School Projects

All of these projects and activities are intended to raise awareness -- and questions -- about one's own style of psychoactive consumption, and to improve community discourse about Psychoactive Management, in terms of a richer and more consistent vocabulary, less denial, and more freedom and imagination in discussing The Five Rules. I wish to de-emphasize the idea of "changing the world" through these projects. It is too much of a burden, and too much of a distraction, to get students thinking that something they are doing is going to make a huge difference in other people or in the community. I consider The Five Rules to be something more like personal hygiene, than community improvement. Of course, if everyone is paying attention to his or her own health, the community is going to be better off. The point of getting students involved with other people outside the class, is more to encourage them to practice Rules 3 through 5, than to get them to change other people's thinking. The distinction between private and public viewpoints is fascinating. Hmm, that could be another project.

Another consideration, about "changing the world," is that it is human nature to want to share newly acquired insights and skills, and some people become obnoxious in doing this. Plato said that it was a mistake to teach philosophy to young people, because they act like puppies, tactlessly and overly enthusiastically tearing away at other people's ideas. Another part of this list discusses that problem explicitly.

1. The Five Rules Project

   Students discuss, in the classroom, how they follow, or don't, the Five Rules of Psychoactive Management. The person guiding the discussion participates in it, sharing their experience and vocabulary.
   In most of these projects, students could be encouraged to query people with whom they are participating, whether "clued in" fellow students, or members of the "as yet unclued in" public, about the other person's Psychoactive Management Style (next topic) after sharing some facts about their own styles.
   
   
   

2. The Quarterly Psychoactive Management Style Survey

   There are 32 ways to violate or follow the Five Rules of Psychoactive Management, thus there are, as it were, 32 different consumption styles. One can ignore 1 and 3, for example, or 2 and 3, or 2, 3, and 4, and so on. The number of possibilities is two to the fifth power. How is that figured?

   Think of the numbers lined up, and various Rules "on" or "off" in a binary way; so we could have 0, 1, 2, 3... 31. For example, if 1 and 2 are on, 3 and 4 are off, and 5 is on, the binary equivalent is 16+8+1=25. In the following table, "y" means that rule is followed, and "n" means it is not.

   Actually, in addition to the 32 combinations of yes/no responses to the various rules, we have the option of not even considering the rules because one is simply not consuming at all (total abstinence). Consequently, we would have to consider that an "n/a" (not applicable) category. That would mean a total, then, of 33 management styles. Since I want to use numbers to categorize these, and have the numbers correspond to a binary interpretation of yes/no regarding the Five Rules, I'm assigning 0 to 31 to the combinations, and letting 32 be "n/a". There's one, slightly unfortunate consequence of this choice, which is that one will then be tempted to say that a non-consumer has a "32nd degree Style," which has a perhaps overly favorable connotation, as it suggests distinguished stature in some organizations, or might imply a non-consumer is "above others who consume," but that's not my intention.

   Here's an example, from a D.A.R.E. essay, of an abstainer's position:

   Mr. McGuire said in our D.A.R.E. essay we had
   to have a pledge that said we would be drug and
   alcohol free until we were the legal age. So here we go:
   I pledge on my honor to be drug and alcohol free.
   I will not take a beer when offered
   or be pressured into smoking anything.
   At school I will surround myself with non-users,
   and after school avoid smoke houses and gangs.
   These things are threats to my health and life.
   My friends and I will always help
   each other remember to fulfill our pledges.
   

   
   So, 0-31 will be the Psychoactive Management Styles, and 32 will apply to non-consumption.

    Style 1 -- 1n 2n 3n 4n 5y (Comment:
     Actually, this seemingly could not
     be the case, as it would seem that
     "including non consumers among those
     mentioned in rules 3 and 4" would
     imply *following* rules 3 and 4.
     But bear in mind  that Rule Five is
     a stance, or attitude the consumer
     is taking, being willing to include
     non-consumers.  It might be, in fact,
     that the reason the consumer is not
     practicing Rule Four, say, is that
     they *do* endorse Rule Five, and are
     not willing to talk at all about
     side effects with others, because
     they think of doing that *with* non-
     consumers. So, there could be
     circumstances in which one is "in
     line with" Rule Five (albeit in a
     limited, almost vacuous sense),
     although not practicing Three and
     Four.  Furthermore, one might be
     unable to practice Rule Five, 
     having no access, at a particular
     time, to non-consumers, yet they
     could be described as having Style 2
     (or 9 or 17 or 25), even though they
     are temporarily unable to practice a
     rule they endorse; and the  same 
     should apply to Rules Three and Four,
     in case they are temporarily hard to
     practice. Of course, this could lead
     to further discussion, like whether
     one's being unable to practice a
     Rule, should disqualify them from
     having a Style including that Rule 
     describe them, but that's another
     issue, and, as I do not like
     prolonging discussions (discreet
     cough), I'll stop here.
   
