I tried googling for lies told by DARE, but it's hard to find anything more substantial than third-hand accounts on Yahoo answers or something (that cop said if you smoke a joint, you might DIE, dude!!!) What little I did find [1] makes me think that the information they gave was substantially true, or at least probably true. For example, there's the strong connection between drug abuse and crime, something any policeman or apartment landlord could confirm for you. You can probably dig up some example of a lie they did tell, but all I'm saying is that, by-and-large, it was true.
"One positive experience" with drugs could, indeed, have wrecked my life, but that one experience would never happen and could never happen. The reason is that I wouldn't have done it, pushy friend or no, because I believed what the adults in my life were telling me. Parents, teachers, and DARE officers all said substantially the same thing, and when only idiot kids were telling me different, weighing the relative trustworthiness of those groups was not especially difficult.
There's nothing arbitrary about this. It's called sound reasoning, and part of it is not taking reckless risks. There's a common myth that kids are incapable of it, but I suspect that the truth is closer to them choosing not to practice it.
"One positive experience" with drugs could, indeed, have wrecked my life, but that one experience would never happen and could never happen. The reason is that I wouldn't have done it, pushy friend or no, because I believed what the adults in my life were telling me. Parents, teachers, and DARE officers all said substantially the same thing, and when only idiot kids were telling me different, weighing the relative trustworthiness of those groups was not especially difficult.
There's nothing arbitrary about this. It's called sound reasoning, and part of it is not taking reckless risks. There's a common myth that kids are incapable of it, but I suspect that the truth is closer to them choosing not to practice it.
[1] http://mic.com/articles/92675/the-5-big-lies-that-d-a-r-e-to...