RSS Feed MenuMy daughter is fast approaching her teen years and I am steeling myself for “the discussion.” But it is not about sex. It is about drugs. I am about to embark on a journey through cognitive dissonance that would have made my old Speech Com 101 professor shudder. To wit: how do I sit her down and explain that, yes, life will get bumpy down the road but turning to drugs to dull the pain is not an answer when our society is bombarding us with just the opposite message? Many a parent frets over the hedonistic images that pour out of TV and the Internet and hit our children right between the eyes. But have you noticed the drum beat of seemingly 24/7 drug advertising? How do I tell my kids to stay away from drugs, when an explosion in direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) over the last decade tell us that drugs are the solution to what ails us?
It is a powerful and seductive message. Consider a typical stream of ads. Got a headache? Take Tylenol. Acid reflux? Here’s a Zantac. Back pain? Try Doans. Can’t sleep? Here’s your Ambien. Can’t wake up? Get your Vivarin here. ED? Viagra to the rescue. Going bald? Minoxidil. Depressed? Take a Paxil. And so it goes. Problem + drug = no problem.
Sure these drugs are legal. And I have no problem with pharmaceutical companies making a dime and offering necessary products that have made living far more enjoyable than in the past. As any student of history knows, these are definitely the “good old days” when it comes to medicine. Chronic pain used to be the common lot of our ancestors and lives were routinely cut short by what are now easily treatable conditions (Can you imagine dying of an impacted wisdom tooth for example?) But it seems the whole is more sinister than the sum of the parts for it is in the drug culture dynamic that I must now tell my child “say no to drugs.” Well, no to which drugs exactly? Only the illegal narcotics that serve no function but for recreation? Ok, what about alcohol then? How do I tell my kids to stay sober when their father, who is ethnically German-Irish (two cultures not exactly repelled by a snifter of port around the holidays) sips a scotch while decorating the Christmas tree? And how do I explain that the most harmless recreational drug that I know of, marijuana, is still illegal, yet alcohol—which has been responsible for more misery, tragic deaths, violence, disease and addiction than any other –is fine once they turn twenty-one so long as they drink “responsibly.” Yeah, right. Think back to college.
The America in which I am raising my little brood is a far cry from the one I knew at their age. In August 1997, the FDA introduced new direct-to-consumer guidelines about what constituted adequate provision for labeling information with broadcast DTC advertising. Spending on DTCA grew at a rapid pace after the publication of these guidelines, with increasing emphasis on broadcast advertising. In 2005, firms spent an estimated US$4.24 billion on DTCA — 11 times the amount spent in 1995. As this graph of U.S. and Canadian per capita expenditures on prescription drugs show, there is a correlation between advertising dollars and purchases in this area.
Look at your own life. How many people do you personally know who are on Paxil or some other anti-depressant? Taking Lipitor or other cholesterol drugs, etc. Are you taking something yourself at the moment? It is astounding really how hopped up we really are. We are, as I said, a monument to cognitive dissonance in that we are a society so puritanically anti-drug that it deems growing hemp a crime, yet nonetheless tolerates a population awash in pharmaceuticals of every kind and for every imaginable health issue—real or not.
I thought of this now also because of some reports surfacing that Tiger Woods was supposedly under the influence of prescription drugs when taken to the hospital after his accident. The drugs themselves I imagine were obtained through a perfectly legal transaction. But their sole purpose seemed recreational. So we now see a very public illustration of the phenomenon of our medical and recreational drugs merging into one culture that feeds on itself. People who would never think to seek out a local dealer of illegal mind-altering substances on a street corner feel little stigma in obtaining drugs for the same purpose if they come from a sanctioned source—a man in a lab coat.
So once again as I sit down with my daughter to impart on her some words of wisdom and advice, I struggle with the subject of drugs as she is about to enter into a culture awash in drugs. Of course, I will tell her to “Say no to— what?” I really don’t know at this point. If trends continue, it may not matter soon. By the time she grows into adulthood, maybe this arcane motto of the 1980s will be replaced by Aldous Huxley’s prescient glimpse into a Brave New World that I see so very much before me this very day: “..there is always soma, delicious soma, half a gramme for a half-holiday, a gramme for a week-end, two grammes for a trip to the gorgeous East, three for a dark eternity on the moon…”
balconesfault // Dec 11, 2009 at 5:48 pm
My congregation has said Welcome. My children have been baptized and attend the parish school. My marriage has been blessed by the parish priest and the new Bishop. What’s your congregation say.
You’re lucky to live in a liberal community like Ann Arbor.
The congregation where I grew up, went to in the parish school, and was an altar boy, and where my mother still attends church, would certainly baptize children of a gay couple, since a child should not face damnation for the sins of its guardians … but would also deny you communion as long as you continued to practice homosexuality. Then again, San Antonio is the hometown for John Hagee – not exactly the most theologically tolerant place you’ll find.