   Style 2 nnnyn
   3 nnnyy
   4 nnynn
   5 nnyny
   6 nnyyn
   7 nnyyy
   8 nynnn
   9 nynny (see Comment for Style 1)
   10 nynyn
   11 nynyy
   12 nyynn
   13 nyyny
   14 nyyyn
   15 nyyyy
   16 ynnnn
   17 ynnny (see Comment for Style 1)
   18 ynnyn
   19 ynnyy
   20 ynynn
   21 ynyny
   22 ynyyn
   23 ynyyy
   24 yynnn
   25 yynny (see Comment for Style 1)
   26 yynyn
   27 yynyy
   28 yyynn
   29 yyyny
   30 yyyyn
   31 yyyyy
   32 non-consumer; rules are n/a

   So, a novice (or someone contemplating consumption, at the level of Rule One) could put consumers in one of 32 categories. It could be an interesting project for K-12 students, quarterly (at the start of each season) polling fellow students and peers, siblings, parents, teachers, administrators, and other grown-ups, regarding caffeine, sugar, chocolate, nicotine, and alcohol. Forms could be distributed, explained, and collected by the students, and filled out (or ignored) privately, but the community would be encouraged to at least listen to the students explaining the survey, whether they fill out the forms or not. This would educate the form-filler-outers. College students could include nicotine and alcohol on the survey, and do correlation studies relating various styles, styles in combination, personality traits, stress, private vs. public consumption, various group settings, cognitive dissonance, etc. A positive side effect would be learning something about binary arithmetic!
   
   
   

3. The Letters to the Editor Project

   Students write letters to the editor of various publications in town, giving opinions, asking questions of readers, and so on. This would be an individual thing, not done as a mass class exercise such as some schools do with an aim to lobby people in authority. The aim would be simply to get the letter published, and keep an eye out for responses to the letters that appeared, and keep a class scrapbook.
   
   
   

4. The Letters to Prominent People Project

   1) Students write letters to authorities in various fields having to do with psychoactive consumption, such as judges, police, pharmacists, doctors, nurses, restaurants, movie theaters, supermarkets, and so on, asking their opinions on various issues related to Psychoactive Management. The aim is to get letters back from these people, not to pressure them to vote in a certain way, or to persuade them to have an opinion one way or another. It would be an information and opinion collecting effort. Results could be published in The Psychoactive Management Weekly Reader, with the permission of the respondents, of course.
   2) Similar letters could be sent to the mavens of etiquette, ministers, Bill Bennett (co-author of The Book of Virtues), and other leaders in fields of etiquette and proper behavior, asking similar questions.
   3) Similar letters could be sent to personalities in the entertainment or political areas, regarding how they see their role as models of behavior, regarding their psychoactive consumption. 3) The respondents could be encouraged to give their opinions on how to improve awareness of the Five Rules of Psychoactive Management, and possibly how they, themselves, practice the Five Rules, perhaps even going so far as to categorize their own Style (0 - 31, above), and their opinions on how one ought to model the Five Rules to other people.
   
   
   

5. The Raised Eyebrow Project

   Very slight changes in body language or motions of body parts, such as a raised eyebrow, or change in tone of voice, can communicate strong messages. Students will research in library resources, in talks by invited experts in communication and body language, and in observation of people around them (a certain number of recorded examples being required, from various social settings), the various behaviors by which messages of etiquette and other controls are conveyed. This also applies to the way in which strongly dependent psychoactive consumers convey approval or disapproval for feedback offered about their consumption. The purpose of this project is twofold. (1) To raise awareness among students of the subtle behaviors involved in social control, both (A) involuntary and (B) voluntary, and (2) ways to confront such behaviors if and when they deem them inappropriate, in polite ways, respecting the fact that those who are manifesting them, may not know they are doing it.
   
   
   

6. The Etiquette Project

   (Related to the previous suggestion, insofar as corresponding with experts in the field of etiquette is concerned.) Students discuss problems of etiquette that come up when there's a need to confront someone else whose psychoactive consumption is becoming a problem to themselves or others. Many times students who learn "facts about drugs" go home and lean on their parents in a rude and unproductive way. That would be one of the first points to cover, in *any* program or project about Psychoactive Management. This is related to the Feedback Project.
   
   A little background for the etiquette project. It must be kept in mind that someone's putting something into their body is a very personal activity, and when what they are putting in, is something that will literally alter who they are, at least temporarily, and perhaps permanently, this is a deeply personal activity. Why don't we normally notice this? Because consuming psychoactives is so common, and because it is usually done according to some kind of ritual or ceremony, even if there isn't a big show about the ritual or ceremony. For example, the way a cigarette smoker will (perhaps) tamp the pack on a table before pulling out a cigarette, the way their eyes move while it is being lit, or how they may hold someone else's hand while the other person is lighting it, how they shake or knock the askes off, the angle at which the cigarette dangles from their mouth, and so on. Think of pictures you've seen of Franklin D. Roosevelt smoking, how the cigarette was at a "jaunty angle." (I've searched for an hour on the Web for a picture, but evidently the politically correct people have seen to it that they've been deleted. Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of things called "politically correct" as a derisive phrase, that should be taken seriously. But abolishing photos of Roosevelt's cigarette holder isn't one of them, IMHO).
   
