Not long ago, I was driving in a neighborhood that shall not be named, and I stopped in front of a hospital that shall not be named. A young woman wearing a nurse uniform had flagged me down, and of course, I picked her up.
As soon as she closed her door and I began moving, the woman began sobbing uncontrollably.
I wasn’t exactly sure what I should do, so I reached into my center console, pulled out a small packet of tissues, and handed it to her.
“I’m sorry … I’m so sorry”, she said, “I don’t mean to freak you out, but I don’t know what to do … I just don’t know what to do … I need someone to talk to!”
“It’s okay”, I assured her, ”what’s going on?”
“I just got blood in my eye”, she continued, “ I was drawing blood, I made a mistake, blood spurted into my eye and …………. my patient had HIV!”
Silence filled the car as I tried to think of something appropriate to say. I mean, what do you say? What is the Emily Post correct thing to say when someone gets HIV in their eye?
I thought for awhile, and finally said, “That’s frightening. You just came from a hospital, though, I’m sure they did something to help minimize your risks, right?”
“I didn’t tell anyone I work with”, she stated flatly.
“Well … why not?”, I asked, truly confused.
“Because … ”, she replied, “……………. I SMOKE WEED!!!”
At this point, she once again busted out into uncontrollable tears.
When she recollected herself somewhat, she explained to me that the first thing Nurse Resources (or whatever it’s called) does when an employee goes to them for a health concern is to drug test them. If they test positive for anything, they are immediately fired or sent to some kind of rehab purgatory until they repent for their evil ways.
Unfortunately, I knew the woman’s explanation to be true.
Well, the reason I was having lunch with him was to celebrate the fact that he had just been re-hired at a new metal shop after 18 months of unemployment.
Why had he been unemployed for eighteen months?
After working for the same metal shop for 14 years … in 2010, David got a tiny piece of metal in his eye while grinding off some edges. He went home for the day, tried in vain to wash it out, and … fearing being laid off of the corporate plantation, went to work the next day.
At some point during the next day, the pain became unbearable and his vision began getting blurry, so he finally summoned his overseer to explain what had happened. The overseer took him to the company-approved doctor, and what is the very first thing the doctor did?
That’s right, urine tested him.
Now, David smokes pot, but not that much. “I’m not a fan of booze, and I find that one bong hit after work helps me unwind and helps me sleep without having any kind of hangover. I’ve had this exact same routine for 20 years.”, he tells me, and I believe him. I’ve seen him perform this ritual with my own two eyes.
Anyway, after getting metal in his eye, David’s urine test came back positive, at which point he was summarily fired. Oh, and forget any kind of workman’s comp or medical reimbursements, he was told. Since David smoked pot after work and on weekends, every bad thing that had ever happened to him for any reason, was his fault. At least this was the company’s (apparently perfectly legal) position.
Now, to be fair, the company did offer him an alternative which had been negotiated by his union. If David wanted to keep his job, he could pay $7,000 for “drug treatment”, which more or less entailed daily screenings of Reefer Madness and constant admissions that he was a powerless, pathetic human being.
David declined that seven thousand dollar invitation, and spent the better part of the next two years looking for another job.
God Bless America.
Now, don’t shoot the messenger, boys and girls, for this is the steaming pile of shit that you have made. You, you, and only you. You elected this nonsense, you re-elected it, and you re-elected it again. If you are outraged by anything you’ve read so far, walk over to the nearest mirror, point your finger at it, and blame that. Blame that person when he/she strides up to the ballet box this year and pulls the lever for a Democrat or a Republican. Blame that when we get four more years of the same, and after that, another four. You’ll ask for it, you’ll get it, we’ll all wallow in it.
It is my firm belief that, one hundred years from now, we are going to look back on this period of drug hysteria in the same manner that we currently look back on witch hunts and slavery. We are going to hang our heads in shame, and wonder what our grandparents could have been thinking.
