Opinions on this?Warning text about drug side effects.

I find that actually to be true. All this DARE and similar ive never really experienced but even my drug education was rather lackluster and mostly focused on cigarettes.
There are things that will make drugs hell but its mostly not the misinformation spread by DARE/similar.

That's a pretty silly thread.

The premise of "scare people into not using them" has been the go to tactic of DARE and similar programs all along. It hasn't gone well.

What has proven most effective in reducing harms is telling the truth. Providing accurate information and education in safety practices around these substances. You probably should avoid using substances like opiates and stimulants recreationally because the likelihood of ending up dependent is very high, but if you do, here is some information on what to do in the event of an overdose and how to obtain and administer narcan, here is some information on reagent based substance identification, fentanyl testing strips, needle exchanges, safe injection practices, and community detox and replacement therapy resources.

It's really astounding how many people use drugs and have no education whatsoever on very basic things like responding to an overdose or using a testing kit. So many lives could be saved by just providing honest and appropriate education instead of pushing forward an agenda of scare tactics, propaganda, and outright lies.

Goofy thread, but with a good point.
DARE isnt just ineffective, its insulting and physically dangerous.
When a DARE officer was assigned to my highschool in the 90's the blatant lies, fundamental ignorance of real drug information, and 1984-like child informant campaign enraged my schools parents so bad that they insisted the DARE program be removed. My principal checked to see if that was even legal, and then expelled the DARE officers from my school- permanently!
I was disappointed to hear from my cousin that the child informant campaign is even more intense with his elementary school age daughters now.

I would add that there is not much truth based education on legal drugs either. For example, synthetic opiates legally prescribed are a big issue for many people that started by following doctor recommendations.
Need a broad truth based approach like dreamer042 said, not the false established cultural biass that legal drugs are good and illegal drugs are bad. However, doing so goes against established false paradigms which people who consider themselves leaders of society tend to irrationally protect, so we are kind of stuck while folks suffer.
There are positive signs though. For example, a Krapton scheduling effort was dropped thanks to the truth about how it can help people came out loud and strong.

I Graduated high school in 1975. Before DARE came out but they were still talking to us about the dangers of Drugs. Sadly I was waiting for one of these people they talked about giving us drugs. I had to find my drug dealers. I would have been delighted if someone was "Hey kid try this". I have talked to my grandson frankly about what can happen and he knows he can talk to me confidentially about anything he wants to know about.

My daughter is ten years old, and we have been teaching her about drugs as it comes up.
When going mushroom picking, we explained about how certain types can make you sick, some are edible, and some make you see things.
She asks about the poppies and cannabis in the garden, and we explain what they do and how they can be used as medicine,
but that you need to be careful and know how to use them properly and to educate yourself about them.

When she is a bit older, I will get her a testing kit, and she always knows she can call us for help,
and talk to us about anything, which she does already.
I think that making drugs taboo, and saying never try them, they're bad, etc, etc, just makes them more curious to try them and see what they're all about.
Proper education and talking about it with children will help them make responsible choices when they do encounter drugs.

I never had much real education about drugs, and got talked into cocaine, crack, morphine, meth, etc, when I was only 16.
If I had known more about it, I may have made better choices and not screwed myself up for so long.
Ah well, hindsight's 20/20, I'm all better now.

Wow, that thread gives new meaning to the words 'anal fixation'.

Not that the guy is full of crap. But i think he definately holds in too much.
It's an attitude thing: some people just want to take, and take, and take, without giving anything back to mother nature every once in a while. But what goes up must come down.
One shouldn't be too rigid or too tight with that. Sometimes we just have to open ourselves, and let go, of all that material stuff we don't need.

But in order to that we have to face our dark side, we have to face the reptile inside of us, the serpent underneath. And this guy doesn't realy sound like someone, willing to face his inner demon.

On the other hand, he may have a point about the education thing. Maybe fancy words like 'brown heroïn' raise the wrong kind of expectations in some people.

Back in the late '90s or early '00s some research came out that showed DARE to be counterproductive. DARE 'graduates' actually had higher rates of drug use than those who had never been exposed to it. Reports of the research appeared in the media only briefly and then disappeared while the aghast DARE people quietly but furiously backpedaled to revamp their program.

Anybody else remember this?

Even after the reboot DARE is still wrongheaded in it's approach, IMO.

Yeah,I think this observation is pretty obvious to most of us. I was in high school just prior to the DARE debacle, thankfully. Still,teachers did their duty to misinforn us; scared straight was the mantra in those days. I had a teacher that, along with the nonsensical stories about kids somehow peeling themselves like oranges thinking they'd become pieces of fruit on lsd, actually told us marijuana would make our eyes bleed!

My experimentation had proved her to be false in that and therefore even though we had Nancy Raygun and her "just say no" campaign, I figured they were wrong about everything so I began my own "just say more" campaign to see what else I'd been lied to about...

Stating the obvious is my superpower.

Sorry buddy, for once I wasn't trying to be snarky...

In the age of Google, does anybody actually make their mind based on what any one particular organization says?

Probably not but that doesn't stop the zealots from trying.

Neither of you have been to a church lately, have you?

There is a quote, "in the age of information, ignorance is a choice."

Despite the fact that DARE lies and uses blatant fear mongering, most people will never Google the risks of drug use. One day they'll try drugs, and they'll realize they were lied to. They'll then question everything they were told about drugs, and most will never think to research these questions. They'll talk to their friends, and one friend might say, essentially, "heroin isn't as bad as DARE said, it's just like the painkillers doctors give you. Here, take a shot." This is why it's important that schools properly educate children on the risks. Because most people have other questions that need answered, and they'll never seek that information on their own.