Red Ribbon Week is Over

I complained about Red Ribbon Week before. Now don't get me wrong, I have no problem with teaching children to be safe and to stay away from drugs. However this whole Red Ribbon thing is very distasteful. It boils down to giving kids a red ribbon to wear and this is all you need to do to keep your kids safe. It also is a case of the school system giving tacit approval to the War on Some Drugs rather than pointing out how futile it is to lock up non-violent people in the first place.

" Stay away from alcohol, tobacco and drugs, " Hunton said. " For you all to be successful, you need to try your best to stay clean. "

Reh said this year's speakers did a good job delivering a drug-free message to students.

" They all volunteer their time to be here, " she said. " They're drug-free adults, and they're letting the kids see that you can have a great life if you stay drug free. "

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Except that a lot of adult role models do choose to have an alcoholic drink, smoke a cigarette or smoke the occasional joint and still manage to lead successful and happy lives. Do you think it is possible that kids are going to grow up, realize that they have been mislead and disregard the entire "drug-free" message? I know I felt the same way when I read unbiased information about marijuana and I found out that everything I was taught about marijuana was completely untrue. The school system misleads children and this makes me quite sad. I hope that it does save at least one child from doing drugs so they can justify the existence of these feel-good do-nothing Drug-War loving programs but I doubt it.

I would be in favor of having a Green Ribbon campaign to go along with the Red Ribbon campaign to commemorate all the people killed and harmed by the War on Drugs.

Although I am not sure why they would include pre-schoolers in all this. Does a pre-schooler have the ability to understand an anti-drug message?

There are many stories show-casing children and their commitment to stay drug-free, as though students in grade five are going to keep these promises when they become teenagers. Fighting THE MAN is a normal part of becoming an adult and doing ILLEGAL drugs is a cheap way to show that you are so much better than your parents. If drugs weren't illegal, would it be as tempting to show your independance by doing drugs? Drug use is not effected by draconian American prohibition any more than it is effected by the relatively liberal drug policy employed by the Netherlands.