Re:Iceland radically cut teenage drug use
by jariel on Saturday March 14, 2020 @06:11PM
(#22579098)
Particularly with respect to alcoholism, that it was quite a very long trend downward, and the fact there's only 400k people it would seem there's been a generational and fundamental change in societal attitude towards alcohol.
It means 'everyone' was thinking about it different over time, and this thinking would have manifested in a variety of policies, awareness, socialization, and probably a lot of 'indirect shaming' i.e. getting alcohol distributors to realize the consequences, bar owners taking underage drinker more seriously, police actually nabbing drunk kids as opposed to turning a blind eye. IE 'hey, we drink here in Iceland, it's normal' to 'we have a drinking problem, let's talk to our kids about it'.
We've seen a significant change in all the Western world on smoking for example, so it's no surprise they couldn't change drinking and tobacco over time.
The marijuana thing is different obviously given the more liberal attitudes in many places, but consider the supply issue in Iceland, as compared to Canada. In Canada, there are grow-ops everywhere with low-level organized crime involved sometimes (not always). In Iceland, it just maybe 'that much more difficult' to get a hold of, thereby limiting the possibility for weed to establish it's behavioural premise as 'being cool' or whatever. The critical mass might not have developed.
It's highly unlikely that 'one policy' was the deal maker on any of these issues, though surely some had more of an effect than others. For example, raising the drinking age by 2 years will have not much effect if it's a social custom to simply ignore those rules anyhow. But raising the drinking age, coupled with public awareness, with messages from law enforcement to alcohol stores saying 'we mean it, we will find out' to random checks to make sure they're following the rules whereas there were none before etc. - this will surely have some change.
I object to anything that the UN has to say about 'Children's Rights', the wellbeing of children is a function of the overall wellbeing of a society, and Iceland, like other Nordic countries, is way ahead of the curve already. Ironically, only such advanced countries would even care about what the UN has to say in the first place. The UN is a highly politicized body of people usually very far removed from any given situation and though I don't doubt their intentions, these things become entirely academic in their hands. The 'real good' they will do is in developing places which are in need of economic development, which in turn provides the basis for the wellbeing of children and all citizens and not just in terms of 'rights' but in everything else as well.
Any nation that has managed to create some kind of positive social change is probably worth studying, that there is ambiguity is fine, the facts are what they are i.e. that substance abuse of certain kinds has dropped quite a lot. That evidence is the underlying bit of credibility which makes the mystery worth solving, or at least learning from.
It means 'everyone' was thinking about it different over time, and this thinking would have manifested in a variety of policies, awareness, socialization, and probably a lot of 'indirect shaming' i.e. getting alcohol distributors to realize the consequences, bar owners taking underage drinker more seriously, police actually nabbing drunk kids as opposed to turning a blind eye. IE 'hey, we drink here in Iceland, it's normal' to 'we have a drinking problem, let's talk to our kids about it'.
We've seen a significant change in all the Western world on smoking for example, so it's no surprise they couldn't change drinking and tobacco over time.
The marijuana thing is different obviously given the more liberal attitudes in many places, but consider the supply issue in Iceland, as compared to Canada. In Canada, there are grow-ops everywhere with low-level organized crime involved sometimes (not always). In Iceland, it just maybe 'that much more difficult' to get a hold of, thereby limiting the possibility for weed to establish it's behavioural premise as 'being cool' or whatever. The critical mass might not have developed.
It's highly unlikely that 'one policy' was the deal maker on any of these issues, though surely some had more of an effect than others. For example, raising the drinking age by 2 years will have not much effect if it's a social custom to simply ignore those rules anyhow. But raising the drinking age, coupled with public awareness, with messages from law enforcement to alcohol stores saying 'we mean it, we will find out' to random checks to make sure they're following the rules whereas there were none before etc. - this will surely have some change.
I object to anything that the UN has to say about 'Children's Rights', the wellbeing of children is a function of the overall wellbeing of a society, and Iceland, like other Nordic countries, is way ahead of the curve already. Ironically, only such advanced countries would even care about what the UN has to say in the first place. The UN is a highly politicized body of people usually very far removed from any given situation and though I don't doubt their intentions, these things become entirely academic in their hands. The 'real good' they will do is in developing places which are in need of economic development, which in turn provides the basis for the wellbeing of children and all citizens and not just in terms of 'rights' but in everything else as well.
Any nation that has managed to create some kind of positive social change is probably worth studying, that there is ambiguity is fine, the facts are what they are i.e. that substance abuse of certain kinds has dropped quite a lot. That evidence is the underlying bit of credibility which makes the mystery worth solving, or at least learning from.