Do you think more needs to be done regarding teens and drugs?

[Kalis]

Here inn Denmark atleast taxes on cigaretess does not make up for the healthcare cost that smokers get at all.

That's a surprise; in the UK smokers pay far more than they cost. I assumed it would be similar in other countries with a high taxation rate.

[runedhill]

I'm a senior in highschool at the moment, over the past four years I can count 5 people that have dropped out. One 4 in 11th and 1 in 10th. All of them were model students. One of them lives with her boyfriend and are heroine Addicts. The other 4 have dropped out due to a drug called Molly. Do you think that there needs to be something done about the drug craze amount minors?

The "drug craze" has been going on for decades. You might think everyone is on some kind of drug, but in reality most of them aren't. Most of them don't do anything.

[Deleted]

Nah, if anything there needs to be done less to prevent it and more to arrest the fuckers. I have no respect for people taking drugs, for wathever reason it may be.

Look at the US and learn how stupid that is.

[Deleted]

I see no issue with soft drugs, legalize and tax the living shit out of them.

Starves the cartels of there #1 money maker, and reduces the inmate population in the U.S quite a bit.

Hard drugs however... those are extremely damaging, both to body and mind - They're often highly addictive and destroy you; so i'd want those to stay illegal, but it would be a double standard to this issue - So i'm flummoxed for a fix to it.

Never really understood the whole bait-fest over drugs though, seems like a prude approach from religious conservatives who deem it immoral.

[Deleted]

I can happily say that I have never known or even heard about anyone doing drugs on any of the schools that I attended over the years.

Seeing as how you're from the Netherlands, I have to say you're either lying or you're simply not paying attention.
The vast majority of teenagers at least experiment with drugs and only a few actually get hooked. As long as it's not heroin or anything equally bad, you can quit relatively easy. That's why you don't see people dropping out of school because they used ecstacy, weed or cocaine. Heck, I did all of that stuff while I was still in school. The thing with heroin though, is that it's very addictive. Eventually you'll be so addicted to it that you can only think of the next high, your future carreer is probably the last thing on your mind. But with most other drugs you can still function normally and realize what's important, so you don't have to drop out of school.

[Purlina]

Why should more be done. They know the risks, let them determine their own fate.

[v2prwsmb45yhuq3wj23vpjk]

Yeah, we can educate people on the consequences of the drugs and not lie to them about it. We can also not make it seem like something forbidden and your life is going to end immediately from it. When a kid eventually ends up trying something forbidden (even if it's not drugs) and they find out that the world didn't end, they're not going to trust people who tell them that something is bad.

[Deleted]

I see no issue with soft drugs, legalize and tax the living shit out of them.

Starves the cartels of there #1 money maker, and reduces the inmate population in the U.S quite a bit.

Hard drugs however... those are extremely damaging, both to body and mind - They're often highly addictive and destroy you; so i'd want those to stay illegal, but it would be a double standard to this issue - So i'm flummoxed for a fix to it.

Never really understood the whole bait-fest over drugs though, seems like a prude approach from religious conservatives who deem it immoral.

Keeping hard drugs illegal does nothing but create violent crime. Illegality of the thing won't stop user using drug, it will only kick them even further down.

[Knight Gil]

What can you do except blame their parents for fucking up so badly?

"Blaming" is not a solution to anything

Create rehab centers. Decriminalize drugs so that people can be helped instead of arrested. Educate people on drugs instead of making propaganda around it, that doesn't really inform people of their effects and consequences (both pro and anti drug people are guilty of this).

This is not much, but it's a start, and it has some practical use, unlike "blaming"

[artemishunter1]

Kids will experiment.
Be it Drugs, Sex, or Alcohol and there is nothing that can be done that can prevent it, unless you go round with your teenage child and inspect every little thing they do.
Only thing you can provide is a good up bringing and let them know that they can talk to you about anything that they may be concerned about. simply denying the fact that they will try stuff out only makes things worse when and if they deiced to come to you for advice.

It's a sad fact of life that drugs are in all walks of life, from the poor, to the rich it is not hard for someone to get hold of them, be they a school student looking to buy a bit of pot at the weekend, to a $1000 a week cocaine addicted millionaire. It is no use trying to shield children from them, instead they should be given ALL the information and not just the "Drugs are Bad mmmkay"

what do you mean by ALL the information. That phase gets overused. We have health class in school now, yet for whatever reason teenage sex, and drug use keeps going up. There is another factor that I do not understand, drug use is highly low among conservative cultures, especially immigrant cultures even after 2 or 3 generation, while Native culture's drug use keeps going up and up. Maybe something else is the problem than teenager being teenager. I think single parent household may have something to do with it.

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"Blaming" is not a solution to anything

Create rehab centers. Decriminalize drugs so that people can be helped instead of arrested. Educate people on drugs instead of making propaganda around it, that doesn't really inform people of their effects and consequences (both pro and anti drug people are guilty of this).

This is not much, but it's a start, and it has some practical use, unlike "blaming"

Rehab is expansive. Preventing people from using is much more cheaper than fixing it after getting addicted (not to mention, Rights are respected, even if someone is hurting themselves). And we have health class, that goes quite in depth on various drugs, including Maruwana.

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Keeping hard drugs illegal does nothing but create violent crime. Illegality of the thing won't stop user using drug, it will only kick them even further down.

It restricts general use. Believe it or not, majority of the population of the U.S. are not addicted to Heroine.

