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by carbide 3917 days ago
I remember DARE. A message delivered to us by people we didn't respect. A police officer that no one trusted and videos of teens we perceived to be losers telling us that drugs were bad. The program seemed to focus on social pressure not to do drugs, but social pressure is meaningless and ineffective when it's coming from somewhere beneath you. It had the effect of making my peers want to get high to distinguish themselves from the lower social class who were shown to us coming out against drugs.

From personal experience, I feel that they would have been better off focusing on the consequences to your health rather than a fumbling attempt at peer pressure. The one class when they showed pictures of a smoker's lungs was the only one that had any lasting positive impact on me.
2 comments
guard-of-terra 3917 days ago
It is very stupid to scare youth with health consequences. For young people, the world "health" means nothing. It's very blank.

It means a lot for senior demographics, and so they happily push measures involving scaring young people with health problems. Which then won't work.

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djhn 3917 days ago
That's a very good point. You can also substitute various other demographics for young people, like lower socioeconomic classes, people heavily discounting their future, impulsive people, etc.

Health disguised as vanity works quite well though. Case in point, current fitness boom.

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njbooher 3916 days ago
The video of the kid who had been drinking and driving, got in a wreck, and had to have a hole drilled in his skull to relieve the buildup of blood was pretty effective for me.
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Cthulhu_ 3917 days ago
From your description, it does sound similar to abstinence-only sex ed. The only thing schools should do with regards to drugs, sex, alcohol, and all those vices that can be enjoyed responsibly, is to educate - this is what these drugs will do, positive and negative effects, it's illegal to possess it in most cases, etc.

We didn't have much or any of that, but we did have a police officer in class once showing us a block of hash. IDK what all that was about though, we just thought it was cool to have a guy with a gun in class, :p. (note that this is in a country famous for its tolerance towards weed)

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