Harm Reduction Zine
Harm Reduction Zine
Harm Reduction Zine
REDUCTION
IS
NOT
A
METAPHOR
Living in the 21st Century with
Drugs, Intimacy, and Activism
08 Introduction
Abdul-Aliy A. Muhammad
32 Collectivities in Kensington
David Oscar Harvey
43 BOOF IT!
Sessi Kuwabara Blanchard
57 Sustainable Safety:
I Don’t Need You. I Want You. A Year of Feeling the Difference
Nick Melloan-Ruiz
90 Credits
Indigenous Harm Reduction
Canadian Aboriginal AIDS Network and the
CANADIAN ABORIGINAL AIDS NETWORK
Foreword:
Harm Reduction
04
@visual_aids
“The world has been experiencing a whole pattern of auto-destruction,
situation that’s sure to bring out the best and the worst in people.
Introduction:
Harm Reduction is
08
Not a Metaphor
Abdul-Aliy A. Muhammad
INTRODUCTION
@mxabdulaliy
I was born to two Black Muslim parents on October 26,
1983, in Philadelphia. This was at the beginning of the
crack epidemic in the US.
ABDUL-ALIY A. MUHAMMAD
Through out this zine, you will find essays, case studies,
images, and reprints about drugs, sex, and activism, with
many of the contributions containing resources for more
information. Please take your time, dive in, and share
with your community.
BOOKS
Drug Use for Grown-Ups: Chasing liberty in the land of fear,
Dr. Karl L. Hart, Penguin Books, 2021
ABDUL-ALIY A. MUHAMMAD
Sex Workers, Psychics, and Numbers Runners: Black Women in New York
City’s Underground Economy
LaShawn Harris, University of Illinois Press, 2016
ARTICLES
Coronavirus, like past pandemics, shows how black bodies are political,
by Abdul-Aliy Muhammad
ZINES
STRIDE ZINE from St. James Infirmary
Three Harm Reduction Zines from People Who Use Drugs in Denver
BIO
Abdul-Aliy is a poz troublemaker, writer and organizer who is rooted in
Philadelphia, the unceded land of the Lenni Lenape people, Lenape-
hoking. A cofounder of the Black and Brown Workers Co-op. In their
work, they often problematize medical surveillance, discuss the impor-
tance of bodily autonomy, and center Blackness. They identify as queer
↝
and nonbinary and grew up in a working class Black family. Find them
on Twitter at @mxabdulaliy.
Harm Reduction = Life
AIDS ACTION NOW!
aidsactionnow.org
AIDS ACTION NOW!
saving activism.
CASE STUDY
Needle Exchange +
Junkie Union +
16
Jon Stuen-Parker
Theodore (ted) Kerr
for What Would an HIV Doula Do?
CASE STUDY
In the late 1970s, the state and societal response to
people who injected drugs in the Netherlands was
confused, to say the least. “The notion that the addict
was a patient, not a criminal, had become the foundation
THEODORE (ted) KERR
Some fear that the wider availability of injection equipment will lead to
an increase in the number of illicit-drug injectors. Others regard these
programs as an endorsement of illicit drug use in general and therefore
not compatible with the policy of placing strict criminal penalties on the
possession and sale of illicit drugs. Opponents demand definite proof for
19
The politics of intoxication. Dutch junkie unions fight against the ideal
of a drug-free society, 1975-1990, Gemma Blok, 2011,
21
Below the Skin: AIDS Activism and the Art of Clean Needles Now,
Dont Rhine, X-TRA, 2013
Bold Fury: The overdose crisis and ACT UP’s needle exchange legacy,
Hannah Gold, N+1, 2021
CASE STUDY
HELPFUL TERMS
Safe Consumption Sites (often called Overdose Prevention Sites)
are spaces that allow for the consumption of preordained drugs under
the supervision of professions, volunteers and/or mutual aid workers,
who are often trained to link to relevant health and social services, and
intervene in case of an overdose. Safe Consumption Sites are currently
legal and open across Canada, Europe and Australia. At present, they
are illegal across the entirety of the United States.
Communities of
22
Drug Use
Tamara Oyola-Santiago
@bronxmovil
ESSAY
“Harm Reduction on the streets? Love is love.” In front of
a shelter in upper Manhattan as we distributed food and
harm reduction supplies, a participant welcomed and
thanked us with that sentiment one night in May 2020. It
TAMARA OYOLA-SANTIAGO
Dedicado a Cabe
4th quarter) were higher than all of 2019. Opioid overdose death is
a reflection and the result of oppression; communities with higher
rates of mortality are also where structural racism and socioeconomic
inequity reign. Click here to read more.
BIO
Tamara Oyola-Santiago is a public health educator and harm reduc-
tionist navigating the multiplicities of home, justice and healing. She is
co-founder of Bronx Móvil where radical love and hope humanize.
ESSAY
↝
Desenredando la Maraña
(Untangling the Weave)
#boricuassalvandovidas #narcanazo
GETTING
30
1. 3. NARCAN
In NYC a
pharmacist may
Medical
insurance will
FROM YOUR
LOCAL
dispense an opioid cover most or all
antagonist of the cost of
(Narcan) to an Narcan.
opioid antagonist
recipient through a
non patient
Without insurance,
nasal Narcan costs
$150, but with a
PHAR M ACY
IS EASY!
coupon from
specific (standing www.GoodRx.com
order) prescription. approximately $30
2. 4.
