Christine the Lioness up'n wrote this

Most laws and rules come from the realization that there is a need for them, then people respond to the need by creating a law, which then affects everyone when the need arose from just one person. And yes, AJ… we have so many laws, I doubt there is a single American alive who knows them all. I don’t know how this drug testing thing came into play, but I can give you a scenario of what might have happened, which would explain the outcome. Let’s say you have 100 volunteers that help the library throughout the year and let’s say you have 10 employees. One employee uses drugs and gets fired for doing so because the library’s policy does not allow employees to use drugs (probably because of their association with children– because honestly, who cares if a library employee is coked out? I’d care if my cab driver was… but a library employee… what he screws up and hands you the wrong book? Anyway… that’s a tangent.) I am guessing it’s a rule because of contact with children… so no drugs. The guy gets fired. But he likes his job there– his friends are there, it’s a place to socialize, he’s built his life in some ways around this library in the community. He wants to come back as a volunteer. The management can’t really tell him that he can’t be a volunteer if he’s now clean, but how do they really know he is without testing him. They can’t test just him. So to deal with this one person, they create a rule that volunteers must also be drug tested. Everyone who isn’t doing drugs will pass, and it will allow them a legal platform to keep this guy away from the library if he is indeed still doing drugs. The 100 other employees get offended and stop volunteering. That could have happened. Something similar happened at a non-profit organization where I used to work.

My stance on this is that if I was a volunteer, I wouldn’t be offended. I would obviously realize that (1) it has no impact on me since I don’t do drugs anyway, and (2) there is probably a legitimiate reason that an organization that doesn’t typically have a lot of extra funds would appropriate some of those funds on drug testing volunteers which incurs a cost for them. They wouldn’t just do it to waste money and invade the privacy of their volunteers… at least I wouldn’t logically conclude that’s why they’re doing it. So I’d just give them the piss test and not think anything more of it if it were me. I think part of the problem with people in this country– like the ones who are offended by images of other peoples’ religious symbols– is that in their minds, it’s all about them personally and someone out to get them. It’s not all about you. There are probably things you aren’t aware of going on with that situation. And if you really think about it, your uproar about submitting to a drug test basically forces the library to either lose volunteers or allow drugged out people to be there– neither which is good for the library– and I would hope that if you’re spending your time volunteering there, you’d actually care about what was good for the library. Just my opinion.

March 4th, 2007

Christine the Lioness commented

But Corey’s second comment sort of proves my point. If you’ve been doing your job competently for ten years, how can you possibly take it personally if you’re asked to take a drug test? It’s obviously not anything against you or you would have been asked a long time ago to do it.

It’s certainly possible that if these old people were on medication, they might be afraid of getting a false positive. If that’s the case, I understand them quitting rather than go through the embarrassment of failing the drug test.

March 4th, 2007

Christine the Lioness thought this

Yes, just a very simple query… and lighting a Santeria candle and chanting a mantra that I am not able to repeat until the 13th night of the 3rd month on the second night of the half moon.

March 5th, 2007