Droopy wrote:This vacuous bilge begs the vary obvious question of just how low self esteem itself, decoupled from a society that glorifies, supports, and celebrates sexual promiscuity, reckless hedonism, the unimportance of family, and prolonged emotional/psychological immaturity could possible lead, in a disproportionate manner, to all the things mentioned were the society in question not itself a primary contributor to making these compensatory pursuits so attractive and viable to those with poor self concept.
It is also quite obvious that people with very high, and indeed, pathological self esteem (narcissism) are just as likely to engage in the mentioned behaviors. Even more obvious is the observation that, self esteem aside, sex, drugs, and hedonistic indulgence are attractive, at some level, to most people because of core elements of human nature (which the gospel understands as inherent aspects of the Fall) that are independent of high or low self esteem.
Also present here (as is typical of western social "science") is the classic unexamined secular leftist reversal of causation, the author being transparently innocent of the degree to which "unsafe sex, teenage pregnancy, aggression, criminal behavior, the abuse of alcohol and other drugs, and membership in deviant groups" is a primary cause of low self esteem, which then feeds, maintains, and expands the behaviors listed.
I just quoted the abstract from a couple of peer-reviewed articles. I didn't think I needed to dig into the data tables. I thought the methodology was sound enough.
It probably does, precisely to the same extent, and perhaps more, than irresponsible sexual behavior leads to low self-esteem, which leads to a viscous cycle in which behavior alters and modifies perception, which then influences further behavior, which supports further negative self perception, in a spiraling cycle of self negation. Addiction follows a very similar trajectory.
I'm assuming you said "viscous" as a pun, but I don't get it. It may surprise you that I believe you're right about the cycle that spirals downward. That's what happened to my friend. I'm talking about correlation, not causation, as I said.
Behavior cannot be extracted and isolated from perception. Hedonistic, promiscuous sex, adultery, drug use, alcohol abuse, violence and criminal activity etc. will lead inexorably to low self esteem. The author provides a chicken-egg argument and then sides with the chicken. The egg is the behavior that produced negative/pathological perceptions of self and self worth that produced further behavior in conformity with the expectations and assumptions generated by those perceptions - is never mentioned. "Low self-esteem" (a near religious preoccupation within the contemporary therapeutic culture, at least since the seventies) appears as an initial condition devoid of cause and effect relations with other psychological dynamics, not the least of which is the effect of the experience of behavior upon self perception.
The article was actually about how behavioral changes could be affected by helping those with low self-esteem (who were engaging in these behaviors) to have a better self-image. It's not about the chicken-egg at all, but rather how one can improve health and behavior through improved self-esteem. So, you're reading it kind of backwards.
Take another look at this, John. This is pseudoscience, at best. Researchers ask a small set of homosexual men for their subjective perceptions of their social status and sense of place in the larger society?
I thought about that, too, but having read the article and how it was quantified, I don't have a problem with the methodology. Low self-esteem is connected to perceptions of social acceptance, and African American communities are well-known to be far less socially accepting of homosexuality than other communities in the US (lots of research on this). Interviewing African American gay men about self-esteem and social acceptance is of course the only way to find out how that well-known social opprobrium affects them. Again, you don't get a good sense of the study through the abstract, but it was clear enough for a message board.
With no controls or any way of ascertaining the actual empirical basis or legitimacy of their responses, it's impossible to come to any conclusion at all regarding what these assertions actually imply for the society outside the subjective thought worlds of the participants in the study.
The controls are the same studies among white and other gays. That there is a marked difference both in behavior and self-esteem among the study group and other groups is empirical confirmation.
How do the researchers know whether and to what degree the claimed link between their lifestyle and low self-esteem are accurate representations of reality and not carefully manufactured rationalizations (increased and maintained by group-think, in-group solidarity, and intellectual support from within the social sciences and having the imprimatur of "science") that significantly alter or ignore the actual psychological dynamics and processes involved?
How does one know that in studying any human behavior? Social science research does not occur in a vacuum, but research adds to the body of science to build knowledge. That is how it works.
I'm sorry, but where did you show this, repeatedly or otherwise? You made one argument by assertion, and left it at that.
Yep, I did. That's because it wasn't my main point.
And unless we know what "severe" means here (which I suspect means any substantive restriction upon sexual expression at all, including expectations of strict chastity before marriage etc.) the claim is useless (having lived through the sexual revolution myself, and having paid attention to its major claims, even as early as Junior High School, I have a good idea where these kinds of claims are going to go).
Well, I can't stop you from dismissing research before you read it.