Editorial Board — Crackdown Podcast:
Drug User Activism
Crackdown comes from the tradition of organized drug user activism.
In the ‘90s—activists in Vancouver, some who used drugs and some who didn’t, had an idea: they were going to start a union of drug users. The Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU) was created in 1997.
Eventually VANDU got a couple of small grants. They used the money to rent a storefront. They spread the word that this space was going to be a kind of drop-in centre for drug users. They held revolutionary political reading groups there. They planned rallies. And they took care of people who needed help.
Crackdown’s Editorial Board consists of some of Vancouver’s most tenacious drug user activists, including members of VANDU, the BC Association of People on Opiate Maintenance (BCAPOM), and the Western Aboriginal Harm Reduction Society (WAHRS).
We have experience with heroin, crack and speed; homelessness and jail; of the Sixties Scoop, where Indigenous kids got taken away from their parents - which is still happening. But we also have experience testifying before parliamentary committees, or at the Supreme Court. We’ve lobbied prime ministers and international dignitaries.
No one else is coming to save us. We have to save ourselves.
