DRUGS EASIER TO BUY, CONSUME AND CONCEAL THAN ALCOHOL

There is great irony in the permissiveness our society grants toward drinking.

Alcohol is the drug of choice for the generation running things. It is
established, it has a history, and it is accepted, embraced and celebrated.
It is the one great vice that cannot be condemned. It is bulletproof.

That said, we still frown upon anyone under 19 years of age who drinks.
They're not allowed to drink, so they go hunting for alternatives.

Like drugs.

Here's the irony. It's difficult and expensive for kids to get booze. It's
cheap and easy for them to score drugs.

If they want a drink, they're going to have to raid dad's liquor cabinet,
falsify their ID and creep into a club, or stand outside the liquor store
hitting up strangers to go in and buy them some beer.

It isn't easy and chances are they'll be out of pocket at least $20.

For that same $20, they can buy a few joints or some chemicals from one of
their classmates. They don't have to leave the relative safety of their
school hallways and they likely know the person who is their dealer -
making rip-offs, bad deals and poor drugs less likely.

Const. Ian Craib, Oak Bay's Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.)
police officer, knows all about it. He routinely confiscates pot from 13
and 14-year-olds.

"Kids are more likely to try marijuana now than alcohol," he says,
explaining that "it's easier to get, easier to conceal and easier to consume."

Try carrying a case of beer into the classroom.

Through the D.A.R.E. program - which reaches out to Grade 5 and 6 students
with a message to resist both drugs and violence - Craib is trying to turn
a new generation away from a pattern of substance abuse many will fall into
by their early teen years.

Craib says the students at Monterey elementary (the only Oak Bay school
where D.A.R.E. is offered) are willing participants in his weekly classroom
visits.

"The kids are starting to ask intelligent questions relating to drugs,
questions they may have been afraid to ask before," he says.

The questions (and the knowledge) are the first stage in getting our kids
to make informed choices. Maybe some other Oak Bay schools should look at
bringing D.A.R.E. into their classrooms, too.