Your classmates are dead.....ok, they aren't

[Traditional_Ale]

Originally Posted by J pold

What do you base that on? That is a very broad statement do you seriously think that no one can comprehend the consequences of drunk driving until they are exposed to those consequences themselves?

My friends and I don’t drink and drive ever we didn’t need someone to pull a horrible prank to get the point across

Good for you and your friends for not being a statistic.

Unfortunately, the numbers show you're an extreme minority. So in a way, you're giving the "average person" way too much credit.

[MarchHare]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

Good for you and your friends for not being a statistic.

Unfortunately, the numbers show you're an extreme minority. So in a way, you're giving the "average person" way too much credit.

Source please.

I have a very, very hard time believing that people who don't drink and drive are the "extreme minority". In my experience, youth today are just as educated about the dangers of drunk driving as they are about the dangers of smoking.

[Bobblehead]

Tough one.

I recall back in my High School days, there was a standard "don't drink and drive" presentation we had to attend, and everyone was suitably somber.

Then that weekend, the student who had arranged the entire thing was out, had a few, and drove. No, nothing bad happened, not even a ticket. But I do recall thinking how much of a hypocrite that student was, and wondering what it would take to get people, especially teenagers, to actually change their actions.

Everyone knows DD is very, very bad. It still happens. Same with smoking, and other things. People know they shouldn't, and yet they still do.

I don't think the ends justify the means, but so far the ends aren't being achieved.

If the choice is between presentations like this or accepting that a certain percentage will always drink and drive, what choice should be made?

[MaDMaN_26]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

I'm a hardliner because until one sees their brother (or mother, sister, father etc etc etc) clinging to life on tubes with staples holding their head together (or insert other horrible circumstance here) they could not possibly understand the ultimate price of the ultimate selfish act of drunk driving.

As horrible as a prank like this is, it is nothing compared to the real thing.

I have no intention of trivializing the real thing or minimizing your personal tragedy, and I'm truly sorry for your loss.

And I agree a one hour "prank" (for lack of a better word) is of course nothing like the real thing. But it is still an evil and intentional thing to do to a group of people and not the right way to do it.

I had a few people like your self who had experienced a tragedy within their family or personally come to my school and speak, show pictures and just talk openly about the devastation it had on their lives. I remember one guy was wheel chair bound and was the drunk driver... those messages still ring true today and I remember those days at school when so many other days have faded into one. We as students walked away somber and thoughtful, not laughing at it or making fun. It was an effective message. This "prank" was a headline grabbing stunt that didn't care about collateral damage as long as it got out a message, and the fundamental reason why MADD is an extremist group and will never get a penny of support from me. When I was in high school my drama class wrote and directed and acted in a play where my character had gotten AID's due to a transfusion and we dealt with the many stereotypes that were associated at the time with the disease all the while there was a underlying theme of drinking and driving, in the end my character was alive and well while his former best friend was dead from drinking and driving. The feedback we received was extremely positive and everyone said it made them think heavily about drinking and driving... hopefully it made a few kids stop and think before actually doing it too. There are other ways to get the message across I have experienced and been a part of a few. MADD's latest attempt is sickening.

[Traditional_Ale]

Originally Posted by MarchHare

Source please.

I have a very, very hard time believing that people who don't drink and drive are the "extreme minority". In my experience, youth today are just as educated about the dangers of drunk driving as they are about the dangers of smoking.

I think you misunderstood.

I'm not suggesting that people who do not drive drunk are an extreme minority.

I'm saying that given the statistics about how many drunk driving fatalities there are in Alberta alone, I would suggest that the entire severity of the act and its consequences cannot be appropriately impressed upon without some very blunt and arguably harsh methods.

Gimme a minute to find the Alberta numbers...

[Ford Prefect]

Originally Posted by MarchHare

According to wikipedia (consider the source), the woman who founded MADD in 1980 resigned five years later because the organization as a whole had shifted its focus from fighting drunk driving to a more prohibitionist stance.



Emphasis added.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothers..._Drunk_Driving

That's interesting ... I didn't know that (acknowledging the source isn't 100% reliable). Wasn't MADD involved in some kind of financial controversy lately too? Maybe money, power and a do-gooder creed isn't such a great mix. Then again money, power and a do-no-good creed is a recipe for organized crime. I guess the common denominators (money and power) lead to corruption or a hijacked agenda, at least in many cases.

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by Ford Prefect

That's interesting ... I didn't know that (acknowledging the source isn't 100% reliable). Wasn't MADD involved in some kind of financial controversy lately too? Maybe money, power and a do-gooder creed isn't such a great mix. Then again money, power and a do-no-good creed is a recipe for organized crime. I guess the common denominators (money and power) lead to corruption or a hijacked agenda, at least in many cases.

http://www.nupge.ca/news_2007/n04ja07a.htm

The Health Sciences Association of Alberta (HSAA/NUPGE) has ended its association with Mothers Against Drunk Driving Canada (MADD) after a Toronto Star investigation concluded that only 19% of donations go to its primary cause. The remaining 81% is gobbled up by fundraisers and administration.

[CaptainCrunch]

Ask the state of california how well their scared straight program from the 70's worked out in reducing crime.

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

As horrible as a prank like this is, it is nothing compared to the real thing.

That's not a rational approach to the problem.

I am sorry for your loss.

[Traditional_Ale]

Originally Posted by Gozer

That's not a rational approach to the problem.

