Ex-Addict Regrets Poster (my title)

Yahoo News ^ | AP Photo

[dennisw]

So, are you saying that you would begin using drugs if they were legal?

Nope. That you and many others would. If it were left up to me meth. pushers would be executed. Same for heroin and crack pushers

[Aarchaeus]

Just more proof we should legalize such poisons! (/sarcasm

No way it should be legalized. We have drug use eliminated now by having it outlawed. Let's keep it that way.

[Kevin Curry]

Or we could move to the Netherlands where because they've decriminalized dope no one uses it anymore.

[dennisw]

You prefer to see the drug user die while I prefer to try and execute the drug dealers.

[mr.pink]

It is nasty stuff.

The most dangerous drug on the scene...IMHO.

[hoot2]

"The truth is more likely this: it will make a difference to some young people and no difference to others"

its friday night. how many young people are home reading this?

[Kevin Curry]

What is your point? It's Friday night and my own teenagers are home watching television or working on a science fair project.

[Aarchaeus]

Just more proof we should legalize such poisons! (/sarcasm)

So, are you saying that you would begin using drugs if they were legal?

Not just him. If drugs were legalized, everybody would feel compelled to start using them. Another thing: Alcoholism destroys people this way, too. Obviously, it needs to be eliminated by being outlawed, like drug use has.

[AnAmericanMother]

God, I thought the first one *was* the "after" picture.

In one sense it is. She was already using the first time they busted her. The website notes that they don't have a picture of her before she began using. The sequence of about ten photos is really sad.

"She was somebody's mother; she was somebody's child," as the old song goes. . . . and odds are she's dead and buried by now, over ten years later.

[BunnySlippers]

I'm glad you posted this. I had lost the link. This one (to me) is the most shocking.

[Aarchaeus]

So, are you saying that you would begin using drugs if they were legal?

Nope. That you and many others would.

Why not be consistent, Dennis? You would be more believable. If you had the freedom to use drugs legally, you would be using them, just like everybody else.

[Pan_Yans Wife]

"Now, she regrets the deal, saying the fliers have become an embarrassment for her, her children and grandchildren."

This is my entire point! In my situation, the woman I mentioned was my sister-in-law! So, if this embarassment that my sister-in-law caused has effected her family members, the same may hold true for the family members of this poor woman in the poster! I didn't have the benefit of a poster to shock me, I had to watch my brother's wife destroy her life, and that of her family, killing them softly, and losing her soul.

Shame, and humiliation, are great motivators for young people! Can't you hear some little kid saying, "Ick! I saw your grandmother! She looks really bad! Did you know that drugs can make you really sick?"

I know that I have used the down-ward spiral of my former sister-in-law to remind me that no matter how much fun drugs can be... my life, and that of my children is worth much more than that, and I only wish she had known the same.

The decision is easier, with the proper motivation... these posters can be powerful, if put to good use!

[Kevin Curry]

So because legal alcohol destroys peoples' lives, we should legalize life-destroying drugs such as methamphetamine too?

Equal rights for dangerous drugs. How libertarian of you.

[hoot2]

"Just more proof we should legalize such poisons! (/sarcasm) "

yes...on indian reservations. when these yahoo's o.d., the indians get to keep their personal property, including auto's.

[Roscoe]

They want their entitlements.

[Ramius]

I don't know what works. Nothing that has ever been tried has worked, so it's a little tough to find success stories.

I do know that one of the biggest mistakes we make is to try to tell kids that essentially all drugs are the same. We have to be straight with kids, not lie to them. When they find out that we're lying to them about pot, for example, all it does is make them wonder what else we might be lying about.

Alcohol is by far the most destructive chemical in more people's lives than any other, yet it remains legal and widely advertised. Pot is almost inconsequential in terms of its impact, especially in comparison to alcohol.

The other drugs, like meth or heroin or crack... I will submit... I don't know what to do there. Honestly, it is a nowinner nomatter what we do. The market is there and it will be with us forever, but I would not go so far as to recommend legalization.

All I'm trying to say is that to me this smacks of a "feel good" measure that will be just as ineffective as anything else that we've tried before. Again: The woman in the picture HAD THIS HAPPENNING TO HERSELF and still it didn't matter to her.

[dennisw]

I don't take any drugs at all. Not even legal drugs such as aspirin, cold medicines and pain pills. Never in my life have I taken a pain killer. Like I said, you would be the one to take illegal drugs if they were legal. Meth. is poison yet you would make it legal. How bizarre !

[The FRugitive]

Just say no to crack.

[Aarchaeus]

You prefer to see the drug user die while I prefer to try and execute the drug dealers.</>

Actually, that is not correct. I supported the "War on Drubs" for a long time. Until it became evident that it wsa not being waged as a real war on drugs. If the gov had been broadcasting stats on how many pushers had been caught and summarily executed, with large enough numbers killed to really make a difference, I would probably still be supporting it.

[kaylar]

There isn't a teenager in the world that thinks *they* are vulnerable

Again, how do you know that? Are you omniscient?

I never took up smoking tobacco (which is legal), because as a teenager I saw photos in a women's magazine of a brave woman. She allowed herself to be photographed in her underwear, to show the world-and especially young people-the ravages of smoking. From the midchest down her skin was healthy and pink and relatively youthful, but from the midchest up, her skin was a sulpher yellow/gray and heavily lined. Her face and neck looked at least ten years older than her stated age and didn't match the rest of her body at all. Also as part of the article devoted to antismoking, they had pictures of twins : One a smoker, one a nonsmoker. Both were in their early 30s, and the smoker, who'd been smoking since HS, looked 5-10 years older.

This teen at least was detered from using a legal product , a product which has far less terrifying properties than, eg, PCP , heroin, crack, etc, from ONE magazine article that appealed to my vanity rather than my health. Cancer scared me less than wrinkles!

These photos, embarrassing though they may be, may well help other young girls who might scoff at antidrug 'just say no' talk.