For the past thirty years, our country has been seized by a completely insane and irrational fit of anti-intellectualism. Anti-intellectualism that will embarrass our decendents to no end when they are forced to confront the atrocities of their forefathers. This assumes, of course, that Idiocracy is not proven to be a documentary.
Oh, but I can hear it now. The keyboard clicks of a thousand Eastside mothers and beer-swilling boys from the south:
“Rex, I don’t have any sympathy for those people. They used drugs. Drugs are illegal. Drugs are bad and people who use drugs are bad. I don’t use drugs, and look how well I turned out! Drugs are for losers, and losers shouldn’t be able to work in the good old USA!”
Well, folks, I hear you, but I don’t for a second believe you. The fact is that you worship drug users every, single, solitary day of your life.
When people start talking to me about the evils of drug use, I always challenge them to go through their record collection and throw out everything that’s ever been made by a drug user. I challenge them to throw out every book that was written by a drug user. I challenge them to discard any artwork made by someone that used drugs. I challenge them to rebuke every article ever written by a drug user, and wait patiently for them to reject the Constitution of the United States of America.
But, you know what?
They never do.
They never discard anything.
You see, despite what people say, and despite their moral grandstanding, everyone on this planet knows that drugs and their users define Western Culture. Everyone knows that, without drugs, this world would be an awful, awful place, almost completely devoid of the arts.
We all know this. Rich, poor, corporate, indie … we know it.
Which exhibit did they sponsor?
Why, the Kurt Cobain exhibit, of course. That’s right, a bunch of companies that obsessively test each and every employee for drugs … companies who by their own admission would never hire Kurt Cobain … openly sponsored an exhibit glamorizing him.
Why?
Because they, like the rest of us, love drugs, love people who use drugs, and love the things that drug users make. They know, like the rest of us, that drugs are responsible for Purple Haze, Leaving Las Vegas, and the Apple Computer.
Everyone I wanted to emulate as a kid used drugs, and everyone you wanted to emulate as a kid used drugs. You can admit it or not, but deep down, you know it’s true.
As such, it’s time to put an end to this faux moral-outrage, complete and utter bullshit, hypocritical and nonsensical war on drugs and everything that goes along with it. We need to drop the phony baloney pretentious feigned outrage when an employee (or anyone else) is caught with “marijuana in their system”, and we need to cast off the corporate collar and government ass probe that has become the drug war.
It’s turned free people into slaves, good people into monsters, and society into an orgy of sadomasochistic barbarism.
As for the nurse, I tried my best to reassure her. I told her that even though she got blood in her eye, chances were very, very slim that she would contract HIV herself. I gave her my card and I asked her to let me know how things work out.
I hope that one day she calls, and I hope that it’s good news.
“You know, this war on drugs is funded by tobacco and alcohol commissions.
It’s not what drugs you’re strung out on they care about so much as who’s.”
Lyrics from Tension, by Todd Snider
And, from the same song:
“Republicans… That’s what scares people these days.
That, and uh, Democrats.”
Welcome to 21st Century Prohibition. Not all that different from the Prohibition Era of the early 20th Century.
If people want to end this nonsense, they would do well to support libertarian-leaning politicians, like Jim Webb, Russ Feingold, Ron Paul, Gary Johnson, Jeff Flake, Rand Paul.
I will support Ron Paul (in spite of his anti-choice position) during this campaign season. Since Paul is unlikely to win the nomination, I will likely vote for Gary Johnson in November. Obama has unfortunately turned out to be notoriously bad on almost all issues of individual liberty.
work at Wells Fargo. was tested on my first day and haven’t been tested since. writing that the bank test “obsessively” is inaccurate.
I disagree with your rebuttal in the strongest terms.