REPRINT
HELPFUL TERMS
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is about 50 times as potent as
heroin. People use fentanyl because it is cheap to manufacture and
a small amount goes a long way. Many individuals consume fentanyl
without knowledge while others use it intentionally because of its
JODI BOSIN
(source: Narcan.com)
Collectivities in
32
Kensington
@DavidOscarHarvy
ESSAY
“They are us; we are them.”
—Prevention Point
From my work and my life, I can tell you: Before the harm
nested in the behavior itself, the subjects of harm reduc-
tion contend with the injury of existing apart, bearing
stigma, being marginal; a social liability compounded for
ESSAY
Dr. Carl L. Hart, Drug Use for Grown-Ups: Chasing Liberty in a Land of Fear
(2021)
BIO
David Oscar Harvey is a harm reduction therapist in Philadelphia, PA.
ESSAY
↝
Opioid crisis is still
not just a ‘white’ problem
ABDUL-ALIY A. MUHAMMAD
Over the last few weeks, debate has raged over Safe-
house, the nonprofit trying to open a supervised injec-
tion site in Philadelphia to prevent overdose deaths from
opioids. In late February, the group announced it would
open a site in South Philly within a week, but canceled
plans when community members pushed back.
I remember growing up amid a very different conflict
around drugs in Philly. Long before opioids hit crisis
point, and before Safehouse entered our city’s social
ABDUL-ALIY A. MUHAMMAD
Our city should respond to all black death, not just wring
39
Visit The Philadelphia Inquirer for more writing from Abdul-Aliy A. Muhammad.
Decriminalization vs. Legalization:
What You Need to Know
Voices Of Community Activists & Leaders (VOCAL–NY)
vocal-ny.org
VOCAL-NY
@SessiBlanchard
Sessi Kuwabara Blanchard, BOOF IT! Getting High Down Under, 2021
↝
@theeblackteebrand
@TheBodyDotCom
CASE STUDY
Safer Sex +
Play Fair +
47
How To Have...
Don’t Yuck
51
My COVID Yum!
Molly M. Pearson
@mollympearson
ESSAY
I am lucky to be in community with all sorts of people
who genuinely want the world to be a better place.
Within these leftist, activist, and liberationist circles,
the phrase “harm reduction” has become ubiquitous,
MOLLY M. PEARSON
Marty Fink, Forget Burial: HIV Kinship, Disability, and Queer/Trans Narra-
tives of Care, 2020
56
Melissa Meinzer, “Saint of the Streets: Dr. Punch Saves St. Louis,” Out
in STL, September 18, 2020
BIO:
Molly M. Pearson loves to write, talk, share, and learn about sex,
identity, illness, and community. She can be found in St. Louis, proba-
bly listening to disco while doing the dishes.
ESSAY
↝
NICK MELLOAN-RUIZ
Sustainable Safety:
I Don’t Need You.
I Want You.
57
A Year of Feeling
the Difference
Nick Melloan-Ruiz
@25centstoplay
ESSAY
I got a dog because I did not want to lay in bed looking at
the wall alone.
numbers you had deleted would text you just to check in,
even if the last time they saw you your face was smashed
against a pillow at dusk and you never knew their name
to begin with.
BIO
↝
CASE STUDY
Housing
and Support +
65
STAR House
Rivera and Johnson saw the need to organize homeless trans street youth.
Both Rivera and Johnson were themselves homeless and had to hustle on
the streets for sustenance and shelter. “Marsha and I just decided it was
time to help each other and help our other kids,” Rivera stated.
“We fed people and clothed people. We kept the building going.
We went out and hustled the streets. We paid the rent. We didn’t want
the kids out in the streets hustling. They would go out and rip off food.
There was always food in the house and everyone had fun. Later we had a
chapter in New York, one in Chicago, one in California and England.
It lasted for two or three years.”
Black Food Matters: Racial Justice in the Wake of Food Justice, edited by
Hanna Garth and Ashanté M. Reese, 2020
long into the Covid-19 crisis”, by Sophie Pinkhan, for The Nation.
↝
Harm Reduction Stickers
Jade Forrest Marks and ripley soprano
@69herbs @suck_dick_carry_narcan
JADE FORREST MARKS
Be in 10 years?
Alexander McClelland
@alexmcclelland
ESSAY
I was asked to share my utopian vision for 2031 at
a recent HIV research conference in Canada. What I
describe is an imaginary vision for 10 years from now.
I’m tired of being in a reactive position – reacting to bad
ALEXANDER McCLELLAND
The inner dialogue you have telling you that what I’m
saying is unrealistic, not possible, far-fetched, that inno-
vation won’t happen this way, that communities can’t
85
and to resources.
BIO
Alexander McClelland has been living with HIV for over 20 years. He is
an Assistant Professor at Carleton University’s Institute of Criminology
↝
We make histories.
89
Editors
Theodore (ted) Kerr for WWHIVDD; Kyle Croft and Blake Paskal
for Visual AIDS, and the Harm Reduction Zine working committee
for WWHIVDD (Abdul-Aliy A Muhammad, Molly Pearson,
David Oscar Harvey, Tamara Oyola Santigo, and Jennifer Brier)
Copy Editors
Alexandra Juhasz, Molly Pearson, John Freeman, Kyle Croft,
Blake Paskal, Cea (Constantine Jones)
Zine Design
Aaron Fowler
Poster Design
Jade Forrest Marks