Pubdate: Mon, 29 Dec 2014
Source: Edmonton Journal (CN AB)
Copyright: 2014 The Edmonton Journal
Contact: 
http://www.edmontonjournal.com/opinion/letters/letters-to-the-editor.html
Website: http://www.edmontonjournal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/134
Author: Chris Zdeb
Page: A2

This Day in Journal History

DEC. 29, 1969: TEENS TAKE ON ADULTS OVER DRUG-BOOZE DOUBLE STANDARD

Few aspects of society escaped criticism when 220 Alberta teenagers 
gathered at the Hotel Macdonald for four days to discuss drug use.

The young, "predominantly clean-cut" attendees were taking part in 
the second annual Youth Conference on Alcohol and Drug Problems, 
sponsored by the Alcohol Education Association of Alberta, formerly 
known as the Association of Temperance Forces in Alberta. They found 
a double standard exists between their generation's use of drugs and 
the older generation's use of alcohol.

As the main conference speaker, Dr. Winton H. Beaven, president of 
Columbia Union College, Washington, D.C., sparked discussion when he 
said drugs were a substitute for personal relationships, used by 
unhappy people in a tense world.

"I think all habitual drug users substitute drugs for a relationship 
they are missing with another person," he said. "They form a twosome 
with their drug."

The teens fired back during a panel discussion in which one delegate 
told the doctors and social workers sitting on the panel, "Your 
generation has had alcohol for its crutch. Why can't we have ours?

"You can walk into a store and come out with a bottle. We can't carry 
a joint ofmarijuana down the street without being picked up."

Another complained there should be government control of the sale of 
marijuana to prevent adulteration of the drug.

"When you buy a bottle, you expect good stuff. You don't want 
something made in a bathtub.

"Well the same goes for us. When we buy a joint we want to know it is 
pure, that it hasn't been treated with opium or something."

Not all the teens favoured drug use. One girl challenged a peer 
speaker who said he used drugs to be able to see his problems more 
clearly and perhaps finds a solution.

"Don't you think taking drugs is just piling one more problem on top 
of the ones you already have?" she asked, to which he agreed.

Panel members also had barbs to hurl.

Richard Anthony, the chief crown prosecutor who chaired the panel on 
Youth and the Establishment, reminded the conference that "not all 
wisdom dries up after age 21. You can still make changes after you 
enter the working world.

"You find that when your father is no longer feeding you, you have to 
conform to some extent to keep bread on the table."

Unlike previous generations, whose addictions were mainly to alcohol, 
the teens who attended this conference were baby boomers, the first 
generation to have multiple addictions to illegal drugs and alcohol. 
Their children and grandchildren have followed their lead, according 
to alcoholrehab.com

To read more stories from the series This Day in Journal History, go 
to www.edmontonjournal.com/history
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom