Are you afraid of the Grim Reaper?
Effective alcohol education is pragmatic, and stresses safety over scare tactics. We were intrigued, if not a bit frightened, to learn of the drastic measures taken to scare teenagers into (they think) refraining from alcohol-related activities. Beyond the classroom lessons instructing teens of the dangers of “demon rum,” one company has taken scare tactics to a new level. A costumed ”Grim Reaper”removes one student from class every 15 minutes. Next, a police officer reads an obituary that has been written by the “dead” student’s parents. The program also includes a simulated traffic crash, hospital overnight retreat, and – even better – an audio-visualization of every student’s death.
Drunk driving is a problem with which we need to grapple; however, the solution does not rest in scare tactics. In order to see results, we need to emphasize the need for safety, and encourage moderation, not prohibition.
December 3rd, 2007 at 11:32 am
Such scare tactics aren’t new. In the late 1800s, the Women’s Christian Temperance Union used to send representatives to classrooms to scare them about the dangers of drinking alcohol (the WCTU was a leading organizer in the movement to ban alcohol, and temperance to them really meant abstinence).
The WCTU rep would conduct an experiment before the children, pouring alcohol directly onto the brain of a dead cow or sheep. The alcohol would immediately turn the brain grey. The idea was to scare the kids so they wouldn’t drink alcohol at all, even though the experiment was scientifically without merit.