10/20/02
by RumpleTeazer
I have an idea! Let's use the terrorist attacks and the tragic, agonizing death of hundreds -thousands- of innocent people to guilt children into not using drugs! Doesn't that sound simply wonderful? Obviously someone thought so.
As for me, I find this line of commercialism insulting, offensive and at the very least, downright disgusting. An ad campaign aimed at adults would be bad enough, but to have images of children saying that they are responsible for the deaths is just wrong. Especially during this time when a lot of kids are having trouble understanding why the attacks happened in the first place. It is not, nor will it ever be, time to start laying blame on our children for these hideous acts.
Now, let's take a closer look at the message this type of advertising is trying to send to people. First off, what kind of impact are they expecting to make? What type of people are they trying to influence? Do they really think that anyone who is already heavily into drugs is going to care? I seriously doubt that they will. Think about it, anyone who's already into drugs is probably addicted to them and if they've done them for any length of time, their brain is most likely fried to the point that they won't understand the message you're sending them anyway.
But what about the ones that aren't so deeply hooked? The kids that may have been curious about drugs and tried them once or twice, but are otherwise, pretty decent? Those are the ones that are now feeling as though they had a personal hand in the murder of innocent people. Now, assuming you're an adult, think about how it would make you feel to know that you had any part in supporting the attacks. Uh huh, now think of how an adolescent child, who probably has to much pressure on him to be perfect anyway, is going to feel. Having trouble picturing that? Just take look at the news paper and see how many kids are out there that don't think twice about going out and killing someone. Why should they? You've already called them murderer. And if they're already damned, why not "take out" a few more before committing suicide? Face it, we're giving these children moral standards that most adults couldn't follow.
Furthermore, think about the seriously mixed signals we're sending these kids. You can't turn on the TV these days without seeing a commercial for some type of prescription drug. What is it we're saying to them? It's OK to take this drug, but not that one. They're going to have a very good question for that... Why?
If we want to make a positive impact on our children, we need to be more responsible with the messages we're putting out. If we're not going to stop the advertising, we need to stop blaming people -children- for doing exactly what the ads want them to do, which is taking drugs.
Admittedly, it could be possible that I am completely wrong about what these commercials are trying to say. But if I got it wrong, how many others did, too? Just to be on the safe side, I say we stick with letting kids tell kids not to do drugs and leave the terrorism to the people responsible... The terrorist.
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