Drug Free America was a site I came across as a banner ad while I was visiting a site that was totally unrelated to the problem of drugs (I think it was a site with Flash videos). At first I thought it was another one of those lame sites that parent groups post up in a vain attempt to get teenage drug addicts off drugs. But I soon discovered that it was much more than that. They seemed to be making up ridiculous proposals to combat the problem of drug addiction.
I was first exposed to a feature story on the site, titled Keeping Tabs on Kids. To me, it was a very disturbing article to say the very least. It starts off with an example about how teenagers explain to their parents where they will be going out. It uses the classic "sit-com" situation, whereby the teen just simply states to their parents that they are just going out with somebody and that they'll be back later. No details, just a brief explaination. This situation has been played out on TV a countless number of times. Then you wold probably imagine my surprise when they say that such as situation happening in real life would be unacceptable. Why? Is it because the teenager disrespected their parents by doind this? No. It appears that the reason why the teen said this was so they could do drugs and not get caught by their parents!
Is that so? I hear you ask. Do they assume that if parents don't know where their kids are, that this means that they are doing drugs? Well, the answer is unfortunately yes. The article goes on to boast outrageous statistics such as "children who are not monitored by their parents are four times more likely to do drugs than those who are".
What is monitoring? It's the sites solution to teenage drug addiction. Demand to know where your kids is, what they're doing and who they're doing it with ALL THE TIME. They claim that the fear of drug addiction justifies the use of such dictatorial methods of prevention. Sure, your kids can't do drugs now, but at what cost? Your kid's privacy, your kid's freedom and your trust.
