DRUG AND ALCOHOL ABUSE

More than one-third of our young adults currently use illicit drugs. The use of illegal drugs has grown to such proportions that it has "become a national crisis".

Drug and alcohol abuse is "an illness that has touched countless lives and families all over the world."

"It is the unsung war in my country 'Malaysia' in America and other countries all over the world".

There is no visible enemy to attack.
There is evidence of dying, the injured, or bombed-out buildings. "This enemy destroys from the inside-out".

"This enemy is self-inflicted and self-destructive."

The victims of this war are - men, women and children. Alcohol and drugs have eaten away their self-respect and destroyed the character. They are not physically dead, "but nevertheless they are dying within, a death of degeneration".

They become incompetent and lay lame in the arms of an uncaring society.
This illness is like a plague the has spread from child to child, adult to adult. The symptoms are related to... apathy.

The users lose interest in work, achievement, pride of self, and or country. They lose human dignity. They live in a state of depression and confusion when "artificial 'high' has died." Their thought and desires are driven by unfulfilled habit, the need to feel 'high' again.

"Today man is pursuing unrestrained sense craving. These pursuits drags man's mind into a gutter."

This war is unsung because it has a stigma - the stigma of shame and failure. Parents, teachers, priests and minister "often hide the illness when it touches their families, schools, or congregation." To sing out is an "announcement to the world that perhaps they have failed."

"These people are the character builder", the role models, of our nation. They feel responsible for the decline and decay of character that is self-evident in our country today. No individual, supportive of moral values wants to see the destruction of morality "that is associated with drug and alcohol abuse".

As long as we support the habit through silence, greater members of people become victims.

"More than one-third of American young adults currently use illicit drugs."
"More than five million American currently use cocaine."

The U.S. Surgeon General estimates the member of young people under 18 who are involved regularly with some form of illicit drugs to be in the millions.

Malaysian adults currently use illicit drugs keep on increasing, has grown to such proportions that it has become a national crisis. It is a hidden habit.

The welfare of the nation ultimately depends upon the quality and nature of individual.

Therefore, reforming the individual is of primary importance. Reforming the individual has two aspects:

First: "Weed out the evil thoughts and bad habits"
Second: "Cultivate good habit".

Who is responsible for this illness in Malaysia?
America or any other countries?

Moms, dads, brothers, sisters, uncles, and aunts, the Malaysian family, the American family or any other family. This excludes no-one.
We share this responsibility equally because it is destroying our world family.

"CONDEMN THE WRONG AND EXTOL THE RIGHT AS SOON AS YOU NOTICE EITHER
IN YOUR CHILDREN; THAT WILL SETTLE THEM ON THE STRAIGHT PATH".

Please remember!

Drug and alcohol abuse is a plague. "It doesn't choose or select its victims". No one is spared because they're a good parent, go to church, go to mosque, go to synagogue weekly, attend good schools, religious, or live in a certain location. It spreads to every household.

"It's like the darkness of night and falls on every home".

It is painful to watch someone destroying themselves. Who wants to admit their child has a serious problem, has broken the law, or injured another?
Parents only one the best for their children and "looking at our child's mistakes automatically requires self analysis". Reluctance or refusal to do the latter is often the barrier that keeps the closed on the facts.

Please note:

"Drug are deceptive, debilitating and dangerous, and they have deleterious consequences".

I repeat again...
"It is painful to watch someone destroying themselves."

When it is your child, the pain is intensified. For a mother, it is unbreakable. A mother's life is devoted to caring for the needs of her child and solving their problems. If the child has a bodily injury, one applies soothing medication and love.

But how does one help when their child grows-up and dosen't want it?
A home should be a place where you can rest from the turmoil and negativity that exist in society. The atmosphere should be somewhat harmonious and "filled with love, peace and understanding".

The purpose of our home "is to strengthen, renew, refurbish and refresh" us so that upon rising each morning, we can face the world with equanimity.

