CITY'S DRUG PROBLEM IS NO JOKE

The Editor,

Re: "Drug user takes hit for movie," the Now, Aug. 14.

The documentary film Crackass: The Surrey Movie portrays victims of drug
abuse and homelessness and should not be dismissed -though it is being
dismissed, indeed outlawed by the Surrey school board. The board's manager
of Safe Schools, Theresa Campbell, has declared: "We will be taking every
measure possible to stop anyone from distributing any copies of Crackass in
our schools."

Since the school board spent close to $2 million defending its ban on
three children's stories depicting same-sex parenting couples, its
resolve is unquestioned. Yet why is the school board so determined to
censor an amateur film that has not even been released? The furor
prior to the release of Mel Gibson's film The Passion of the Christ
only served to increase its audience.

Marko, the director of Crackass, hopes his film will bring attention
to social problems, such as the drug addiction which afflicts him.
Opponents of his film appear to be placing their own moral anxieties
above this quest, and the school board is denying students their
educational right to know.

To draw from the Canadian Association of University Teachers'
constitution, "The common good of society depends on the search for
knowledge and its free exposition."

I hear so often that kids are growing up faster these days, but
whether that's true or not, it is evident that they have still a lot
to learn in order to protect themselves from dangers of sexual
diseases, drug addiction and the like.

This July I taught high school students at Queen Elizabeth secondary,
and at the end of each day I rode past young prostitutes and other
broken and degraded people on my bicycle ride home down the King
George Highway. Many were openly drug users, like Marko, but seemingly
without the blend of qualities that has moved him to reach out to
others through his camera.

The kids I teach would benefit from seeing his film, for it is very
likely to deepen their understanding of life. At age 14 or 16 they
already know that if there are man-eating tigers in the street, much
better than locking the door, pulling the blinds and plastering
bedroom walls with reassuring pictures of gentle animals, is to learn
about the habits of tigers.

Jim McMurtry

Cloverdale