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Comment by dadthrwy | Hacker News Reader

"long-brewing national tragedy only made worse by the isolation and stress of the pandemic"

As a parent, it seems strange to me to blame this situation on the pandemic when it's been, for all purposes, over in most parts of the country for more than a year. My kids have been back in school, sports, and being IRL with their friends for going on two years now.

The inability of mental health professionals to clearly separate temporary factors like pandemic isolation from the pervasive root causes that remain unaddressed is pretty frustrating. The science, if you can even call it that, is distressingly thin here and it makes me angry.

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The pandemic (isolation etc) might have formative/lasting effects though, similar to trauma? Perhaps especially for kids/youth who were a certain age/stage of growing up at the time?

Ed: apparently the study uses data from 2021

it was a huge hit to the gut. the kids were sitting at home for like a year+. crappy zoom non-classes where everyone falls asleep. at my local high school even the newly built sports field was shut down and fenced off for the whole year. why??? sure, the pandemic, whatever, but it was brutal for the little people.

It didn't have to be that way. I moved my family out of California in May 2020 to get away from the terrible decisions that were already happening. They were playing sports and doing normal stuff by June, 2020. Went to school in person that fall.

All of the data was there. It's been there the whole time.

Well, it is red meat thrown to the activists to avoid talking about issues that would make them shout down the article and its publisher.

For example, if we talk about racial issues in this country, we don’t usually focus on the capitalist music industry using gangsta rap to export role models spewing misogynistic lyrics to Black kids many of whom identify with them, we don’t talk much about the breakdown in the nuclear family, the rise of divorces or out-of-wedlock births. (People used to — see the Moynihan report for instance.) We hardly talk about welfare traps or minimum wage laws (Milton Friedman used to etc.) We don’t talk about academic performance of Black kids being affected by stuff like https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acting_white

Whenever Bill Cosby or Stephen A Smith or Deloris Tucker someone like that goes on a rant, they are shouted down.

That is why it is far safer to attribute it all to slavery 150 years ago, and Jim Crow laws, even though the previous generations who had marriage and school uniforms and higher church attendance etc. are horrified at what many in the current generations have been doing, and the lyrics in Drill music or Gangsta Rap etc. People are starting to wake up — I have been in a clubhouse room with 2000 people about whether a lot of rap is leading to violence, and almost everyone on stage was Black and most were saying absolutely. Some people said it creates jobs in the music industry, others pointed out how many jobs are destroyed overall because the kids can’t pass an interview. And so on. It was really nice to see but only possible because Black people got together to honestly discuss what has been going on. Now we need to turn it into action, in our own lives, with our own kids, and what they are exposed to. Most parents work so much or are divorced and the kids are raised by the street or by the government!

There's also the fact that things are getting worse in terms of the reproductive rights among females. If you are a teen girl growing up in a red state where you have the national culture celebrating how we have supposedly advanced past bigotry and hate, while you have your local state legislature making it impossible to get an abortion and general being cruel and corrupt, its hard not to get depressed about the situation.

This rise also seems present in e.g. The Netherlands; ~24% of women aged 12 to 25 in 2021; up from ~14% in 2020.[1] It's less than "3 in 5" from this article, but the age brackets are different and differences in the asked questions might influence things, so it can't be directly compared.

[1]: https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/nieuws/2022/22/mentale-gezondheid-j...

I think we're supposed to stop looking to Cosby for moral advice? Anyway, complicating an already contentious issue (parent stipulates that he is "angry") with one's own idiosyncratic take on "race in America" seems bad for reasoned discussion.

Who do you look to for moral advice? What is wrong with Deloris Tucker and Steven A Smith?

And anyway, one does not need to be a paragon of virtue in every fact of their life to denounce current trends. Many people who were very loud turned out to do shady things in the background. Are we supposed to look to BLM leaders for advice, for example? NAACP has a far longer track record and their leaders seem to have acted with more integrity over the decades: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/black-lives-matter-activ...

Normally I wouldn't respond in a thread I had already declared OT, but you've asked a fairly direct question.

Smith is a windbag who riles up viewers about controversial trivia. He is less obnoxious than most such, since his topics typically relate to sports rather than politics, but nothing he has said outside the realm of sports (and fairly little he has said within it) would indicate a habit of deep thought. Tucker passed away 17 years ago, and in the preceding decade seems primarily to have been a one-note instrument. Cosby's infamy perhaps doesn't disqualify him as a source of advice, but it makes one wonder. What common thread weaves through these three seemingly different exemplars you've chosen?

I prefer to think in terms of ethics rather than morality, and in terms of timeless values rather than current events. I struggle with this, but I feel I have benefited from the works of Walter Kaufmann, Kierkegaard, and other existentialist and existentialist-adjacent thinkers. If you seek moral advice and can't find it in your bible or at church, perhaps you might appreciate e.g. Jason Whitlock? I do, but in a different way than most of his other fans, I suspect.

