181–190 of 586 posts
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Can we blame lead for the US’ electoral landscape too?
No. You can’t blame lead. There is zero justification for making the average person less responsible for their own worldview and choices in leadership.
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It's lead. Lead concentration in America "rapidly increased in the 1950s and then declined in the 1980s" [1]. There is a non-linear discontinuity among kids born in the mid 80s, with linear improvements through to those born in the late 2000s [2]. Arrest rates for violent crimes are highest from 15 to 29 years old (particularly 17 to 23-year olds) [3]. They're particularly low for adults after 50 years old. We're aro…
No it's not. Not entirely anyway. One thing I've learned in my decades on this planet is that just about never is one explanation for a human condition mostly correct. Lead is a convenient technical explanation that underestimates the impact of upbringing and community. It doesn't explain a lot of factors of juvenile delinquency that existed for generations before lead service lines or leaded gasoline.
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It's actually the age of the egg that matters most, not the age of the mother during pregnancy.
How are these two measures different? Oocyte formation happens before birth.
> Rapidly declining numbers of youth are committing crimes, getting arrested, and being incarcerated. This matters because young offenders are the raw material that feeds the prison system: As one generation ages out, another takes its place on the same horrid journey. Another factor which will soon impact this, if it isn't already, is the rapidly changing nature of youth. Fertility rates have been dropping since 200…
The flip-side of an aging society with declining fertility is that older people, with fewer children are likely to be less sympathetic to children, and you could see the incarceration rates increase, or remain steady, as less severe infractions are punished more harshly. We recently saw this play out in the Queensland, Australia, state election where the opposition party, which was pretty much out of ideas, ran a sca…
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It is insane to just confidently assert that the only factor in the decrease in crime is Lead. Treating an insanely nuanced issue as an absolute doesn't make your argument more compelling, it is actually kind of baffling.
But it's so satisfying to one's ego that a single cause is the issue. All complexity of societal changes in the last 50 years can be outmanuevered. Simplification is sexy.
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Drugs. Don’t overthink things.
To dig deeper, not only are young people doing less drugs (good), but we've also stopped being so unbelievably fucking crazy with our policing of drugs. In many places marijuana is basically decriminalized, although not outright legal. Not too long ago even just carrying around marijuana could land you decades in prison, depending on how black you were.
https://www.findlaw.com/state/criminal-laws/marijuana-posses...
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It's actually the age of the egg that matters most, not the age of the mother during pregnancy.
Paternal age is also a contributor. Children with fathers over 40 see an increase in potential diseases, a shorter lifespan and higher infant mortality, likely due to DNA mutations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paternal_age_effect
This is interesting. I don't know why it's happening. However, this book deserves a mention: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Better_Angels_of_Our_Natur... . It shares statistics on how violence has been decreasing throughout the history of humanity.
How much of this is due to smartphones? The years seem to line up. 2014 seemed like the big year where smartphone ubiquity changed US teen culture. Less boredom, dumb adventure, drinking, etc. (For better or worse but in this case better.)
Or maybe video games. Lots of teen boys staying at home playing Xbox instead of getting into trouble.