Pubdate: Thu, 05 Apr 2001
Source: Salt Lake City Weekly (UT)
Copyright: 2001 Copperfield Publishing
Contact:  http://www.slweekly.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/382
Author: Ben Fulton

RAVING AGAINST THE RHETORIC

News flash: Youth who attend raves aren't necessarily drug-crazed, 
sexual deviant insomniacs. Honest, they're not.

That was the predominant tune at a recent panel discussion inside 
Salt Lake City Council chambers attended by parents, rave promoters, 
disc jockeys and young ravers themselves. Call it an organized 
attempt to dispel the ongoing bad rash of media hype and 
law-enforcement sensationalism that's quickly branded late-night rave 
dance parties as bacchanalian drug havens, followed by 
massage-induced orgies.

Eight rave enthusiasts shot that image down. Each had a separate 
rhythm and volume level. Some spoke with so much earnest emotion, in 
fact, that the discussion almost evolved into feel-good rally of 
raving proportions.

"The message we've all heard lately is that if your kids go to raves 
they must be bad people. We all know that's not true," said a 
barefoot Amanda Bushnell, a coordinator with the Intermountain Harm 
Reduction Project. "Raves are about people more than drugs. I 
remember that at the first one I went to someone bumped into me, 
stopped to apologize, and then we had a five-minute conversation. 
It's a social atmosphere you don't get anywhere else."

Kade "Troah" Gibb, an 18-year-old restaurant worker, painted a 
picture of the rave scene with almost Utopian strokes. "For me, a 
rave is one of the few places I feel openly accepted, loved and 
appreciated," he said. "I've finally found the place I wanted."

Other panelists remarked that a place as conservative as the Salt 
Lake Valley simply doesn't know what to make of all-night dance 
sessions hosted in warehouses with lights, booming sound systems and 
an open sense of camaraderie. So, naturally, it gets demonized. It's 
not that raves don't occasionally involve people on drugs. They do, 
panelists admitted. But, they pointed out, drugs are far too 
pervasive in society to be the sole domain of a rave. Like a rock 
concert of the '60s or the soda stand of the '50s, a rave is a 
cultural phenomenon centered around self-expression and social 
interaction.

That's a tough sale for many in law enforcement who patrol on weekend 
nights looking to shut down raves, which they see as traveling drug 
caravans of free-form massaging and open debauchery. As little as six 
months ago the city's daily newspapers focussed on methamphetamine as 
the latest drug plague. Now the enemies are rave and club drugs such 
as ecstasy and nitrous oxide "whippets."

The rhetoric has grown increasingly alarmist, with everyone from 
school administrators to LDS church President Gordon B. Hinckley 
weighing in on the subject. Skyline High School recently prohibited 
the wearing of rave bead necklaces and other paraphernalia. After a 
Salt Lake County sheriff's undercover detective made the incredible 
claim to Skyline students that one in three high school students take 
ecstasy, the school's student council went into panic mode, 
establishing a new anti-drug campaign to fetter out so-called 
"drug-using" students. Presumably, that means anyone wearing rave 
beads. Long before that, at the LDS church general conference last 
fall, Hinckley vilified raves as sinful drug dens that lead nowhere.

Enough already, said panelists. If the media and law enforcement 
insist on labeling raves as drug markets, it's little surprise that 
youth go to raves looking for drugs and sex. Even some parents in the 
audience felt that raves are unfairly maligned. "I think the Salt 
Lake City police are the chief disseminators of misinformation. To 
say that your kid's on drugs if you see him wearing rave beads is 
false," said Ilene Done, a mother of one of the panelists. "Drugs are 
out there whether they're inside or outside of raves. If we're 
diligent parents, our kids will take appropriate action when it comes 
to drugs."

And if they don't, law enforcement's ready to strike. At the federal 
level, there's talk of using the same anti-drug law aimed at crack 
houses to thwart the use of ecstasy. That means night club owners and 
rave promoters might be prosecuted even if, unbeknownst to them, 
ravers in attendance were selling or buying drugs. Locally, Salt Lake 
County Deputy District Attorney Sirena M. Wissler said her office has 
employed undercover officers at raves=F3even at the panel discussion, 
there were rumors of two vice officers sitting in the audience=F3and 
will vigorously prosecute ecstasy dealers. "We're not out to stop 
raves. We're out to stop drug use," Wissler said.

No wonder the valley's ravers and warehouse revelers feel urged to 
mount a public relations offensive. Show respect for security and 
police officers who might show up to raves uninvited, they told all 
in attendance. There were admonitions against drug use and for open 
communication between parents and children. The future might even 
hold an invitational rave for members of the media, concerned parents 
and anyone else who dares judge without prior experience. Gibb, for 
one, sounded ready to host.

"I'd love to see Hinckley at a rave," said Gibb.

Luciano Colonna Intermountain Harm Reduction Project
455 East 400 South Suite 208 Salt Lake City, UT 84111
tel: 801.355.0234 fax:  ---
MAP posted-by: Josh Sutcliffe