WE ARE SOMEBODY
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is a project of the B.C. Coalition of Organizations By/For People Who Use Drugs which aims to develop movement level analysis & strategy for the drug user liberation movement, while supporting local organizing and organization building.
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In WAS Phase 1 (2020-2021) a group of activists from grassroots drug user organizing was convened by the B.C./Yukon Association of Drug War Survivors (a previous provincial group) to write a 'mini-manual' on drug user organizing. The resultant 40 page book outlines four workshops intended to guide drug user groups through developing analysis of the drug war, thinking about movement level strategy, and engaging in concrete local organization building.
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In WAS Phase 2 (2025) 15 drug user activists from across B.C. participated in a two day training to learn how to facilitate and lead the WAS workshops. Over the next six months 11 of these WAS facilitators had the opportunity to co-faciliate the workshop in their own regions/ communities. In total the workshops were given in seven communities (Victoria, Gibsons, Vancouver, Abbotsford, Prince George, Terrace and Trail), including one in each of B.C.'s health authority regions, and one Indigenous led and focused iteration in Northern B.C. (Terrace). Over 100 individual drug users participated including members of 15 different local drug user organizations.
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In WAS Phase 3 (2026-2027) we intend to convene 12 - 20 previous WAS workshop participants to assess, workshop, and re-write the manual based on the experience of having 'tested' the workshops close to a dozen times. In particular, we are looking to explore/ deepen the book's analysis of how the war on drugs targets Indigenous people, workers, and criminalized im/migrant communities, and the need to build resistance to the drug war with deep roots in these groups of the people.
