Page 440 - Between One and Many The Art and Science of Public Speaking

Chapter 15 Thinking and Speaking Critically 407

“Anyone who tries drugs is a ‘loser’ and will become an addict.” This makes them believe
that once they’ve tried drugs, they will be shunned by their friends and family. This whole
“loser” idea stems from the gateway drug concept. The gateway drug concept, simply
stated, means that drugs like marijuana, cigarettes, and alcohol will lead to heavier drugs
like cocaine and heroin. As a matter of fact, the “gateway drug” concept is nothing more
than a false hypothesis. According to the American Journal of Public Health, one out of
100 people that try marijuana move on to harder drugs. According to Marsha Rosenbaum,
a well-known expert in the fi eld of drug education, many students discover that what they’ve
learned in the D.A.R.E. program is a lie and therefore become skeptical of any other drug
information they hear in the future. D.A.R.E. graduates will then reject other drug education
programs, and it leads to mistrust between students and the police offi cers because they’re
the ones delivering the information. Children consistently reject D.A.R.E. because rejection is
the main lesson taught in the program—not how to make responsible decisions about drugs,
just how to say “no” and be negative and intolerant. As I mentioned earlier, D.A.R.E. has not
only shown to be ineffective but has been known to be counterproductive and has shown to
cause an increase in drug use and abuse amongst graduates of its program. According to
AlcoholFacts.org, when D.A.R.E. was at its peak in the last decade, it sucked up about 1 to
1.3 billion dollars a year. Now, according to the Oklahoma Tribune, this number has lowered to
only 700 million dollars a year. Finally, D.A.R.E. has even been eliminated in Los Angeles—its
city of birth.
Now that I’ve talked about the qualities of a bad drug education program, I’ll give some of
the qualities of a good one.
As Dr. Brydon mentioned in one of his lectures, not all drug information is perfect for
every age. D.A.R.E.’s “get ’em young” strategy is effective for younger children but is inap-
propriate and pointless for them to see. Older students will reject D.A.R.E. because they have
learned to distrust authority fi gures like the police offi cers giving them the information. The
real-life effects of drugs are harmful enough—they don’t need to be twisted around or
infl ated to prove a point. According to Marsha Rosenbaum, inventor of one of D.A.R.E.’s
most successful replacements (the Safety First program), it’s also important to emphasize
the legal consequences of drug use so kids truly understand what they’re getting into. One
of the main reasons why D.A.R.E. was so popular in the past few decades was because
schools didn’t have a lot of money to spend on drug education and the local police depart-
ment put it on for free. Supporters of D.A.R.E. constantly bring this up as why it’s so great
(because schools didn’t have to pay for it), but the people who were actually paying for it
were the taxpayers. Finally, drug education doesn’t have to be expensive. As part of my
senior project, I brought some speakers from the local drug rehabilitation center to my middle
school and had them talk to the kids about drugs and their experiences. I think it was really
effective.
Tonight, I’ve talked to you about D.A.R.E.’s history, structural fl aws, and I’ve gone over
some simple alternatives which any school can take advantage of.
According to the editorial in the Oklahoma Tribune, the only thing keeping D.A.R.E. alive
now is a 700 million dollar grant which is due to run out sometime this month. This means poli-
ticians nationwide will be lobbied by D.A.R.E. for continued support. Therefore, I urge you all to
go out, write your congressman (or whoever), and demand for D.A.R.E.’s termination because
if we don’t get rid of it now, our children could end up having the same ineffective and even
counterproductive drug education that we did growing up. Thank you.
Note: This was transcribed from a videotape of a speech given at California State University, Chico on
December 1, 2006.

407