   (Meanwhile, back on the track...) Personal activity. Yes, consequently, one ought to be very courteous and use tactful expressions, listening reflectively and with deference, when disagreeing with someone else's Psychoactive Management Style, no matter how sloppy, inconsistent, harmful, dangerous, disrespectful, or disruptive it seems. And this is not to suggest that any of those terms necessarily apply; yet sometimes they do. Nevertheless, psychoactive consumers are doing something intensely personal, whether they recognize this or not, so it behooves us to treat that activity with respect. Remember that when you point a finger, the thumb is pointing back at you, and it's possible that, when admonishing another psychoactive consumer, your own practices may put you at odds with your admonishions. Admmonishings. Admonishments. Whatever.
   Furthermore, someone used to consuming psychoactives, is very likely going to discover that they provide alternatives to dealing with emotions, and get into using them for that reason; so it is likely that, if you are admonishing someone for their psychoactive misuse, as you see it, that you are at the same time stepping on some toes in another area of their life, which you would choose not to intrude upon, such as, possibly, bereavement, anger, fear, or other strong feelings. Many people, for example, use psychoactives because they believe (sometimes correctly) that they will lose friends if they abstain. Confront them about their consumption, and you are threatening their support of a circle of friends.
   
   A further reason for discussing etiquette, is that society's expression of expectations and prohibitions in the realm of etiquette, are far stronger than those in the realm of law. That is, conveying that a certain act is rude, to the perpetrator, is more likely to dissuade that behavior, than conveying that it is illegal. I believe that society ought to control psychoactive misbehavior through etiquette, rather than through legal restraints. I'm thinking of a scene in a Woody Allen movie, where he sneezes and blows a quantity of cocaine powder all over the room. Someone doing that is not as likely to be invited back to a party where cocaine is the dominant psychoactive, nor is someone who tends to knock over wine glasses, likely to be invited back to dinners where wine is served, nor someone who drops cigarette butts on the carpet while they are burning, and so on. These are extreme examples. Lesser examples are dealt by more subtle communication than outright exclusion or ostracism. (See The Raised Eyebrow Project.
   
   
   

7. The Market Survey

   Students collect information on companies selling psychoactive products, and put together a bar graph showing percentage of such sales in terms of GNP or other economic measures, and rank such sales in a general context. For example, Consumer Reports reported decades ago, that tobacco, alcohol, and two stomach-problem OTC medications, accounted for the top ten advertisers. Perhaps those products were also tops in sales.
   
   
   

8. The Space Program

   Er, "The Space Project," that is. People in different cultures keep a certain < a href=" http://www.edupass.org/culture/personalspace.phtml">distance from one another, in everyday social interactions. In Phase One, students collect information from a hundred or so observations of people about town, as to whether mutually consuming a psychoactive is associated with a closer distance than when that is not the case. (My hypothesis is that mutual consumption is associated with a closer distance.) Then (Phase Two) they discuss what might produce that result, and possibly go out and interview another hundred people on why they think this is so. This is essentially a consciousness raising project, and exact numbers are not required; that is, students don't have to carry a tape measure around with them during Phase One.
   
   (An extremely detailed analysis of this idea of distance is here. I just got back after getting very bogged down. Caveat browser.) (Here's another one.)
   
   
   

9. The Advertising Project

   1) Students collect information on where recreational psychoactives are advertised, such as on billboards along the highway, ads in sports stadia, on the backs of magazines (just about all magazines have alcohol or tobacco ads on the back page), newspapers, and so on.
   2) Students write letters to advertisers whose ads promote, or depict, psychoactive consumption, asking which of the Five Rules they consider important, and why or why not, and ask if they intentionally are recommending that, say, Rule Two not be followed, in depicting someone casually or thoughtlessly consuming psychoactives in their advertisements. Only advertisers who depict psychoactive consumption in their ads, would be contacted, for example an ad showing someone drinking a particular brand of coffee.
   3) Similarly, students could write to a movie company, if a particular brand of psychoactive were shown in a movie, or a particular style of consumption, or a particular type of psychoactive substance. Or to tee-shirt manufacturers.
   4) Students analyze the advertisements, going into such topics as to whether the ad is challenging the observer, for example in the way that anti-smoking ads challenge young people by implying they are not old enough to smoke, and whether the ad seems to intentionally distort or ignore important information, for example by saying that a product has a low percentage of nicotine, but fails to point out that one might smoke that product harder to get one's accustomed dose, thereby consuming more of the product.
   
   
   

10. The Psychoactive Focus and Rituals Project

    Students think of examples of how psychoactive consumption is at the focus of many activities, or is an integral component in activities, for example beer drinking contests, or alcoholic beverages used at power lunches to impair the other guy or gal, to gain a business advantage (students are encouraged to ask grownups for examples, of course), or used in other ceremonies, for example at holidays (toasts), and so on, and how rituals are involved in psychoactive consumption, like one person lighting another's cigarette, or offering chocolate, or taking chocolate; Japanese tea drinking ceremony, British 4pm (GMT) tea drinking ceremony, communion with wine, and so on. The idea here is to raise awareness of how psychoactively oriented rituals pervade the culture. This is related to the "Party Time Project" and the "Happy Holidays Project".
    