"It is possible for a single individual alone to achieve peace? If there is chaos and unrest all around you, how can you alone have peace? If there is no peace in the home or in the community, how can you have peace? Your peace is dependent on peace in family, in the society, and in the world".

You cannot be indifferent to the state of the environment in which you live. One who wishes to dig a well for pure water will choose a spot far from polluted or saline areas. If you want to achieve peace, you have to see that the atmosphere around you is conducive to peace.

This means that you have to cultivate the feeling that your individual peace is intimately related to the peace of the world.

Currently every home is in a turmoil, everybody is unhappy and would take their feelings out on everyone at home. Everybody prayed for it to become a loving home, filled with peace. And everybody knew this world be a reality someday. But my advise is, "please don't wait - do it now, redress and correct your family now," don't wait... "We live in instant society".

"We have instant cameras, instant food, instant news, even instant marriage and divorce".

Today, uncontrolled living habits and unrestrained social behavior are extolled as signs of freedom. It is really only freedom to slide down into the animal behavior from which man has arisen.

Spend your time in good company. When we make an inquiry as to what is the meaning of good company, we will come to understand it by saying that it is friendship with good people. You may ask what is the benefit that we will get out of such good company? "Man's good as well as bad features receive their final shape when he mixes with other members of the society". If you spend your time in bad company and wander about the streets like stray dogs, whistling like foxes, you will only be wasting your life... Please note! "Time wasted is life wasted".

The future of the country depends upon the condition and quality of the students. Students may be described as the very roots of the nation. Therefore, we must pour water of the divine force into the very roots. Students may also be compared to the creepers bearing flowers. If we allow these creepers to grow as they please, they grow in a wild and disorderly manner without beauty and symmetry. Therefore, we must prune each creeper so that its shape may be beautiful and it may not grow in a wild fashion without any beauty. The beauty of life depends upon our good habits. The period of student days is so sacred and most important in life.

So, the students must be disciplined in their minds and habits and must fill their minds with pure thoughts and try to enforce and put into practice all those good thoughts in day-today life and in their day-to-day activities. Only then can they attain the right stage of development.

"A better quality of life is much more than the material standard of living." Our children need a safe environment to live in.

Love must be regulated and directed by intelligence and discrimination or else it may cause even injury and defeat.

Please follow this advise:

"If someone in your family needs help... Get it!"
"If someone in your family needs to be informed... Do it!"
"If your child's behaviour is suspicious... Investigate it!"
"If your neighborhood is promoting prevention... Support it!"

Remember!... "If you hide addiction... IT STAYS!"

It is significant to note that drug trafficking have "even surpassed international oil trading as money spinner and is second only to arms trade".

The lucrative trade in drugs has made its distribution widespread and caused serious sosio-economic problem in both developed and developing nations. Drug traffickers are in fact known to be using complex corporate structures and dealing in intricate business transactions involving banks, trust companies, financial institutions and real estate firms.

"THE PROBLEM OF DRUG ABUSE"

During the early 1960s, the 'hippie' subculture swept the West making a deep impact on human civilization. A typical 'hippie' was seen as a young unkempt person wearing gaudy coloured casual clothes and long hair, advocating freedom of thought and expression, and rejecting many of the conservative standards and values of society... Smoking cannabis (ganja) was their favourite form of drug abuse.

Our local youths copied this lifestyle to a certain extent. Although with hindsight, we can say that the hippie movement did have some positive effects, its permissiveness paved the way for the greatest scourge mankind has even known: "Drug Abuse".

When drugs are abused, the result can be devastating - for the abuser, for those who care about him or her, and for society at large? Dependence on commonly abused drugs has become one of the leading public health problems. The escalating drug toll is quiet unacceptable... In terms of "wasted lives, distabilized families, and rising crime rates, quite apart from the high costs of funding research programs, rehabilitation centres and specialized law-enforcement agencies."

The severe harm addiction causes the human body and the difficulty of overcoming the problem are beyond doubt.