Wells Fargo tests new employees for drugs, regardless of the employees job description. If the employee is to work in a cubicle by themselves filing receipts, they will be drug tested. In addition, in their employment contracts, many of these companies reserve the right to access the employee’s urine at any time in the future, and failure to supply said bodily fluid on demand can result in immediate dismissal. My guess is that, should you be injured at work, Wells Fargo will drug test you in an attempt to avoid any kind of financial responsibility for you injury, regardless of its nature.
To what kind of blind indoctrination have we acquiesced to no longer consider this obsessive?
I believe you’re using the word “obsessive” out of context in this instance.
When I think of the word “obessive” I am reminded of a story I once heard about a man and his blog. This particular man decided to chronicle his life in the form of a blog. He thinly vailed his narcissism by suggesting the true subject of his blog wasn’t himself, but a city. Over time, the cities changed but one thing remained the same. Without his blog, the man wasn’t alive inside. He needed it. It was his drug. He needed attention, validation, and a sense that what he was doing wasn’t superfluous, but indispensible. He would ride down city streets taking video so his readers could see the world through his eyes. In his opinion…this was the only way to see it. He awoke every morning thinking about his blog, his readers, his pageviews, his comments, his high. He realized that the more he disagreed with everything, the more people would visit him…if not for no other reason than to read what he could possibly find objectionable now. Unfortunately the man became someone he truly wasn’t. His blog had changed him. Instead of being the lens through which he viewed the world, the blog was the lens through which the world viewed he. He was under the microscope, sliding around on a glass trey just hoping that he wouldn’t be judged as useless, and therefore tossed away. The tables had turned and the man was trapped. His obession had become his burden. It had halted him from truly experencing life. He’d never admit it though.
Anyways, Wells Fargo does drug test EVERY employee upon hire because that is fair, not to mention legal. Everyone from the clerk in the mail room, to the guys on the trading floor…we are all treated the same. With 250k employees globally, I’m willing to bet many of them are drug users. The bank isn’t obsessed, it is diligent. Would you want your pilot to be high? No, you’d want them drug tested. Do you want your bankers high? No, you want them drug tested. Every job I’ve ever had, I have been tested. I once mowed greens at a golf club by the way. I don’t see how you can sit there and write that Wells Fargo, along with others, is “obsessed” with drug testing. It’s irresponsible.
When I think of the word “obessive” I am reminded of a story I once heard about a man and his blog. This particular man decided to chronicle his life in the form of a blog. He thinly vailed his narcissism by suggesting the true subject of his blog wasn’t himself, but a city …
Why, that guy sounds like an asshole. A real asshole, he is. I wonder why I’ve never heard of him, though. I mean, I’m a blogger and I talk about my city and …. HEY WAIT A MINUTE!!!
You were talking about me, weren’t you??!!
You … you ….
Boy is my face red!
The only critique I would have of your critique is that the narcissism has never been thinly-veiled. It’s pure, unfettered narcism. The stats thing is also an overreach since I may be the first person in history to kill a blog because it got too big. Otherwise, spot on.
While you’re riled up, though, do social media. I mean, if you think this stuff is bad, what must you think of things like Facebook and Twitter?
The bank isn’t obsessed, it is diligent.
What is it diligent about?
Would you want your pilot to be high?
Oh golly geepers no! That would be awful, just awful!
I wouldn’t want them to be tired, either. Or upset. Or underpaid. Or in pain.
And, really, what does “high” mean?
Do you even know?
Did you know that military pilots are routinely given dextroamphetamine for night flights. A drug which is actually more adrenergenic and peripherally stimulating than its close cousin, methamphetamine?
But those pilots are high, right?
No, you’d want them drug tested.
No, I wouldn’t.
Do you want your bankers high?
High on what? When? On what dose of what?
If they test positive for drugs, does that mean they were high at the time the test was taken, or does that mean that they took it some time last weekend?
If it’s the latter, I could not possibly care less. I’m not sure I would really even care if it were the former.
No, you want them drug tested.
No, I wouldn’t.
Every job I’ve ever had, I have been tested.