The Unitarian Universalist Church I go to in Austin would welcome you, however!
Interestingly, this is the second time I find you at complete odds with the teachings of the Catholic Church – previously, in claiming that Catholics worshipped statues and relics (something that the Church considers apostacy), and now this.
MI-GOPer // Dec 11, 2009 at 8:12 pm
Like I wrote, BlankHead:
Bigot. Catholic bigot and a baiter. Shame on you, BlankHead.
And now we can add Liar to the conviction. You’ve written here, right alongside your TrollTribe saddle buddie OttoBS’er that you aren’t religious and don’t believe in organized religion… and you’ve posted under BarryS name and others that you have contempt for “religionists”.
Bigot. Baiter. Liar. What a load for someone of such short mental stature, BlankHead. At least keep the multiple names you post under clear on their antagonism toward religion, will you.
For now, you can keep Bigot. Baiter. Liar. And you don’t need to check PoliFact to learn of your new found, gutter level status.
MI-GOPer // Dec 11, 2009 at 8:22 pm
“previously, in claiming that Catholics worshipped statues and relics “… right and you shut up quickly when I pointed out that at Lourdes, Craigh na Patrick, Calcutta Center and hundreds of other religious sites in the world, good Roman Catholic faithful worship the both statutes and venerate relics of the saints. And priests and Bishops are right alongside.
Of course, back then when you advanced that line, you were anti-religion and peddling that special democrat core value of bigotry toward all who actually believe in God. Now, you’re just an agnostic unitarian –right. We can believe that one too?
I didn’t think we’d find someone more comfortable telling lies than OttoBS’er on the far Left. You might have eclipsed him, BlankHead. Good show, ol’ sport??
balconesfault // Dec 11, 2009 at 10:15 pm
You’ve written here, right alongside your TrollTribe saddle buddie OttoBS’er that you aren’t religious and don’t believe in organized religion
You sir, are still a scoundrel and a liar. I have not written that I am not religious. I don’t believe in dogmatic religions, since I believe dogma to be created by man. That is not the same as not being religious.
And I have never posted under another name here, so your continuing attempts to conflate multiple posters, despite my advice that you take this up with Frum, just makes you an abject coward.
I believe that the Catholic Church is all about its dogma. If you don’t want to embrace the dogma of the Church, I don’t understand why you would want to continue to belong to it. That is most certainly the reason I am no longer a Catholic … I was just honest enough to say that if I didn’t believe the teachings of the Church, I should leave it – rather than continuing to remain a Catholic while intentionally engaging in behavior that the Church believes a serious sin.
The Catholic Church has always been very clear on their linkage of sex and procreation. Per Papal Encyclicals, sex which is done in a way to dislink it from the miracle of procreation is demeaning to all involved. This is why the rejection of the use of birth control, and along with biblical passages condemning homosexuality, this is also a reason for the rejection of active homosexuality. One can ask “what about a sterile woman, an infertile man, an older couple”. As the story of Abraham and Sarah tells us, God can overcome all of those obstacles.
I have provided you with passages from the highest levels of the Church itself which states that worship (rather than veneration, which you do not seem to be able to grasp the difference between) of anything but God Himself is a violation of the First Commandment.
As such, it is you, accusing fellow Catholics of heresy and apostacy, who are a bigot, sir.
And I am not agnostic. I am a deist.
Your ignorance is surpassed only by your belligerence.
I’d encourage you to come visit your local Unitarian Universalist Church, if you are at odds with the Catholic Catechism. Perhaps not having the stress of being at odds with your own faith will help you find peace.
sinz54 // Dec 12, 2009 at 9:16 am
balconesfault: And one of the worst things about our war on drugs, imo, is that a relatively benign drug like marjiuana is illegal
The worst thing about the War on Drugs, is that how society treats these drugs (which are legal, how severe are the penalties for the illicit ones) bears almost no correlation to what modern medical science has discovered about these drugs.
Instead, society sets the penalties to make various social statements. Robert Bork, in his book “Slouching Toward Gomorrah,” says that the penalties against marijuana must remain strong, because marijuana has always been the symbol of left-wing rebellion by youth. And by keeping the penalties strong, society sends a strong message to youth that left-wing rebellion won’t be tolerated.
balconesfault // Dec 12, 2009 at 9:44 am
And by keeping the penalties strong, society sends a strong message to youth that left-wing rebellion won’t be tolerated.
Yeah, I was once listening to Rush and hearing him state that a culture that tolerated pot wasn’t acceptable because nobody would be willing to fight in wars anymore.
ottovbvs // Dec 12, 2009 at 9:59 am
balconesfault // Dec 11, 2009 at 10:15 pm
“You sir, are still a scoundrel and a liar.”
…………this guy really is a nasty piece of work…….he has only one mode of communication and that is ranting and name calling and it’s a mode he’s clearly incapable of varying whatever the topic……given his personal circumstances he’s fortunate that other posters here seem better able to control their emotions