The agony of ecstasy
Gregor Stronach
It's hard not to be sad when someone dies young. It's completely natural for there to be an outpouring of grief - and when the death is a public one, it necessarily follows that there will be some level of public mourning.
But when the death in question - in this case, 17-year-old Gemma Thoms - is ecstasy-related, the grief machine gets put into overdrive. Is it because of the relative rarity of ecstasy-related deaths that such stories get the kind of hyperbolic press they do? Or can it be put down to a twisted version of Missing White Girl Syndrome?
As always in these tragic cases, the TV shows and radio talkback runs white-hot. And, as always, opinion is divided as to whose fault this all was.
It was sadly inevitable that Tony Wood - the father of 15-year-old Anna Wood who died in similar circumstances in 1995 - would bob up and stick his oar in to the debate. I feel for the guy - while I've never lost a child, I've lost more than a couple of friends to drugs over the years, one of whom was murdered in cold blood. It's not an easy thing to deal with.
But I feel that Tony is altogether far too close to problem to be an effective campaigner. I can only hope that he was misquoted on the Channel 7 website when he complained that the police were spending too much time focusing on speeding and alcohol - two of the biggest killers in Australia - instead of combating the reprehensible scourge of ecstasy use.
Priorities are important things. And I suggest that if Tony really wants to be a part of the debate on drug control, he might want to get his sorted out.
On the flip side of the authoritarian and mindlessly ineffective 'zero tolerance' approach is the growing voice that has put the blame for Gemma Thom's death on the shoulders of the police. It is, in my opinion, one of the most heinous examples of a straw man argument in a public debate I have ever seen.
I quote LiveNews.com columnist Tim Brunero's thought-provoking piece on the subject. "So instead of monstering children with killer dogs when they go out, perhaps it's time to consider another approach." That quote is from an article entitled "Did sniffer dogs kill this Perth teenager?"
The answer to Brunero's question is an unequivocal "no".
Gemma Thoms did not die because there were sniffer dogs at the Perth Big Day Out. She died because she took three pills at once on a hot day, without thinking about - or perhaps even knowing - the potential consequences.
Brunero's argument that we need to change the laws to stop from turning "the kids" into criminals is putting the cart before the horse. The laws are there to stop the bulk of the population from hurting themselves with dangerous chemical compounds. Making these drugs legal - or even decriminalising them - will only result in wider-spread drug use.
It's the least-ideal solution to the current problem: more drugs in the hands of inexperienced young folks who are poorly-educated in their use and abuse is a recipe for widespread disaster.
This debate, then, should not be about police tactics, police resources or even the laws themselves. The discussion we need to be having, as a nation, is about personal responsibility - something that seems to be lacking in almost every position other than the heartless "she did this to herself so she's only got herself to blame" that we're hearing from the anonymous talkback heroes in the 'burbs.
Let me draw an analogy here: Anyone who partakes in a personally risky endeavour has to realise and acknowledge that they are putting themselves in a position of danger. And with that danger comes an elevated requirement for personal responsibility. If someone decided to leap from an aeroplane on their own with no sky-diving training, I'm sure the bulk of the population would agree that they were solely responsible for their actions, should they plummet to earth and die in a crater.
But according to some commentators, when a teenager decides to down three pills with little or no understanding of what those pills will do to her, the argument ceases to be about her personal responsibility and becomes an issue of heavy-handed policing or draconian law-making.
To tackle the "drug problem", the drugs themselves need to be understood. The culture surrounding those drugs needs to be understood. And the people who take those drugs need to be understood. But most of all, the people who are going to be taking those drugs need to understand what they are going to be doing to their bodies.
Recently in New South Wales, a pamphlet was produced by the Sydney West Area Health Service and was set to be distributed to Year 9 and 10 students. Called Choosing to Use, it set out in plain language what young people - the ones most likely to be experimenting with drugs - should expect to encounter if they choose to get high, and how to deal with the potential problems that can - and do - occur. It was precisely what young people need to know.
The NSW government had every single copy of the pamphlet pulped, after someone complained that the information in the pamphlet might encourage young people to try drugs.
I hate to be Captain Obvious here, but young people don't need to be encouraged to take drugs. From my own observations over the years, young people seem to be doing a bang-up job of motivating themselves along that particular course of action.
Miranda Devine - columnist for the Sydney Morning Herald - got hold of the story, went straight to the anti-drug lobby for a rent-a-quote on the topic and came blustering out of her corner, throwing punch after punch at the "harm minimisation lobby".
By using disingenuous logic, she managed to equate harm minimisation with legalisation, thereby demonising anyone and everyone who dare walk the harm minimisation line.
So with social commentators telling everyone who will listen that harm minimisation tactics will put syringes into the arms of every precious snowflake exposed to its message, and a government so appallingly frightened of being seen to be anything other than zero-tolerance, the burden of educating young folks on the reality of drug use is left to fall by the wayside.
So to whom should the burden of education fall? Clearly, parents should shoulder some of it - after all, their children are in their care until they become adults. But we clearly can't expect any useful form of educational help from schools or the government.
Until governments and schools come to their senses and understand that the education concerning drugs that they are giving the children in their care is misguided at best, and downright dangerous policy at its worst, I suggest this:
Drug users need to educate each other. If no one else is going to teach young people about what can go wrong and what to do if something does, then it's up to the members of the community who do understand to teach those around them. For the most part, drug use is a fairly communal thing - particularly with ecstasy.
It's a very rare case indeed of someone taking ecstasy on their own - normally it's with at least one other person.
If neither of those people know what they're doing, it's a potential disaster. If one person knows the lay of the land, it can still go badly wrong. But if everyone involved is well-versed on how to deal with an immediate health crisis - and is given the knowledge that if something happens, they can call an ambulance without an automatic appearance by the police, then the likelihood of another completely needless death is drastically reduced.
I can't help but wonder - if Gemma Thoms knew what she was doing, would she be dead today? I doubt it. Most people who regularly take pills know that consuming ecstasy involves siginificant risk, that consuming it in hot weather is especially dangerous, and that taking three at once in the middle of a heat wave is tantamount to throwing yourself under a bus and hoping that you'll emerge unscathed.
So if the government wants to bury its head in the sand and pretend that zero tolerance is working, then let it. If teachers don't want to get in trouble for providing young people with the information they need in order to survive, then let them sit on their hands. And if parents want to believe that their straight-A student or rebellious teenager isn't dabbling with drugs, then let them.
And let the drug users - those who know and understand the highs and lows of their chosen recreation - educate each other. That's where the responsibility for education should lie.
Let us all, please, be realistic about this issue - even if it's just for a moment.
Fact: a percentage of young people are going to take drugs.
Fact: a percentage of the young people who do take drugs will encounter an immediate and potentially lethal situation while they are doing so.
Fact: Denying them the information that could save their lives, because of the fallacious argument that it might be seen as encouraging them to take drugs, is the real crime.
![:\](https://bluelight.org/xf/BL_Images/Orig_Emoji/wrygrin.gif "wry grin :\")