PARENTS AND PROHIBITION WON'T FIX DRUG CALAMITY

Your correspondent Athol Moffitt (Herald, March 27), shows a poor grasp of
the realities of drug use. He calls for dissuasion of the young by parents.

But parents are unlikely to be able to persuade their charges that while
the unhealthy habits of many citizens are quite legal, any experimentation
with certain substances should never be undertaken.

When the time comes, the children will take in information from many other
sources. Under prohibition, these other "sources" are highly distorted, a
cause of great evil.

It is a much better long-term strategy to teach responsibility by
completely open information, advice and example. You do not teach
responsibility by prohibiting something. Prohibition teaches that some
people, perhaps the majority, are against the use of certain drugs and that
you have to be very careful to avoid penalties. The focus is on the
calculus of whether the pleasure is worth the possible penalty at law, not
on whether it is worth the health dangers.

Prohibition ensures that many people die unnecessarily. It stunts the
development of a robust sense of responsibility. It is the wrong framework
for attacking the evils of drug addiction.

Ted Kroiter, Newtown, March 28.