cannabisnews.com: Cannabis Crusades: Anti-Pot Ads Have Backfired Cannabis Crusades: Anti-Pot Ads Have Backfired Posted by CN Staff on September 26, 2003 at 08:22:20 PT By Mitch Earleywine Source: San Francisco Chronicle Sometimes the most well-meaning plans backfire. The federal government's attempt to curb teenage drug use with a multimillion-dollar ad campaign dramatizing the perils of marijuana has backfired spectacularly. It is now obvious that these ads are doing more harm than good, and Congress should pull the plug immediately. Unless you've been living in a cave the last two years, you've probably seen the commercials sponsored by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. Sensationalized and scary, these ads suggest that teens who smoke marijuana are likely to commit date rape, run over little girls on bicycles and even shoot their friends. As a psychologist who studies drug abuse, I worried about these ads from the beginning. The "facts" in them are exaggerated and out of context. Their single-minded emphasis on marijuana, rather than far more addictive and lethal substances such as cocaine and methamphetamine, makes little sense. Now, scientific data -- from the very surveys that Congress set up as yardsticks to measure the success of the drug control policy office -- tell us that these ads have boomeranged. Back in 1998, Congress chose to evaluate the office's performance via two well-known surveys of adolescent drug use: the federally funded "Monitoring the Future" study and the privately run Parent's Resource Institute for Drug Education survey. Both are considered reliable indexes of teen drug use. The goal was to reduce the percentage of teens using illegal drugs within the last month to 3 percent of the adolescent population over a period of five years, starting in 1999. Snipped: Complete Article: http://www.freedomtoexhale.com/crusades.htm Source: San Francisco Chronicle (CA)Author: Mitch Earleywine Published: Friday, September 26, 2003 Copyright: 2003 San Francisco Chronicle - Page A - 27 Contact: letters sfchronicle.comWebsite: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/Related Articles:Marijuana, Gateways and Circuses http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15462.shtmlText of Dr. Mitch Earleywine Interview on NPR http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread14712.shtmlThe Roots of Reefer Madnesshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread14653.shtml Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #2 posted by Jose Melendez on September 26, 2003 at 08:44:05 PT bumper sticker idea IT'S THE FRAUD, STUPID. [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by kaptinemo on September 26, 2003 at 08:34:11 PT: Again and again again... It's so simple: don't lie to the kids, because they can generally tell when you do.Lie to them, and the effect expands exponentially: they won't trust you on anything after a while. They'll EXPECT that you'll lie to them about anything...and the tragic cycle will continue.These anti-drug ads should have been a wake-up call for the entire country: if the Busch Regime would lie about this, what else would they lie about? Invading Iraq, maybe? Hmmm? [ Post Comment ] Post Comment