Repeated use of drugs can cause the user to become dependent on them. Physical dependence on a drug like heroin, for example; is characterized by increasing tolerance to the drug - that is, the user has to take ever larger doses in order to achieve the same degree of drug - induced euphoria, or 'high'. And this of course makes the withdrawal symptoms, (the often severe physical reactions the user may experience when denied the drug) much worse. Traditionally, drug addiction has been defined as physical dependence.

Today, the term drug addiction usually refers to a behavioral pattern marked by compulsive use of a drug and a preoccupation with getting it.

"Drug abuse" has been rated as "one of the world's greatest enemies". Society has ascribed the cause of this scourge to the moral degradation of our youths who have strayed from their normal family home environment to be enticed by influences outside the home. "Many use drugs as a means to escape from unhappy home situations."

Parents who are too busy to attend to the social and spiritual needs of their adolescent children often neglect them to the extent of driving them to seek solace in drug addiction. The lack of proper parental guidance and supervision and the low regard for values of life, such as morality and spirituality has to a large extent contributed to this negative state of affairs. Many addicts began with no intention what soever of becoming addicted but they were sadly mistaken when they became enslaved to the habit.

Drug abusers invariable progress on to hard drugs and 'mainliners' live under the perpetual threat of an overdose. The common habit of sharing needles to 'fix' or inject drugs into one's body system by hard-core 'mainliners', is "one of the principle causes of the spread of AIDS" now threatening the country.

According to reports a vast majority (98.8%) of addicts are men, with more than 80% of them aged 20 and 39 years. More than 41% of addicts cought the habit because of peer pressure, 36.8% were seeking pleasure on their own initiative, while 15.6% took drugs out of curiosity. Others became addicted to overcome mental stress (40%), as a result of medical treatment (1%) by accident (0.4%) and (0.1%) as sexual stimulant.

How can parents tell if their in the adolescent age group (12 to 21 years) are on drugs? Millions of parents are quite rightly concerned about this problem and worry about the appeal of drugs to youngster.

What they are obviously concerned about is illicit drug use? Your suspicious that one of your children is involved in drug-taking may be aroused by an unexpected change in his or her behaviour patterns. He or she may appear confused, have slurred speach, become aggressive, paranoid or depressed, suffer weight loss, display red eyes, drowsiness, reveal declining performance at school, etc.

If face with irrefutable evidence, it is best not to over dramatise the situation but to get the help of trained counsellors who will best know how to handle the situation.

"The worst action, would be to deny that the problem exists."


"ALCOHOLISM"

The term 'alcoholic' is hard to define exactly since people have different reactions to alcohol and the way they use it. It usually takes 10 to 15 years of drinking five or more drinks a day (less for woman) for a person to develop what might be called the full alcohol syndrome - that is, a state of physical dependence with serious damage to health and social relationship. In essence, alcoholism is not measured by the amount of alcohol consumed, but rather by the way a person uses alcohol to deal with life's problem, and its effects on one's physical well-being.

Alcoholism is a chronic illness which manifests itself as a disorder of behaviour. It is characterized by the repeated drinking of alcoholic beverages, to an extent that exceeds customary social customs.

Chronic alcohol abuse can damage all vital organs in the body. One of alcohol's most damaging effects is on the brain and mental disorders.

Pubs have mushroomed all over towns and are luring our youths to indulge in the drinking habit. Certain undesirable shows are known to take place in pubs and discos contrary to the license issued to such establishments exposing to the risk of the premises being raided by the police.

For person in the lower rungs of the social scale, toddy provides the much needed solace for them to relax. Quite a number of them however imbibe the brew in excess and as a result become drunk and boisterous thus creating domestic violence at home.

Many from the low income group also indulge in drinking 'samsu' distilled from rice. But what worries the authorities is the consumption of cheap illicit 'samsu' (distilled under most unhygienic conditions) by unwary drinkers, leading to many cases of death, that had occurred arising from drinking such toxic brews.

To experience worldly pleasure there must be an external object or partner but to gain mental happiness, it is not necessary to drink alcohol.


From Empty Hands,
A. Rahman bin Mahadi
Labis, Johore

02 OCTOBER 2010

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