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May 22nd, 2000, 11:58 AM
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#1 |
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Hullanewbie
Join Date: Feb 2001
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from the may 22 toronto star:
Attack drugs, not dancing, Chow says Councillor warns against banning raves By Nicholas Keung Toronto Star Staff Reporter Law-abiding ravers should not be penalized for illegal drug use by some of their counterparts, an inquest has been told. ``Those who do drugs should be punished, but a person who dances at raves should not be punished for dancing,'' Councillor Olivia Chow (Downtown) testified Friday at the inquest into the death of Allen Ho. ``Dancing and ecstasy are two separate issues,'' said Chow, the city's designated youth advocate. She said a Toronto-wide ban on raves would drive the electronic dance scene underground and pose a bigger risk for party-goers. Ho, a Ryerson student, died two weeks short of his 21st birthday after ingesting the drug ecstasy at a rave in the city's west end on Oct. 9, 1999. Chow said the city's protocol with rave organizers, enforced since December, is effective in protecting the health and safety of party patrons. ``The protocol needs to be honoured. If a rave doesn't have any paid-duty police officers or ambulance present, that's an underground rave and officers can come in and shut the rave down,'' she said. ``The key to eliminate illegal drugs is to empower young people, to have their peers say `It's not cool to have drugs and don't do it,' '' through public education, she said. But Rusty Beauchesne, lawyer for Toronto police Chief Julian Fantino, said expert witnesses had testified earlier that ecstasy consumption is a part of rave culture. Up to 80 per cent of ravers are believed to have used the hallucinogenic drug, he said. Chow said the issue around Ho's death is drug abuse, not raves. ``Ho should have been there dancing and shouldn't have used drugs. He made a mistake and we are here to learn from that mistake,'' she said. When asked by Paul McDermott, lawyer for Coroner Dr. Barry McLellan, how a self-regulatory protocol can give authorities the power to crack down on illegal raves, Chow said current legislation and city bylaws can be enforced. ``We can make the lives of (non-abiding rave organizers) miserable by hounding them with the fire code and (other regulations). We have many other ways to shut them down,'' said Chow. |
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May 22nd, 2000, 10:30 PM
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#2 |
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Hullaboarder
Join Date: May 1999
Location: canada, brampton ontario
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very positive article.
keep this up and we'll have half of the population with us  Dawn |
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May 23rd, 2000, 02:12 AM
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#3 |
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Hullaboarder
Join Date: Jan 2000
Location: Etobicoke
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On the front cover of the star today it said
Viagra and ecstasy, the whole rave, or something like that...whatever |
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