THE SKY ISN'T FALLING

Earlier this month Julian Fantino, Toronto's new police chief, sent a
letter to the prime minister inviting him to a rave -- an all-night
dance party frequented by young people. According to Chief Fantino,
raves are "threatening the very fabric of Canadian society."

In the three-page letter, he offers to escort Jean Chretien to a
Toronto rave so he can witness "kids, most of them under 16, high on
drugs." Chief Fantino believes 80% of those who attend these events
are on drugs and insists this represents "a health and safety
emergency that could easily become an epidemic."

Since Mr. Chretien's schedule has yet to accommodate a visit to a
rave, I decided to attend my first one this past weekend. At age 37,
this required help from a younger, decidedly more hip, National Post
colleague. On his advice, my first stop was the hair salon where
(temporary) pink and orange neon was spritzed into my hair. Stop two
was trendy Queen Street West, where I tried on baggy pants in funky
clothing stores before settling on a skirt purposely designed to drag
on the ground.

These same shops distribute dozens of postcard-sized glossy ads for
upcoming raves. Chief Fantino has complained such promotional material
incorporates drug imagery, thus sending young people the message that
drug use is "cool, safe and a must-do."

But that's not what I saw. Indeed, two of the 50 or so ads I examined
explicitly condemn drug use: "Zero tolerance. No drugs!" reads one.
"Strict Searches. NO drugs, markers, weapons" warns the other.

Among the remainder, I found drug imagery only once. Rather than being
integral to the ad itself, the small marijuana leaf is part of a logo
for one of four businesses where tickets to the event can be
purchased. In comparison to the much larger marijuana leaves the Body
Shop uses to promote its hemp-based skin-care products, this is a mild
example of pro-drug propaganda.

Since such promotional material is expensive to produce and is
distributed weeks in advance, it's unlikely the entire rave scene
managed to sanitize its advertising in the brief time since Chief
Fantino began declaring the sky is falling. While the material he
describes surely exists, it's far from rampant.

No large-scale raves took place in Toronto on the weekend, but on
Friday and Saturday night my friend and I visited a total of eight
venues: four small raves and four larger, all-night dance clubs that
play rave-type music.

Only once, at an establishment that charged $18 admission and served
strictly non-alcoholic beverages, did I see a child definitely too
young to be out partying at 2 a.m. The boy, well dressed and a
cigarette smoker, told us he was 14 but looked 12. He said he'd come
with friends, a 15- and 16-year-old, and that his parents thought he
was sleeping over at their house.

Is Chief Fantino right that the parents of such children need to be
more vigilant? Absolutely. Should the promoters themselves be turning
these kids away? Yes (many liquor-licensed events already do). But
it's quite an exaggeration to say that the majority of ravers are under 16.

Security guards frisked us at the door to most of these events:
running their fingers along ball cap headbands, shining flashlights
into knapsacks, and insisting people throw away bottled water (it
could contain illicit drugs). I saw large signs warning that those
using or selling drugs would be escorted from the premises, and
witnessed security guards hustling a young person into the men's room
for yet another search.

Drugs of the legal variety -- alcohol and tobacco -- were available in
abundance at most of these places, the music was deafening, and
first-aid personnel were often on hand. One event included an
information table distributing ear plugs, condoms and literature on
how to spot a drug overdose.

The only readily detectable illicit drugs were marijuana and hashish.
But one doesn't need to attend a rave to find these. Indeed, while
waiting for a taxi Friday night on College, one of Toronto's main
streets, two people taking shelter from the rain under the same
overhang asked if we minded if they lit up a joint.

It's not clear how Chief Fantino's claims that most people attending
raves are high on drugs can even begin to be substantiated. (How can
he tell they're not drunk?) But we do know that when two huge events
attracted 21,000 young people between them recently, police laid fewer
than 100 drug charges.

In my view, there's reason to be concerned about Ecstasy, a
hallucinogen popular with ravers that comes in pill form. Some people
have allergic reactions to it (as many do to other pharmaceuticals),
and some inadvertently overdose on it. While our youth don't risk
death from a few puffs of marijuana, and usually vomit before they can
die of alcohol poisoning, Ecstasy can kill. Consequently, like
mountain climbers and sky-divers, those engaging in this activity
should strive to minimize the risks. That being said, it's worth
noting that among the nine Ecstasy-related deaths in Ontario last
year, only three (all involving adults) were connected to raves.

At every Toronto rock concert I've attended in the past decade,
audience members have smoked pot while police officers turned a blind
eye. Had the cops bothered to frisk the middle-aged bikers attending
Bruce Springsteen's recent concerts, they would almost certainly have
found weapons.

In other words, when large groups of people of any age congregate, a
small percentage of them may well do illegal things. But despite Chief
Fantino's apocalyptic rhetoric, and despite the guns and knives spread
out for the TV cameras at his anti-rave press conference (which,
disturbingly, turned out not to have been seized from raves at all),
rave-related safety concerns appear to be eminently manageable.

Either Julian Fantino, the new police chief of Canada's largest city,
is badly misinformed or he's a hardline law-and-order crusader with
highly questionable judgment.