Latest / Kvetch & Release / Why meth-fueled orgies are bad

Transcript

Why meth-fueled orgies are bad · Kvetch & Release

0:03
Speaker 1: Welcome to Convection Plots with John lid Key. This is
0:06
Speaker 1: an article I an interview I wasn't expecting to be
0:09
Speaker 1: having today based on an article pitch that had shown
0:12
Speaker 1: up in my inbox. Some you ignore, some you automatically
0:15
Speaker 1: say yes to. This was the latter. When I saw
0:18
Speaker 1: the headline matthueled orgies are bad, I knew I had
0:22
Speaker 1: to figure out, quite frankly, why they sound like so
0:25
Speaker 1: much fun. I'm joining me right now to discuss. Is
0:27
Speaker 1: the founder and the executive director of the Center for
0:30
Speaker 1: Responsible Drug Policy, a voice that I speak with often
0:34
Speaker 1: on AM eight hundred CKLW. You can read him often
0:37
Speaker 1: in the National Post as well. Adam zvo joins me
0:40
Speaker 1: right now. Hey, Adam, how you doing.
0:42
Speaker 2: I'm great. I'm tired, but not because I was in
0:44
Speaker 2: the math field orgy because those things are bad.
0:49
Speaker 1: You're joining me right now from Ukraine, where those are
0:53
Speaker 1: not taking place. I'd imagine rampantly in the streets.
0:57
Speaker 2: I mean, not to my knowledge, but if anyone knows
0:59
Speaker 2: is Doney it could be interesting. Journalist and angle. I'm
1:02
Speaker 2: here visiting my boyfriend and you know, ideally soon to
1:05
Speaker 2: be fiance for three weeks we're reconnecting. We have a
1:08
Speaker 2: long distance relationship and it's been a few months since
1:11
Speaker 2: we've seen each other. So now we're just enjoying splendid
1:14
Speaker 2: bliss playing warcraft.
1:16
Speaker 1: That sounds lovely, if not to be added with the
1:20
Speaker 1: meth field orgies. But okay, Adam, let's dive. Then I
1:22
Speaker 1: need to know why is it that meth field orgies
1:26
Speaker 1: are a bad thing? Can you summarize what this piece
1:30
Speaker 1: is all about for people who haven't had a chance
1:31
Speaker 1: to read it, so.
1:33
Speaker 2: The piece can be divided into two sections. So the
1:35
Speaker 2: first section discusses how chem sex is a big issue
1:39
Speaker 2: in the gay community in Canada and across the West.
1:42
Speaker 2: More generally, chem sex is the practice of having sex
1:45
Speaker 2: with other people, often in groups, while being high on
1:49
Speaker 2: more dangerous forms of drugs, predominantly meth but sometimes ketamine,
1:53
Speaker 2: which is a disassociated sedative often used to tranquilize horses,
1:57
Speaker 2: and GHB, which basically makes you basic, almost comatose. You
2:01
Speaker 2: feel like you're flying in the air. Says a friend
2:04
Speaker 2: of mine. Well, I did it once like five years ago.
2:06
Speaker 2: It was terrible, And the problem here is that so
2:10
Speaker 2: since the early two thousands, you know, chem sex has
2:13
Speaker 2: proliferated as a scourge upon the gay community, and it
2:19
Speaker 2: became it's popularization and coincided with the rise of dating
2:23
Speaker 2: websites and dating apps, which allowed gay men who were
2:27
Speaker 2: strangers to get together, you know, just because they wanted
2:29
Speaker 2: to have casual sex. Now, the problem with this, of course,
2:33
Speaker 2: is that having sex with other people, and group sex
2:36
Speaker 2: in particular, while being high on meth is reckless. You know,
2:41
Speaker 2: meth destroys your life. It's highly addictive, it rots your teeth,
2:45
Speaker 2: you get paranoid, you're up for days on end, and oftentimes,
2:50
Speaker 2: you know, you end up homeless because your life destabilizes
2:53
Speaker 2: or you die. So these are things that are not great,
2:57
Speaker 2: which is why the chem sex play has been such
2:59
Speaker 2: a huge health crisis in the gay community, which is
3:03
Speaker 2: underappreciated because gay men's health is very niche. Now, I
3:08
Speaker 2: want to imagine, given how serious the crisis is, that
3:12
Speaker 2: public health experts working in with LGBTQ communities would be
3:16
Speaker 2: trying to prevent this practice from happening. But that's not
3:20
Speaker 2: what's happening. Instead, harm reduction advocates, Queer harm reduction advocates
3:26
Speaker 2: are arguing that we should destigmatize chem sects, and they're
3:30
Speaker 2: producing materials that actually glorify the practice of fucking on math.
