Where Do We Go From Here?

After Bill C-216 & The BC Exemption

Written by and for people with Lived Experience - Port Alberni Community Action Team - Families Helping Families

Today's Learning Moment – 06 06 22 Issue: Where Do We Go From Here?
Note: This is an opinion/commentary article reflecting the author's views.

Advocating is hard! Especially anything to do with substance use disorders or mental health.

This week has been a roller coaster of a ride. (May 29 – June 4, 2022) It started with the joint statement by the Federal and British Columbia governments. They announced that an exemption from federal laws governing possession of drugs for personal use would be granted to BC. This request took years to achieve. I'm not going to go into the details here. There are many news sources everyone can access to find out when, how, and all the details in the exemption.

However, it's not enough! Not by a long shot.

The very next day, a vote on a private member's bill, C-216, in the Federal House of Parliament was shot down in flames by the same party (Liberals) who granted the exemption to BC. The legislation proposed Canada-wide decriminalization and a national strategy to reduce harm from the poisoned drug supply in our country. Again, many of us had pegged our hopes that common sense would prevail. But, sadly, politics once again dictated the outcome.

These two events set the stage for what I'm about to discuss in this article.

I watched with fascination and then horror as the ramifications of the exemption announcement rolled throughout the general public. At first, I felt almost euphoric. Finally, all the work by our movement was driving a more enlightened substance policy in our country. We are a movement, aren't we? I'm not sure we even have an official name. Are we the movement for Enlightened, People-centered Drug Policies in Canada? Anyway, the thousands of hours by so many people seemed to be finally paying off.

Then I watched a local TV station in Victoria run a poll on who supports the exemption and who is against it. I know, it's not an official poll. However, it does reflect public opinion. The result of more than two thousand votes was that sixty percent were against the exemption.

To add insult to injury, I checked out the BC government's Facebook page, where they posted their official announcement. Unfortunately, some of the comments were, at best, uninformed. Some were horrid, cruel, and disgusting. I'm not one to give a lot of authority to social media comments. We all know by now that, for some reason, social media can bring out the worst in some people. Yet, there is a theme throughout that we, in the movement, need to consider seriously.

First of all, we all deserve a pat on the back. It's been an arduous and painful journey to get to this point. So, no matter how you contributed - even if it was only one person you talked to or just a simple share of a post on social media, you need to be proud of what we collectively have achieved and your personal role in those accomplishments.

Then we need to refocus and get back down to work. After some reflections on everything to date, I realized what I believe are some vital takeaways for us to consider.

The entire subject of moving to an enlightened substance policy in our society is completely polarizing. The silence from the people sitting on the fence is deafening. Those against decriminalization and more holistic substance health policies scream with a fevered passion seldom seen on other social issues.

Even within our own ranks, we have trouble supporting divergent views. That tears us apart. If we can't be tolerant and respectful amongst ourselves, we're certainly not going to show a united front to others.

In continuing our advocacy, we don't have to get everyone on our side. That TV poll I mentioned early clearly says we only have to sway another twenty percent of society to our views. Remember, forty percent were in favour of the exemption. If we tip the numbers over and our views represent sixty percent of people, we will be the majority voice on substance policies in Canada.

We've gained a lot of traction over the last decade. However, what is important now is to ask ourselves what we have to do to get that additional twenty percent?

Therein is the rub. I'm not sure that our existing methods will deliver, or at least in a timeframe that will be acceptable. However, I do believe our success is inevitable. The question is will that success take years or multiply decades? My fear is that future generations will look back at our efforts and ask why it took so long? Until then, the deaths from overdose pile up across our country every day because of our inability to have a collective will to do things differently. So what do we have to do to gain that last twenty percent of support?

Here are some questions we must ask ourselves,

·         Is our overall message clear enough?

·         Do we have evidence-based science on our side, and can we point to that science consistently?

·         Do we speak in understandable, plain language?

·         Does education need to be a greater focus? How do we get folks educated?

·         How do we shift the public's perception away from the old and horrendous (War On Drugs) model?

·     How do we encourage courageous advocacy by every one of the people who now make up the forty percent supporting enlightened drug policies?

·         Are we leveraging communications channels, especially social media, effectively?

·         Do we create our message content for ourselves or the audience we need to persuade?

As we start to reflect on these questions I have posed above, a ton of other questions should begin to form in your minds. I want to encourage each and every one of you to create your own list. Maybe even share it as a comment from where ever you sourced this article. In the meantime, let's move on to some ideas and possible solutions.

My background (primary career) screams that all of us advocating need to be on top of understanding change. How we go from one paradigm to another is one of the most challenging journeys humans make. Unfortunately, almost all of us don't do change easily. The good news is that when we must, humans adapt. The bad news is that it's almost always universally painful.

We have tools – a great resource comes from The Commons Social Change Library. If you're serious about upping your advocacy game, you need to check out their resources. A good starting point is their information on Change Theory. After that, head over to their Main Page and check out all the rest of their material.

I'm going to say right up front that many of the concepts of advocacy can be mind-boggling and complex. However, three critical areas define successful advocating organizations and movements. These encourage and foster success in meaningful and measurable ways. They are,

1.   Flexible: people in the movement who can easily change direction when the societal and political barometer changes on a dime. (It can and most assuredly will)

2.      Committed: dedicated supporters of the movement and each other. This includes respect for each other's diversity and personal stories and acknowledging that each member is at their unique place in their own journey.

3.      Independent: not reliant on significant donors or outside influences.

The most potent and essential resource we have are the people who move our advocacy efforts forward. We need to be devoted to three fundamental principles that need to govern all our interactions. They are,

·         Stay Curious

·         Keep People First

·         Find Joy in our Advocacy Work

All our past articles are here: https://ptalbcat.blogspot.com/ 
The link to this specific article is https://ptalbcat.blogspot.com/2022/06/where-do-we-go-from-here.html. You can SHARE by copying and pasting this link everywhere you want:

Author: Ron Merk  – Ron is an advocate for families with loved ones who suffer from concurrent disorders. He also writes on various topics driving understanding to a more enlightened substance use policy in British Columbia and Canada.

Families Helping Families is an initiative of the Port Alberni Community Action Team. We regularly send out "Learning Moment" articles to help folks understand substance illness. Knowledge is vital in understanding the disorder of our family members. You may copy, distribute or share our articles as long as you retain the attribution. Add yourself to our distribution list by dropping us a note at - albernihelp@gmail.com