Courage

After reading and looking at the anti-drug campaigns in Everything’s an Argument, I had to share my thoughts and feelings about the message the campaign is trying to convey. I believe the print ads are somewhat affective. I think they use scenarios common to people who use drugs and simulate emotions they may feel. For example, the first campaign picture on page 822 has a very common issue presented. A male and a female are in a relationship where one is a drug user and the other is scared to confront them about it. This was a large issue in my high school.
I attended a very large school, over six hundred kids in my graduating class, so you can imagine we had a very diverse group of people. One specific couple comes to my mind. I met a girl in my homeroom and over time we quickly became ‘homeroom buddies’. We talked all the time and of course we talked about our boyfriends, however, our relationships were completely opposite from each other. I dated the jock of the school, someone who took school very seriously and would never use drugs. She dated a very popular guy, but he was someone that put school on the back-burner and made being the biggest drug dealer in our area his top priority. Don not get me wrong, he treated her well, but she was still very scared to confront him about all of her concerns. She did not like him using drugs but especially selling them. Selling drugs, in my opinion and her opinion, is one of the most dangerous things you can ever do in your life. I tried to convince her, in the nicest way possible, that she definitely needed to talk to him and if he did break up with her or get mad at her for saying something, then there was something wrong with this guy. He should be touched that she cares enough for him to say something. As time went on she finally mustered up the courage and decided to say something to him. She practiced over and over with me exactly what she was going to say and how she was going to say it. She wanted to come across as caring and concerned, not bossy and controlling. She finally talked to him one night and called me right after to tell me everything. She said immediately after she said what we had practiced, he started crying. He admitted that he did not like his lifestyle and was not proud of who he had become, but most of all, he said, was that he hated having to expose her to something so dangerous. In the end, it made their relationship stronger and from the last I heard, he has not used or sold a single drug in one year.
So, depending on how you interpret the anti-drug campaign on page 822, it may just inform you about drugs and situations they may put you in, or to someone it that situation, it may give them the courage to finally speak up and stand up for themselves and the significant other they are concerned about.