Monday 21 July 2008

Why did three broadsheets run drugs features this weekend?

I can't understand it. Do newspapers collude? It's like buses - nothing, then three come along at once. The Sunday Times, The Observer and The Sunday Telegraph all ran features about drug abuse. But what was the Observer one about though? Was there a message at all there that didn't say that it was perfectly fine to use so long as you still work? Why is it that none of these features actually made the point that using drugs was really BAD for you and led not simply to rehab but to spells in nasty, dirty psychiatric wards - and not just in the UK but around the world?

These journalists still want to make the point that it's cool to use. It's not. Just look at Amy's face for a start... They start off with the premise that because they've used in the past, or still simply 'have the occasional toke', then it's all perfectly fine. They think it amusing to make the point that because they did it at uni when they were younger, being friends with their kids, they tell them so. They don't seem to be able to join the dots that actually telling your kids that you did it, then it's all perfectly fine. Kids look to their parents to learn. If they know that their parents used (and using means cannabis too), then why shouldn't they?

So the broadsheets want to publicise that people are using with no real reaction or comeback and nothing serious happens to them apart from the giggles, the spots and the munchies. Well, guys, it's not like that. It's totally irresponsible to make the comparision that booze is worse. It's a fallacy. Yes, English kids drink far too much and make themselves sick and some of them end up in hospital because they've been out of control but it's far rarer for them to find themselves actually addicted in the same way that so many people who use drugs are addicted. Nor do they find themselves in psychiatric wards because they've shot their brains with too many chemicals.

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