    
    

11. The Paraphernalia Collection

    Students collect various examples of psychoactive paraphernalia, and mount them on a display board, showing for example coffee cup and saucer, beer mug, sugar bowl, pipe cleaner, coffee pot, cigar cutter, humidor, lighter, stein, ash tray, sugar spoon, wine glass, tumbler, whisky bottle, case of beer (this one might be hard to mount on a display board), box of chocolates, tea cozy, parfait glass, sundae boat, rolling papers, cigarette holder, shot glass, fire extinguisher (which should be mounted somewhere in the room anyway). Students discuss whether a given item of paraphernalia helps, or hinders, practice or awareness of the Five Rules. For example, a tumbler was originally a glass with a round bottom, designed to fall over when not being held, which encouraged the drinker to empty it (swallow all its contents) before he could lay it down if he or she wanted to leave the bar for a moment, or if she or he wanted to open his/her wallet or purse, and so on; this would encourage violations of Rule Two.
    
    Digitized pictures of the paraphernalia could be at a section of the Web page.
    
    
    

12. The Meme Project

    Students collect examples of memes, such as jokes, paraphernalia, and so on, which transmit various attitudes about psychoactives, and then are asked to come up with other memes, which promote awareness of the Five Rules, or other concerns they have. Even if a student were to come up with a pro-use meme, such as are used in advertisements, this would be a good idea, as it would call attention to advertisements which have, or attempt to have, memes. This project has five aspects:
    (A) Promote awareness of memes already in the culture, having to do with Psychoactive Management, and
    (B) Demonstrate that memes are often unconscious things, not launched by design by, say, advertisers, and
    (C) Focus attention on positive values in the area of Psychoactive Management.
    (D) Develop awareness that memes can be used to cover up something, or camouflage it, as well as promote it-- As jokes about poor Psychoactive Management might cover up the presence of an inappropriate need for consumption, for example a need engendered by persistent consumption, which drives up one's tolerance. (See The Rule Two Camouflage Project.)
    (E) Create memes that spread Psychoactive Mangement, for example, a movie-GIF file which shows how tolerance builds when consumption increases. Movie-GIF files are easy to transmit and could even have "collector value" like Pokemon cards or beer cans. A meme-contest could make this project itself a meme (hmmm... not sure about that use of "meme").
    (F) (OK, six purposes) Promote awareness that ideas, once generated, have a life of their own, and don't "belong" to the generater. For example, one criticism of Psychoactive Management's view (my view) that "addicts foster enabling behaviors" is that addicts don't intentionally foster enabling behaviors. I agree with this; yet I believe our behavior as addicts (and I am one of them) (and who among us is not? If any of you is not, you may cast at the first stoned. Sorry, I couldn't resist) focuses other peoples' attitudes and choices in such a way that enabling occurs. After that happens, the enbling develops its own logic and the addict, who unintentionally memed his or her significant others, goes his or her merry way, benefiting, as it were, from what he or she spawned.
    
    
    

13. The Rule Two Camouflage Project

    For upper grade classes. Have a team of students write to sociologists asking if they think the massive, worldwide incidence of violations of Rule Two is partly the result of a conspiracy, although at an unconscious level, of high-level consumers who are heavily dependent on their consumption, promoting high level consumption in their social circles, and thereby fostering support for high level sales, which of course is simply an ordinary marketing phenomenon -- But in no other markets that I can think or, except perhaps in a culture endorsing potlatches, is wasteful consumption endorsed to the degree that this occurs in the area of psychoactive consumption. Looks to me like it might be a "camouflage conspiracy" and I'd like the opinions of a lot of sociologists. There may be other "forces" afoot, at least processes that encourage the camouflage of high level consumption, for example fruitless debates about whether this or that chemical ought to be legal, or whether extra penalties ought to be associated with impaired driving. As long as dead-end debates like those are taking up the vital free time of the informed citizenry, discussion of more important Psychoactive Management issues is bound to be prevented.
    
    
    

14. The Penny For Your Thoughts Project

    Students in teams of five or more (for support and protection, carrying cell phones) stand at a Metro (subway) entrance, or other place of high traffic flow, with a sign saying "A Penny For Your Thoughts" and conduct an opinion survey, paying each participant a penny. They ask questions like,
    1) When you use something to feel good, like chocolate or alcohol or tobacco or some other psychoactive, do you consider getting the same experience without using it?
    2) When you choose to use something to feel good, do you usually use as little as necessary, or as much as possible?
    3) When you consume something to feel good, do you talk over with others, how well or badly it's working, before, during, and after, on an immediate and long term basis?
    4) When you consume something to feel good, do you talk over with others, your reasons for doing it, what contexts it works in or doesn't, the long term changes in your lifestyle that are associated with your hobby, and other factors and consequences you hadn't thought of aside from the immediate intention to change your experience psychoactively? (Obviously this question needs to be cleaned up, or divided up, to some degree.)
    5) (assuming "yes" to 3) Do you include people who don't consume your choice of psychoactive, or are you willing to do that?
    6) When someone is doing something foolish with their psychoactive substance, what do you do about it?
    