And look how great you’ve turned out, right? Having a conniption fit because your comment on a blog wasn’t approved within 30 minutes. Yeah, I’m going to go ahead and stick with my own position if you don’t mind. I just don’t think you’ve made a persuasive case to the contrary.
In my opinion, you’ve approached the subject matter in a hysterical and anti-intellectual manner. The notion that drug tests ensure quality candidates who have a higher IQ and are intoxicated less often is not something that I think has been proven.
To the contrary, if history has shown us anything, it is that a large number of the most truly gifted people whom we hold in the highest of esteem have one thing in common. Many, if not most of them used drugs to one extent or another.
As such, the drug test may be little more than a barometer of mediocrity. A tool by which to weed out those who aren’t satisfied watching TV and guzzling beer on the weekends.
At best, it’s only a tool of oppression.
Oh, and thank your employer for the Cobain exhibit. A man who could not have even gotten a position at Wells Fargo mopping floors.
This site is political propaganda. Greenlight comments that fit in with your socialist agenda. A real “blogger” wouldn’t moderate comments. Much like the major corporations you rail against, you must control everything.
Oh, I don’t know about that statement. I’ve had Rex approve comments of mine that were pretty contradictory of what he was posting about. Also, once a blog pisses off a weather-lady on Twitter, it starts to get a lot of spam, hence, moderating comments.
Things seem much more relaxed in Canada. Except for those who work with heavy machinery etc. Actually, weed for personal use has been decriminalized in Canada. In the city where I live, people smoke it freely out in the open.
On a positive note, I am close to someone who is an emergency room nurse and she says that the threat of contracting HIV in the manner described is quite small. The biggest threat is being stuck with a needle – blood to blood contact.
This is not true.
First, things aren’t remotely more relaxed in Canada than in the U.S…
Many companies (esp. the bigger corporations) do test potential employees.
Second: It’s utterly false weed has been decriminalized for personal use. I don’t think a single town in Canada has done it. Unless if for medical purposes (but even in such case it’s severely monitored)
I recently applied for life insurance with a major corporation and I was denied because I smoke tobacco. The application was littered with questions about drug consumption, which I don’t use.
The risk of contracting HIV via a blood splash in the eye is very small. But “very small” can feel huge for the person who is splashed, and has to wait a few months to be tested and know for certain they are HIV negative.
At my workplace, like pretty much every where else, they urine test for any injury requiring medical attention. Thankfully they are not requiring me to pee in a cup every time I visit the first aid cabinet for a band aid for a nasty paper cut. I’d like to think that would never happen, but back in the 1970s, I sure didn’t see the “Just Say No” anti-drug hysteria coming. Figured pot would be legal sometime in the early eighties. I’m a lousy prognosticator.
From Rex’s reply to Segal,
“If they test positive for drugs, does that mean they were high at the time the test was taken, or does that mean that they took it some time last weekend?
If it’s the latter, I could not possibly care less. I’m not sure I would really even care if it were the former.”
This is the main problem in my opinion. The body metabolizes different drugs in different time frames. Could you imagine what would happen to our culture if alcohol stayed in our system as long as marijuana? Most of our population would be unemployable. The hospital and the machine shop (and their insurers) have no viable way of knowing if the positive UA came from a bong hit last week or from breakfast that morning so they have to take the safe road and treat it as worst case scenario. They are just covering their asses. Until the man can better test for and differentiate between being under the influence and just having it in their system, pot smokers know the risk they are taking when it comes to their employment.
Those drug using people you (and I) admire weren’t/aren’t slaves to the corporations. They are free thinkers who do shit their way. They tap into life much deeper than non users and express themselves in ways 99% of the population can’t or won’t. They are ‘artists’. In a way they are not much different from other recognizable groups in a society. In this world we also have ‘healers’ ‘protectors’ ‘servants’ etc… Does that mean they would do better work if they were allowed to work high? Some, maybe. But do you want your fearless SPD to be allowed to slam an eight ball before every shift? Should the school bus drivers be allowed to take a hit of acid before their shift? Precautions must remain in place to ensure the safety of others. I don’t want some nurse tripping out trying to draw my blood and I don’t think the machine shop owner wants an employee cutting off a finger because he smoked some weed on break.
