Discuss to what extent young people ‘say yes’ rather than ‘say no’ to drugs?

“There is no single age group of people more affected by alcohol and drugs than young people.” (dependence.inc, 2015) Youth culture is extremely affected by drugs nowadays, many adolescence suffer a high dependence in drugs, either in hard ones or soft ones “More than 23 million people over the age of 12 are addicted to alcohol and other drugs”. (dependence.inc, 2015) In the past drug consumption in young adults was linked to bad behavior in relation to criminal acts, it was something that was linked with subcultures. Nowadays it has to do more with liberty and freedom of choice, except of being problematic it has become recreational and some drugs have become more normalized in the youth culture.

“Normalization is a multi-dimensional tool, a barometer of changes in social behavior and cultural perspectives, in this case focusing on both illicit drug use and users.” (Parker, 1998, p. 943) In general there are two types of classes which drugs are grouped in, these ones are class A and class B. Class A also known as hard drugs includes: heroin, cocaine, crack, ecstasy, MDMA, LSD and psilocybin mushrooms meanwhile class B contains the soft drugs, which are: speed (amphetamine), cannabis and Ketamine. However there is another class, which is class C where drugs like Paracetamol or Ibuprofen can be found. This are the drugs you can go and buy in the store or in any pharmacy and are sold to you, some of them with prescription from doctors and other with out. We cannot also forget about the legal highs also known as NPS, this ones fall into 3 categories, which are: synthetic cannabinoids, pills and powders and nitrous oxide. In contemporary culture class C are the most normalized drugs whereas in the youth culture not only class C is the most normalized also class B and in some cases even class A. “As expected, cannabis is the key drug” (Parker, 1998, p. 957) in youth culture the most normalized drug is cannabis. Users that consume heavily amounts of drugs in class A or B are categorized as ‘junkies’ or criminals, also as people who are marginalized from society.

Depending on the country some heavy drugs are seen as legal while others are extremely prohibited. Different rules apply for different drugs and their consumption. In Holland cannabis is considered legal meaning that it forms part of group C of the drugs and is more normalized. People can easily smoke a joint in a cafeteria while eating cake and its normal to see 18 years olds rolling a marijuana cigarette. Meanwhile in Portugal in 2001 the consumption of some types of heavy drugs is permitted. This was created due to that they wanted to bring the marginalized people back to society, “Use and possession for use are now only administrative offenses; no distinction is made between different types of drugs (hard vs. soft drugs) or whether consumption is private or in public.”(Mirijam Van Het Loo, 2020).Nevertheless in most of the European country the only drugs permitted are the ones in group C and sometimes cannabis but only if its by prescription of a doctor. In general there are three main causes while young adults start to take drugs, these are: peer pressure of friends or family, famous role models and rebellion, such as disobeying what the parents say.

Peer pressure can be sometimes a good thing but for example in some experiments of peer pressure during young adult life, “peers were seen as encouraging misconduct less than other types of behavior.” (B. Bradford Brown, 1986) One of the big causes why teens start to try new drugs is for the acceptance of a group or of someone in particular. Nowadays adolescence and in this case millennials are always seeking for approbation and normally the approbation of the public viewers. They are all about the likes and the views their post gets and if a post of them smoking a joint or consuming any drugs gets them more likes then they are going to put more pictures and videos like that to seek attention and approbation from their own generation, at this moment teens are all about hash tags and views. Additionally people find it funny seeing babies act as adults and there are many videos in the Internet of toddlers insulting their parents, and even some of them make babies hold a cigarette just for content. So it’s not only the teens normalizing drugs by spreading all over the Internet that it is normal to consume them and in some cases even cool, the parents are also normalizing it.

Famous people who are role models to many adolescents also generate a great impact in the consumption of illegal drugs. When someone has a role model the subject or in this case “The person identifies and will seek to approximate the behavior and values of a peer, a parent or public figure” (merton, 1949, pp. 302-303). Contemporary artist have always had an effect on their followers and their fans are always trying to peruse their attention or try to be like them. In this generation trap and rap music is very popular in the youth culture, many adolescence listen to Drake or Cardi B worldwide. However this sort of music comes with its own style, gangsta style. American urban rap contains lyrics that have to do with heavy drugs and having a good time wasting their money in them. Most of these singers not only consume them but they advertise them in their own video clips, letting all of their fans see what they do with them, some of these new contemporary era rappers have even songs drugs like the song Young, Wild & Free by Wiz Khalifa that talks about smoking marijuana and having fun making it like something normal to do.

Another important key feature that plays a massive role in the consumption of drugs in young adults is rebellion, the disobedience of parents. It’s like challenge and daring the authority. Some teens consume drugs just to get the parents angry its like they where punishing them, like showing them what a bad son can be and what is he capable of doing. Anyhow some adolescents just consume drugs to get their parents attention, normally bad behave kids are the ones that haven’t been educated properly due to the absence of paternity. By doing ‘bad stuff’ they get their parents fool concentration for themselves.

In conclusion “Normalization are: access and availability, drug trying rates, rates of drug use, attitudes to ‘sensible’ recreational drug use by adolescents and young adults, especially of non users, and the degree of cultural accommodation of illegal drug use.” (Parker, 1998, p. 944). With the introduction of the Internet in this modern era drug abuse not only has increased but there are also new drugs for teens to experiment with. Normally it was seen as something linked to subculture and poor people or marginalized people where the ones to consume it, but nowadays times have change is seen as something more recreational that all teens from different social groups can experiment and play with it. Finally due to the fact that is more recreational and linked to development of society place like “The United Kingdom has the highest level of dependent drug use and among the highest levels of recreational drug use in Europe.” (Reuter, 2007, p. 7) Except of Romania, which is one of the least developed countries in Europe.

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