    
    

15. The Fax Network Project

    1) Students are encouraged to get in touch with citizens who are involved in the fax network which normally squelches development of alternative solutions to "drug abuse education" (described to me by a White House ONDCP worker several years ago -- I assume it still exists), and encourage those citizens to use the fax network as a venue for frequent discussions of the Five Rules, and other consciousness raising activities described among these projects, thus indirectly and directly building support in this important communication network, for progressive changes in the classroom, regarding education about Psychoactive Management issues. Members of the fax network could be invited to classrooms, to discuss their purposes and activities with the class members, and to have an exchange of ideas about Psychoactive Management or alternatives to Psychoactive Management. Members of the fax network could be encouraged to share information about themselves and to discuss which Psychoactive Management Style describes themselves. Perhaps the fax network could distribute copies of The Psychoactive Management Weekly Reader (below).
    2) Students could start their own fax network.
    
    
    

16. The Bumper Sticker Project

    Students discuss what short sayings could be used, as on a bumper sticker, to communicate the ideas and skills of Psychoactive Management. "If we don't manage our psychoactives, they will manage us" is one option. I looked into getting 100 weatherproof bumper stickers made, one time, and found it would cost about $100, so I gave up on the idea.
    
    
    

17. The Happy Holidays Project

    
    
    Students collect ideas, memories, and observations, about which psychoactives are used at various holidays, how they are prepared, who uses them, what styles of consumption are exemplified, and whether and to what degree The Five Rules are involved in managing them.
    
    
    
    
    

18. The Collage Project

    Students put together a large (e.g., wall size) collage showing various psychoactive substances being consumed, and styles of consumption, for example, someone reading the lable on a chocolate bar, or a bottle of beer, or asking someone offering something to smoke, how strong it is, how long it will last, how soon tolerance builds up and how little is required to get an effect (talk-balloons could be used, as in a cartoon). Magazine covers could be displayed. I saw a wall in a civics classroom covered with New Yorker magazine front covers, one third of them showing someone consuming psychoactively. (The teacher was not happy that I pointed this out, but the lecture was about psychoactive consumption, after all). (He was also not happy when I pointed out that the class's civics textbook had one page in it about drug abuse, all about heroin. (See reference to Cornell Medical School curriculum.) Perhaps a two-wall display could be put together of New Yorker covers, showing the back covers which generally advertise some kind of psychoactive consumption.
    
    
    

19. The Ratio Survey Project

    (For upper grades) Students put together a list of psychoactives commonly consumed, and list various numerators and denominators and how they change over a long period of time (years). For example, the amount of time taken per day, to consume a psychoactive substance, or to manage the hobby, like buying the substance, storing it, transferring it from one place to another (from a shirt you took off, to the table by the door, to another shirt pocket) (e.g., pack of cigarettes), or the degree of attention used to manage the hobby, like while driving, while eating, while talking on the telephone (the denominator being an acitivity description, like "20% of my attention per phone conversation" or "10% of my attention while I'm driving"), or the amount of money spent on the substance per day or per dose (dollars or doses could be the denominator), or associated paraphernalia, or amount of time per day in talking with others about the hobby (Rules Three through Five), or the degree (percent) to which one is preoccupied with the hobby. Sub-groups could handle different aspects, and call themselves, e.g., "The Doses per Day Committee," or "The Preoccupation Committee", and periodic results could be published in The Psychoactive Weekly Reader.
    
    
    

20. The Seven Percent Solution Project

    Reference is made to a Sherlock Holmes story, the solution being one of cocaine, which was one of Holmes' psychoactive hobbies.
    1) students discuss what percent of time ought be taken up in an average day, by someone with a paychoactive hobby, in practicing The Five Rules, that is, how many minutes out of one's normal allotment of 1000 (about 16 waking hours), should one spend in considering alternatives to psychoactive consumption (Rule One), measuring doses and keeping notes on how little is consumed with an aim to getting some effect (Rule Two), talking or writing about one's objectives in consuming (Rule Three), talking or writing about one's context, outlook, personality, and other factors and consequences having to do with one's hobby, and (Rule Five) considering who is, and who is not, in one's circle of co-consumers, in order to provide objectivity in discussing the hobby according to Rules Three and Four.
    2) Students could go over each of the projects in this list, and estimate roughly what percent of time during the next N weeks, would be involved in becoming involved in the project, or
    3) What percent of a school curriculum should be taken up with discussions of Psychoactive Management. For example, in 1974 I attended a conference in New York City, with 174 meetings during a week, having to do with drug abuse. One of the meetings had to do with tobacco, in other words, the percent of the meetings taken up with the tobacco subject was 0.57%. At another of the meetings, it was revealed that out of a four year course at Cornell Medical School, one hour was devoted to consideration of drug abuse, and that hour was totally devoted to the subject of heroin. I forget how many total hours were in the four year course, but guessing at 8 per day, that would mean the topic of drug abuse was 0.0086% or less than one hundredth of one percent.
    
