but not all that many. She would use heroin everyday if she could, but for financial reasons is forced to endure methadone and the crap that goes with being on maintenance, so that she can function. She’s been working full-time, continuously, to build drug user orgs, peer-ed, and achieve law reform for all drug users for more than a decade.
Last year she was the only self-identifying drug user to address the UN General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS, in front of more than ten thousand delegates.
She works 50 hour weeks and earns $70K. She has taken AIVL from no funding to having just secured a contract for $1.5 million in 3 years – and she’s squeezed that out of a conservative government openly hostile to users, law reform, and harm reduction in general. She contracted Hep C before anyone even knew the virus existed, and is just starting to experience symptoms like exhaustion.
She meets with the Federal Health Minister or Parliamentary Secretary for Health at least twice-yearly.
She is my hero(in-e). She shows users at our best, reflect the good in us, and I love her for it. But it’s sad, too, sometimes, because I know how much more she could do if not constrained by prohibition; and she reflects that in us all as well.
Who are you, Runner, to set the terms by which someone so gifted - and willing to use her gifts for community good – must live her life? What makes your morals god-given?
I’ve been living with life-threatening illness since I was 18 (and before people jump to conclusions it is not the result of injecting or drug use at all); the initial prognosis was dead before 21 – I’m 28. I have at times been prescribed large amounts of morphine for pain-relief; and the side-effects of my medication are pretty yukky. I’ve worked full-time for 7 years, opiate-dependent for all of that on methadone and heroin when I could afford it, plus all my other excursions. As Acting President, I just signed the contracts with the Federal Health Dept for AIVL’s $1.5 million, and I ultimately bear legal responsibility for it.
I fit several of your criteria for junky. Who are you to dictate the terms I live my life under? Told to gear up for the other side when you were 18? Signed any contracts for $1.5 million lately? And if you have: it’s still my life. I intend to live however long I have the way that brings me the most pleasure and love, and I’ll use my energy to try and create a society where others can (legally) be loved and be happy.
For more on “functional” use visit
http://www.drugtext.org/library/books/waysofuse/default.htm
Call us what you will, we are building something for our communities. The user movement created NSP, for example, did it illegally at first and were arrested for it; and that has saved the lives of tens of thousands of users (25000 according to the NSP: Return on Investment report
http://www.health.gov.au/pubhlth/publicat/document/roisummary.pdf and is held up by the government as their great contribution to harm reduction. And we were helping ravers get money and create the structures to do peer health promotion as early as ’93.
“Must feel good knowing that someone new will try to IV because of your thoughtless drivel which creates a sudden atmosphere of "IV is not bad at all, its all about being open minded"
Do you give drug users any credit? And, again, why is it OK to post experiences and harm reduction tips for everything but injection, when you also seem to argue that we (injectors) are more in need of that info than anyone?!
What I do feel good about is knowing that users have implemented safer injection strategies because of contact with me personally or through my peer ed work. And does anyone else doubt that I have put a lot of thought into this topic, whether you agree with me or not?
frankly if someone does choose to inject because of what I’ve written (my words are just that powerful , apparently), no, I don’t have a problem with that. I'm not ashamed of my activities or ideas, nor frightened of others pursuing similar paths.
For those who are interested, I’ll be posting a series of articles that I and other “junkies” have written, explaining the users movement and just what we have achieved.
