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| quote: | Originally posted by sylphin
from a post on Tribe.ca
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Property Rights and Right to Dance Under Attack.
The Senate is considering legislation that would give federal prosecutors
new powers to shut down raves or other musical events they don't like and
punish business owners for hosting or promoting them. The bill (S, 2633),
also known as the Reducing American's Vulnerability to Ecstasy Act (RAVE
Act), is moving very rapidly and could be considered by the full Senate as
early as this week. (A similar bill is also pending in the House.)
S. 2633, sponsored by Senators Durbin (D-IL), Hatch (R-UT), Grassley (R-IA)
and Leahy (D-VT), expands the so-called "crack house statute" to allow the
federal government to fine or imprison businessmen and women if customers
sell or use drugs on their premises or at their events. Property owners,
promoters, and event coordinators could be fined hundreds of thousands of
dollars or face up to twenty years in federal prison if they hold raves or
other events on their property. If the bill becomes law, property owners may
be too afraid to rent or lease their property to groups holding hemp
festivals or putting on all-night dance parties, effectively stifling
free-speech and banning raves and other musical events.
The new law would also make it a federal crime to temporarily use a place
for the purpose of using any illegal drug. Thus, anyone who used drugs in
their own home or threw an event (such as a party or barbecue) in which one
or more of their guests used drugs could potentially face a $250,000 fine
and years in federal prison. The bill also effectively makes it a federal
crime to rent property to medical marijuana patients and their caregivers,
giving the federal government a new weapon in its war on AIDS and cancer
patients that use marijuana to relieve their suffering.
Health advocates worry that the bill will endanger our nation's youth. If
enacted, licensed and law-abiding business owners may stop hosting raves or
other events that federal authorities don't like, out of fear of massive
fines and prison sentences. Thus, the law would drive raves and other
musical events further underground and away from public health and safety
regulations. It would also discourage business owners from enacting smart
harm-reduction measures to protect their customers. By insinuating that
selling bottled water and offering "cool off" rooms is proof that owners and
promoters know drug use is occurring at their events, this bill may make
business owners too afraid to implement such harm-reduction measures, and
the safety of our kids will suffer.
The RAVE Act punishes businessmen and women for the crimes of their
customers and is unprecedented in U.S. history. The federal government can't
even keep drugs out of prisons, yet it seeks to punish business owners for
failing to keep people from carrying drugs onto their premises. If this bill
passes, federal authorities will have the ability to scare business owners
away from using or renting their property for all-night dance events, as
well as any other "politically incorrect" event. |
This will never affect the scene itself. Maybe big promotion events such as 514 raves or afters will be reduced to nothing, and so on, but the underground nature of our scene will return to the actual meaning of the word "underground". What we have now is not underground, its up in the skies, everyone knows about this, they are very (very very) commercial. Think back to the way it was 6-7 years ago, how you only knew about a rave 24 hours in advance, and the there were meet up places where buses would pick up ravers and drive them to the event (there are still some of them now, but not as big). It will eventually lead back to that. But what I'm afraid of is that big names such as PVD, Tiesto and AVB and on and on will no longer play at these "illegal" events, so the value of the show will diminish, only locals will entertain us. We will have to suffer, but the scene will never go away, until a new "rave" (read as actual meaning of the word, not an event) sets itself in on a different style (e.g. hippies, discoes/70s, etc...). But hopefully that will not happen for a while, and we will not suffer the consequences.
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