3:37
Speaker 1: Ok No, So when you say that they're producing materials
3:41
Speaker 1: like glorify it, Like, what do you have an example
3:43
Speaker 1: of something like this?
3:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, I have. I have a few brochures that were
3:46
Speaker 2: published recently. But I'm going to give you an example
3:48
Speaker 2: of how I first became aware of this. So that
3:51
Speaker 2: twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen, I was helping this community organization
3:56
Speaker 2: put together a workshop on meth abuse because I was
4:01
Speaker 2: volunteering a lot with the gay community. I mean before
4:03
Speaker 2: I was an evil National Post columnist, I was an
4:05
Speaker 2: LGBTQ activist for many years. And you know, we put
4:09
Speaker 2: this together and it was it was the presentation was
4:12
Speaker 2: to be given by another volunteer with this community group,
4:15
Speaker 2: and I assumed that they would tell people that having
4:19
Speaker 2: sex on thatth is bad, don't do it. But that's
4:23
Speaker 2: not what happened. Instead, he said that we should destigmatize
4:26
Speaker 2: matthews and chem sex. We need to understand why people
4:29
Speaker 2: use it. And he really emphasized the fact that math
4:33
Speaker 2: makes sex feel amazing. It's so great, it's hotter than
4:37
Speaker 2: anything you've ever experienced. Before it's so hot that you'll
4:40
Speaker 2: never be able to have regular sex again, at least
4:42
Speaker 2: not for a year. And it was basically a sales pitch,
4:46
Speaker 2: and I remember leaving that session feeling ashamed that I
4:50
Speaker 2: had supported its implementation. You know, I'd gotten the pizza,
4:54
Speaker 2: gotten the venue, and I was like, why did I
4:56
Speaker 2: do that? Because walking away from this, I feel more
4:59
Speaker 2: inclined to use math than I did walking in. Before
5:03
Speaker 2: I walked in, there was a zero percent chance. Now now
5:05
Speaker 2: there was a zero dot, zero one percent chance, and
5:07
Speaker 2: that is not good community activism. So the issue fell
5:13
Speaker 2: off my radar for many years.
5:15
Speaker 1: But one secon let me just, yeah, let's put a
5:16
Speaker 1: pin in that harm reduction should not be designed to
5:19
Speaker 1: turn people on to the substance, right right.
5:23
Speaker 2: Well, that's the thing. Harm reduction is about reducing the
5:27
Speaker 2: harms associated with drug use, but it's not about actively
5:30
Speaker 2: promoting drugs as being this, you know, great thing that
5:33
Speaker 2: will enrich your life. And when it comes to destigmatization, yes,
5:38
Speaker 2: of course we should destigmatize drug users so that they
5:41
Speaker 2: feel comfortable enough to seek assistance, but we shouldn't destigmatize
5:45
Speaker 2: dangerous drugs themselves, because those drugs will kill you or
5:48
Speaker 2: ruin your life. And that's that's where we've crossed it
5:52
Speaker 2: to dangerous territory.
5:54
Speaker 1: Well, for sure, And i'd imagine there's the concern about
5:58
Speaker 1: you know, HIV, the great spreading risings because of this
6:03
Speaker 1: sexual behavior, because of this promiscuity and these uh I
6:06
Speaker 1: guess the lack of boundaries that you would have from
6:09
Speaker 1: the meth use itself. It seems like it's the complete
6:11
Speaker 1: opposite that than what you would want from a public
6:14
Speaker 1: health perspective.
