Drug laws are the Trojan Horse of the police state
By The Blue Collar Bohemian
16 May 2005

The drug test strike by Sydney rail workers on May 11 was yet another example of the level of frustration and disgust with harassment by RailCrap management.

The strike was ''settled'' by the union bosses selling out the strikers by agreeing that testing should continue while they ''negotiated'' to preserve the ''dignity'' of the workers. In other words, a typical gutless sellout by ALP stooges to appease the government.

The urine testing of rail workers is not a safety issue – it is the controlling of people outside work hours with bogus tests that do not prove any impairment. This bullshit was introduced after two accidents in an attempt to show the government was ''doing something'', even if that something achieved nothing more than intimidation of non-conformists.

The fact it was introduced by Michael Costa in a staggering display of hypocrisy makes it doubly despicable, a double standard galling in its hubris and dishonesty. The amount of intrusion by bosses into the lives of employees is reaching outrageous heights. Micro-management of every aspect of workers' lives can only increase the levels of stress and lack of autonomy felt by those of us who are in no position to make decisions.

Every honest study of workplace health indicates the less control a worker has, the higher the incidence of stress related illness, the lower the morale and the greater the impact on families and personal relationships.

The rail industry has one of the highest incidences of family breakdown of any industry – something the bosses don't care about as these losers have already sacrificed their families and relationships on the altar of ''career'', and resent anyone who hasn't.

Of course there are all the wonderful ''caring'' services on offer – counselling, ''rehabilitation'', sympathetic ears etc, etc, but only the docile and trusting use them as few take seriously all their crap about confidentiality or other guarantees of protection from discrimination or persecution.

The ''self-identify and you'll be helped'' crap offered to drug users was a farce – everyone knew what was happening and if you did self-identify you lost overtime, allowances and everything you needed to make ends meet, and made yourself an easy target for the ''random'' piss-in-a-jar squads. This is the duty-of-care? What a joke.

So where are the unions in all this? Docilely up the arse of the ALP government that introduced this rubbish in the first place. As the paid officials line up for the safe seats and MLC places, they won't bite the hand they hope will feed them, and they certainly won't be piss tested themselves. Just as they piked over the workers' comp changes they pike over this. One of them told me, ''We can't strike over this – the Telegraph will attack us!''.

While the sniffer dogs sniff and the piss jars fill, the lesson of all this prohibition bullshit goes by all the people who are sure it won't worry them : the drug laws are the Trojan Horse of the police state, and it's inside the gates and shitting cops everywhere.

Prohibition is an abject failure whatever it seeks to ban: sex, drugs, gambling, you name it. Abraham Lincoln said when opposing alcohol prohibition, ''You can't ban an appetite''. But then Joseph Goebbels said, ''You don't tell a little lie, you tell a big one, and you tell it over and over again''. It's obvious which of those two has the running in 2005 in Bob the Gaoler's Punishment World theme park.

• The Blue Collar Bohemian