Drugs: anything not prescribed by a doctor will lead a person to being a homeless crack addict. Marijuana is such a powerful gateway drug, don’t try it even once.

Sex: is for reproduction within the bounds of marriage. And even then, women won’t enjoy it unless they’re promiscuous sinners.

Just say no

Don’t do drugs

Don’t do sex

I’m indigenous Canadian and both my parents survived residential school in the 50s. Residential school for indigenous people back then was forced on us, especially for children where they were systematically abused by Christian missionaries. Mom was not so abused but dad was terribly traumatized to the point where sex and anything sexual or remotely sexual was forbidden. Just about everything in life to him meant burning in everlasting hell. Drugs were no different but less so.

So our indigenous Christian home just dealt with it all by forbidding everything.

How did it turn out?

I have seven siblings and we all ended up with alcohol and drug addiction by the time we were teenagers. I cleaned up early and I’ve been sober for 29 years, all my other siblings never fell off the deep end (thank God) but I’m the only one who got officially ‘sober’.

I didn’t have kids but everyone else in my family did before anyone was married. One of my younger brothers picked up the slack for me by having children with four women. I have over 40 nieces and nephews, some by the family, some brought in, some married in and others illegitimate.

We’re all one big happy family … but we’re all gonna burn in hell. Lol

When I was 5, and I asked the question of where babies come from, my parents explained to me that when a man and a woman love each other very much, they produce “seeds” and “eggs” which then seed a baby in the mother, and these “seeds” are transfered through a special kind of cuddle. I found it amusing and asked, “so, people are like flowers? 🥺” (I had a phase back then where I was obsessed with flowers…)

There were anti-drug ads on TV and I asked my parents what they were about. They said that there are “bad pills which aren’t medicine”, that a doctor would say are very bad, which will make you act in a way that isn’t yourself and also ruin your health.

Man, my parents were cool as shit about this. And I think it had really good consequences for me later on, like in college.

Sex was positively viewed, but strict about protection (rightly so), and drugs were described as a spectrum with weed being very low, and the scary drugs (heroine) being very scary. They were honest about wanting me to wait for drugs and booze till I was more adult, but let me have a few parties with friends where everyone crashed at their house. It was super fun, and very badass feeling. I got to college and was like … Meh? On partying.

Definitely not the only way to go about it, but the honesty helped me weigh consequences of it all a bit better, I think.

I had to teach them :/

I remember frequently telling my mother to stop smoking, hiding her cigarettes and the like (that was in elementary school). She still smokes, I never started.

I wonder where I got that from. I don’t think we talked about that in school so early, and I didn’t have like The Talk about drugs at home.

I have the same experience as the first few commenters. These things were never talked about in my home.

How can we as a society justify refusing to educate the youth about these things and leaving them to haphazardly stumble through the same mistakes that we all made?

Use protection and don’t do drugs or nicotine. It would be nice if you abstained alcohol as well. That’s about it

I was told, by my mother who smokes nicotine, to never smoke nicotine

My folks were hippies. Did the woodstock thing and all. I grew up around them smoking pot at parties and stuff. When Nancy Reagan told us all it was bad my parents told me she was full of shit, that smoking dope sometimes was as ok as drinking a few beers and that when I moved out of the house I was free to do what I wanted.

As for sex, pretty much the same thing. Wrap your willie, wait till you’re an adult, and don’t do it here.

I’m as honest with my kids about drugs now.

One simple word. Dont.

Drugs were bad. Really no exceptions to any drugs but alcohol was OK if over a certain age. Sex was never talked about

Non-existent

We pushed “the guide to getting it on” on our children at a relatively early age and invited them to discuss, which ensured they would never, ever, ever ask us anything about sex.