6:15
Speaker 2: Well, well, it's interesting. So chem sex is actually very
6:18
Speaker 2: popular with HIV positive men because they are stigmatized and
6:23
Speaker 2: they are not accepted in other sexual spaces often and
6:27
Speaker 2: so they come together and they have math sex. Not
6:29
Speaker 2: all of them, but some of them. Uh. And you know,
6:32
Speaker 2: usually they're on their meds, which means that they're they're untransmissible,
6:35
Speaker 2: like cannot infect other people. Right, So in that case,
6:39
Speaker 2: the public health risk when it comes to HIV is contained.
6:43
Speaker 2: But the problem is that if someone has developed a
6:46
Speaker 2: crippling addiction to meth or to ketamine, then that destabilizes
6:50
Speaker 2: them and often means that they're no longer compliance with
6:55
Speaker 2: their with their medication schedule, and so that can cause
6:58
Speaker 2: their viral load to in priests over time, which makes
7:01
Speaker 2: them a danger to other people. So now you have
7:03
Speaker 2: someone who is addicted to math having group sex and
7:07
Speaker 2: is you know, infectious with their HIV and usually prefers
7:11
Speaker 2: unprotected sex, whereas before, you know, they were uninfectious. So
7:15
Speaker 2: maybe they haven't fully adjusted their practices to account for
7:18
Speaker 2: their new HIV status.
7:21
Speaker 1: So who are some of the people then that would
7:23
Speaker 1: be spreading the benefits, if you will, of chem sex?
7:27
Speaker 1: I mean, is it just like some randos here or there,
7:30
Speaker 1: or is it people that like we should be paying
7:32
Speaker 1: attention to.
7:33
Speaker 2: Oh no, these are like, these are actually significant harm
7:36
Speaker 2: reduction advocates. And back in twenty nineteen, there was this
7:40
Speaker 2: interesting back and forth in Now magazine, which is a
7:45
Speaker 2: Toronto based publication, very progressive. I'm not sure if it's
7:48
Speaker 2: still functional. But Tim mccaskell, who was a veteran gay
7:54
Speaker 2: rights activist, you know, he was there from the very beginning.
7:56
Speaker 2: He's an old dude. He wrote an op ed saying
8:00
Speaker 2: that it was appalling that we were not doing more
8:03
Speaker 2: to prevent the proliferation of chem sex, and he compared
8:06
Speaker 2: it to the HIV crisis. He said that during the eighties,
8:09
Speaker 2: there were posters everywhere warning people, you know, not to
8:13
Speaker 2: have unprotected sex, saying that you should use condoms. And
8:17
Speaker 2: he said that based on what he saw around him,
8:19
Speaker 2: there was no not a modicum of effort in prevention
8:22
Speaker 2: when it comes to crystal meth. And he said we
8:24
Speaker 2: should be screaming from the rooftops that meth kills people.
8:27
Speaker 2: Meth is bad. It kills gay men now. In response
8:30
Speaker 2: to that, a group of harm reduction activists wrote a
8:33
Speaker 2: counter op ed which was obscene. Basically, they said that
8:40
Speaker 2: Tim was stigmatizing myth and they argued that there is
8:44
Speaker 2: and I'm going to quote here, there is no shortage
8:46
Speaker 2: of shitty prejudices against meth use. And to continue the quote,
8:51
Speaker 2: they say, you never hear the stories about how much
8:54
Speaker 2: fun your friend had at his chem sex hookup because
8:57
Speaker 2: the fear surrounding crystal meth use has created echo chamber.
9:01
Speaker 2: To speak casually or in a positive light about such
9:04
Speaker 2: a villified drug immediately creates a panic in those who
9:08
Speaker 2: care about you. What the fuck right?
9:13
Speaker 1: So wow?