I am sorry for your loss.

Thankfully (and miraculously), my brother lived.

The tactics described in this thread are (imo) a rational approach to an irrational problem.

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

Thankfully (and miraculously), my brother lived.

The tactics described in this thread are (imo) a rational approach to an irrational problem.

I respectfully disagree.


(and thank goodness)

[Traditional_Ale]

I guess my angst comes from the fact that in life we all have to deal with so much tragedy as it is already.

Friend of mine lost his father to cancer in a few months. From perfectly healthy to gone before he turned 18.

A mother of friends from childhood recently commit suicide.

Hell, not even related to me, that quintuple homicide in the north.

Drinking and driving causes the same pain and greif, except that it is entirely preventable, where as things like cancer and suicide are a fact of life.

[Matata]

To loosely quote Neitzsche: Any organization thats goals are unattainable, eventually becomes bloated and trivial.

[Gozer]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

I guess my angst comes from the fact that in life we all have to deal with so much tragedy as it is already.
.
.
.
Drinking and driving causes the same pain and greif, except that it is entirely preventable, where as things like cancer and suicide are a fact of life.

Stupidity is part of life too.

I think everyone needs more respect for everything - this is going in the wrong direction.

[Save Us Sutter]

I knew a girl a few years ago who's mother was killed by a drunk driver when she was 14.
This girl's father bought her a car when she was 20.... a car that was soon routinely driven by this drunken girl and/or her drunken friends.

Probably not too common a situation, but what I'm trying to say is that even those people who experience the tragedy first hand are not above acting like stupid, irresponsible morons.

Now, this deception at the school. While it may have been quite traumatic for the kids, it's probably not going to effect those kids' future behaviour. Which means, IMO, it caused a lot of hurt for no significant gain.

As someone else said asked, why is it these groups are so committed to their "awareness campaigns"? Is there really anyone out there old enough to drive who doesn't understand that drinking and driving is freakin' ######ed? Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think so.

The problem is, the only times in your life where you're actually confronted with making a decision to drink and drive... well... YOU ARE DRUNK. Duh. Now what have we learned about decision-making skills and alcohol???

The people that are fighting this cause are just throwing all this money down the "awareness" tube and it is clearly not working. They need to find a way to target the drunk guy who is trying to decide if he should risk the 20 minute cruise back home or wait 30 minutes and pay 20 bucks for a cab. Free cabs, all-night buses, I don't know what the solution is, but it's ideas like that that need testing/funding, not MADD and their scare tactics and their 81% administration fees.

What about more roadblocks in downtown areas? I didn't see a single roadblock in downtown Calgary last summer and I don't think I've ever really seen one here in Halifax. It won't catch everyone, but it IS a deterrent to that guy standing on the corner with his keys in his hand.

Anyway, my 2 cents.

[octothorp]

This strikes me as bordering on pavlovian cruelty: reckless, perverse, and likely ineffective. You've given extreme short-term emotional trauma to hundreds of kids, apparently without any sort of scientific study to understand firstly the effectiveness at actually changing behavior, and secondly, the long-term psychological effects of such trauma.

When there's a tragedy at a school, especially a loss of life to several students, the school-board doesn't rush in a troupe of hotcops and J. Walter Weatherman to tell them that this is why you don't drink and drive, you don't play with firearms, etc. Instead, they bring in counsellors. They don't treat it as a chance to change behavior until much later, when they can pay close attention to how students are coping. The emotional damage in these first hours after a tragedy can last for a lifetime, and is not to be taken trivially. And here they are dispensing that trauma like a cheap new medical drug, like they found a way to take those kids huddled together outside Columbine and bottle that reaction, and dismiss any notions of side effects by saying 'oh, well it wasn't real.'

If I was a parent and they did this to my kid, I can't even imagine what I'd do. Well actually I can. My first concern would be to talk to my child, and if there's even the slightest sign that they're internalizing it or having trouble coping, I'm taking them to a councellor who has experience with trauma in youths, and then recommending to other parents that they do the same. And then after that, I would go after the school and the police so hard. People need to lose jobs over this.

[Save Us Sutter]

Originally Posted by octothorp

And here they are dispensing that trauma like a cheap new medical drug, like they found a way to take those kids huddled together outside Columbine and bottle that reaction, and dismiss any notions of side effects by saying 'oh, well it wasn't real.'

If THIS doesn't make people see how wrong MADD was, nothing will.

Excellent post octothorp. Just a great way to word it that really drives home what I (and I imagine others) were thinking.

[chris lindberg]

I think maybe a program where the drunk would have an option to take a cab home with the option to pay at a later date if needed, that way there there would be no excuse to drive home drunk, well besides picking up your car the next day, the other part would be stiffer penalties like doing some jail time and losing your license for 20 years on the first offense, 2nd offense, 5 year prison term and lose driving license for life, third offense maybe life prison sentence.

[yyc]

Dont like this idea at all, pointless shock for little if any reward.

D&D is wrong but we cant stop it, time to look at alternatives like putting in huge insurance reductions for people who put in a breathalizer disabler in there own vehicles. most drunk driving comes from "ill have a few" but end in 12 beers and poor desicion making. I dunno but there has to be a better way then turning our kids into a bunch of tweaks from southpark.

[Flashpoint]

I think they should just tell those kids that anyone who drinks and drives will be forced to sign an organ donation card and given a free motorcycle.