DEA warns kids are putting drugs in their calculators, alarm clocks, and cars


"You usually wouldn't be suspicious of your teen keeping his or her graphing calculator close," concedes a new guide to places kids can hide drugs from the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). "But if you suspect them of drug addiction you may have to be."
Calculators are just one of many ordinary objects in which little Johnny may be stashing some reefer, reveals the DEA's illustrated list of items parents should search, entitled "Hiding Places." Other options include car interiors, alarm clock battery compartments (really, anything with a spot for batteries), and shoes.
In a suggestion that wins the award for "most likely to produce deep resentment and distrust in your child," the DEA recommends ripping open an "adored childhood teddy bear" because the "inside seams of the stuffed animal can be used to hide small amounts of drugs."
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Or maybe don't, because, as The Washington Post notes, "use of illicit drugs other than marijuana [among teens] is near historic lows and marijuana use is flat or falling." Sometimes a graphing calculator is just a graphing calculator.
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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