I think every drug should be legal. I am not even opposed to the FDA regulating the hard shit for safety reasons. It is not much different than the regulations imposed on distilleries, breweries, and wineries. It’s going to be taxed, but it is worth it.
But, in many places in our society there is a time for use, and on the job isn’t usually one of them.
But do you want your fearless SPD to be allowed to slam an eight ball before every shift?
How would we know?
The SPD does not test for drugs after an officer has been hired. The union won’t allow it.
Ironic, eh?
Drug testing is so important for public safety, that the police themselves want nothing to do with it.
Should the school bus drivers be allowed to take a hit of acid before their shift?
How would we know?
LSD cannot be tested for with conventional drug screenings.
And how many school bus drivers are running off the road in an LSD-fueled haze because of this?
Precautions must remain in place to ensure the safety of others. I don’t want some nurse tripping out trying to draw my blood and I don’t think the machine shop owner wants an employee cutting off a finger because he smoked some weed on break.
Would you want her to do it because she was tired? Overworked? Preoccupied over debt?
The number of workplace accidents due to the worker being high on goofballs is undoubtedly pretty damn low. And again, what is “high”? Some drugs don’t effect performance negatively at all. Some improve it. Some drugs just keep people out of pain. Is this “high”? Do we know what high is, exactly?
Also, keep in mind that 90% (or greater) of people who are drug tested do not work in a position that effects public safety.
Drug testing as a means for ensuring public safety is specious, and is typically nothing more than cover for an employer’s desire to control their serfs behavior when they are off the clock as well as on. Drug testing is also about profits.
When you can deny employee benefits on the basis of a positive drug screen, you can save a great deal of money. This is done each and every day, and every city across America. Drug testing is about control and greed.
Don’t buy the notion that drug testing is for the general public’s benefit.
Few things truly are.
How would we know? The SPD does not test for drugs after an officer has been hired. The union won’t allow it. Ironic, eh? Drug testing is so important for public safety, that the police themselves want nothing to do with it.
It doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be. Why they are not tested immediately after an officer involved shooting is ridiculous.
Should the school bus drivers be allowed to take a hit of acid before their shift?
How would we know? LSD cannot be tested for with conventional drug screenings. And how many school bus drivers are running off the road in an LSD-fueled haze because of this?
Semantics. Replace LSD with another drug which is detectable. It is the fact that they know they will be tested following any slightest accident.
Would you want her to do it because she was tired? Overworked? Preoccupied over debt?
So, being overworked and in debt is the same as the effects of drugs? Where can I get half an ounce of credit card debt and a double shift?
The number of workplace accidents due to the worker being high on goofballs is undoubtedly pretty damn low. And again, what is “high”? Some drugs don’t effect performance negatively at all. Some improve it. Some drugs just keep people out of pain. Is this “high”? Do we know what high is, exactly?
Yes, people abusing prescription pain meds are often times greatly affected by their high or low. Again, semantics. High or low or stoned or tripping or whatever you want to call it, in the workplace, is at the point where performance and actions are compromised. How are the suits going to regulate that level? They can’t, so everyone is tested. How as a business owner, wouldn’t you want your minions operating efficiently and safely? If you assumed the risk and had a fleet of cabs and hired a bunch of drivers, wouldn’t you 1) want them to operate efficiently enough to turn a profit, and 2) not be so blitzed out of their minds that they cause accidents in the vehicles you own?
I am not in favor of being over regulated but common sense has to come into play at some point. Should we not have DUI laws? They are in place to protect the general public. I don’t see why corporations can’t protect themselves with similar policy.
