SUBTLE AS A FRYING PAN

Today's hit-you-over-the-head anti-drug propaganda can't help but
become tomorrow's camp.

The other day, I passed a car with a bumper sticker that read ``DARE
to Think for Yourself.'' At first, I thought it was a satirical jab at
Drug Abuse Resistance Education, the mindlessly puritanical program
that is omnipresent in American schools despite a lack of evidence
that it does any good.

On reflection, though, I wasn't sure how to interpret the exhortation
on the sticker. DARE purports to teach kids how to resist ``peer
pressure,'' so its promoters probably do see themselves as encouraging
independent thinking.

According to this view, only a true iconoclast accepts the
government's claims about drugs at face value. That conviction, of
course, makes the bumper sticker even funnier; the only question is
whether the humor was intended. I'm inclined to think it wasn't, since
public discussion of the drug issue is rife with messages that subvert
themselves.

Look down in the men's room of certain restaurants, and you will see
``Just Say No to Drugs'' imprinted on the perforated plastic liner at
the bottom of the urinal. Leaf through a catalog of school supplies,
and you will come across various items bearing similar slogans,
including the doormats kids trample as they enter and exit the building.

In a similar vein, the Associated Press recently reported an
embarrassing incident involving a Plainview, N.Y., business called the
Bureau for At-Risk Youth. Last fall, the company marked Drug
Prevention Week by distributing special pencils to hundreds of schools
around the country.

``Too Cool to Do Drugs,'' the pencils proclaimed. But after repeated
sharpening, the message became ``Cool to Do Drugs'' and then simply
``Do Drugs.''

The problem -- discovered, aptly enough, by a fourth-grader in
Ticonderoga, N.Y. -- led to a recall of the defective product. The AP
story said, ``a new batch of pencils will have the message written in
the opposite direction, so when they are sharpened, they (will) read
`Too Cool to Do' and finally `Too Cool.'''

Too Cool to Do? Apparently, the new pencils will encourage kids to be
teachers instead of drug addicts.

Sometimes anti-drug messages subvert themselves less directly. A
memorable scene in the 1989 film ``Drugstore Cowboy'' shows
protagonist Matt Dillon laughing as he watches an anti-drug commercial
on TV. This sort of reaction is not limited to junkies who knock over
pharmacies.

When the Partnership for a Drug-Free America started airing its ``This
is your brain on drugs'' ad in the 1980s, the eye-catching image of a
frying egg must have seemed awfully clever. But the spot quickly
generated a rash of lampoons -- including a T-shirt announcing ``This
is your brain on drugs with a side of bacon'' -- that neutralized any
power the message may have had to scare people.

The Partnership clearly did not learn anything from that experience,
because its latest batch of ads -- co-sponsored by the federal
government and financed with your tax dollars -- includes a spot that
plays off the fried-egg theme: A sexy young woman who exemplifies the
skinny ``heroin chic'' look smashes an egg and wrecks a kitchen with a

frying pan while screaming about the damage done by drug use.

The Partnership has thus taken a concept that was not exactly subtle
to begin with and transformed it into a very loud, over-the-top bit of
hectoring. If the spot has not already been mocked on a sketch comedy
show, it's only because broadcasters have promised to reinforce the
government's ad campaign, which is bringing them a lot of money.

The combination of titillation and moralism in the frying-pan ad is
reminiscent of the old paperbacks that warned people away from drugs
even while treating them to a salacious peek at the demimonde. ``A
cheap and evil girl sets a hopped-up killer against a city,'' says the
cover of William Irish's ``Marihuana,'' which shows a menacing man
smoking a joint over the prone body of a woman in a low-cut red dress.

Books with titles like ``Reefer Girl,'' ``Dream Club'' and ``The
Pusher'' featured similar themes and illustrations. A sample of the
covers is available as a set of magnets at a gift shop near my apartment.

So if the folks at DARE, the Bureau for At-Risk Youth and the
Partnership for a Drug-Free America ever wonder whether their work
will amount to anything, they should take heart: Today's anti-drug
propaganda is tomorrow's camp.

Checked-by: Rich O'Grady