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Yeah, we can educate people on the consequences of the drugs and not lie to them about it. We can also not make it seem like something forbidden and your life is going to end immediately from it. When a kid eventually ends up trying something forbidden (even if it's not drugs) and they find out that the world didn't end, they're not going to trust people who tell them that something is bad.

What Lie? I mean I know pro drug users always use that line, but we do have madnatory health classes that talks about the mainstream drugs and their history. None of the facts about them were lie. Even Maruwana got the benefits listed, so was its consequences on the developing brain of teenagers. But then people said the consequences are propaganda, and some how they know more about it than scientists that actually research the stuff.

[Asics]

Better parenting would certainly help. Also better guidance in schools would help as well especially for the kids whos parents are no longer in the picture for them.

15-18 year olds are in no condition to make decisions for themselves that will make or break their lives, but in school that is exactly what the situation is. Without proper guidance from parents or guardians most kids are going to make wrong decisions and many take the easy way out (dropping out, drugs, spawning more failure kids).

[artemishunter1]

Look at the US and learn how stupid that is.

How so? We are not going after consumers unless they are really really really stupid like carrying bag in the park. We are going after growers. But as long as we turn blind eye to consumers, there is not going to be any solution to this problem. This is the only stupidity. By the way, if you try to bring prohibition, know this Alcohol use dropped decades low during the prohibition. It was a success, but as democracy is driven by public opinion it was forced to taken down.

[Knight Gil]

Rehab is expansive. Preventing people from using is much more cheaper than fixing it after getting addicted (not to mention, Rights are respected, even if someone is hurting themselves). And we have health class, that goes quite in depth on various drugs, including Maruwana.

I agree that prevention is the best option. Does not mean that rehab shouldn't be a choice when prevention fails to do its thing, though.

[Drekker17]

No I don't, I used to hate it in High School...a lot of people did Marijuana, Alcohol, Tobacco or Adderall, I never understood how people fell into these pressures. I wanted all of it banned and was very pro-drug war. Nowadays though, I don't care...I see them falling behind me and making an easier path for me with less competition.

[Realsykes]

Nah, if anything there needs to be done less to prevent it and more to arrest the fuckers. I have no respect for people taking drugs, for wathever reason it may be.

Oh, look at the model citizen everyone, stare up in awe.

I have no respect for anyone who can't walk in anothers shoes and understand their situation.

It's not an epidemic or anything OP, it's been happening for decades, actually, centuries with opiates and other things.

You're not even in the real world yet, just you wait until you're out and everyone goes off on their own. Just had a kid I went to elementary with rob 8 banks and was found to be a hardcore heroine addict. A picture perfect poster boy kid, whom everyone liked.

Things happen in life, and you'd do well not to sit there and judge others for their actions, but rather understand them, and help them if they need it.

[Deleted]

what do you mean by ALL the information. That phase gets overused. We have health class in school now, yet for whatever reason teenage sex, and drug use keeps going up.

As far as I know, teen pregnancy is down (at least in the places where proper sex ed is taught (not just by the schools, by the parents too), not that abstinence nonsense) so the sex argument is a fail.

It restricts general use. Believe it or not, majority of the population of the U.S. are not addicted to Heroine.

As if it would change if heroin was legal.

How so? We are not going after consumers unless they are really really really stupid like carrying bag in the park. We are going after growers. But as long as we turn blind eye to consumers, there is not going to be any solution to this problem. This is the only stupidity. By the way, if you try to bring prohibition, know this Alcohol use dropped decades low during the prohibition. It was a success, but as democracy is driven by public opinion it was forced to taken down.

Have you looked at the prison population in the US and why they are there ?
As for the prohibition thing, what's worse: Joe getting drunk or the violent crimes brought by the black market ? You could only consider the prohibition a success if you tunnel vision the whole thing and only look at alcohol usage (and you'd have to consider alcohol usage a bad thing in the first place on top of that). Basically, you'd have to be stupid to consider it a success.

[Prokne]

I believe that after the War on Drugs ends and most drugs become legal that the issues caused by some drugs with kids will also go away. One of the worst things that has happened as a result of natural drugs being illegal is that people are always trying to make new, synthetic drugs which are often worse. Hopefully when people regain access to natural drugs, drugs like meth, oxycontin(when not used as prescribed), bath salts, rave drugs, ect will go away. I know they wont completely disappear but why would you use an extremely dangerous and equally priced drug when you can use one that has the same effect with less side effects?

There will always be people who abuse drugs(like alcohol) but it is not the governments job to protect those people from themselves.

[THE Bigzoman]

Teen drug use was a problem in previous generations as well as this one.

I see it as a consistency that isn't really problematic as a whole.

[Deleted]

Nah, if anything there needs to be done less to prevent it and more to arrest the fuckers. I have no respect for people taking drugs, for wathever reason it may be.

Uh, not even if they do so to manage a problem?

[Rucati]

Don't have any problem with it to be honest. People do drugs, nothing new. Drugs aren't innately bad, and there's not really anything you can do to make people stop using them.

Besides, the average school has like 800 kids or so right? 5 dropped out, out of 800. That's .6% of the school. Not even a full 1% dropped out due to drugs. I really don't think that's any type of massive problem that needs to quickly be resolved. If it was like 10% or 20% then yeah, that's probably an issue, but a couple of kids dropping out is really not that big of a deal.