    
    

21. The Consistency Project

    Students look for inconstent materials, in texts, conversations, and other areas, where psychoactives are not discussed consistently, or are (on the other hand) discussed consistenly. Double binds are of particular interest. For example, advertising against young people smoking has a subtle message, "You're not old enough to smoke," which implies, "It's OK to smoke when you're over a certain age." Yet the ads explicitly also imply that there's something wrong with smoking. This inconsistency is interesting. Another double bind could be involved if someone were to encourage practicing Rule Two, but discovered that they were drinking in order to get "smashed," in other words, the aim of the drinking was to become irresponsible. Wondering how little alcohol is needed to become irresponsible, is itself a responsible activity, and thus this application of Rule Two would be oxymoronic. Having to accept double binds can make people go crazy, or at least are very difficult to respond to, so it might be of interest to discuss what specific forms of craziness result from such double binds with psychoactive messages and/or usage styles. Logically, double binds are contradictions, and contradictions in the premises of an argument justify any conclusion (including contradictory ones), so it may be of interest to pursue the idea that double binds in advertising, and in behavior inconsistent with messages (such as teachers smoking yet encouraging students to stay away from drugs) actually causes irrational and irresponsible behavior with regard to psychoactive substances. This discussion should be carefully guided, to keep it from degenerating into a "who is to blame" argument, and it would be important to encourage students not to conclude that it is OK to challenge someone rudely for inconsistent behavior (see also The Etiquette Project).
    
    
    

22. The Obituary Project

    More on the Sherlock Holmes idea, that is, detective work: Why is it that we are told 400,000 people a year die from tobacco use, or a similar number from alcoholism, yet this does not show up on death certificates? Students get relevant statistics about various psychoactive substances, then do research in offices of vital statistics, to see if, and if so how often, chemical consumption is listed as a cause of death. Upon finding out that it seldom is, students then ask various authorities why this is the case. Results could be published in the Psychoactive Management Weekly Reader. The purpose of this survey is to illustrate where statistics come from (or don't come from) and what they mean (or don't mean). The school's mathematics teacher could get involved in this project, and could of course be invited to share his or her Psychoactive Management Style with the group, after the group shared theirs with him or her, although of course that is not essential.
    
    
    

23. The River in Egypt Project

    This one is for upper grades.. Reference is made to the popular joke, "Denial ain't a river in Egypt." Many cases of what appear to be denial, are simply an inability to speak about something. Students will be educated regarding typical, or classical, cases of denial, for example drug-dependent people denying that they are dependent (which might be an unawareness of a consumption pattern), and asked to talk about what expansion of vocabulary ought to be promoted, to make it easier for people generally to talk about Psychoactive Management and mis-Management. This could be related to the Feedback Project, in regard to conducting group interventions, or to the Missing Links Project, regarding the need for concepts to relate facts in the field of Psychoactive Management, or to The Etiquette Project.
    
    
    

24. The Psychoactive Product Stores Survey

    Students go into stores which sell primarily psychoactive products, such as liquor stores, tobacconists, and candy stores, and ask the clerks to profile, using ball-park estimates, their customers according to style of consumption, like a liquor store might report that 60% of their customers ignore Rule Two and consume at a high level. In this case, clerks, not managers, would be the focus of the survey.
    
    
    

25. The Missing Links Project

    For upper grades, or perhaps lower grades (I'm curious if they'd catch on to this). Referring to the "categories" page, students will try to construct a consistent set of linkages among various concepts in the Psychoactive Management field.
    
    
    

26. The Newspaper Project

    School provides two copies of the daily (and weekendly) paper, and students scrutinize the newspaper as an ongoing project, clipping and filing all mention of psychoactive consumption, for example in an Archie cartoon showing teenagers drinking sodas, or a restaurant or movie ad for an establishment where psychoactive consumption is assumed to take place, or a pharmacy, or a series on drug abuse, advice columns about family problems typically caused by alcohol abuse, and so on. Items are categorized according to substance and according to apparent style of consumption. A scrapbook is assembled. This is done for just one newspaper, in the higher grades, on a continuing basis, or in lower grades, all the students could bring in examples of items and they could be put on a bulletin board in the corner, perhaps with a contest for the most amusing one, or most flagrant violation of a Rule, and so on.
    
    
    

27. The I Heard About Project

    Students relate stories they heard about, some of them of course being from their own family but the students are discouraged from mentioning this, the stories having to do with problems caused by psychoactive consumption, particularly when done other in a style other than Style 31. Stories can include stories from a newspaper article, or a book, or a movie. The focus is on figuring out what style of Psychoactive Management is being practiced, and how it does, or does not, foster certain kinds of problems or solutions in the person's consumption of that psychoactive.
    
    
    

28. The Priority Dislocation Percent Calculation Awareness Project

    1) Students categorize different sets of Psychoactive Management Styles, for example according to sloppy or responsible, depending on which have more, or less, attention to the Five Rules, for example, the Styles which involve following four or more rules are yyyyy (31), yyyyn (30), yyyny (29), yynyy (27), ynyyy (23), and nyyyy (15). (those are 31-1, 31-2, 31-4, 31-8, and 31-16). These would rank high. Others would rank lower. Or perhaps the students would disagree, putting some rules ahead of others and weighting the "y"s and "n"s. Their disagreement in rankings would be compared using the PDPC (Priority Dislocation Percent Calculation). This would be an exercise in pure values, having no bearing on individual behaviors (at least not necessarily), and would raise awareness of the relative values of the Five Rules amongst one another, and would be an exercise in using the PDPC.
    2) Students individually rank the importance of various psychoactives to people they know, and then compare their results using the PDPC.
    3) Students look for other ways in which societal Psychoactive Management or psychoactive consumption patterns can be ranked.
    4) Students develop a value-scale for the 32 different Psychoactive Management Styles (see above), then use the PDPC to compare this ranking with the 0-31 ranking of the Styles (which is value-free, having been generated by the binary progression from 0-31). This would be an exercise in using the PDPC, in addition to acquainting the students with the meaning of the Styles.
    
