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No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

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Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#11

Post by anonuser123456 »

green_man_lives wrote: post #6

Article spends entire time "debunking" a political pundit who posts "hot takes" on Twitter, doesn't interview a single teen. Maybe, just maybe, the answer is multi-faceted. Maybe we should take the things kids say at face value if we want to pretend that we are being intellectually honest. Sure, humans are notoriously bad at describing their own qualia and reasons for why they feel the things they do, but listening s…

As a neoliberal/capitalist, I would suggest that capitalism is an incomplete theory and that we are still flushing things out.

The huge rise in material standard of living from the 1850s to 1970s in the US made a dramatic improvement in people’s real quality of life.

But since the 70s the improvements are very marginal. I speculate that’s because most of the consumer improvements are in the domain of status consumption goods, which by definition is zero sum. Material abundance beyond a certain point is in and of itself corrosive because it’s just status seeking / competitive signaling.

Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#12

Post by jackson1442 »

green_man_lives wrote: post #6

Article spends entire time "debunking" a political pundit who posts "hot takes" on Twitter, doesn't interview a single teen. Maybe, just maybe, the answer is multi-faceted. Maybe we should take the things kids say at face value if we want to pretend that we are being intellectually honest. Sure, humans are notoriously bad at describing their own qualia and reasons for why they feel the things they do, but listening s…

> see what the negative externalities are of a system that assumes the driving force between human interactions to be economic (one of which is the commodification of everything including relationships)

Absolutely agreed. We've gone from a community-based culture where you took care of your neighbors because it's the right thing to do to "rugged individualism" where things like healthcare are "privileges" you have to _earn_ through labor.

I think we need to stop making the assumption that all the systems we have today are the best and take a long hard look at what upholds society, piece by piece.

Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#13

Post by gretch »

LatteLazy wrote: post #9
korroziya wrote: post #7

"Between 2007 and 2018, the suicide rate among Americans ages 10 to 24 increased by nearly 60 percent." Right around the time social media garbage bloomed. Weird coincidence.

Or post the 2008 crash where everything governments did for young people was slashed...

+1 to this

How many teens had to watch their parent come home and announce that they got laid off from their job and that this year there wasn't going to be a yearly family trip?

Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#14

Post by rationalist »

LatteLazy wrote: post #9
korroziya wrote: post #7

"Between 2007 and 2018, the suicide rate among Americans ages 10 to 24 increased by nearly 60 percent." Right around the time social media garbage bloomed. Weird coincidence.

Or post the 2008 crash where everything governments did for young people was slashed...

> everything governments did for young people

This is the first time I've heard of this argument. What kinds of things are you referring to?

Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#15

Post by braingenious »

From the article:

>Lorenz isn’t wrong to suggest that economic conditions can influence the prevalence of mental distress. Unemployment and poverty are both major risk factors for depression. Recessions are associated with elevated rates of suicide. And there is some evidence that robust social-welfare states improve mental health by reducing material insecurity. It is therefore reasonable to suspect that America’s relatively stingy social safety net and elevated level of child poverty are implicated in its youth mental-health crisis.

lmao he agrees with her main point and then goes on to just shrug his shoulders in the next paragraph.

Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#16

Post by inphovore »

Are you sure?

Just last week an article that rising number of teens (girls and boys) are being sextorted, or sexually coerced.

More and more girls are getting raped before adulthood, let alone the rising likelihood that an attractive single woman will get raped in a major metropolitan.

America has several converging cultural epidemics.

It’s all in the meme stream.

Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#17

Post by woolion »

The logic here is absolutely astounding. People _killing themselves_ is not an indicator that life is worse? What is it an indicator of, Mr Levitz? Are they unable to tolerate so much happiness? Are these people dumb? Defective?

Arguing that life is objectively better because you are going to make a better salary than in the fifties is plain gaslighting, but I don't believe there are a lot of people who will still fall for this trick.

Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#18

Post by zmgsabst »

scotty79 wrote: post #8
rayiner wrote: post #5

> [Lorenz] went on to suggest that the young people of the 1950s enjoyed objectively superior material prospects than young people do today This is why I think culture is more important than policy. Lorenz’s point is obviously non-sensical. She mentions the “safety net.” But Medicaid didn’t exist in the 1950s. There were no federal student loans. There were no food stamps. Almost nobody went to college. Etc. But it’s…

> So what has changed since the 1950s? Trajectory of how well off average American will be in x years?

To add numbers to this:

A teenager in 1950s would be 40-50 when the productivity-wage breakdown happened [1]. Their generation not only benefited, they caused that for juiced returns on their stocks.

A teenager today was born an entire generation after that decoupling — and has only known a world where their parents were exploited by 1950s teenagers.

I don’t think it’s surprising that a generation where hard work was rewarded was more optimistic than one born to parents for whom that didn’t apply.

[1] - https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/

Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#19

Post by vore »

rayiner wrote: post #5

> [Lorenz] went on to suggest that the young people of the 1950s enjoyed objectively superior material prospects than young people do today This is why I think culture is more important than policy. Lorenz’s point is obviously non-sensical. She mentions the “safety net.” But Medicaid didn’t exist in the 1950s. There were no federal student loans. There were no food stamps. Almost nobody went to college. Etc. But it’s…

Or maybe those changes are fine. You have no idea, I have no idea! But I surely don't know how you're saying this with such certainty!

Re: No, Teen Suicide Isn’t Rising Because Life Got Objectively Worse

#20

Post by falcolas »

nhchris wrote: post #10
rayiner wrote: post #5

> [Lorenz] went on to suggest that the young people of the 1950s enjoyed objectively superior material prospects than young people do today This is why I think culture is more important than policy. Lorenz’s point is obviously non-sensical. She mentions the “safety net.” But Medicaid didn’t exist in the 1950s. There were no federal student loans. There were no food stamps. Almost nobody went to college. Etc. But it’s…

> There were no federal student loans. [..] Almost nobody went to college. How much did college cost? How necessary was a college degree for success?

My mom, in the late 60's, paid for her master's degree at an accredited university with a summer waitressing job. It enabled her to get a career as a teacher.

Separately, my father built a 2k square-foot house on 5 acres of land for $10k in the 70's (about $100k adjusted for inflation). He did this on a telephone lineman's budget without a degree.

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