not to be a communist about it but if you're finding hypodermic needles in your public trash cans, your gut reaction shouldn't be to get rid of the trash can, it should be "thank god this ended up in a place where , a DPS worker trained in hazardous waste management can handle it, instead of a kid on the street"
because if you remove the trash cans where the needles end up GUESS WHERE YOU'RE GONNA FIND THEM
@wgahnagl i fucking remember in the early 2000s there where multipurpose biohazard cans next to the trash. For anything that could easily spread desease, like diapers, wipes, needles, bloody anything. Condoms should have also gone in there but people didnt.
im glad your reaching out to your city, cause ofcourse the cops want to be able to fine people for littering and arrest people with larger drug charges and fuck the enviro and community safety.
@budsofstone it's literally that
I'm with a direct action org for homeless people and these trash cans were being safely used for years until they started sweeping them out of the downtown area. Now for Some Reason there are no trash cans in the place where we run our meetings and they hang out! And what's the reason? "human feces and needles", very hard things to publicly argue in favor of?? Could this be a step towards enforcing a no-loitering policy in the place where my organization and the homeless people we serve go?? I wonder! :D
it's not like they didn't literally stop and frisk someone at our meeting two weeks ago!
I'm sure there's nothing going on, and hey won't enforce laws for fake crimes that people have no choice but to commit :-)
@wgahnagl @budsofstone also make sure people can just walk into any pharmacy and get a free sharps container or hand in a full one, no questions asked, hell, make it so you can just grab an individual one or drop one off with the barest of nod from the staff to not like add more of a barrier
@helle @budsofstone like ,,,,,,,
literally
do we or do we not want people to get HIV
like, yes or no, are we trying to give people HIV
@wgahnagl @budsofstone not just that, just make it easy for people to deal with *stares at all the trans women she knows that are on non-prescribed injections, who will be safe about reuse, but may not have proper means of disposal*
@helle @budsofstone literally, I've been putting trans girls in my area in touch with harm reduction groups for this exact reason
it's really helpful for them to get more than they give out, because their funding is based on how many needles they pick up, instead of how many needles they distribute
so if you have a bunch of trans people who bought their needles from CVS giving their brand new shiny needles to harm reduction agencies, they'll be able to distribute more needles to people who can't afford them
Also if You, A Trans Person can't afford needles for whatever reason, you can go to that same group
Everyone wins
@helle @budsofstone but also like this should be way fucking easier to do, and not like, cult knowledge from people deep in direct action circles, and harm reduction groups should be accessible from your local pharmacy
@budsofstone @wgahnagl here you have to hand them in at the (out of town) rubbish station, or arrange for pickup, pharmacies in this town do not take them back, it is frustrating.....
@budsofstone @wgahnagl thankfully in my use case, doing blocker injections, they will probably never fill up, but still
@budsofstone @helle 👁️ 👁️ omfg
TBH do you want to DM me or something maybe I can help get you in touch with a harm reduction group nearby that you can use for the infinite needles for infinite solidarity hack
where you give your needles to harm reduction groups, which gives them access to more needles to distribute, which also could give you access to free needles
You don't have to be doing drugs
@budsofstone @helle do you also want to DM me, I wonder if there's a group in your area that is way cooler and less of a pain about this shit
@wgahnagl @helle i used to do that actually when i lived in portland, i would gather all the sharps from my polycule and friends and would take them to the needle exchange. I live in bum fuck no where now tho so i dont think there is one close by. The clostest "city" doesnt even have public trash cans
@budsofstone @helle you'd be surprised at how many cool people are doing cool shit in the middle of nowhere! But you might be right lol
@budsofstone literally that's what I'm emailing about like
The cops are like "uhm, there were needles in the trash so we needed to get rid of them :(" like THEN PUT A FUCKING SHARPS CONTAINER ON THE NEW TRASH CAN YOU FUCKING PIG, DO SOMETHING