All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[Vakanai]

Are we Fat Shaming, Ugly Shaming or Stupid Shaming here?

How about just bigot shaming?

[Mister Mets]

There's a case to be made for giving people the benefit of the doubt, or for asking for clarity of intent, or pondering what good legislative policy would be, or trying to correctly and precisely frame an argument or point or whatever just so - but more importantly there's a stronger case to call out transphobia when confronted with it. When, by all your many myriad points and counterpoints and arguments and clarifications and wanting things to be as exactingly precise as possible, is the case strong enough for you to feel the need to call out the transphobia running strongly through the ethos of your party?

Is there a need to convince people on this message board of that? I kinda figured most of you are against the idea that every trans person is really mentally ill (an idea I've called out before.)

The sins of Republicans aren't really relevant in a discussion about Singal's journalism, or his source, neither of whom seem to be Republican partisans. This seems to be an indication that it doesn't matter what specifically is said, but what side people appear to be on, which is an attitude worth discouraging.

[ed2962]

Yeah, consistently abominable. When I was 17, all I thought about was hanging out with my buddies and working hard to graduate high school, not wondering how I’m going to raise a kid after getting a girl two years my junior pregnant. If Boobert was truly a responsible parent, she would’ve warned her son about the perils of unprotected sex and the consequences of same, not REWARD what he had done after the fact. That makes her a suck ass mother, just like she’s a suck ass politician.

We don't know that she didn't. And again, to be fair...she's no different than thousands of parents rich or poor, black or white in that, ok...the deed is done, how do we do what's best for the baby that's coming? Now I do think it's weird that she's trying to turn this into some sort of partisan issue...Like republicans care about life and democrats don't...?

[ed2962]

How much you wanna bet she tried really hard to bully the kid into having an abortion?

I'll bet my next paycheck she didn't. However, I wouldn't make that bet concerning the majority of the GOP...

[ed2962]

That is logical. Criminalizing two teenagers for having sex just because there's a small age difference would be wrong, IMO. The law should protect the teenagers from grown adults preying on them (like Matt Gaetz for example).

Exactly, despite how one feels about Lauren, the kids are just teenagers.

[Mister Mets]

A CDC study on teenage depression had an interesting result: the numbers are pretty bad for young liberals.

Social media is good at generating polarization, and some of the left-inflected pushback has essentially argued that maybe teens aren’t depressed because of phones but because, in Taylor Lorenz’s words, “we’re living in a late stage capitalist hellscape during an ongoing deadly pandemic w record wealth inequality, 0 social safety net/job security, as climate change cooks the world.” Noah Smith and Eric Levitz both wrote good articles questioning the veracity of that doomer narrative, and Michelle Goldberg did an excellent piece trying to reframe the issue, arguing correctly that “the idea that unaccountable corporate behemoths are harming kids with their products shouldn’t be a hard one for liberals to accept, even if figures like Hawley believe it as well.”1

But I want to talk about something Goldberg mentions but doesn’t focus on: a 2021 paper by Catherine Gimbrone, Lisa Bates, Seth Prins, and Katherine Keyes titled “The politics of depression: Diverging trends in internalizing symptoms among US adolescents by political beliefs.” The CDC survey doesn’t ask teens about their political beliefs, but Gimbrone et. al. find not only divergence by gender, but divergence by political ideology. Breaking things down by gender and ideology, they find that liberal girls have the highest increase in depressive affect and conservative boys have the least. But liberal boys are more depressed than conservative girls, suggesting an important independent role for political ideology.

There's speculation as to the reasons for this. Are liberals more likely to be open about mental health struggles? Do young liberals correctly identify serious problems? Are young liberals more likely to be on certain social media platforms? Are young liberals encouraged to catastrophize, and dwell on problems in an unproductive way?

[Tami]

A CDC study on teenage depression had an interesting result: the numbers are pretty bad for young liberals.



There's speculation as to the reasons for this. Are liberals more likely to be open about mental health struggles? Do young liberals correctly identify serious problems? Are young liberals more likely to be on certain social media platforms? Are young liberals encouraged to catastrophize, and dwell on problems in an unproductive way?