    
    

29. The Drug Store Survey

    Students go into all the drug stores in town, asking the manager three or four questions:
    1) Does your store sell tobacco products?
    2) What other psychoactive products does your store sell (for recreational use, such as those containing caffeine, sugar, chocolate, alcohol, and so on)?
    3) What percentage of pharmaceuticals, by dollar value, does your store sell, which are used to treat illnesses resulting from tobacco consumption, and
    4) consumption of other psychoactives?

    It isn't likely that number three (or four) can be answered, but asking it should raise the awareness of people participating in the survey. Of course the local newspaper can be asked to cover the event, and promote it and encourage pharmacists to cooperate. The questions can be answered privately, and put into sealed envelopes; only the fact of a store being included, would be identified with a particular store. A store owner could indicate on the envelope whether he or she answered the questions, perhaps inviting the students back at a later date to supply more information, or they could mail in the envelope, but in any event the fact of a store being covered, is noted. Stores in towns all over the world could be polled, in an ongoing poll, perhaps reported in The Psychoactive Management Weekly Reader (below).
    
    
    

30. The Textbook Project

    Students can look into the textbooks in their own classes, and in the school library, and in the public library, to find instructional material on psychoactive consumption, and determine to what degree this material is consistent among various psychoactive substances mentioned, and whether or not some kind of rules for cautious consumption, such as the Five Rules of Psychoactive Management, are offered, then get together and discuss their findings, perhaps reporting them in The Psychoactive Management Weekly Reader.
    2) Students conducting this survey then write to the textbook manufacturers, suggesting more attention be put into raising awareness of The Five Rules of Psychoactive Management in the texts they publish, and then share the letters they get back from the publishers, perhaps publishing them in The Psychoactive Management Weekly Reader.
    
    
    

31. The Algebra Homework Project

    1) This is an exercise for students in mathematics, civics, or science classes: Think up math problems having to do with the market dynamics of psychoactive consumption, or personal consumption, such as, "If Arthur consumes more of his favorite sedative than he needs to get relaxed, to the extent that his tolerance rises one quarter bottle per month, and he requires two bottles per occasion to get relaxed, how many months will it be before he is drinking that two-bottle dose just to come down from an agitated state to normal, rather than to get relaxed?" (Answer: Eight months, assuming he is not escalating the dose, to keep reaching the relaxed state.) Or, "If a beer company is making $1,000,000 per year profit from a population of X consumers drinking normally, supposing 1/5 of those consumers drink five times as much because they have a higher tolerance, what percent increase would the beer company experience in their profit?" (Answer: $800,000 from the normal drinkers, plus 5 x $200,000 from the formerly normal drinkers, equals $1,800,000, or an 80% increase.)
    2) Students constructing and practicing those exercises write letters to textbook manufacturers, suggesting they put examples like that into their textbooks, and share the letters they get back, perhaps publishing them in The Psychoactive Management Weekly Reader.
    
    
    

32. The Feedback Project

    1) Students are asked to consider Rules Three through Five, concerning being approached by someone talking about their psychoactive consumption. How ought one give feedback in a diplomatic say? Should feedback be offered if none is solicited, and if so, when or under what circumstances? Does emergency feedback mean "anything goes" and the rules of etiquette, and respect for boundaries, are out the window? What if someone is impaired and doesn't seem to know it? What are some ways students could offer constructive criticism, without turning off the listener? What are some examples of situations where feedback should be offered, when not solicited? For example, is it OK to walk up to a clerk in a 7-11 who is smoking and say, "Excuse me, but did you know that smoke is coming out of your nose?" This could go into the dynamics of a group intervention, in older grades.
    2) Students are encouraged to come up with assertive interactions to use when someone is leaning on them to practice a Psychoactive Management Style to which they are not accustomed, for example, encouraging them to abandon Rule Two, or deriding them for attempting to practice Rule Three, or perhaps encouraging them to practice Rule Four when they are not so inclined. What are some polite ways of rebuffing the other person, yet at the same time encouraging them to keep offering feedback at other times? Examples from personal experience, or stories they've read, or movies they've seen, could be shared.
    
    
    

33. The Party Time Project

    This is a Rule One exercise.