9:13
Speaker 2: The people who this include Zoe Dodd, who is one
9:16
Speaker 2: of the leading harm reduction activists in Canada. She was
9:20
Speaker 2: constantly on the CBC as well as you know Nick Boyce,
9:23
Speaker 2: who is a senior policy analyst with a Canadian Drug
9:26
Speaker 2: Policy Coalition, which is an influential drug legalization advocacy group.
9:34
Speaker 1: How do you feel, you know, just as a gay person,
9:37
Speaker 1: when you see your community being sold this product, if
9:44
Speaker 1: you will.
9:46
Speaker 2: It feels terrible. Game men go through so much in
9:51
Speaker 2: their lives. Not so much anymore because we've mostly been accepted,
9:54
Speaker 2: although with recent political developments, I don't know how much
9:57
Speaker 2: that's going to hold over the next decade. But for
10:00
Speaker 2: most of us, you know, we came of age at
10:03
Speaker 2: a time we're being gay was not okay. You know,
10:05
Speaker 2: it became way more okay in the mid two thousands,
10:07
Speaker 2: but even when I was a kid, it was not
10:10
Speaker 2: all right, and people would use you know, fag and
10:12
Speaker 2: gay as a pejorative and you would feel shamed, like
10:16
Speaker 2: ashamed of yourself. Many, many gay men are excommunicated from
10:19
Speaker 2: their families, from their communities, from their from their religious
10:23
Speaker 2: communities as well. And and when you have all that trauma,
10:27
Speaker 2: and all this trauma precipitates drug use, right, because I
10:29
Speaker 2: have to keep in mind that gay men often use
10:31
Speaker 2: these drugs to deal with unaddressed trauma. You know, it
10:34
Speaker 2: hurts them, it kills them, and then the people who
10:36
Speaker 2: are tasked with protecting them, with saving their lives, are
10:40
Speaker 2: enabling these self destructive, maladaptive coping mechanisms. It leads to
10:46
Speaker 2: gay men dying. And me, as a gay man, I
10:49
Speaker 2: don't like the I don't like the thought of gay
10:51
Speaker 2: men dying. I would prefer us to live. And you
10:56
Speaker 2: know I mentioned earlier this op ed and you think, well,
10:58
Speaker 2: that's just an op ed. You know, I just mentioned
11:01
Speaker 2: a presentation. So back in like last year or been
11:06
Speaker 2: twenty twenty three, because now we're in twenty twenty five,
11:10
Speaker 2: there were these brochures that were published by some prominence
11:14
Speaker 2: gay men's health organizations in Toronto. So the first one
11:19
Speaker 2: is by the AIDS Committee of Toronto and it's called
11:22
Speaker 2: Safer P and P. P and P means party in play.
11:25
Speaker 2: That's another term for camp sex. And you know it's
11:28
Speaker 2: a brochure that glorified keem sex and provided a how
11:31
Speaker 2: to guide on it. You know, some of the stuff
11:34
Speaker 2: that they advised on. I mean you gave another quote,
11:36
Speaker 2: you know, to say, loading syringes and prepping in front
11:39
Speaker 2: of others can be difficult and take away your playtime,
11:43
Speaker 2: especially if you're already high. Try to load syringes and
11:46
Speaker 2: pre measure doses earlier than the party. Now, mind you,
11:50
Speaker 2: the brochure is full of images of hot gay men
11:54
Speaker 2: who are definitely not addicted to meth. I mean all
11:56
Speaker 2: of them have really nice teeth.
11:59
Speaker 1: These guys all have like, you know, really like the
12:03
Speaker 1: healthy looking bodies, not very much emaciated looking.
12:06
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, none of them look like they sucked
12:08
Speaker 2: for five dollars an alley because they've given up everything
12:11
Speaker 2: else in their life because they're addicted to meth, right, Adam, Well, yeah,
12:15
Speaker 2: and so when you fill a brochure with really hot
12:18
Speaker 2: gay men and describe chem sex in these terms, you're
12:21
Speaker 2: basically producing aspirational advertising. And look, there was another thing
12:28
Speaker 2: from twenty twenty three, Your Party and play Field Guide,
12:31
Speaker 2: a brochure published by the Gay Men's Sexual Health Alliance.
