Last week, it happened again. The day after a lesson about marijuana was given to 5th graders at an elementary school in Matthews, North Carolina an eleven year-old-student brought his parents marijuana to school to give to a D.A.R.E. officer and report them. D.A.R.E. stands for Drug Abuse Resistance Education and is an international education program aimed at children.
The program that began in 1983 in California has students sign a pledge not to use drugs or join gangs. The interactive in-school curriculum last ten weeks and is taught by a trained police officer in full uniform. D.A.R.E. has been criticized because follow up studies have proven it to be ineffective at best. Scientific evaluation studies have consistently shown that DARE is ineffective in reducing the use of alcohol and drugs and is sometimes even counterproductive — worse than doing nothing. That’s the conclusion of the U.S. General Accounting Office, the U.S. Surgeon General, the National Academy of Sciences, and the U.S. Department of Education, and others. DARE is being implemented in 80 percent of the United States’ school districts and in more than 43 countries around the world.
In the North Carolina case, a spokesman for the Mathews Police department, Officer Stason Tyrrell said about the incident, “Even if it’s happening in their own home with their own parents, they understand that’s a dangerous situation because of what we’re teaching them, That’s what they’re told to do, to make us aware.” Police arrested the child’s 40 year-old father and 38 year-old mother on Thursday. Both were charged with two misdemeanor counts each of marijuana possession and possession of drug paraphernalia.
They were both released after the arrests and given a date to appear in court. In response to media reporters waiting for him outside of his house, the father told them point blank,”I don’t give drugs to my kids.” When asked where his child got a hold of the marijuana he replied, “that’s no one’s business”. The eleven year old child that turned in his parents to a DARE office along with a sibling have been removed from the parents home by social services. Police report that they are staying with relatives.


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[...] See the article here: Child Turns In Parents After a D.A.R.E. Lesson [...]
This only reminds me of one thing, as bad as these parents are for not keeping their stash of pot away from their kids, thats all they did wrong, its worse that we have resorted to NAZI tactics to keep waging a war on US citizens. Seems to me history tells the story quite well, when Hitler trained his Hitler Youth, their first act was to turn any parent in that wasn’t a good German, including their own, these parents were shot in front of the kids! What are we doing to our own country, to our own citizens, to our own children and why are we letting it continue? We say we are are fighting to protect kids from the dangers of drugs and I get it I have 4 kids myself and don’t want them to die due to a drug problem, but I also don’t want them locked up or even worse shot because they have a drug problem. The simple fact is a drug addiction is a medical condition, jail or prison isn’t the proper treatment for any addict and the cops are not the proper treatment advisors. Now we also have the truth and facts and if we want to cut drug use we know how to do it because we already have. Tobacco use has been cut in half, we should be proud of that, but its how we did it that we should be really looking at. We reduced tobacco use in half but we didn’t arrest or imprison even one person to reach that goal. We did it by strict regulations, like the “We Card” program, by beefing up education about tobacco and its harmfulness and we increased the tax so people would stop buying tobacco so easy. We didn’t raid peoples home with military tactics, clog the courts with nonviolent tobacco criminal cases, we didn’t overfill our prisons with nonviolent tobacco using citizens and we never had anyone smuggling tobacco or growing it in our forests. I love my kids and Dam it I want them to be safe, It angers me so much when I can see how much more danger they are in because of our failed drug policies. The violence is because of prohibited items, we learned that years ago during Prohibition and we know what monsters can come from that, Al Capone and now the same with the Cartels. I just know as a father that there is a better way and I would much rather my kids or their friends were carded when trying to buy drugs, prevented by age like we do now with alcohol and tobacco. Instead a dealer seeks out my kids, for profit, then cops seek to arrest them, for federal drug funding and they both paint a target on my kids backs and they both carry guns and bullets. So lets stop the madness, the crime and violence surrounding drugs and take back control by strict regulation and education, teach my kids science based facts about drugs so they know the truth and don’t have to fear the drugs, the pushers and the cops in their daily lives! All I want is for all of our kids to be safe and to feel safe too, just safe from the mess we are seeing today. Forget the terrorists, its the drug war that is destroying this nation but from the inside out and as a parent I wont be a part of it any longer!
YES! And we cut tobacco in half without separating kids and their parents, and we didn’t humiliate one tobacco user by asking for them to hand over a cup of their urine for scrutiny! Thanks for this great comment. It is even longer than my post, but I know others will read it and agree. As a parent of four, you know that prohibition makes our kids LESS safe, legalization and regulation makes them more safe.
What about full disclosure by the DARE educators? Criminals are read their rights. As part of the DARE lesson. What about letting the young people knowing that turning in their parents may have a disastrous effect upon their lives.
Parents may be fined or imprisoned. The home maybe lost . Brothers and sisters may lose their home. Children may wind up as wards of the state. Brothers and sisters separated. Life will definitely be different. It may be much better or much worse. Think before you act.
That is such a great point. These kids want to befriend the officer of the program, all nice people, I am sure, but a child cannot possibly comprehend the consequences of the action, and probably think they are helping. So sad….so sad.
I agree with the first poster. This kind of s@#t makes me sick. Think of the scarring on that boy. He had his mom and dad locked up, and taken away! WTF!!!! He should receive a reward. Like a lifetime of counseling. He’s going to need it.
What the hell are these right wing nazis telling these kids to make them do such things. If that DARE stuff rears its ugly head around here, I’m home-schooling