Posted on 03/24/2003 10:31:15 AM PST by MrLeRoy
CHAPEL HILL -- He’s a local high school student who gave his name simply as "Bob." Bob said he started drinking when he was eight. In recent years, he said, if he wasn’t high, he was trying to get high.
Bob said he had used cocaine, tripped on LSD and other hallucinogens, and spent hours soaring on ecstasy, which he said he easily found at many area high school parties. When nothing else was available, he explained that he got intoxicated with common household substances.
Once, he described using a plastic bag to inhale Freon from the back of an air conditioner. In a matter of seconds, he recalled, he had collapsed to the ground in convulsions.
Moments after his release from the hospital, he said he was, again, trying to get high.
Bob might be unusual in the lengths he has gone to get intoxicated, but experts and parents say he isn’t unique. He is not the only area high school student who has spent a significant part of his life using alcohol and other drugs, they say.
"I honestly believe we have truly reached the phase that we’re talking about a drug epidemic," said Linda Hammock, a substance abuse counselor at Chapel Hill High School. "I find myself regularly joking about what must be in the water around here."
Hammock estimated that 70 to 80 percent of the area’s high school students are using alcohol and other intoxicants on a regular basis; 30 percent are smoking, drinking or otherwise getting intoxicated often enough to affect how they function.
"Some of these kids are very, very bright," she insisted. "They’re white, upper and middle class kids who are bored."
They also aren’t concentrated in any one area high school. An increase in drug abuse has also alarmed Ruby Bugg, Hammock’s colleague at East Chapel Hill High. Bugg said that after years of lagging behind, drug abuse among students at her school has caught up with the situation at Chapel Hill High.
"Every year, we see an increase from the year before," Bugg acknowledged. "But this year, I’ve had as many discipline referrals in two and a half months than in the whole semester last year…I’m seeing an even greater increase in the number of referrals from students for themselves and their friends."
This increase in teen drug abuse hasn’t been lost on Chapel Hill police officers.
Matt Sullivan, an officer in the department’s crisis unit, said that in his experience alcohol and marijuana are the drugs of choice for many adolescents. But a large number of teens are also using so-called club drugs like ecstasy and gamma-hydroxybutyrate, or GHB, which Sullivan said is used to get high rather than in its more sinister incarnation as "the date rape drug."
From what Sullivan has seen, even the most exotic of these drugs are more readily available than parents suspect.
"There is a vast network — an underground network," he explained. "It’s certainly not coming from street dealers."
Bob said dangerous drugs have been traded right under the noses of parents and other authority figures. Even hard drugs like crack, he claimed, are bought and sold on school grounds, out of book bags or lockers. Bob asserted that a wide selection of traditional and designer drugs could be found at a typical high school house party.
"When you go to a party, you see your friends talking, drinking and having a good time," Bob said. "Everyone there has a buzz or is trashed off their a-- and everyone is happy as hell."
Unlike Bob, most local teens don’t betray any outward sign of drug use, say authorities.
More typical of young substance abusers is "Charlotte," a name given by an unassuming 15-year old with wide, curious eyes and plastic novelty bracelets wrapped around her arms. Charlotte said she had used drugs regularly here since she moved from another state less than a year ago.
"The only drugs I’ve done are alcohol and pot," Charlotte said. "When I moved here, I was the only girl in a group of guys , and I always got offered pot and alcohol."
Charlotte said she entered Alcoholics Anonymous after her parents learned about her drug use, and she is now starting to realize the effect that alcohol and marijuana had on her life and her performance in school.
A teen can normally sniff out BS faster than a dung beetle.
BUMP for common sense!
Relegalize drugs for adults, thus giving sellers an incentive to not sell to kids---namely, the risk of losing their legal adult market.
Also the parents of kids who drink illegally, shoplift, commit vandalism, etc., etc. What a goldmine!
Sure. Turn public schools into boarding schools, make all children wards of the state upon birth, and send "parents" nice letters with photos periodically, like they do with those poor kids Sally Struthers is trying to help.
Well, that certainly explains half the Liberalism out there...
It is a failure.
To have any chance of success, they need to reduce demand. Hit 'em where it hurts: in the wallet. Seatbelt usage went up when they levied fines for noncompliance. It's time to start ticketing users, too. Bigtime.
Start by setting and publicizing the new rules. Then, ensure uniform enforcement. The system is not working when one judge will levy a $25 fine, "and don't get caught again, okay?!" while another will throw you in the pokey for 30 days or a year, depending on her time of the month.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.