12:34
Speaker 2: And mind you, all this stuff is publicly funded. It's
12:36
Speaker 2: all paid for with our tax dollars. And they say, look,
12:41
Speaker 2: I'm gonna quote again. When you think about P and P,
12:44
Speaker 2: crystal meth and GHB are the drugs that come to mind.
12:48
Speaker 2: These two have a bad reputation that follows them around.
12:52
Speaker 2: Yet guys still love to party with them. Why well,
12:57
Speaker 2: stex on. These drugs can be hot and intense, not
13:00
Speaker 2: to mention, it can last for hours. You feel more
13:04
Speaker 2: connected to people and better about yourself. Of course, there
13:07
Speaker 2: are downsides like dehydration, losing sleep, and increased anxiety. Now
13:14
Speaker 2: let's pause for a second. Okay, so the downsides they
13:17
Speaker 2: describe as dehydration, losing sleep, and increased anxiety. Math is
13:21
Speaker 2: not fucking coffee, right. It will kill you, and they're
13:26
Speaker 2: describing it in these terms.
13:29
Speaker 1: Okay, So I get. We can't presume then that this
13:32
Speaker 1: is a one off. You've shown two different examples here.
13:35
Speaker 1: So is this something that government I mean essentially government's
13:41
Speaker 1: funding this. So I don't know if the question is
13:43
Speaker 1: government able to respond to this? Are you hopeful of
13:47
Speaker 1: something like that under this current federal government?
13:50
Speaker 2: Under this current federal government, absolutely not, because there is
13:52
Speaker 2: no way that they're going to intervene in this. Because
13:54
Speaker 2: you know, they love their ultra radical queer activists, and
13:57
Speaker 2: I say, this is a gay man. I would hope
14:00
Speaker 2: that if the Conservatives get elected that they'll clamp down.
14:04
Speaker 2: But the problem here is that this space is so
14:06
Speaker 2: niche and so obscure that it's hard to get people
14:10
Speaker 2: to care. No one talks about gay men's health because
14:13
Speaker 2: it impacts such a small segments of the population, which
14:16
Speaker 2: is why it's been this petri dish for radical activism.
14:19
Speaker 2: And even if the federal government were to intervene, I'm
14:23
Speaker 2: concerned that the people who work in this space, and
14:25
Speaker 2: I know many of them, they're in an echo chamber,
14:28
Speaker 2: and I wonder if they would find ways to undermine
14:32
Speaker 2: the implementation of change given that there isn't much There
14:37
Speaker 2: aren't really an any that many people who can oversee
14:40
Speaker 2: this effectively. As an external evaluator.
14:44
Speaker 1: It seems to me like the policy solution to this
14:47
Speaker 1: is a pretty simple one, right, don't promote m sex
14:53
Speaker 1: is like a really simple starting point. Is there anything
14:56
Speaker 1: beyond that, whether it be messaging from the from different
15:00
Speaker 1: levels of government or from you know, gay organizations or
15:05
Speaker 1: HIV organizations, Like, what should the messaging be be on
15:09
Speaker 1: this front? Knowing as you said, that this is a
15:12
Speaker 1: phenomenon that does exist, people are engaging in keem.
