Dear Abby October 3

[Sharnita]

So what its ok for kids to talk to strangers now?  Because I'm pretty sure when I was a kid as strongly as the "don't smoke" message was drilled into my head, the "don't talk to strangers" message was drilled in more.  Sheesh.

I do think the kid was being disrespectful.  Yes he was honest too - people shouldn't smoke - but adults are allowed to make individual personal bad choices, and that should be respected over generalities.

They don't teach the "Don't talk to strangers" thing anymore.  Kids would be quiet while the bad man was hauling them off because the other people nearby were also strangers.

I think don't talk to strangers was always stressed for when kids were alone I'm not sure this kid was.

[gen xer]

 My oldest daughter once told an adult that he shouldn't smoke and started in on how bad it was....but I cut her off and took her aside to teach her about not admonishing adults.  She was a little confused because of all the anti-smoking media out there but it is rude for a child to correct an adult.  Period.

It is rude for an adult to admonish another adult as well.  My MIL had the nerve to chastise a smoker at a family gathering - telling her to "think of her child". 

I don't like smoking either but smokers KNOW the health issues.  They don't need to be told by sanctimonious do-gooders.  If they want to quit they will quit.

As fars as talking to strangers...well of course my kids can talk to strangers.  They have simply been told not to go off with them.  I refuse to raise paranoid, skittish kids who are afraid of everything and everyone.  Personally I hate when I see small children cowering behind mama bears skirts while their helicopter mom proudly says she has taught them never to talk to or trust strangers.  Not the childs fault either.

Rant over.

[Shea]

I can easily see a small child, at that age where they haven't yet developed a brain-to-mouth filter, blurting out the lesson about smoking he'd learned in school. It doesn't make it okay, but it is understandable. If a parent/caretaker was in earshot, s/he should take the child aside and tell him that yes, smoking is bad for you, but it's not polite to go around telling random adults that. Grown-ups have the right to do things that aren't good for them, such as smoke, and the fact that it's bad for them isn't news.

I wonder if the kid had been subjected to the DARE program (is that still a thing?) or something similar. We had DARE when I was in elementary school (late '80's/early '90's) and they basically told us that drinking a beer or a glass of wine made you an alcoholic, smoking so much as a single cigarette would kill you, and just THINKING about consuming weed or other illegal substances would cause you to become addicted, homeless, criminal and die a horrible lonely death. I, and a lot of other kids, became concerned that our single glass-of-wine-with-dinner-drinking parents were on the verge of becoming abusive, violent alcoholics, because the program failed to draw lines between moderate drinking for grown-ups and alcoholism, as well as to distinguish between, say, beer or cigarettes and crack or heroin. It's ridiculous, scares kids, and leads to stuff like the kid in the letter.

[readingchick]

I wonder if the kid had been subjected to the DARE program (is that still a thing?) or something similar. We had DARE when I was in elementary school (late '80's/early '90's) and they basically told us that drinking a beer or a glass of wine made you an alcoholic, smoking so much as a single cigarette would kill you, and just THINKING about consuming weed or other illegal substances would cause you to become addicted, homeless, criminal and die a horrible lonely death. I, and a lot of other kids, became concerned that our single glass-of-wine-with-dinner-drinking parents were on the verge of becoming abusive, violent alcoholics, because the program failed to draw lines between moderate drinking for grown-ups and alcoholism, as well as to distinguish between, say, beer or cigarettes and crack or heroin. It's ridiculous, scares kids, and leads to stuff like the kid in the letter.

Didn't DARE also imply that prescription drugs were bad? I seem to remember that lecture too....or maybe I'm mistaken?

[Shea]

I wonder if the kid had been subjected to the DARE program (is that still a thing?) or something similar. We had DARE when I was in elementary school (late '80's/early '90's) and they basically told us that drinking a beer or a glass of wine made you an alcoholic, smoking so much as a single cigarette would kill you, and just THINKING about consuming weed or other illegal substances would cause you to become addicted, homeless, criminal and die a horrible lonely death. I, and a lot of other kids, became concerned that our single glass-of-wine-with-dinner-drinking parents were on the verge of becoming abusive, violent alcoholics, because the program failed to draw lines between moderate drinking for grown-ups and alcoholism, as well as to distinguish between, say, beer or cigarettes and crack or heroin. It's ridiculous, scares kids, and leads to stuff like the kid in the letter.

Didn't DARE also imply that prescription drugs were bad? I seem to remember that lecture too....or maybe I'm mistaken?

I don't remember that, but it's entirely possible. It's been awhile for me since DARE. My parents didn't smoke cigarettes or do illegal drugs or even get drunk, but they did (and still do) have a glass of wine almost every evening, so that's what I remember most. Fortunately, my parents were able to explain to me that adults were allowed to drink alcohol, and drinking it in moderate amounts is fine and doesn't make you an alcoholic. I trusted them more than the DARE instructor, so I believed them.