Have you read the actual study?: The politics of depression: Diverging trends in internalizing symptoms among US adolescents by political beliefs

Adolescents in the 2010's endured a series of significant political events that may have influenced their mental health. The first Black president, Democrat Barack Obama, was elected to office in 2008, during which time the Great Recession crippled the US economy (Mukunda, 2018), widened income inequality (Kochhar & Fry, 2014), and exacerbated the student debt crisis (Stiglitz, 2013). The following year, Republicans took control of the Congress and then, in 2014, of the Senate. Just two years later, Republican Donald Trump was elected to office, appointing a conservative supreme court and deeply polarizing the nation through erratic leadership (Abeshouse, 2019). Throughout this period, war, climate change (O’brien, Selboe, & Hayward, 2018), school shootings (Witt, 2019), structural racism (Worland, 2020), police violence against Black people (Obasogie, 2020), pervasive sexism and sexual assault (Morrison-Beedy & Grove, 2018), and rampant socioeconomic inequality (Kochhar & Cilluffo, 2018) became unavoidable features of political discourse. In response, youth movements promoting direct action and political change emerged in the face of inaction by policymakers to address critical issues (Fisher & Nasrin, 2021; Haenschen & Tedesco, 2020). Liberal adolescents may have therefore experienced alienation within a growing conservative political climate such that their mental health suffered in comparison to that of their conservative peers whose hegemonic views were flourishing. This is particularly true for less privileged groups of liberals, including girls and low SES individuals, for whom both heightened awareness and experience of conservative actions to restrict their rights may have compounded emotional distress.

The cause of their depression? Trump and Republicans, and a conservative climate that made the future look pretty grim.

Note that the data was from 2005 to 2018, from GW Bush to the first two years of Donald Trump. Even during Barack Obama's two terms, the Republicans were causing all sorts of problems in Congress.

[Mister Mets]

Have you read the actual study?: The politics of depression: Diverging trends in internalizing symptoms among US adolescents by political beliefs



The cause of their depression? Trump and Republicans, and a conservative climate that made the future look pretty grim.

Note that the data was from 2005 to 2018, from GW Bush to the first two years of Donald Trump. Even during Barack Obama's two terms, the Republicans were causing all sorts of problems in Congress.

The idea that liberals are alienated because of a sense that Republicans are winning is not confirmed as the cause of their depression. It remains speculation.

I don't know if it tracks. Conservatives were less depressed even when Democrats had big wins. The trendlines for liberals didn't get better when Obama won.

Would liberals have more reason to be unhappy than conservatives from 2005-2018? What are the major policy fights Republicans won? The left got greater acceptance of gay marriage, the Affordable Care Act and a general understanding that the wars in the Middle East were a fiasco.

[Gray Lensman]

The idea that liberals are alienated because of a sense that Republicans are winning is not confirmed as the cause of their depression. It remains speculation.

I don't know if it tracks. Conservatives were less depressed even when Democrats had big wins. The trendlines for liberals didn't get better when Obama won.

Would liberals have more reason to be unhappy than conservatives from 2005-2018? What are the major policy fights Republicans won? The left got greater acceptance of gay marriage, the Affordable Care Act and a general understanding that the wars in the Middle East were a fiasco.

If you believe in climate change there isn't anything to be happy about, and that will continue no matter who wins the next election.

[Dalak]

Have you read the actual study?: The politics of depression: Diverging trends in internalizing symptoms among US adolescents by political beliefs



The cause of their depression? Trump and Republicans, and a conservative climate that made the future look pretty grim.

Note that the data was from 2005 to 2018, from GW Bush to the first two years of Donald Trump. Even during Barack Obama's two terms, the Republicans were causing all sorts of problems in Congress.

Misrepresent a study? Surely you are wrong.

All the increased school shootings, Trayvon Martin and many more racially charged killings, the increased politicization of schooling by conservatives across the board, the increasingly open embrace of hate by conservatives across the board, none of that would upset kids because the ACA was passed . . . only to be continually under attack by conservatives from 2010 on. Nope. Perish the thought. Teachers know better than us internet hobbyists anyway.

/s

E:

If you believe in climate change there isn't anything to be happy about, and that will continue no matter who wins the next election.

Darn, I knew I missed something (read: many many things).

[Jack Dracula]

The idea that liberals are alienated because of a sense that Republicans are winning is not confirmed as the cause of their depression. It remains speculation.

I don't know if it tracks. Conservatives were less depressed even when Democrats had big wins. The trendlines for liberals didn't get better when Obama won.

Would liberals have more reason to be unhappy than conservatives from 2005-2018? What are the major policy fights Republicans won? The left got greater acceptance of gay marriage, the Affordable Care Act and a general understanding that the wars in the Middle East were a fiasco.

Democrats are depressed because of the existential threat of an authoritarian conservative takeover of the government.
It’s hard to be hopeful when half the country has abandoned democracy in favor of autocracy and you don’t know if you may be caught in a mass shooting when you go to the store for groceries.

[Tami]

The idea that liberals are alienated because of a sense that Republicans are winning is not confirmed as the cause of their depression. It remains speculation.

I don't know if it tracks. Conservatives were less depressed even when Democrats had big wins. The trendlines for liberals didn't get better when Obama won.

Would liberals have more reason to be unhappy than conservatives from 2005-2018? What are the major policy fights Republicans won? The left got greater acceptance of gay marriage, the Affordable Care Act and a general understanding that the wars in the Middle East were a fiasco.

