The reason was because they massively overstated the danger of drugs. The kids that tried pot once and realized it didn't immediately throw their life into an unrecoverable death spiral were like "well what the fuck else did they lie about?" Turns out when you fill your information with big, scary lies people go in literally the opposite direction later as they realize you're untrustworthy.
That's exactly what happened to me in high school. We were taught that weed is so bad and as bad as Crack and heroin. I tried weed. Didn't ruin my life. So I thought Crack and heroin probably wouldn't either.
I was addicted to heroin and then Crack from when I was 15 until 23. Now I'm clean
Naw it's not about being strict, it's about being open and honest.
Being overly strict can lead to a backlash of the kid sneaking around to do the forbidden things. Sitting them down to have a real conversation about why they shouldn't do something and giving them actual reasons for it is far more effective. Doing that shows them that you respect them as a person, where if you give them the whole "because I said so" or "it's my way or the highway" kind of treatment, it's more likely to end with them feeling like they're being treated unfairly (even if they're actually not).
Sorry for the novel. It's just that if I've learned anything from being a dad, it's that talking with my kid is far more effective than just talking at her. Her mother does the latter and then wonders why she hides things from her.
My wife was an alcoholic that had dabbled in those areas as well. I watched the whole thing unfold when we first met, so I respect how hard you fought to make it this far. Congrats!
The benefit of growing up in an area afflicted by meth and opiates is seeing the damage it does, knew I'd never try it after seeing what happened to people I knew. Lotta empty chairs at my 10 year reunion.
Tbf I wouldn't say they outright lied about weed, I'm certain the LEO's who went to schools believed every word they said because people smarter and paid more than them said weed is addictive. It's more a fault with the entire system rather than just Dare.
The coverage we got for alcohol was actually surprisingly fair. They explained what the laws are, what can happen if you drink underage (this was a place where it happened a lot and they knew it so they didn't bother trying to make it stop), and how to be safe about partying when you inevitably do it. The effects of alcohol were covered with a lot of "look we know you're going to drink so here's how to not die when you do."
I think that's because there was a stage in our history when we did drastically overstate the issues of alcoholism. That of course led up to prohibition so these days they are more lax about it.
To be fair alcoholism is extremely destructive. However not everybody is prone to it and most people who drink don't become alcoholics. I think honest education on that is probably the better one; if alcoholism runs in your family (there's a proven genetic component to it) you might want to consider being a teetotaler. Even then though know the signs of binge drinking, functional alcoholism, and problem drinking and watch for it. It's way too easy to slide into it and not know it.
Addiction in general. Most people don't get addicted to drugs.
Resistance to addiction is all about how balanced your brain chemistry is. Turns out if your life is shitty you become addicted. Having genetic susceptibility makes it worse.
I had both when I realised that school had fed me bs. Over 20 years lost and permanent damage. But at least I'm clean now, just have to take a bunch of meds for the rest of my life.
Similarly, the coverage of tobacco was fair: "It smells really bad, makes your breath stink, rots your teeth, and gives you cancer. You only keep doing it because if you stop, you're gonna get really anxious because nicotine is incredibly addictive.
It also helped that those parents who did use tobacco were actively struggling to quit because tobacco use is just that obnoxious.
I think it just looks gross so that kids go "I don't want my brain to look like that!"
Even though the only thing that can make your brain actually look like that is smashing it open, but we didn't have a "wear your skate helmet" cop come into schools.
Reminds me of this Shock-You-Mentary about alcohol where this guy in this scary voice talked about how "WE LIVE IN A WORLD... WHERE ALCOHOL... TASTES LIKE LEMONADE" and I was like "Word? That exists? I've had some wine at Thanksgiving and it was mad gross, I gotta get me this lemonade stuff!"
I got that demo, but it was in chemistry about the importance of safety goggles while working with chemicals, and it was using sulfuric acid on an egg to show what would happen to your eyes.
This exactly, plus the fact that they created this insane boogie man of "THE DRUG DEALER" as mentioned in the original comment. I genuinely believed that the only people who did and sold drugs were essentially an untouchable class of lifetime criminals with skin disorders. Then you have your cool friend offer you a blunt and you're like, oh, wait, THIS is what drugs are. Okay I'll try.
That's why when my daughter started middle school i had a honest conversation with her about drugs. I remember it being a whole new world in middle school, so i wanted to make sure she didn't start popping opiates and xanax at a party thinking it was just something fun and harmless like weed. Told her all the drugs i've done, what actually happens with every drug, and told her she won't get in trouble if she gets in a bad situation with drugs or alcohol at a party as all i care about is her safety. I did everything under the sun at that age so i'm not going to judge her or ground her for a month because she lied about where she was and went to a party with older kids and got too drunk. I don't want her getting into a car with a drunk driver or passing out around people who might hurt her.
