Dumping Them Out: Keeping Kids Off Drugs

Welcome back to yet another episode of Dumping Them Out. There's only one rule to Dumping Them Out - There Are No Rules. 15 girls will enter. Only one will take home the prize. Their fate is in your hands. 

I spent the last couple days doing the worst thing you can possibly do on the internet. Which is getting mad. My #1 rule for being on the internet has always been to not get mad. Don't get mad, and don't let people know that you care about anything. If there's ever something you do care about, what you're supposed to do is emphasize the fact that you are NOT mad, and assure people that you actually just find it funny. 

What you're not supposed to do is spend 24 hours bitching about Penn State's Tyler Warren winning the John Mackey Award for best tight end over Bowling Green's Harold Fannin. No matter how correct you are. I broke my golden rule and I feel shame. I'm not even going to post the tweets or blogs. I've said too much already. But I was still right god damn it. I've placed a large wager on Penn State money line in an effort to curse them.

Never again though. You'll never find me caring about something on the internet again. Take the Colts game right now for example. Thank god I don't actually care, or else I would be really frustrated right now.

The other day I was thinking about the D.A.R.E. program. Specifically I was thinking about how cool the logo was.

I don't know if they still do D.A.R.E. classes in schools. But for people who went through it, I feel like everyone's D.A.R.E. experience was about the same. At one point you saw the logo on an older kid's shirt. You didn't know what the hell it was but you thought it looked pretty cool and wanted to be a part of it. Then one day in 6th grade a cool cop showed up to your class. He spent the next however many weeks teaching you that drugs were bad, while simultaneously teaching you how to do them. At the end of the program you signed a pledge saying you would never do drugs. You probably had intentions of honoring the contract because you were still just a kid. But the minute you learn that someone your age who's cooler and better at sports than you smoked weed and didn't die a painful weed death, everything you learned went out the window. Then one day you smoke weed while wearing your D.A.R.E shirt and it gets a really big laugh. Also at some point you hear a rumor that Officer Tansel was actually a big pot head and would smoke weed in the D.A.R.E. car before class. And the reason he's the D.A.R.E. officer in the first place is because he got a DUI and is being punished. 

I think that sums up the D.A.R.E. experience for most kids. The problem with D.A.R.E., or any youth "don't do drugs" program is that they try to tell kids doing drugs isn't cool. Their entire organization is built on a lie. Yes drugs eventually become uncool. But not at first. At first they make you cool as shit. If you build your entire sales pitch on a lie you'll never succeed in the long run.

Personally, I liked Kodak Black's approach to talking to kids about drugs.

"Drugs are awesome kids. You can't handle them. I promise."

Kodak Black might actually be the perfect person to talk kids out of doing drugs. Or at least convince them to take it easy on them. They respect him as a rapper, so they'll pay attention to what he's saying. But most importantly, you can physically see the impact drugs have had on Kodak Black himself

For a child, I imagine looking Kodak Black in the eye is a almost a bit unsettling. Maybe unsettling enough to convince them to dial back on the drug use. Kodak Black speaking to your class is just a few million dollars away from bringing in real life crackhead. Which is also a strategy I think might be effective. Like when they invited Tyrone Biggums to give a presentation on Drug Awareness Day.

The more I think about it, having any person speak to a classroom full of kids, whether it's a cop, a high rapper, or Tyrone Biggums, might not even be necessary. It's impossible to articulate the dangerous of drug use to a room of children. It's nearly impossible to make kids look however many years into the future and consider the butterfly affect of a decision made at 16-years old may have on their future. You can't put that into words. Maybe all schools should do is go to the bad part of town and find one of those 90-degree angle fentanyl guys. Just post him up in the corner of class. Make this guy the D.A.R.E. officer.

You'd have to pay to keep him high, of course. But it's a small price to pay for the future of America's youth. And considering they're paying for people's drugs, they'll have an endless supply of D.A.R.E. Officers. They'd be the most reliable employees in the world. He'd be the first guy into work every morning. Would scare the living shit out of every kid in class.