Last Thursday, Hank Green was one of three Youtube celebrities tasked with making President Obama seem accessible to millennials. Green took the opportunity to ask Obama about marijuana legalization in Colorado and Washington during the White House interview.
After assuring Colorado and Washington residents the feds won’t go nuclear on their crop, Obama called U.S. drug policy “counterproductive,” suggesting a public health approach to drug use.
Despite speaking to new people, the stance is nothing revolutionary from Obama, but it was the first time in awhile I’d heard him talk about the issue. The president ran on this approach in 2008, when he promised to steer the Department of Justice away from raiding medical marijuana patients.
The problem is his rhetoric doesn’t line up with reality. The Obama administration blazed a warpath against legal pot with about 270 medical marijuana raids throughout his presidency. The administration spent $100 million dollars more than under both terms of George W. Bush.
The smoke has been extinguished, though, thanks to an amendment in the recently signed omnibus spending bill. The amendment prevents the Department of Justice from using funds for raids on marijuana businesses in states where it’s legal.
If Obama wants to treat drugs as a public health issue, instead of just talking, he needs to stop bothering with the Department of Justice and refocus his attention on the Department of Education.
The state of drug education in the United States is miserable. The biggest and most recognizable of the government’s attempts is the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program.
You might remember D.A.R.E. as the time a cop came to your school and told your fifth-grade class how to make meth.
The closest I had to a D.A.R.E. experience is when some guy doing lines of something at Voodoo Fest wearing a shirt emblazoned with the logo, blocked what would normally have been a wonderful view of Pearl Jam.
Beyond festival kiddies ironically wearing the T-shirts, there isn’t much success to speak of for D.A.R.E. The program has proven ineffective at stopping kids from using drugs in multiple peer-reviewed academic studies as far back as the ‘90s.
Turns out, “just say no” is a terrible education strategy for preventing drug abuse. Just like abstinence-only education, trying to scare kids away from something will only further their interest.
One of the arguments made by D.A.R.E. proponents is it’s better than nothing. This falls flat in the face of facts.
A six-year study from researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago found student-reported drug use was higher in D.A.R.E. schools than schools with no comparable drug education.
It’s an undeniable fact that many kids will experiment with drugs. If drug education is designed around that simple fact, it’ll be much closer to the reality of drug use than what is currently taught in school.
Harm reduction strategies do just that. The Drug Policy Alliance defines harm reduction as “a public health philosophy and intervention that seeks to reduce the harms associated with drug use and ineffective drug policies.”
Harm reduction is already incorporated into government policies in other parts of the world. Needle exchange programs allow intravenous drug users to swap their dirty, disease-ridden needles for clean ones.
The U.S. is the only country to ban the use of government money for NEPs, despite seven federally-funded studies finding they reduced HIV rates while not encouraging more drug use.
Because of these and other programs, the Netherlands has virtually eliminated heroin use among young people with more than nine-out-of-10 heroin users over the age of 40.
If you aren’t convinced about needle exchange programs, another prominent example of harm-reduction is pill testing at music festivals, a place where intoxicated college students are almost as plentiful as music.
There, unethical dealers peddle synthetic cathinones, known commonly as “bath salts,” under the guise of popular club drugs like MDMA and cocaine. Groups like DanceSafe and Bunk Police offer testing kits to help concert-goers identify what the hell they’re putting in their body.
Serious discussions require serious solutions. If the president wants to do anything about the lies he’s spread throughout his term, than education is the place to start.
James Richards is a 20-year-old mass communication sophomore from New Orleans. You can reach him on Twitter @JayEllRichy.