15:15
Speaker 2: Sex, well, I mean, I would think the most the
15:18
Speaker 2: most obvious thing is to invest into prevention, right because
15:23
Speaker 2: As of now, prevention is not mentioned in any of
15:26
Speaker 2: these resources. Uh the one that was produced by the
15:29
Speaker 2: Gay Men's Health Alliance, I believe, Uh, well, one of
15:33
Speaker 2: the brochures. You know, they spent more time warning people
15:36
Speaker 2: about the dangers of leaving with someone else's cock bring
15:39
Speaker 2: after an orgy, or leaving out valuables right that could
15:43
Speaker 2: be stolen while you're passed out on meth like. They
15:46
Speaker 2: talk more about that than prevention. So I think that
15:49
Speaker 2: there is We're at rock bottom in that space, so
15:53
Speaker 2: we can only go up when it comes to finding
15:56
Speaker 2: ways to dissuade men from engaging in these practices. But
16:01
Speaker 2: of course there's a problem here, and as I mentioned earlier,
16:03
Speaker 2: the people who work at these institutions are ideologically hardwired
16:08
Speaker 2: to think that prevention is impossible and that harm reduction
16:13
Speaker 2: is the only way to go. I was at an
16:15
Speaker 2: addiction conference last year where there was a chem sex session,
16:21
Speaker 2: and I asked them, what are you doing to dissuade
16:24
Speaker 2: gay men from engaging in chem sex? What prevention method
16:29
Speaker 2: what prevention initiatives you have in place? I shit you not.
16:33
Speaker 2: They told me that prevention doesn't work and they only
16:36
Speaker 2: do harm reduction and they said that we should focus
16:39
Speaker 2: on the positive aspects of drug use and not just
16:41
Speaker 2: say that drugs are bad. So these are the kind
16:44
Speaker 2: of people who are you know, working in these institutions.
16:49
Speaker 2: So you can change the funding, but you kind of
16:51
Speaker 2: have to purge the staff as well. And actually, you
16:54
Speaker 2: know what, one thing I haven't mentioned yet, and I'm
16:56
Speaker 2: going to add thiss in is one other anecdote just
16:58
Speaker 2: to show how fucked up this is. So at that conference, right,
17:04
Speaker 2: the presenter said some other concerning things, you know, not
17:07
Speaker 2: only saying that we should think about the positive aspects
17:10
Speaker 2: of myth, he also said that, uh, you know, chem
17:14
Speaker 2: sex will make you feel more connected and that it
17:16
Speaker 2: has the added benefits of leveling the sexual playing field
17:21
Speaker 2: because if you're old or ugly, you can have sex
17:26
Speaker 2: with younger or prettier people at chem sex orgies because
17:29
Speaker 2: everyone's fucked up and can you imagine, like, how how
17:34
Speaker 2: how how this is? This is so obscene? Imagine if
17:41
Speaker 2: you had a if you if you had a researcher, say,
17:45
Speaker 2: you know in a straight context that meth fiel doorgies
17:48
Speaker 2: are great because it allows older and ugly men to
17:52
Speaker 2: fuck younger and pretty women while everyone is high. Often
17:56
Speaker 2: by giving these younger and prettier women meth that they're
17:58
Speaker 2: addicted to, there would be an cry. But you know,
18:02
Speaker 2: with the gay community, it is considered fine because we're even.
18:05
Speaker 1: If it was even if it wasn't about meth, if
18:08
Speaker 1: it was just say about alcohol, alcohol, it was the
18:11
Speaker 1: great equalizer because if you get a girl so fucked up,
18:14
Speaker 1: she won't be able to say no because she'll just
18:16
Speaker 1: be having such a fun time. I mean, that is
18:19
Speaker 1: something that, as you you, it would it would send
18:22
Speaker 1: people running for the hill, screaming. And it goes back
18:25
Speaker 1: to my question where I asked her at the outset,
18:27
Speaker 1: how does it make you feel, just as a gay
18:29
Speaker 1: man that it's being presented in this way? Why is
18:32
Speaker 1: it that? I mean, I think you've touched on it
18:34
Speaker 1: a bit in terms, but I'd like for you just
18:38
Speaker 1: to answer the question head on. Why is it that
18:41
Speaker 1: the education is presented in this way when it comes
18:44
Speaker 1: to the gay male community versus I can't speak to
18:51
Speaker 1: you know, the lesbian community or you know, I guess,
18:54
Speaker 1: or comparatively to the straight community. Why is it that
18:58
Speaker 1: your community is so spirit in terms of this messaging.
