Mixed Signals

Jacob Sullum | February 2, 2004

A pamphlet issued in conjunction with the government's new anti-drug ads (which premiered yesterday during the Super Bowl) has this sensible advice for parents whose kids ask them about their own drug use: "Experts agree that it is best to be honest. Answering deceptively can cause you to lose credibility with your kids if they ever find out that you’ve lied to them."

That's a bit different from the position taken by George W. Bush, who in 1998 told Newsweek: “If I were you, I wouldn’t tell your kids that you smoked pot unless you want ’em to smoke pot. I think it’s important for leaders, and parents, not to send mixed signals. I don’t want some kid saying, ‘Well, Governor Bush tried it.’ ”

That's not the only way in which the pamphlet, distributed by the Office of National Drug Control Policy, contradicts the president. "Drug testing of kids," it says, "is a complicated issue and is best done within the context of a doctor-patient-parent relationship." In his State of the Union speech last month, by contrast, Bush recommended new funding for drug testing of kids in school, which he called "an effective part" of "our aggressive community-based strategy to reduce demand for illegal drugs."

Comments

|2.2.04 @ 2:04AM|#

"Experts also "agree" that you're not supposed to whack your children, although I submit that the reluctance of baby boomers and yuppies to hit their children is partially what has allowed those same children to become such undisciplined animals."

Actually, I believe that the majority of people in prison for violent crimes were "whacked" by their parents.

Like circumcision, corporal punishment is a personal decision. If there were any evidence at all that it was beneficial (as something other than an easy way to angrily give simple messages regarding might and right), it would be more than just a personal decision.

But we digress. Bush, like Clinton and Gore, has always been a shameless hypocrite regarding recreational drug use.

Xrlq|2.2.04 @ 3:08AM|#

"Yep, and the Bush twins are pristine angels."

So far they've only been busted for alcohol, which Bush has always admitted to having used in the past. So if gratuitous references to his twins proved anything at all about Bush's theory, they'd tend to vindicate it.

|2.2.04 @ 3:15AM|#

Actually, he did conceal his DUI arrest from them, for better or worse. I wonder if he refuses to answer their questions regarding his cocaine use.

|2.2.04 @ 4:34AM|#

So how much cocaine have you done, Les?

|2.2.04 @ 4:39AM|#

Never tried it, actually. If I had, I certainly wouldn't duck the question while supporting laws that put cocaine users in prison.

I've always wanted to ask Bush (as well as Clinton and Gore) if it would have been best for them if they had been imprisoned for their drug use.

|2.2.04 @ 4:41AM|#

I always picture W in the oval office cutting lines with the side of his hand ala Tony Montaro in the last scene of Scarface

|2.2.04 @ 5:07AM|#

"So how much cocaine have you done, Les?"

Was that necessary?

|2.2.04 @ 5:24AM|#

Les-

Harry Browne said in 2000 that if he could ask only one question of Bush and Gore (which is one more than he actually got to ask, of course) it would be "Would the two of you be better men today if, for your youthful indiscretions, you had gone to prison?"

Talk about a one-way ticket to Gitmo... :)

|2.2.04 @ 6:29AM|#

Xlrq, who said anything about being busted?

http://dir.salon.com/politics/feature/2001/03/23/jenna_bush/index.html

"Jenna came over one night and we all did some doobies together. I wouldn't say she's a major pothead but she likes to toke up when it's around..."

Of course, Salon is dicussing the National Inquirer's credibility on this expose. However, "If I were you", is looking like that rock inside the glass house. I would certainly understand that the lack of discussion on Bush's drug use leads to no discussion and therefore leaving daddy naive!

SteveInClearwater|2.2.04 @ 11:09AM|#

The 'undisciplined monsters' segment of our kids sprang forth less as a result of 'not getting whacked' then from having parents who were just too damn busy (for whatever reason) to spend time with them and develop trusting relationships.

Kids and adults alike only lie to those who they fear and/or distrust.

Give your kids credit for being smarter than you think they are. Then tell them the truth. Anything less breeds distrust.

Once they've reached oh, 12 years old?, their decision to use drugs/have sex/try other risky behavior will be based on the information they receive from people they trust. Will you be part of that group?

|2.2.04 @ 11:20AM|#

"If I were you, I wouldn't tell your kids that you smoked pot unless you want 'em to smoke pot. I think it's important for leaders, and parents, not to send mixed signals. I don't want some kid saying, 'Well, Governor Bush tried it.' "

Yep, and the Bush twins are pristine angels.

|2.2.04 @ 11:46AM|#

I hope the preznit cracks down on those soft-on-drugs liberals at the ONDCP.

John Kerry opposes federal action against medicinal marijuana states.

|2.2.04 @ 12:05PM|#

Looks like the writers of the pamphlet got "off message". Whatcha wanna bet that either:
a)they lose their jobs, or
b) they are never again promoted.

|2.2.04 @ 12:07PM|#

Further mixed messages:

"Experts agree that it is best to be honest. Answering deceptively can cause you to lose credibility with your kids if they ever find out that you�ve lied to them."

