Pubdate: Sun, 15 Sep 2013
Source: Boston Globe (MA)
Copyright: 2013 Globe Newspaper Company
Contact: http://services.bostonglobe.com/news/opeds/letter.aspx?id=6340
Website: http://bostonglobe.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/52
Author: Sandra Sidney
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v13/n459/a04.html

WAR ON DRUGS HAS BEEN A FAILED CAMPAIGN OF MISINFORMATION

In his column "The drug divide" (Op-ed, Sept. 8), Tom Keane asks: If 
the first time people do something risky, such as taking the drug 
MDMA in a club, they die, what chance to learn do they have? It's a 
false premise. Education does not occur in the nightclubs; it has to 
occur before people go. Keane is describing trial-and-error learning. 
That dramatically increases risk.

When well-meaning people inflate the risks of drugs, or falsely 
conflate very different risks, kids know they are not getting the 
truth from their so-called caretakers. This leads to young people 
with NO good sources of real experience to draw on. The war on drugs 
has been a decades-long mistake, for all the reasons Keane stated and 
important ones he left out.

Since at least 1971, the story of pot in America has looked like the 
story of alcohol, but Prohibition only lasted 14 years. More than 20 
years ago, my mother, who never smoked pot or did drugs, surprised me 
by saying she was in favor of legalization.

Spinning, censoring, denying, and polarizing the information and 
experience we do have prevents real learning. That has an even worse 
success rate than trial and error, for all of us.

Sandra Sidney

Natick
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