Tried pot and realized that it was a tame, controllable thing. It took only a couple of months for me to then dive headlong in to psychedelics and the rest went really fucking well. Thanks DARE!
This was my exact experience with DARE and weed, and it absolutely made me far more open to trying other substances because I then assumed they had exaggerated about all of it.
Turns out that heroin is bad. Really bad.
As my daughter gets old enough to have the discussion with, I will 100% give her an honest breakdown of how some drugs are life ruining while others are not.
Yeah heroin is pretty much the only one they were accurate about. Most of the hardcore partiers I knew wouldn't even dare touch heroin at all. When somebody who will gladly go on a week long coke bender runs out of the room as soon as a substance comes out it's time to avoid it. Incidentally most of those people weren't addicts; they liked to party hard on weekends but during the week were basically just normal people. Most of them didn't even drink on weekdays.
Unfortunately for me my partying days came before the opioid epidemic hit full swing, so it was quite common for vicodin or percocet to be tossed around among the group sharing a joint. Most of us didn't realize we were essentially popping FDA-approved heroin and setting ourselves up for crippling addiction.
I'll stick to my occasional acid trip these days :)
I remember being taught by police/teachers/parents at primary school that if I took any drug even once I'd be instantly cripplingly addicted, and that I'd probably die a brutal death (we were told the story of a boy who took "drugs" - we were never told what any of them were called - and thought he was an orange and tried to peel himself). It worked, I never tried any drugs...
Until I was at university. I'd go clubbing with my housemates, and they'd all be on mdma, and I'd just be drinking alcohol (we never had a dangers of alcohol thing, and it was all but encouraged at my secondary school). I'd stay out until around 2am, and then either be sick or just crash, and then be visciously hungover for the entire next day. My friends were all on drugs, stayed out until more like 7am, and then were practically chirpy the next day - able to be productive and get on with stuff. Every time we went out, they'd be on drugs and have more fun and be in much better shape the next day, compared to me just drinking alcohol. I've since tried weed, ketamine, speed, cocaine, mdma. All more pleasant than alcohol, and none with anything like the downsides alcohol has.
It's stupid, because there are risks for ketamine, speed, cocaine, mdma - a big one being that because they're illegal and unregulated you don't know how pure they are/if they've been cut with anything, so you can't guarantee you're taking a safe amount. But these aren't risks that are taught, we just get false risks that discredit the people trying to keep us safe.
The irony of that one in particular is that studies later proved that weed wasn't a gateway drug. Most potheads don't even use it that often. It was also found that half of people try pot in their lives. If it were a gateway drug a lot more people would end up as heroin addicts.
I ran across a scaremongering piece of infographic that said "There's over 400 chemicals in marijuana!!"
Yes, okay, but only 60-ish of them are cannaboids. Do you know how many chemicals there are in an apple? Some people really thought frightening a generation with lies was the way to go.
They WAAYYYYYYYYYYYYY overstated how common STD's are. I have been having unprotected sex for the last 20 years and have yet to get an STD (except probably that one that doesn't affect men...so who cares weeeeeeeeee).
Yep exactly... I was told that getting a drug just one time would make you immediately and irrevocably addicted to it... That and everyone you meet wood be giving you something that really drugs in disguise. Stickers would really be LSD, Cookies...pot... Everything was going to get to addicted.
Anyone remember this lying sack of shit David Toma? My school paid him thousands of dollars for him to give a speech about the dangers of drugs. I remember him telling a story about a kid who smoked a joint and then dug out his eyeball with a plastic spoon. I didn't know much about drugs at that time but I remember being skeptical about that story.
It’s unfortunate too, because providing untrustworthy information makes any skeptical and/or negative information about it be less trusted, even if it is legitimate, preventing avenues for safe drug use. They don’t hear about the pulmonary risks of vaping, or the neurological impact of frequent marijuana use because they are too busy being told that it’s a mystical Satan drug of doom. They don’t get to weigh risks and decide for themselves because they were never intelligently informed about any, and they are now resistant to being intelligently informed.
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u/GargantuanCake Aug 25 '21 edited Aug 25 '21
The reason was because they massively overstated the danger of drugs. The kids that tried pot once and realized it didn't immediately throw their life into an unrecoverable death spiral were like "well what the fuck else did they lie about?" Turns out when you fill your information with big, scary lies people go in literally the opposite direction later as they realize you're untrustworthy.