I kind of agree with this. And not only concerning more dangerous drugs, but 'dropping out of life.' Problem of course is, that it is difficult for parent to know, how much your kid is controlled by drug and how much they control the drug use. Or even less to predict future.
I mean fast majority of kids experimenting with pot or alcohol turn out just fine, but some get taken away by substance abuse. How can one know, which group their kid belongs? I think it is always negative when you take a kid out from that 'fast majority' and the natural flow of their lives moving on. Single them out and keep them back. Reduce their expectations for themselves. It can be awfully difficult to catch others after being held back, most don't even try but end up living at the fringe of society. In some cases that may not happen, if you don't take them out from that flow. But problem of course is that none of us can predict future that accurately, that we would know the best option with our kids.
My kid's addiction issue wasn't substances and it was clear that his addiction controlled him and he didn't have much control, but we too faced a problem on how to deal with it. How completely cut a kid out of the world? How much let him have rope to hang himself because he did had some things going for him. I assume that if I would have been here during the time of those decisions and asked opinions, most would have recommended us to to take much harsher line and restrict him much more. Not let him out of home, three hours away, without much supervision, living alone with other teen boys, doing his school work independently and chasing a pipe dream in sports. And all that with extra baggage of ruined reputation, bad social skills to begin with and understanding that life would be very hard for him there. If someone would ask my advice in similar situation, I would likely say to restrict much more, take everything away - or at least would had before our own experience with this choice and after seeing our outcome of it. We chose to let him chase that pipe dream, try to keep him in that flow that would take him further and for now it hyas worked for us, at least as well as can be hoped.
