When I was in seventh grade, the school tried to scare us to
death about using alcohol. We saw a film about a party where
students danced and listened to music. One guy invited his
friends to the back room for drinks, and another guy passed
out. They couldn't revive him, so they called the ambulance.
The paramedics rushed to the hospital where someone called the
parents. Mom was crying. Dad was crying. The doctors stuck
needles in his veins and tubes up his nose. The moral of the
movie was "Don't drink alcohol or they'll stick needles in
your veins, tubes up your nose, and your parents will cry."

We were convinced that none of us would ever drink alcohol if
that's what they were going to do to us. We even stayed clear
of the water fountain, I think, the rest of that day.

Then they brought in another film, whose plot was basically
the same, but the moral this time was "Don't take drugs."

Another time, we got to look at and touch the lung of some
poor soul who had smoked all his life. The object was, "If you
smoke, your lung will look like this, and kids will touch it."
We were convinced there in the seventh grade that we would
never ever smoke cigarettes.

Another movie is still shown today in driver-education
courses. It makes slasher films look like they are PG or G.
Photographers have filmed the scenes of car wrecks before the
paramedics get there. From accident after accident, there are
shots of crushed cars and mangled bodies. I thought the moral
of that movie was, "Don't ever get in a car."

We seventh graders were convinced that under no circumstances
would we ever drink, smoke, take drugs, or drive recklessly,
if at all. Yet, soon after we entered high school, most of my
friends were smoking. Just about everybody was drinking, and I
lost several of my friends to drug overdoses.

How could we be convinced that something was deadly,
unhealthy, and unwise, yet not act on our beliefs? Today many
of you are involved in things that a year or two ago you never
dreamed you would do....

What happened to my friends in the seventh grade also happens
to us. We have preferences. Yet we have very few convictions.