I suppose the common thread is that they are all outspoken Black people, from different walks of life, who have all recognized that corrosive influences are coming from certain capitalist entertainment industries and contributing to cultural/moral degradation as a negative externality made in the name of profit.

Cosby spent YEARS playing "America's dad" for the Black family, as did James Avery, Reginald VelJohnson and others. They provided a wholesome role model to look up to, of a married family man, who provides for his kids and teaches them manners and morals, as opposed to "role models" poppin bottles and bangin models that the rap industry provides. Misogynistic lyrics, racial slurs, materialistic lifestyles, sometimes even glorifying violence. What good does it do? If outsiders can't criticize it because it is "authentic Black expression", then it falls to Black voices to do so. And they do, increasingly.

To try to combat moral / cultural degradation and restore family values takes both economic and cultural reform.

This used to be the subject of Black sit coms: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5D2RvIQwQE

And even CNN anchor Don Lemon used to OPENLY say stuff like this: https://www.cnn.com/videos/bestoftv/2013/07/27/nr-lemon-no-t...

So Steven A Smith said the same: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pb4pEN3s7B8

Deloris Tucker: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pr6gb1w72xA

I mean, I think you're tilting at windmills here when you're going after everyone's moral character who has said similar things. I could give you a lot more examples, but they haven't and don't make a dent in the capitalist machine. It has adapted.

The reason it's on topic is because it's just a special case of what that machine sells to everyone regardless of consequences. Instagram and TikTok "influencers" have contributed massively to anxiety and depression of teenage girls, but also promote dressing and acting in ways their parents and grandparents never could.

Miley Cyrus was the "voice of a generation", a "good girl" promoted by "wholesome" Disney, then she had a coming-out with the record industry, where her biggest new talent was sticking her tongue out while naked and gripping a chain: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=My2FRPA3Gf8

Sex sells and nudity grabs headlines on billboards: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2157969/Rihann...

It tells women to "lean in" and work 10 hours a day instead of telling both men and women to "lean out" and spend time with their family.

Sometimes it even becomes a parody of itself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNzXze5Yza8

Again, there doesn't need to be a conspiracy behind it (as Kanye believes) it's just what the market (and "the algorithm") selects for.

Look at your news, it's all become click-bait that makes ADULTS (whose brains are fully developed) into frothing-at-the-mouth rabid haters of the left, or the right, or whoever. It also radicalizes citizens into supporting destructive wars.

Look at your social media. It has made you distracted at dinner, addicted like a pavlov's dog to notifications, using your phone 10 hours a day of screen time. If it can do that to adults, imagine what it can do to kids.

This society overall tries to medicate people and put bandaids on real problems, like when both parents work 10 hour days, stick their kids in public schools and their parents into nursing homes, and everyone is medicated because everyone is depressed or not served well by the system.

Again, there doesn't need to be a conspiracy behind it (as Kanye believes) it's just what the market (and "the algorithm") selects for.

As C. Wright Mills wrote in The Power Elite, "To accept either view -- of all history as conspiracy or all history as drift -- is to relax the effort to understand the facts of power and the ways of the powerful." The precise form of our situation is not inevitable. Just as algorithms are written by people, so are laws and extortion notes. The tools that oppress us may be refashioned into others that free us. We must keep in mind that tools are nothing in themselves; they take on significance when used.

I do agree "that machine sells to everyone". Perhaps it makes sense to compare the situation of teen girls to that of black families like you suggest, since there is a sizable overlap between these groups. Rather than despairing of all the awful media, however, would it be better to focus on better media? The Cosby Show was produced in the 1980s, but surely there are good things happening now? Not necessarily shows on television, which is itself the sort of machine we're discussing. I've heard good things about "Black Twitter"...

Conservatism seems reasonable in the face of the issues you identify, but it's not, especially if you're following Milton Friedman on the minimum wage as you indicate above. The real minimum wage right now is barely half of the inflation-adjusted $12 it was in 1968. Had it kept pace with productivity as well as inflation, it would have been $22 by now. [0] Our enemies don't care about ideology. They happily wore the skins of Republicans before they wore the skins of Democrats, and it will be no trouble for them to switch again.

The lockdown did harm teen girls, even if we can't prove it to the scientific satisfaction of thread parent. That's not even the really bad part. What they have done once, they can and will do again. When it is normal for children to plug into a device instead of going to public school, it will be easy for some asshole billionaires to arrange that the children will just plug into their "education" apps and all the money we used to waste on teachers instead can just go to collateral for some asshole billionaire personal lines of credit. After they've done away with teachers, the McKinsey consultants will start examining whether the children really need parents. After all, they don't need a home if they're plugged into their devices...

But seriously, give Whitlock a listen, especially one of the episodes featuring Royce White. They are both better than Steven "A" Smith, in every respect.

[0] https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/21/politics/minimum-wage-inflati...

Thank you for your recommendations, I will try to make some time for those -- been so busy, as many have!