And to me,what it all comes down to… If these people want to do drugs, then don’t work somewhere they will get tested. I guess they can all become cops!
It doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be. Why they are not tested immediately after an officer involved shooting is ridiculous.
Because they don’t think it’s relevant. And they’re LAW ENFORCEMENT.
They’re judged by their actions on-the-job, not what they do on their own time.
The public has accepted this, while screaming for the Walmart janitor to be pissed tested.
Dumb animals, eh?
So, being overworked and in debt is the same as the effects of drugs?
Well, sure.
Which drug? At what dose? Taken when?
Again, you’re channeling the dogma of a suburban soccermom here.
Being tired or in pain can be far, far more impairing than being on “drugs”. Depending on the drug and the dose. Such a question is patently unanswerable.
Yes, people abusing prescription pain meds are often times greatly affected by their high or low. Again, semantics.
Often positively effected.
I don’t believe these things are semantics.
Your LSD example was actually quite useful. You brought up LSD testing as a way to keep bus drivers from using LSD, and I noted that bus drivers rarely use LSD … even though there is no test for it.
This is telling, no?
Obviously, we don’t need to collect their urine to keep them from using it while driving, they just typically … don’t.
Actually, the vast majority of people don’t consume their drugs of choice at work. Most do it afterward.
Your claim that commercial drivers would drive around “blitzed out of their mind” is a page out of the reefer madness hysteria.
Few drugs have the effect of “blitzing the user out of his mind”. To be honest, the only one I can really think of that has such an affect is alcohol.
In a previous comment, I gave you a dextroamphetamine example. Military pilots are given this drug quite frequently This drug is functionally the same as methamphetamine, and it’s more potent and longer-lasting than cocaine.
Are the pilots who take this drug “blitzed out of their minds”?
If they fly ten ton aircraft, are they unable to drive a bus? A cab?
I mean, can you not see the obvious in this debate?
Look, let me spell it out for you …
If an employee is, as you put it, “blitzed out of his mind”, then this fact will be evident to everyone around that person.
If they come in, stumble around, fall down, and slur their speech … then they are not able to perform their job and can be fired on the spot, absence a good explanation for their behavior. You do not need a drug test to tell you that the person can’t perform their job.
If someone is “blitzed out of his mind”, however, then a drug test is completely superfluous, no? I mean, how can such a thing be subtle?
If you cannot tell that an employee is using drugs without a drug test, however, then clearly the employee’s drug use does not interfere with their work.
If the only way you can tell that a person uses drugs, is via a urinalysis, then that person’s drug use shouldn’t be an issue.
The only thing you’re going to do is send people who use drugs on their own time to the unemployment line, and that, has nothing to do with safety.
It’s 100% about profits, control, and political horseshit.
Check this out:
http://seattle.craigslist.org/see/csr/2793978772.html
“We require a criminal history background check as well as a drug test which will include nicotine testing.”
Slippery slope, my friend.
Slippery slope.
Tobacco smokers are blitzed out of their minds, right?
Next up, HIV test, pregnancy test, cholesterol test, DNA test …
Once they get you all accustomed to marijuana tests (for your own good, of course), what makes you think they’re going to stop there?
A company has got to be diligent. Right?
Scotts already refuses to hire people who smoke tobacco even in their own free time. It’s shameful but we the sheeple have allowed for this to happen. And yes, HIV and DNA tests are next in line.
Just as a wonderful aside to all this, I think the worst part about the “war on drugs” is the LACK of actual knowledge it provides on drug use. The ignorance the D.A.R.E program left me to deal with on my own was astounding.
I also have to second Rex’s opinion on drugs in the workplace. I used to work in a kitchen, where, my supervisor informed me, “The hard drugs can only come out after 9pm.” I thought he was joking. He wasn’t. You know when people are donked out of their gourd. It’s especially visible the more sober you are.
I LOVED this article and I couldn’t agree more!! I posted this anywhere I could!!!