RAVING MADNESS

Since city council seems determined to hold dance raves on city property -
perhaps it needs the money - it had better do it properly.

We disagree with this decision, particularly since the Toronto area is
already becoming famous, if that's the right word, as a production and
consumption centre for Ecstasy, the often deadly drug of choice at
all-night raves.

Nonetheless, council appears poised next month to reverse an earlier
moratorium on raves at city-owned sites, such as the CNE's Better Living
Centre. (What's next, "better living" through drugs?)

It's one thing for council to set up regulations to control private raves,
which are going to go on anyway.

But for the city to allow public premises to be used for raves sends out a
tacit message to the young that it's okay to use drugs.

We can't wait for the first one at the Scarborough Civic Centre.

This is about more than simply ensuring there's enough free drinking water
so the kids can try to bring down their body temperatures and not die or
get sick from dehydration, one of the side-effects of these drugs. As part
of the pro-rave propaganda effort, 10,000 kids are being urged to converge
on a "drug-free" rave at Nathan Phillips Square on Aug. 1.

Of course if it's drug-free, it won't be a rave. Let's at least see
councillors aggressively questioning rave promoters who are behind this big
business. That doesn't mean meekly accepting pious lectures from industry
mouthpieces that if raves are over-regulated, they'll go underground. Real
politicians don't give in to threats.

They do their homework, such as reading the testimony and recommendations
of the inquest into the death of Allen Ho, 20, who died of an Ecstasy
overdose at a private rave in a garage last fall.

Those who do will notice the inquest didn't just say raves should be
regulated rather than banned. It said the minimum age should be 16, that
raves should be licensed and that the police should be able to shut down
unsafe raves, plus search for drugs. (How?) Some of this would require
changes to provincial and municipal laws.

Plus, at a minimum, promoters should be required to post big cash bonds
sufficient to cover such things as the cost of hiring the cops and
ambulances that will be needed to rush overdose victims to hospital. And
let's not license any rave promoters with drug convictions.

Ah, so much to look forward to.