I don’t know. I just find it so hard to be understanding.
We teach our children that drugs and alcohol are bad things, right? We tell them that these things could kill them, in big or little amounts, depending on how your body reacts to the substance. But after long term use, you’re doomed. Well, that’s what I tell my kids anyway.
Generally speaking, most of the kids don’t listen and stupidly try these things. Typical kid behavior, right? Superman complex, the whole lot of them! They all think they are immortal and impervious to bodily destruction or death.
Many are lucky. They experiment. They even overdose and roll around in their own foam and vomit. But they live. There by the grace of God, right?
Then there are those stories. All over the news.
This one “accidentally” overdosed on sleeping pills, after he/she had taken too many uppers and couldn’t sleep.
Or…
That one snorted too much cocaine and took a lethal dose of prescription pills, washing it down with a WAY too much alcohol.
They make these killer cocktails ON PURPOSE. BUT…it “accidentally” kills them.
It’s horrifying, yes. Absolutely.
I feel so sorry for their families that have been left behind.
But I find that I am left scratching my head in sheer amazement. Because, these kids didn’t accidentally take the pills mixed with the drugs mixed with the hard alcohol. It wasn’t like, oops, I swallowed my entire bottle of pills by mistake. And wowzers, I drank it down with that fifth of tequila that was sitting out on my counter. Oh zoiks, I didn’t mean to snort all those lines of coke. And I probably shouldn’t have taken some tokes off that fatty.
It was done quite on purpose.
And the amounts and dosages that were taken? What did they expect would happen? That they’d wake up with a little hangover? But no biggie, they would just start their shit again that night?
They had to have known this stuff would kill them eventually.
Every single day in the newspapers or on television, there are stories of people committing “accidental” suicide.
This is just a major duh factor to me.
And I really, really hope my kids aren’t that stupid.
I’m just going to add my 2 cents here which is, in a society where everything is about feeling good and excess (ie. mom and dad poppin’ happy pills while racking up huge debts on their plastic for all the best shit) why is anyone surprised that kids are doing drugs in excessive amounts and shocked when they die? Why is it even news? Feeling good, instant gratification and excess is practically bred right into children these days. Do I feel any compassion for people who OD or get alcohol poisoning? Hell no. I ‘accidental’ an appropriate word?
Well, I’ve seen a guy’s heart flop around in his chest at a rave because what he thought was pure Ecstasy was not. I’ve survived my own dirty E, excessive alcohol and weed OD when i was 20. If I had died, yeah…it would have been an accident. I didn’t set out to kill myself that night and that kid didn’t expect to die when he took a pill. So the term accidental, I don’t have a problem with. It like being in a car accident that’s your fault and you die. You didn’t set out to die that day but you decided to be stupid and video yourself while driving for a vlog, crossed the line, hit a car head on and died. Ooops! Accident.
It’s stupidity, period.
No, you don’t lack compassion any more than I do or anyone else. You’re right. They ARE stupid. They do this sort of thing to themselves and they do it on purpose. They are selfish brats who don’t care about themselves or those they leave behind. But it’s still a pity that young lives are wasted so. It’s still a pity that there is an element in our society willing to profit from their stupidity. It’s still a pity that we can be enlightened enough, as a country, to realize that this stuff is going to happen – has ALWAYS happened – and that it should be legalized and controlled so that the criminal element can no longer profit and addicts can get treatment for their addiction once they realize the folly of their ways. or not. But either way, they can live their lives within the law and society can deal with them as PEOPLE, not criminals. Rant over.
I too feel bad for their family, and even worse, children left behind, but you are absolutely, 100% correct on this one. How am I supposed to teach my kids this when it’s all over the news that it was an accident? Well, kids, accidents happen, sometimes you swallow the 75 pills with a bottle of vodka before you realized that their were 75 pills there and that the vodka wasn’t water. Read and count carefully! Sooo frustrating
Wow. I have so much to add to such a discussion, having been one of those kids, but this here is a comment, and it would read more like a novel and quite frankly, it’s all a matter of opinion anyway.
Accidental. Some of them. Sometimes it isn’t. And as a parent you may never know the damned difference.
Because my parents had NO CLUE I did drugs. No CLUE I was a drinker. And I did this for YEARS and started very, very young. They never had a damned clue and the only reason they know after the fact is because I told them.
But I do know, every day, just how lucky I am.
DH was watching television the other night and I happened to walk through the room…the TV screen showed a group of overprivelaged prep-school kids (think NYC Prep) sitting around a coffe table with a large brandy snifter (big/large/huge brandy snifter) into which they were all dumping their prescription pills. They were then downing handfuls of pills – mixture grips from the snifter – with glasses of wine/shots of tequila. I was instantly horrified.
And terrified.
I misspelled “over-privileged.”
I hate MISSPELLING things! I can’t imagine how I would handle Pineapple on a serious, drug-induced teenage bender. :S
Sometimes, it just happens. Sometimes, it’s on purpose. But having been one of “those kids”, I can tell you that my parents knew and didn’t give a SHIT about it. So sometimes, it’s not always black and white.
I think Huckdoll summed it up best for me, honestly.
I will never understand it myself either. But I certainly have my fears. Especially for my daughter. There is a fair share of addiction in her genes.
Just say no! HAHA