Experimenting in a safe environment is less likely to lead young people to dangerous life journeys, says Anne Poitrineau
Regarding Zoe Williams’s article (Taking drugs with your children? Gen Z won’t even want to share a beer with us, 24 March), I took magic mushrooms with my daughter on a balmy night in Switzerland (where we were living at the time). She had told me that she wanted to try them as her friends all had, so I got the stuff for us (grey area in Switzerland: not illegal, but not encouraged). It was lovely.
I do not like alcoholic drinks and I do not smoke – getting the mushrooms to work on me was a bit difficult as a result. She was 15. That was 22 years ago. A few weeks before, we had used a banana for her to know how to put a condom over a penis. She now has three children, a job and a long-time partner. I have always thought that experiments taking place in a safe environment were less likely to take people on dangerous life journeys.
