Reflective Parenting
By: Rabbi Yakov Horowitz
Purim, and The
Search for Yossi
“The more often and earlier a child smokes,
drinks and
uses marijuana, the likelier that child is to use harder
drugs like cocaine and heroin.”
“It’s all about children. A child who gets through age 21 without
smoking, using illegal drugs or abusing alcohol is virtually certain never to
do so.”
“Teens who smoke cigarettes are 12 times
likelier to use marijuana and more than 19 times likelier to use cocaine”.
- Joseph A. Califano, Jr., CASA Chairman and President
I like Joseph Califano
– although I never met him. I admire his dedication, his courage, and his brutal confrontation of the facts on the ground.
He heads The Center for Alcohol
and Substance Abuse (www.casa.com). The Center, now celebrating its 10th
year, has dedicated itself to the prevention of substance abuse and its
horrific consequences. The ubiquitous, “Parents; the Anti-Drug” ads are a
direct result of the research and public advocacy of CASA, under the leadership
of Joseph Califano.
Please take a moment and read the
mission statement of The Center. Then read it again. And
again. Then carefully study some
selected quotes from a speech given by Mr. Califano.
And, during this Purim season, as
hundreds, perhaps thousands, of our precious children are being introduced for
the first time – under the guise of one of our most joyous yomim
tovim, and under the direction of adults who should
be modeling more responsible behavior – to the deadly scourge of cigarettes and
alcohol that bring addiction and death to our children; ask
yourself, “Where is Yossi Califano???”
Where is the Jewish leader who will step forward, call a spade a spade and
address this issue? Who will break through the denial and apathy and stop this
insanity of the exponential growth of smoking and drinking among our dear
children?
·
Inform Americans of the economic and social costs of substance
abuse and its impact on their lives.
·
Assess what works in prevention,
treatment, and law enforcement.
·
Encourage every individual and institution to take responsibility
to combat substance abuse and addiction.
·
Provide those on the front lines with the tools they need to
succeed.
·
Remove the stigma
of abuse and replace shame and despair with hope.
Quotes from a speech given by Joseph Califano.
“This year, The
“We are proud of our accomplishments. But
we know that there are many mountains to climb before we can rid our nation of
this scourge that has cost so many billions of dollars in health care, social
problems and criminal conduct and that has imposed so much private anguish on
families and children.”
FIND AND REPLACE
Microsoft Word has some pretty
amazing features, many of which we now take for granted. One of them is ‘find
and replace’. You select a word in a document, and order the computer to
replace all of those words with a different word that you select.
I think that the time has come
for us to write our own mission statement – or hire our Yossi
Califano to write it for us.
We can, however, get started on
our own, thanks to Bill Gates and Microsoft. Let’s replace Americans with Jews,
and institutions with shuls and yeshivos,
then add a few words. Here is a rough draft. Please
drop me an email at jp@rabbihorowitz.com with any edits.
·
Inform Jews of the economic and social costs of substance abuse
and its impact on their lives.
·
Assess what works in prevention, treatment, and law enforcement.
·
Encourage every individual, ba’al simcha, shul and yeshiva to take
responsibility to combat substance abuse and addiction.
·
Provide those on the front lines with the tools they need to
succeed.
·
Remove the stigma
of abuse and fear of ruined shidduchim
·
Replace denial,
shame and despair with hope.
EIFOH YOSSI???
Truth be told, we do have Yossi Califanos in our Orthodox
world. They have been speaking to us. We just have not been listening.
Their names are Rabbi Abraham Twersky, s’hlita, one of the most
visionary and courageous people of our times, David Mandel, CEO of Ohel, Dr. Bentzion Twerski, among others. For years, (and in
the case of Rabbi Abraham Twerski, decades), they
have been acting as the prophets of our times – standing in the village squares
and begging us to listen to them. It is high time that we do.
We all need to follow the actions
of Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb of the OU, and their recent stand on ‘Kiddush
Clubs.’ We need to get serious about curbing alcohol and cigarette use and
abuse in our schools.
PURIM AND HALACHA
As for the ramifications of Purim
and the concept ‘ad d’lo yoda’:
From a standpoint of halacha and minhagim,
there is absolutely no basis for smoking of any kind as it
relates to Purim.
As far as alcohol consumption is
concerned; I am not a posek, so I will not offer my
thoughts as to the mitzvas hayom
of ad d’lo yoda. I am also
aware of the various minhagim among our diverse klal, and the importance of maintaining our minhagim.
I would however, encourage each
of my readers to ask their Rov for guidance and
direction on this matter – just as they would ask any other halachic
question. And when we do ask the question, let us ask:
·
Should we be drinking?
·
How much?
·
How about our children? At what age should they be drinking?
·
Is there another way to fulfill the obligation of ad d’lo yada
Regardless of your thoughts on the
‘Indian shaitel’ issue that surfaced a number of
months ago, it was inspiring to see thousands of women humbly following the Da’as Torah of their Rabbonim.
Now it is time for the men to step forward and ask our rabbonim
and gedolim how Purim should be conducted according
to the letter – and spirit (no pun intended) of our Torah.
More in next week’s column. In the meantime, here are some
results of the voluminous research commissioned by CASA.
SOME FACTS ON TEEN DRUG ABUSE
(taken from the research of CASA)
·
Alcohol is far and away the top drug of abuse by
·
Children under the age of 21 drink 19.7 percent of the alcohol
consumed in the
·
Teenagers
who drink are seven times likelier to engage in promiscuous activity
·
Preliminary
studies have shown that alcohol damages young minds, limiting mental and social
development.
· High schoolers who drink are five times likelier to drop out of school.
·
Teens
who experiment with alcohol are virtually certain to continue using it. Among
high school students who have ever tried alcohol--even once--91.3 percent are
still drinking in twelfth grade.
·
Teen drinking is the number one source of adult alcoholism.
Children who begin drinking before age 21 are more than twice as likely to
develop alcohol-related problems. Those who begin drinking before age 15 are
four times likelier to become alcoholics than those who do not drink before age
21.
Rabbi Horowitz
welcomes your comments and letters on this column. He can be reached at jp@rabbihorowitz.com
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Rabbi Yakov Horowitz is the founder and Menahel of Yeshiva Darchei Noam of Monsey, and the
founder and Program Director of Agudath
He is a popular lecturer on chinuch and parenting topics in communities across the world, and is the author of several best-selling parenting tape sets. To sign up for Rabbi Horowitz’s weekly parsha email; for more information on Rabbi Horowitz’s published articles, tapes, or to schedule a speaking engagement in your community, please visit www.rabbihorowitz.com