This rule of thumb apprarently does not apply to drugs adds themselves. If I was still in high school, I'd be laughing my ass off at this latest incarnation of "reefer madness." No credibility lost there.

|2.2.04 @ 12:17PM|#

Zzzzzzzzzzz....

|2.2.04 @ 12:23PM|#

Doesn't the advice to be honest explicitly contradict the PFDFA's and ONDCP's line as of a few years ago? I'm pretty sure Bush was on message at the time he said that.

|2.2.04 @ 12:38PM|#

Experts also "agree" that you're not supposed to whack your children, although I submit that the reluctance of baby boomers and yuppies to hit their children is partially what has allowed those same children to become such undisciplined animals.

I will lie to my kids about it if necessary, and I will also curtail every freedom they enjoy at my expense until I am confident in either their ability to make mature decisions, or their absolute fear of parental wrath in making immature ones.

The advice you heed on raising your children should come from your own family, your parents, etc. Don't ever depend on a government for solid advice in matters like this. They can't even do their own jobs; why would you take advice from them on yours?

|2.3.04 @ 2:03AM|#

Excellent point Les!

|2.3.04 @ 2:04AM|#

Excellent point Les!

|2.3.04 @ 3:26AM|#

That said, most folks in prison for violent crimes were spanked as kids.

The emotional problems and/or sociopathic tendencies are the root cause of most violent crime don't start at age 18, criminally violent adults were, in almost all cases, really nasty and violent kids. You would expect a vastly-higher percentage of criminals to have been spanked, compared to regular people, simply because both "getting severely punished as a kid" and "getting severely punished as an adult" are positively correlated with sociopathic tendencies and emotional problems.

Let me give you a parallel: school detention. I'd be willing to bet that a large majority of people in prison got detention back when they were in school. Furthermore, I'd bet that the "school detention" rate for prisoners is much higher than that of the regular population. Yet even if this is true, it isn't an argument against the value of detention as a disciplinary tool and/or a means of discouraging student misbehavior. It just means that "landing in detention" shares correlating factors with "landing in prison".

It's impossible to know if spanking makes kids more or less likely to misbehave, in the long run. It just isn't possible to do a controlled experiment.

|2.3.04 @ 5:22AM|#

Jenna came over one night and we all did some doobies together

For fuck's sake, JSM, "two unidentified potheads quoted in the National Enquirer" ranks somewhere between Nostradamus and a Ouija Board on the credibility scale. The Enquirer gives better sourcing than that for Elvis sightings.

Salon should be ashamed of itself for repeating the story.

|2.3.04 @ 5:57AM|#

tendencies are the root cause of

Should be "tendencies that are the root cause of"

|2.3.04 @ 7:22AM|#

Dan, I completely agree. There is no way to determine the long-term effects because the personalities of the kids and their parents and their relationship in general all play important parts.

I just mentioned that stat in response to the argument that kids who aren't spanked are trouble makers. I'd run to look one up if someone said that kids who are spanked are trouble makers.

However (grin), as a special education teacher who's worked with emotionaly disturbed and extremely violent kids for years, I would argue that spanking isn't necessary to change a kid's behavior.

Highway|2.3.04 @ 10:37AM|#

..."two unidentified potheads quoted in the National Enquirer" ranks somewhere between Nostradamus and a Ouija Board on the credibility scale. The Enquirer gives better sourcing than that for Elvis sightings.

Oh man, Dan, that's gotta be the funniest thing I've read in months! Thanks!

|2.3.04 @ 12:49PM|#

MALAK, I never said spanking was abuse. I was merely responding to the baseless notion that NOT spanking causes kids to grow up bad. That said, most folks in prison for violent crimes were spanked as kids (I'll try to find a reference for that). That doesn't mean they were abused as kids, just spanked. Just so we don't think that kids who aren't spanked naturally lack discipline (which, btw, is supposed to be an internal mechanism; what happens to discipline when the external threat of violence is removed?)

|2.3.04 @ 12:50PM|#

So Les believes that the majority of people in prison for violent crimes were 'whacked' as children. Corporal punishment is not abuse. I think it IS possible that a majority of people in prison for violent crimes were victims of abuse, but that is a different topic, and I would want proof. I would also be willing to bet that the majority of people with NO criminal record whatsoever were 'whacked' as kids. Again, corporal punishment is NOT abuse.

|2.3.04 @ 12:57PM|#

I thought drugs ALWAYS led to trouble. This recent ad takes the "It doesn't always end up bad, but why risk it?" position. Interesting.

|2.4.04 @ 4:35AM|#

Les, I do not believe that spanking changes a child's behavior beyond getting him/her to stop doing what it was they got spanked for. Spanking is a tool of last resort, as far as I'm concerned. Though we have spanked my daughter in the past, I would be hard pressed to tell you the last time it occurred. It is certainly better, imo, than a 'time-out'.

|6.30.04 @ 2:31AM|#

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