By the way, I think for myself -- even though I cited Friedman, I disagree with him in various ways, after looking at the data. I am not a fiscal conservative, but I am a social conservative. I think corporations have co-opted liberal movements like women's lib, and freedom of speech, and conflated them with corporate agendas, e.g. turning feminism into "Lean In" climbing the corporate ladder for women. Freedom of speech actually suffers under capitalism, because the one who pays the piper calls the tune. Those with million of "followers" have social capital, and we should be more concerned about how they got "platformed" than whether they would be "deplatformed". Their profit motive and incentive structure leads them to corrupt society with their controversial, incorrect, corrosive rhetoric which is passed off as "entertainment" the minute it's criticized (Alex Jones' Sandy Hook bullshit comes to mind, as does FOX election conspiracies, which falls apart the minute they are sued). It corrupts society at large. That's why I started https://rational.app

In fact, I think that safety nets and UBI and 30-hour overtime laws will help men and women opt out of the rat race, and spend more time with their kids. The increased health, IQ points and better morals / education of the children will actually provide greater monetary returns for society (even though for me they are ends in themselves). For example, the moratorium on evictions may have enabled a richer society than one where millions of people are housing-insecure.

I think that UBI and gift economies (like science, open source and wikipedia) are far healthier than "private ownership" of social capital like audiences, (Twitter followers), distribution (news stations, etc.) or infrastructure. Gift economies become possible when people have their maslow's needs met and the anxiety is gone, so they can freely associate with projects they like, instead of being mercenaries 40-60 hours a week to survive. In these gift economies, there are so many small contributions that peer review is instituted (in science, open source, wikipedia, etc.) which actually increases the quality of what is published far better than competition, because most audience members are not informed enough (and will soon be bamboozled by AI bots and fake articles on a scale heretofore unseen, in the current capitalist system).

That's why I believe in building decentralized solutions, like solar panels, mesh networks, open source social networks, and smart contracts. I want a world where people are healthier, safer, and more moral. Sadly, the corporations and governments collude to keep the individuals distracted and at each other's throats (glance at https://magarshak.com/blog)

I think "not a paragon of virtue in every fact of their life" is a very strange way to describe a multiple convicted rapist!

I am more interested in widespread problems in society than one specific person. But having said that, regarding Cosby raping women, I can only go by what I read about the Cosby allegations and lawsuits on Wikipedia.

There is a lot said on both sides (eg several women sued Cosby for calling them liars in 2014). It seems the biggest actual clear admission of sexual assault was from a leaked deposition where he described how he would give Quaaludes in the 60s and 70s to women he met in clubs and subsequently slept with. I looked up the drug on Wikipedia:

Methaqualone became increasingly popular as a recreational drug and club drug in the late 1960s and 1970s, known variously as "ludes" or "disco biscuits"[citation needed] due to its widespread use during the popularity of disco in the 1970s, or "sopers" (also "soaps") in the United States and Canada, and "mandrakes" and "mandies" in the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand. The substance was sold both as a free base and as a salt (hydrochloride). This use means the drug is controlled in most countries, and is so under Schedule II of the United Nations Convention on Psychotropic Substances.

So if this drug was “in widespread recreational use” in that period, I would imagine this was a widespread systemic problem, and not just limited to Cosby.

So once again, we as a society are distracted and made to think one specific guy is the problem, where actually the entire liberal society got permeated with this kind of stuff, fueled by the exact sort of profit seeking industry I am talking about: drug sales, in this case, rather than rap songs. I am not saying for the government to get involved and carry on a violent and useless drug war on the supply. I am talking about demand-side education like the “just say no to Drugs” by Nancy Reagan, but more importantly — individual attention and relationships with kids, teenagers and young adults, by their parents, teachers, coaches, clergy, whoever. Don’t let the kids slip through the cracks and become loners / outcasts. That is how they turn to these drugs and then this gets cynically exported by CAPITALIST MEDIA to all the others. I am not being hyperbolic, look:

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cool/

Even today, how many times do we investigate allegations of rape on campus, and enact yes means yes and affirmative opt in policies, while doing precious little about the upstream culture of ALCOHOL FUELED PARTIES on campus? These teenagers are below legal drinking age — but besides that, the very idea that college is like an expensive year cruise for partying and experimentation, and coming of age, is behind many of the activities. The “girls gone wild” and “spring break” videos exploit this at the extremes, but we KNOW about the parties even today, yet we focus downstream only, and catch isolated cases.

Hookup culture and casual dating has replaced “going steady”, engagement and marriage. Out of wedlock births have skyrocketed. Divorce rates and opiates and antidepressants have skyrocketed. You can listen to any person, doesn’t have to be Cosby. But what Cosby has admitted to was widespread in society (drug use, alcohol etc) so shouldn’t we as a society look at the widespread problem, instead of patting ourselves on the back that we removed “all the rapists” from the pool?

It is like the gun debate … there are lots of guns in the country, most of the time the people shot and the people doing the shooting are drunk, but we as a society are hung up on individual cases after the fact or “a good guy with a gun an stop a bad guy with a gun”. We don’t connect the dots. The NHS was ordered to STOP doing research into guns and alcohol as an epidemiological or health issue.

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