TEEN GIRLS USE ALCOHOL & DRUGS TO COPE

TEEN GIRLS BECOMING MORE OPEN
TO DRUGS, ALCOHOL, U.S. SURVEY REVEALS

HealthDay News - American teenage girls may be more receptive to using alcohol and taking drugs than in years past, a new report says. Girls appear more inclined than ever to reach for drugs and booze to help them emotionally, according to a survey by the nonprofit Partnership for a Drug Free America. For example, the 2009 survey of high school students found 53 percent of girls agreeing with the notion that drugs “help you forget your troubles,” up from 48 percent in 2008. The survey, which examines changes in substance use and attitudes, found the use of alcohol and marijuana jumped considerably more among girls than boys between 2008-2009. Also, fewer teen girls than a year earlier frowned on illegal drug use by their friends, and fewer considered the “party” drug ecstasy addictive, the study found. According to the research, use of alcohol by girls increased 11 percent but not significantly among boys. Among the nearly 3,300 teens from private, public and parochial high schools included in the survey, 81 percent of girls reported seeing drugs as a way to handle school stress, versus 75 percent of boys.

Only 33 percent of teen girls said they don't want to hang around drug users - a drop from 38 percent in 2008. Steve Pasierb, the Partnership's president and CEO, believes that drug use is rising, in part, because schools have fallen down on drug education as a result of budget cuts and a focus on testing. Also, he said parents have not been keeping up with shifts in teens' attitudes. To head off drug abuse, parents need to foster an “open relationship with their kids, to talk with them and find out what they're doing” because kids whose parents talk to them about drug use are more likely to resist it, said Dr. Marc Galanter, director of the division of alcoholism and drug abuse at Langone Medical Center in New York City.



Today's teen drug abusers are not just the slacker teens, but also the university students. Drug use now stems more from a pursuit of life-management strategies rather than the rebelliousness of the past. Instead of intoxicating to overcome the stress at school, they should adopt the chanting of the Hare Krishna maha mantra to purify their lives.

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US?

Millions of people all over the world have experienced the purifying potency of the Holy Names of God. During the period of the counterculture in the US in 1960s and 1970s, Srila Prabhupada propagated the congregational chanting of the Holy Names and saved thousands of young people from a condemned life of drug addiction. All over the globe ISKCON devotees who practice mantra meditation - chanting of the maha mantra Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare - everyday for two hours are easily able to eschew intoxication (of all forms), gambling, meat-eating and illicit sex, which are the primary self-destructive activities impelled by lust.

Śrīpad Caitanya Caran das (BE E&TC) :
“The Tragedy of Self-Destruction”
“The Spiritual Scientist” - Vol. 1 Issue 16.
Bhaktivedanta Academy for Culture and Education (BACE), Pune
http://www.dandavats.com/?p=3984
http://thespiritualscientist.com/