Producing Pleasure, Minimizing Harm

Abstract

This paper addresses the lacuna in research on chemical use by nightlife workers by exploring harm reduction strategies among queer nightlife workers in Brooklyn, NY. Based on interviews and ethnographic research, my findings suggest that harm reduction can be effectively imagined and implemented by individuals and social groups themselves. Chemical use enables queer nightlife workers in Brooklyn to perform and produce pleasure for others, challenging the notion that functional chemical use is opposed to or separate from pleasurable chemical use. Just as nightlife workers see chemical use as made meaningful through how it enables or inhibits productivity and pleasure in specific circumstances, they often view risk and harm as conditional and emergent. Night workers already practice their own, tacitly informed harm reduction strategies, such as being self-reflective about their use, moderation and dosing, scheduling use around other responsibilities, only using chemicals at work that aid productivity, getting enough sleep, avoiding chemicals they don’t enjoy, and taking breaks from use when they feel it is necessary. Future harm reduction research and policy should begin by examining what practices of harm reduction from below already exist and attempt to strengthen them.