Remember the first line of defense on drugs

By Mike Moore

Some time in grade school or junior high, we were trucked over to the police station to be warned about drugs. I suppose the officers talked for a while in that Matt Foley, motivational speaker voice about where we'd end up living if we used them.

Maybe they even showed us the temporary facilities we'd get comp'd if we got caught.

I don't remember a word of it. I was focused on the confiscated drug paraphernalia sitting on display.

It resembled the horrible science lab a comic-book villain might operate and, for some reason, it gave me nightmares for weeks. After that, no way was I going to use any of that stuff.

I realize now it was more cumulative than that. That day wouldn't have had the same effect had my parents not bombarded me with warnings dozens of times before.

By then they'd done their best to convince me if I used marijuana even once, my brain would shrivel and they'd have to run a theme park on the extra property in my head. That fried-egg analogy on the TV ads was a relief compared to that.

Later experiences firmed up my "anti" position. One guy in my high school class dabbled in weed, but still managed to be the math and science genius. Then he turned up a couple of summers later wearing tie-dyed shirts and bragging about the epiphany that drove him to major in philosophy.

If I got the munchies, it was going to be for the traditional reason: a good, old-fashioned craving.

As for alcohol, I don't remember any nightmares warding me away. If there were strongly worded talks, they've escaped me. I took that lesson in the form of headaches, real and figurative, for a while.

News from Racine County lately shows we're still deciding how best to do our part to prevent those fried brains.

It would be fantastic for everything on our abuse-fighting checklist to go perfectly. We'd have enough money to keep D.A.R.E. officers on the west end of the county beyond this school year. Somebody would give liquor sellers a financial reason to turn away underage customers so all of these compliance checks would actually mean something.

Missing those things shouldn't mean losing the battle. Those are the last lines of defense. As Burlington's city Police Chief David Walsh was quoted, "I'm nervous if the Police Department is the only place sending the message out that drugs are bad."

As long as parents are around, we'll always have the first line. That line has to be willing to do the defending.

Science will back me up on this. I plucked a study from the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.

I'll summarize, to spare you the temptation of using uppers to get through it awake. Researchers set up a mini-grocery store for a bunch of children ages 2-6. The place was stocked with all kinds of products, including alcohol and cigarettes. The kids picked out what they wanted and played with their purchases and some dolls.

Kids whose parents smoked were almost four times as likely to pick out the cigarettes as the others. One 4-year-old girl grabbed the smokes, saying, "I need this for my man. A man needs cigarettes."

A 6-year-old boy couldn't name the favorite cereal in his hand (Lucky Charms) but had no trouble picking out the Marlboros. Score that an error on mom and dad, with an assist from marketers.

The alcohol numbers were less dramatic but still there. Not hard to imagine those statistics carrying over to illegal drugs.

What the researchers took from this study is we need to find a way to intervene earlier in children's lives. I'd say there's already a great way.

For the really bad stuff, prove to the young'uns it's bad by not doing it. For the rest, keep reinforcing the word. And don't defeat it by glorifying it yourself. Little Jimmy doesn't need to hear the adults in his life chortling about getting trashed last night.

Of all the mouths repeating the anti-drug message, remember who has the loudest megaphones.