I hope my kids are sensible enough not to consume a car.

Ate a whole pack of Polo’s once…

Notwithstanding the above, if you’re going to mention the dangers of smoking grass, I’d be very keen to also point out how “legal highs” (fake weed) is much much much more dangerous.

Seriously, that shit has messed-up EVERYONE who I know who used it.

I was a good kid so if anything would want my kids to push the boundaries a little more and experience more in life when younger.

Back in’t good old days it was a bit of squidgy or rocky and thai stick if you were lucky, the gubbins they’re smoking these days is like psychotropic kryptonite with hundreds of times the psychoactive ingredients in, legal or ‘proper’. If one of mine came back telling me he was smoking weed I’d be going batshit mental, not least with the nursery.

I was merely pointing out the hypocrisy that we all fall victim to of trying to protect our kids from stuff that might harm them because society frowns upon it whilst simultaneously encouraging them to consume other stuff that’s more likely to kill them like alcohol, sugar, fat and cars.

Understood. Death and physical health risks aside, weed is far more detrimental to your mental health and ability to function than alcohol imho. It has no obvious short term ill effects, no hangovers etc. I think it’s easy for kids to get caught up and end up smoking it all day, every day.

Except the proportion of alcohol users who have serious problems due to it is far lower than for any of the other drugs. Yes, for society as a whole it might be the biggest issue, but how much of that is because it’s the most widely used?

“I’m just an occasional social smackhead and it really doesn’t affect my health”?

Of course alcohol is bad when taken in excess, but even taking into account the latest medical reports about moderate consumption, if consumed sensibly it’s really not that big an issue. Don’t think I’m in denial about this or unaware of the issues either – my normal consumption is comfortably under even the most recent guidelines and my aunt died of alcohol related issues.

Given all the comments on here about education rather than prohibition, then surely being taken to the pub by dad on your 18th (for a pint, not 8 ) is actually a sensible thing to do, to help give the idea that alcohol is something to be consumed socially in moderation. I’d like to think that drinking a glass or two of wine with a meal (once or twice a week, not every meal) in front of our kids is also giving the correct idea.

Will I be honest? As in completely open? **** no. Got off the hard stuff after half a decade of daily use, started drinking, rehabilitated (cycled through all of it).

So no, I’ll just drop mysterious hints and knowing looks whenever the subject comes up with our son. And all the money not spent on drink and drugs will buy him whatever bicycle is most suitable for him 🙂

Before this gets derailed into a drugs thread, (which inevitably has a vast range of nuance concerning the types of drugs involved, legality, context of drug taking and frequency, plus the experience of drug taking, personally or by acquaintance of the poster) what about being honest about other stuff?

Sex? Nicking stuff? Violence? Driving offences? Not that I’ve erred in all of the above! There are some things I’d be more prepared to talk about than others though, mainly because I think it could be more instructive…

I’d certainly never admit to them that I posted a thread in the wrong forum.

I remember as a teenager saying I was off to a nightclub in down. My mum says, where’s that? I explained she said, “Oh, that used to be The Place! I remember scoring Purple Hearts in the toilets there…” then realised what she’d just said 😆 (*) TBH I took her much more seriously after that, up til then it was kind of “what does she know?”

Way I see it, you don’t have to be an angel to tell people to stay on the straight and narrow. I didn’t decide never to smoke because of PR campaigns or great examples, it was because my mum and dad were both addicts and I just went “no ta”. And my dad’s always been a functional alcoholic if I’m honest and likewise, there’s no drink advice I’d take more seriously than his.

(* it was almost as good as when I got my first motorbike… She went absolutely radge, proper end times. Til my grandma heard, and quietly said to her “That’s how I felt, when you got yours”. FATALITY!)

Not the case here. No, I’m not dead, Mark is. Another friend managed to get into a state where crack seemed like a good idea, and that had serious repercussions for years.

It’s a funny one. I dabbled on soft stuff and drank a lot, but never wanted to try the harder stuff as the fear of losing control was too much. I was also scared I’d like it.

I also watched a friend get into speed in a big way and drop like a stone – he went from being great fun on a night out to being an utter nightmare and getting thrown out of uni in the space of a term.

I think, at the end of the day, you’ve just got to be straight. I also think going in screaming DRUGS ARE BAAAAD!!! will just make them more interesting.

Endless surveys and the direct experience of more grown-up societies, show that the shift away from (completely ineffectual) prohition towards a more mature, and liberal system of education results in a reduction in drug use, but more importantly a vast change in the detrimental effects of that drug use.

Yet here we are in 2016, still with our fingers in our ears going ‘LA LA LA WE’RE NOT LISTENING!!!!’and our aproach as a society is best summed up by this attitude

So in answer to the original question: Our government and the authorities will not only refuse to provide a sensible approach to drug education, they will actively prevent one taking place. So as parents, we’ll have to do it ourselves. Which we should be doing anyway