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May 12, 2001
Turning the Tide of Drugs
Mid the national debate over liberalized drug policy and efforts to minimize drug harm, one group in Australia is working to prevent youth from starting drugs in the first place—with results
A young teenaged girl approached the booth at the fair, attracted by the kangaroo figures, balloons and streams of other young people coming and going. She soon realized the booth’s message was against drugs, and joined dozens of other teens and children that day to become a Drug-Free Ambassador, pledging to live a drug-free life and to help friends and families to do the same. With the others, she was presented a certificate to commemorate her decision and to remind her of her pledge in the future.
The following day, the same girl returned to the booth, this time with her father and a young cousin in tow. Her father explained to campaign volunteers that the evening before, after his daughter returned from the fair, he framed her certificate for her and put up on her bedroom wall. “Her mother died a drug-related death only three months ago,” he said, proud of his young daughter’s decision to remain drug-free. She now wanted her cousin, a 10-year-old boy, to do the same as he had already smoked marijuana and he, too, had lost a family member as a result of drugs. He became a Drug-Free Ambassador on the spot.
The girl and her cousin are among more than 10,000 youth throughout Australia who have participated in the Drug-Free Ambassador program, a drug prevention initiative sponsored since 1995 by the Church of Scientology.
Those participating in the campaign take a seven-point pledge to live a drug-free life and to encourage their peers, family and others to do the same. The campaign promotes individual responsibility and the message that one can live a life without drugs. Each new participant is presented with a badge, which signifies their status as a Drug-Free Ambassador and a certificate which can be presented to family or friends. “Our aim is to educate on the dangers of drugs, the positive effects of a drug-free life and that it is an attainable goal,” said Cyrus Brooks, campaign spokesperson for Sydney.
During 2000, Drug-Free Ambassador campaign organizers and volunteers contacted thousands of kids, teenagers and young adults, speaking to them about the negative effects of taking illegal drugs as well as abuse of prescription drugs.
“It’s preventive rather than waiting for kids to be on drugs. Prevention is more effective than waiting until they need rehabilitation. The campaign should be expanded,” said Ted Aritao, attorney and director of the Lion’s Club Cabramatta.
“Liberalization” or Education?
Campaign spokesperson Brooks said response to the program indicates the demand for drug education. “We’ve found at a grass roots level that youth are willing to listen to facts about drugs. They want to make the right choice and appreciate cold, hard facts about drugs and the harm they do.”
Indeed, a review of press releases issued by the Federal Health Department during the year 2000 finds only two on the subject of handling the illicit drug problem. Ironically, at least 20 discussed mental health programs for conditions such as depression, for which mind-altering drugs are generally promoted and increasingly used.
“Almost everywhere you look, even from our own government, the message to our kids is that drugs are the solution to getting through the ups and downs of life,” said Brooks. He referred not only to the plethora of advertising for psychiatry’s “legal” drugs, but the reports proclaiming that “prohibition” and a tough attitude against drugs have failed and should be abandoned in favor of a “harm minimization” strategy to reduce health risks and social ills associated with hard-core drug use and addiction. The strategy embraces measures such as legalized prescription heroin to addicts and loosening the drug laws.
However, overseas experiments have shown that the efficacy of “liberalizing” drug policy is in question, and doomed to failure without employing meaningful drug education and prevention efforts
While efforts are increased to curb abuse, addiction and its attendant crime, health and economic consequences in society, Brooks said that at least the same effort must go into meaningful drug education and prevention.
“Without a real education about drug dangers on a large scale, we won’t make a dent in the problem of abuse no matter what programs or laws we try,” said Brooks. “We need a nationwide effort to educate youth on the truth about drugs and what they do.”
Brooks also said that what is needed is not “scare tactics,” which tend to challenge youth, but hard facts and evidence. “Then young people will avoid drugs out of common sense, because they do not want to damage themselves mentally, physically and spiritually,” he said. “They can make their own informed decisions.”
Prevention the Cure
In Australia, some claim that a “prohibition” stance has failed, thus leaving “harm minimization” and “liberalization” as the only routes.
“The real fact is there hasn’t been a ‘zero tolerance’ atmosphere for many years, because the government’s harm minimization strategy in effect promotes drug use, under the guise of taking drugs ‘safely’,” said Brooks. “And we have found the current ‘harm minimization’ programs and ‘expert’ statements in the media are not representative of the people, but rather of small interest groups.”
From surveying thousands of youth and adults, Drug-Free Ambassador campaign organizers say they have found that 97 percent of people support the idea of a drug-free life and kids being drug free, both from illegal and “legal” drugs. Further, the public asks many questions about drugs, how to get off them, and how to proof kids up against them.
“It is clear that people want information and direction given to them about drugs. They want to know the facts. They want to know the real consequences about drugs. They eagerly reach for and read all informational fliers we hand out about drugs,” said Brooks. “We frequently hear how hard it is to find good information about what drugs really do to a person. The number of parents and kids who thank us for being there and providing a drug information service that is free and on the street is overwhelming.”
Shopkeepers, officials, families, youth workers and people in the street have responded favorably to the Drug-Free Ambassador program, with a common reaction of approval that “someone is doing something about it”.
Brooks said that missing from most other drug education program to date is factual information on the damage that comes from drug use, not just physically, but mentally and spiritually. “We address this point. The Drug-Free Ambassadors concentrates on what drugs do to the mind, including intelligence levels and creativity. And in practice, this does make a difference.”
One of the drugs the Drug-Free Ambassador campaign targeted throughout 2000 is marijuana. Brooks said that by survey, teens and children who take it consider the drug virtually harmless. “It has become acceptable, part of the culture. It isn’t considered addictive,” said Brooks.
While youths on the whole consider drugs such as heroin and crack dangerous, a false impression pervades that marijuana is not. “We’ve heard such things as ‘cigarettes are worse’ and ‘its natural’. But marijuana is dangerous as its effects creep up on a user,” Brooks continued. “While a user may not hit the headlines with death from overdose, or rob and steal in order to pay for the habit, marijuana’s silent role in suicides is reported in the annual bureau of statistics reports.”
According to Brooks, youth respond positively to drug education and even offer to hand out fliers for the campaign and carry on the message to their friends.
Results
The Drug-Free Ambassador program has enjoyed results because organizers and volunteers contact people personally, answer their questions and provide them with facts about drugs and what they do to a person mentally and spiritually.
While many young people may not be concerned about their physical health twenty years hence, campaign organizers say they find they do care when they find out that drugs will affect their mental alertness, memory and concentration and cause shifts in personality. They know that will affect their creative abilities and their ability to get a good job.
“In a society largely conditioned to the idea that drug use is just ‘a choice of life’ and inevitable and unstoppable, it’s easy to be cynical, especially with the incessant lobby of our politicians to create more lenient drug policies,” said Brooks.
“The first thing to change is the idea that one mustn’t be direct, and ‘tell people what to do or think’ as that reluctance leads to a permissive, ‘nothing to do with me’ attitude pervasive in society,” Brooks continued. “We can be firm with our drug education and can take responsibility and teach our children to be drug free. It works.”
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