Pubdate: Fri, 29 Sep 2006 Source: Maple Ridge Times (CN BC) Copyright: 2006 Lower Mainland Publishing Group Inc Contact: http://www.mrtimes.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1372 Author: Dan Banov HELP THE USERS Editor: Re: Drug Message Being Lost, Times, Sept. 26 The column does correctly identify the drug problem at schools. You rightly identify the cause of the problem being primarily from poor parental guidance. (But) it is more complex than just blaming the parents. It is the parent's lack of skills at parenting. Parents usually only start to address the problem when it is too late. Parents in this complex world need to be experts on child psychology. Distractions are so much more than in the past.For instance in pre-school parents who fail to direct children to watch something like Sesame Street over violent cartoons need to know how this will affect future behaviour. Parents need to be educated and if they are not willing to put an effort to be an expert should get a cute puppy instead. While lack of parenting may be the cause and better parenting will eventually eliminate the problem, the solution is not to blame drug pushers and attempt to jail them and the producers. Making drugs illegal only wastes resources and if anything increases use. Just like the old saying guns do not kill, people kill. It is not drugs killing people it is the users of drugs who are killing themselves. We need to stop wasting time trying to control the availability of weapons and concentrate on the teaching the users to put the weapon down, or never to pick them up. Dan Banov Maple Ridge - --- MAP posted-by: Elaine