19:02
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, like I just want to say the
19:04
Speaker 2: lesbians don't have time for camp sex because they're too busy,
19:06
Speaker 2: you know, doing plumbing and building for great we all
19:11
Speaker 2: love the lessons, well, they get things done and they
19:15
Speaker 2: don't have med field or no. I think that the
19:18
Speaker 2: underlying problem here, and this is some historical context I
19:21
Speaker 2: haven't brought up yet, is that the harm reduction movement
19:24
Speaker 2: actually originates from the HIV aid space. So it began
19:28
Speaker 2: in the eighties as a way to reduce the transmission
19:32
Speaker 2: of HIV AIDS through needle exchanges. And then after HIV
19:36
Speaker 2: AIDS was mostly managed by the late nineties, we had
19:38
Speaker 2: all of these harm reduction experts had to pivot to
19:40
Speaker 2: a new place lest they lose their jobs essentially, and
19:45
Speaker 2: so they transferred their expertise to addiction because they also
19:48
Speaker 2: worked with addicts who had HIV, and even though they
19:51
Speaker 2: didn't have a background addiction medicine, they essentially took over
19:54
Speaker 2: that space. So you've always had a close alliance of
19:58
Speaker 2: queer activism harm reduction activism. And because you have this
20:03
Speaker 2: intersection in such a niche space where there is no
20:06
Speaker 2: external accountability, that's where you get this incredible radicalism. Now
20:11
Speaker 2: in terms of how I feel about this. I think
20:14
Speaker 2: that it betrays a certain level of homophobia. To be honest,
20:17
Speaker 2: When I was at that conference, most of the audience
20:20
Speaker 2: there these are all, you know, people working in healthcare,
20:23
Speaker 2: mostly clinicians, and they were mostly women who were mostly straight,
20:28
Speaker 2: and they were nodding along, you know, imbibing this information uncritically,
20:34
Speaker 2: and I felt revolted at the thought of what they
20:38
Speaker 2: must think of gay men, right, that we are just
20:41
Speaker 2: drug addicted sex maniacs, and that if we destroy ourselves
20:47
Speaker 2: through methorgies, that's okay, because from the harm reduction perspective,
20:52
Speaker 2: that is a cherished cultural practice, right. And essentially, brochures
20:59
Speaker 2: like this, educational material like this gives license to heterosexual
21:04
Speaker 2: clinicians to give up on gay men and abandon them
21:08
Speaker 2: to their despair and self destruction. And I think that's
21:12
Speaker 2: the underlying pernicious aspect of it. I don't like it when,
21:16
Speaker 2: you know, politically radical gay men indirectly kill gay men
21:20
Speaker 2: through their reckless policy preferences. But I think it's even
21:24
Speaker 2: worse when well meaning but ignorance great women working in
21:27
Speaker 2: healthcare condemn gay men to death as well.
21:32
Speaker 1: Adam, I want to thank you so much for your
21:33
Speaker 1: time talking about this one. I just it's it's hard
21:38
Speaker 1: to wrap your head around that this is actually something
21:42
Speaker 1: that's being funded and pushed by various levels of government.
21:46
Speaker 1: But I find myself increasingly these days saying that sentence.
21:50
Speaker 1: Quite frankly, it seems to me as if the sea
21:54
Speaker 1: change might be coming and there's going to be a
21:56
Speaker 1: culture swing coming soon enough, at least if polling shows
21:59
Speaker 1: anything at like that. But I really appreciate you taking
22:02
Speaker 1: some time to talk about why methfield orgies are bad.
22:05
Speaker 1: Learned a little bit along the way here, had some fun.
22:08
Speaker 1: Hope you did as well well.
22:10
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me on the show.
22:11
Speaker 1: Absolutely, thanks so much, You have yourself a great time.
22:14
Speaker 1: Adam Zevo is the founder and executive director of the
22:18
Speaker 1: Center for Responsible Drug Policy. Check out this latest article,
22:21
Speaker 1: methfield orgies are Bad. It's online at Readthline dot ca.