A: Okay, great question, totally legitimate. First of all, what Canada needs to do regarding drugs is legalize all drugs. Decriminalization really does very little to take any kind of power away from the illicit market, which makes its own rules by doing exactly what the laws say they’re not allowed to do.

So, imagine this: You’re a chronically dependent heroin user of 20 years, dope sick from withdrawal, with no home and $10 you got from picking bottles all night. Your one option at this point is to go to a dark alley and look for heroin, but you know that these days, there is way more fentanyl and death out there than anything else.

Or we say to you: Yes, you are allowed to use drugs. And regarding opiates, because we, The System, are collectively responsible for the creation of the laws which caused all this over-prescribing, unchecked dependency and addiction maintenance—as well as breeding the culture in our society which glorifies using medication and then abandons the user as soon as they become “problematic”—well, from now on, we’re gonna give it to you for free.

Here is a single, regulated daily dose you can access, cleanly and legally from this vending machine, openly here in this safe consumption site, where you are surrounded by friends, resources and people dedicated, without judgment, to your safe use of whatever drug you do, recreationally or otherwise. And we’re gonna do this for as long as you need it.

Would you still then choose to go back out into the rain, to this desperate-looking and possibly dangerous stranger who is hustling not to satisfy his customer, but to make money, and who is aware of the shape you’re in but does not appear to care?

Of course we would love if everyone could just stop using drugs. But we’ll take staying alive, too.

Nicolas Crier (pictured above)
Coordinator, Megaphone Speakers Bureau

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