DRUG EDUCATION 'HAS FAILED'

Re: "Drug Aware to host third-annual forum," Friday, Nov. 20.

Cops teaching kids about drugs is like a priest teaching them about
sex: "Just don't ever do it or you will be in trouble!"

This approach has failed.

My only consolation is that with the use of Google, more and more kids
are realizing that police-driven drug "educators" are actually
exaggerators or bald-faced liars.

Also, the fact that taxpayers' dollars are used for this fear and
fealty campaign is sick and reprehensible in the extreme. It should be
illegal to go into schools and deliberately frighten and mislead kids,
but no, we use taxpayers' dollars and send cops in to do it. It isn't
just irresponsible, it is obscene.

We live in a culture that glamourizes sex, fun, danger, thrills,
law-scoffing, risk-taking, rule-breaking, power, wealth-acquisition
and authority-resisting. We advertise booze, fast cars, fast food,
violent movies and video games, and drugs of all kinds, right on TV.
Then we tell kids that "drugs are bad." Does anyone still believe that
kids don't notice this wild hypocrisy? A ruse by any other name ...

There is also a misconception in our society that suggests that only
drug-abstinence is to be encouraged and admired. Telling kids to
"never" use certain drugs is like telling them to never see a certain
genre of movie, never go to an amusement park or exotic country or
never do anything at all that may be both risky and fun. It teaches
them to be afraid of new things, instead of curious, and, as history
has shown, fortune favours the adventurous. Sensible, moderate,
well-informed drug use is no more harmful, dangerous or immoral than
any one of dozens of other activities humans participate in every day.

And if you think "drugs" have nothing good to offer society, then
throw away every CD you own. For those keen on teaching kids about
drugs without all the hyperbole, spin, sloganeering and bald-faced
lies of the standard "education" programs, I recommend the Canadian
Students For Sensible Drug Policy website at www.cssdp.org, the
Educators For Sensible Drug Policy website at www.efsdp.org or the Law
Enforcement Against Prohibition website at www.leap.cc .

Russell Barth

Federally Licensed Medical Marijuana User

Patients Against Ignorance and Discrimination on Cannabis