There are actually a large number of studies on the effects of Trump's Presidency on levels of Stress/depression/mental health. Personally, I like the title of this article: President Trump Stress Disorder: Partisanship, Ethnicity, and Expressive Reporting of Mental Distress After the 2016 Election

Oh, and here is another with an interesting title: Not Fake News: Toxic Consequences of the Trump Stress Effect

[Adam Allen]

Is there a need to convince people on this message board of that? I kinda figured most of you are against the idea that every trans person is really mentally ill (an idea I've called out before.)

The sins of Republicans aren't really relevant in a discussion about Singal's journalism, or his source, neither of whom seem to be Republican partisans. This seems to be an indication that it doesn't matter what specifically is said, but what side people appear to be on, which is an attitude worth discouraging.

Singal aside, what are relevant things to consider, about this "whistleblower"?

The validity of her claims about the clinic certainly are the primary point of contention, but is it reasonable to consider these claims as if they have occurred in a social and political vacuum?

[Gray Lensman]

Misrepresent a study? Surely you are wrong.

All the increased school shootings, Trayvon Martin and many more racially charged killings, the increased politicization of schooling by conservatives across the board, the increasingly open embrace of hate by conservatives across the board, none of that would upset kids because the ACA was passed . . . only to be continually under attack by conservatives from 2010 on. Nope. Perish the thought. Teachers know better than us internet hobbyists anyway.

/s

E:

Darn, I knew I missed something (read: many many things).

I also forgot to mention the long term effects of Trump's judicial appointments. That isn't going away anytime soon, and the most radical are openly partisan. They decide the case before hearing it, and look for reasons after.

[Mister Mets]

Singal aside, what are relevant things to consider, about this "whistleblower"?

The validity of her claims about the clinic certainly are the primary point of contention, but is it reasonable to consider these claims as if they have occurred in a social and political vacuum?

The context matters, but that argument should be stated clearly, and without incorrectly implying that someone is a Republican partisan.

The film critic Mark Harris had a version of this argument, which seemed to me the best defense of the criticism of the New York Times' coverage of trans issues.

https://mobile.twitter.com/MarkHarri...64435464228867

This piece by @jackmirkinson is historically rich and rock solid--and I know many good people at the NYT will agree with it. I hope those in charge will listen to them. Treating trans people as "a knotty problem for society to solve" is not a way forward.

Part of the dispute is not about this one subject; it's about the proportion of coverage devoted to this subject relative to overall trans coverage, and about an editorial (as opposed to reportorial) aversion to grappling with how this is being used, by whom, and to what end.

The letter starts by noting that there's plenty of fine trans coverage in the paper. But the history of an emerging minority community telling a major publication that they're being covered incorrectly and being wrong is almost nonexistent. As the Nation piece makes clear that history, as the NYT itself has acknowledged, was grave and truly damaging, and at the very least, it should cause those in charge now to pause and reflect rather than instantly circle the wagons or view this letter as a misdeed to be punished.

Precision matters. A claim that an article is false is different than a claim that an article can be weaponized. It does get to something that's icky in that it can be serious criticism of people who are factually correct.

I also forgot to mention the long term effects of Trump's judicial appointments. That isn't going away anytime soon, and the most radical are openly partisan. They decide the case before hearing it, and look for reasons after.

This would be relevant to informed young people after 2016, so it doesn't seem like a significant factor for the poll which covers 2005-2018.

There are actually a large number of studies on the effects of Trump's Presidency on levels of Stress/depression/mental health. Personally, I like the title of this article: President Trump Stress Disorder: Partisanship, Ethnicity, and Expressive Reporting of Mental Distress After the 2016 Election

Oh, and here is another with an interesting title: Not Fake News: Toxic Consequences of the Trump Stress Effect

The survey showed the biggest rise at around 2011/ 2012, so it's probably not Trump related. One potential suspect is widespread access to smartphones, which increase social media usage.

The existing pattern trends continued with Trump. It didn't change all that much.

Democrats are depressed because of the existential threat of an authoritarian conservative takeover of the government.
It’s hard to be hopeful when half the country has abandoned democracy in favor of autocracy and you don’t know if you may be caught in a mass shooting when you go to the store for groceries.

This gets to another issue that it may be harmful to exaggerate problems in American culture, like the individual odds of suffering a school shooting.

If you believe in climate change there isn't anything to be happy about, and that will continue no matter who wins the next election.

There is cause for optimism, and this is something that activists are recognizing.

https://www.csmonitor.com/Environmen...-against-gloom

Obviously, articles in 2022 are not going to be available to young people answering questions about depression in 2014, but there are advantages to acknowledging the positives, in terms of inspiring people that change is possible and meaningful, while improving their quality of life (depressive states are not enjoyable.)