HOME | POLITICS | SPORTS | LIFE | SCI/TECH | OPEDS | HELPFUL TIPS
|
Jan. 3, 2005 The ability of people to ignore the crimes that are being committed around them is nothing short of amazing. It sickens me to watch my peers purchase drugs for use at parties, to hear 14 year old girls talking about how they got stoned and went home with a man they don’t know, to see people I care about torn from side to side by marijuana. I have been driven to physical illness over the idea that people – members of my own family, even – are so complacent in the face of this crisis. I write using the anger that is boiling in the pit of my stomach. I will not stand for this anymore. Children, minors, engaging so freely in marijuana use while adults, people who can stop it, do nothing. I heard it best when it was stated bluntly, “It’s their life, let them do what they want, involving yourself in it will only lead to trouble.” I could not believe this. I was utterly stunned and amazed, pushed to the very brim of self control. How can we expect things to change when the people who should be acting are not? This is not about someone’s right to live life as they see fit, it is about someone committing a crime and not being punished because people who could greatly help clean things up simply do not see it as being worth their time. They do not see these parties, their ranks filled with underage drinkers and budding drug addicts, as places where they need to concern themselves. “Teenagers make stupid choices,” someone told me the other day. Well, I have never engaged in this kind of stupidity. I was insulted by that comment. The time has come to stop all of this apathy and take a stand. I was told that, if I turned someone in for selling, transporting and using cocaine, that it would not be in my best interest, and that they would tie up litigation. I could not believe what I was hearing: a crime is not worthy of being punished? Is there no one who is willing to take a stand for what is just and right and be willing to fight for that? Is there nothing more important than the lives America’s youth? When one is fighting a battle against a crime that so many see as being a personal flaw, a mistake, something that one outgrows, it is always hard. As a young child I had always wondered why drug use was so prevalent, why nothing seemed to stop it: this is why. This is why. The people no longer wish to help the community – it is about what is best for them over all, the individual ruling over the public good. Any high school student knows at least one or two drug users, and if not can count themselves as very lucky. It is far more common for a high school student to know several drug users and even an occasional dealer than it is for that student’s parents to even acknowledge that drugs exist. It seems to be that willful ignorance of reality that shields parents from having to accept that this is an epidemic, a crisis of amazing breadth and depth. It is no longer a personal problem. It is a violation of the law. I was raised to believe that justice is necessary for those who have committed a wrong. To hear from my own parents that it would not be of any benefit to anyone to drag before the courts this laundry list of offenders: dealers, users and transporters alike, makes me ill. What kind of morality is there to stand for – what kind of order is there to keep – if people back down from the most basic actions of a concerned citizenry? With or without support, at whatever risk to myself, I will step up this fight. I will use the wheels of justice and our courts to remove as many offenders as I can from our schools and from our streets. The only way we can hope for change is if we are strong enough as individuals to fight for the decency of our nation. If we sit back and allow this to continue, how can we ever – how can anyone ever – have faith in justice again? ------------ About the author: Max Burns is a 17-year-old Democrat with moderate, centrist ideals. He blames John Kerry's 2004 loss on John Kerry, and is authoring a pamphlet on how to refine the Democratic Party for Victory in 2008 and beyond. For more information, check out The New Democrat. Read the fantasy-fiction novel "Alcardia". Email: DeMBurns@gmail.com Tell a friend about this site! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
||||||
|
|
|||||||
|
