Pubdate: Thu, 15 Mar 2001
Source: Nelson Daily News (CN BC)
Copyright: 2001 Nelson Daily News
Contact:  266 Baker Street, Nelson, British Columbia V1L 4H3
Fax: (250) 352-2418
Website: http://www.nelsondailynews.com/
Author: Dan Loehndorf (aka Reverend Damuzi)

DARE-ING TO BASH DARE

To the Editor:

I am writing with regard to the article "City police DARE-ing students," 
(NDN, Thur. Mar. 8).  My first criticism is that the article reads almost 
like an advertisement for the highly costly, ineffective and dangerous DARE 
program.

In the article, Nelson city police officer Bill Andreaschuk is quoted as 
saying that "the program has had an impact since its inception in 1983," 
implying that the impact has been positive, when in reality the DARE 
program has been shown to be a colossal failure - even from the perspective 
of anti-drug warmongers - in more than 16 highly-respected, independent 
studies.  Included in these studies is a 1999 West Vancouver Police report 
which concluded that "in the majority of studies where drug use was 
examined, reseasrchers concluded that the DARE program either had little or 
no effect on drug use..."  Among the researchers, many of whom studied only 
the best operating DARE programs around, there was unanimous consent.  The 
Rand Corporation, the US General Accounting Office, the North Carolina 
Justice Department - organization after organization - have found DARE has 
either insignificant or no effect whatsoever on drug use among teens. Under 
questioning from the press, even the ashamed leaders of the DARE program 
have acknowledged their program's ineffectiveness.

Some studies even found an increase in drug use among those students taking 
the program.  In fact, DARE was based upon an untested model developed by 
researcher Ruth Rich, who later found that the model actually encouraged 
children to "fiddle with drugs."  Regardless of concerns, the project was 
pushed through by DARE founder and California Police Chief Daryl Gates.

Because of DARE's ever more widely acknowledged uselessness and dangers 
there are reports of a large range of officials who have cancelled the 
program, including a US teacher, Rudi Krause, who has even started a 
campaign to rid the educational system of DARE. Principals in some school 
districts have refused to have the program in their schools, facing down 
opposition from anti-drug zealots who stand to make loads of cash by the 
programs continuation.

The BC Provincial Government currently spends hundreds of thousands of 
taxpayers' dollars on this ineffective American-based program that 
essentially encourages children to do drugs while miseducating them about 
the dangers.  DARE founder Gates saw no difference between marijuana and 
crack cocaine.  It is exactly this misinformed reefer-madness hysteria that 
has students laughing behind the backs of officers who do little more than 
receive government funding to make themselves look like classroom clowns 
while earning the disrespect of yet another generation of children. Whether 
you are for the drug war or against it, the DARE program is a futile waste 
and should be discontinued.

Dan Loehndorf (aka Reverend Damuzi), Nelson Creston candidate for the BC 
Marijuana Party
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