    1) Students get together and write down all the things that people supposedly need psychoactives for, to achieve certain party experiences, like loose talk, uninhibited dancing, and so on, and rank the value of those experiences. (Some will probably be graded as undesirable, like irresponsible intimate behavior.) Then they have a party without psychoactives, and try to duplicate the desirable behaviors. The aim of this exercise is to demonstrate that you don't have to get high to have a good time -- the *same kind* of good time that supposedly getting high is necessary for achieving. Perhaps exceptions to this article of faith would be discovered, in which case students could discuss the value of those experiences for which psychoactive consumption is necessary. This is also relevant to Rule Two, which keeps the focus on maximizing the experience with minimizing consumption, as contrasted with maximizing the consumption.
    2) Students discuss other situations where one works on having an experience without psychoactive consumption, where society conveys an impression that consuming is necessary for that experience, such as relaxation, reduction of anxiety, creativity, and so on. This is related to The Holiday Project

    NOTE: Although it may seem that this Project is intended to dissuade students from consuming psychoactives, the real aim of it is to see the relationship between psychoactive consumption and various experiences. Of course, if dissuasion occurs, that might not be a bad thing. On the other hand, it might *be* a bad thing. this is something the students could discuss. (How could it be a bad thing? A young person's stopping psychoactive consumption might make their parents uncomfortable, if they are consumers. See The Etiquette Project.)
    
    
    

34. The Psychoactive Management Car Bash

    In the traditional car bash, people whack away at a car until it is almost unrecognizable.
    In this project, a car which is no longer needed by anyone,is the object of the bashing. Students use the smallest tools they can find, like perhaps a stone, and inflict as little damage on the car as necessary, to make it undrivable. They then stand around and discuss their feelings of frustration, at wanting to inflict more damage, and after a previously decided upon length of time, they pick up their sledgehammers, goggles, and gloves, and totally demolish the car. (Maybe they should wait for a coin-toss to see if they actually get to do it; this would increase the anxiety). The point of this exercise (also discussed, prior to the final activity) is to contrast this situation with a typical party scene, where people are "getting smashed," to show how tempting it is to smash something, even if it is one's self. Even though one's self has a much greater value than a car, the smasher-self is much more important (at the time of smashing) than the smashee-self. Why is this? I dunno. Anyway, this would illustrate that following Rule Two is not always a piece of cake. (Get it? Another psychoactive. Ha ha.)
    
    I forgot to mention that the traditional car bash is associated with fund raising, and it might not be a bad idea to have a Psychoactive Management Car Bash as publicity for promoting The Five Rules, as well as raising some funds for other of these projects. (That doesn't sound like good grammar.... Comments welcome.)
    
    
    
    
    
    

35. The Deminimization Project

    Students are encouraged to come up with ways of talking about activities which are repeated so often that their quantity alone presents a "forest for the trees" paradox, making it impossible to grasp the significance of the magnitude of the situation. For example, someone having smoked 300,000 cigarettes, or having drunk 20,000 beers, is no doubt affected in some definite way, but their cognizance of these facts is bound to be impaired by the inability to deal with large numbers. Is there a way to present large-scale facts, in an acceptable way? I used to use a bolt of cloth at lectures, about 8 feet long, having thousands of brown dots on it. "Each dot represents a pack of cigarettes I've smoked," I would tell the audience, as a couple of volunteers held the sheet out, next to me on the stage. "If you had one of these sheets, how long do you think it would be?" This usually provoked some constructive conversations.
    
    
    

36. The Private Versus Public Project

    Students discuss the difference between public and private policies and policy making, as mentioned in the introduction above. Two examples come to mind, the "food pyramid" and the widespread use of antibiotics.
    The food pyramid developed by the Department of Agriculture includes, as I understand it, a higher percentage of fat than their own experts deem advisable, yet supposedly they believed that if they recommended fat consumption at a healthier, lower percentage, their recommendations overall would be met with less enthusiasm, causing a net decrease in healthy results of the campaign to educate the public. So, ironically, they recommend more than is healthy, so the public will end up being healthier. The ironic "private / personal" situation is this: On a personal basis, one is consuming more than optimal levels of fat, but on the public basis, there is more health.
    Widespread use of antibiotics to stamp out a disease, for example tuberculosis, can result in an increase in resistant strains, thus a lower degree of health. This is supposedly happening in Russian jails. Prisoners are given less than total doses of antibiotics, so the jails are actually a breeding ground for worse strains of tuberculosis. The antibiotics are making things better at the personal level, but worse at the public level.
    Students could discuss whether public policies based on The Five Rules could be effected, through inculcation of better habits and attitudes at the personal level, such as by having school students participate in these projects. Or they could discuss other government projects intended to make massive changes in the public's behaviors with regard to psychoactive consumption. (See the "12 Steps of Prentntianon".
    
    
    

37. The Psychoactive Management Weekly Reader Web page

    A student journal something like The Weekly Reader (which I used to read in public school), with results of surveys, letters to the editor, a Q/A column, advice column, articles, results of students writing letters to the editor of other publications, reports on PDPC controversies, and so on. This could be a Web page, or something the class puts out weekly, just for that class. A Web page could have a message board shared by students all over the world. Yahoo!/Geocities offers free space for Web pages, 15 megabytes, with 6 megabytes for free email with the same ID as the home page.
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    A problem with all of these is that some people could object that such projects are going to make kids curious about using drugs. That could very well happen, although whether it would result in more consumption, or more harm, is debatable. Also, it is certain that those who are against scrutiny, by themselves or others, of their psychoactive hobby, will object, and of course some of their objections might be valid. In any event, there are some ideas for consciousness-raising projects for young people.
    
    
    

38. The Project Project

    Students discuss new ideas for projects. (See below, about Scouts merit badges.)

The Merit Badge Project