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Childhood Stress Leaves Genetic Scars
sciencehabit writes "Traumatic experiences in early life can leave emotional scars. But a new study suggests that violence in childhood may leave a genetic mark as well. Researchers have found that children who are physically abused and bullied tend to have shorter telomeres — structures at the tips of chromosomes whose shrinkage has been linked to aging and disease."
Unless it happens on school grounds. Then people turn a blind eye.
Especially if other kids are doing it. Then the school administration gives their silent consent by doing nothing about it. Or worse, when it's physical abuse, they punish both the bully who attacked someone without provocation and the one who defended himself, just to add that element of mindfuck to existing injustice.
I am thankful to have had parents who told me I would not be in trouble for legitimate self-defense even if the school system was far less reasonable. What I found was that if you knock out one of them, the rest tend to leave you alone, for the nature of a bully is to find a doormat who will not fight back. I believe the school officials who have no doubt studied child psychology and the like are also aware of this and understand the injustice they facilitate. It is not mere bureaucratic ignorance but some kind of desired effect, a sort of unwritten portion of the curriculum.
People who can and will stand up for themselves, even when a price must be paid, are extremely undesirable to increasingly tyrannical governments. It's something they would discourage and it is not difficult to understand why. It's amazing how hard that is to accept for people who cannot comprehend that organizations, like individuals, can also be selfish and encourage only what is in their long-term interests.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
Sorry, but that opinion is not healthy. Abuse is abuse, but on occasion a parent (assuming they are actually parenting) will have limits tested beyond any other punishment. Normally, I see your type of comment from one of two kinds of people.
1. Those that have no children so have no idea what parenting is.
2. Parents who's children are monsters that have no respect for any authority. Generally the parents are either ashamed or afraid to take the kids out in public, or the children are so poorly behaved that people don't want them in public.
Truth be told, I have spanked my son 2 times in his whole life. The first time he refused to stop what he was doing, refused any punishment (go to time out) and was doing something dangerous. The second time, he was a bit older. He refused punishment and took a swing at me.
Now unlike when I was a kid and just got the shit kicked out of me with a belt, I explained to my kid on both occasions why I had to punish him and how we could not repeat those mistakes. He learned valuable lessons on both occasions. In my opinion, he learned valuable lessons from those occasions. He is going to be an adult soon, and one day may ask for advice when it comes to parenting. I really hope he remembers how he was raised or talks to me before he talks to someone like you.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Parents need to learn there are other ways to handle discipline and yes, aside from being damaging in yet another known way - previous revelations including lower test scores and greater aggression from children who have been spanked, spanking is the lazy way out. There are more effective, responsible means.
Timeouts for one, if done right and that is key, if done right, are absolutely better. Parents screw this one up by making them too long or delaying them. I for one always found a minute per year of age, given immediately at the time of the infraction regardless of where we were, done standing, done silent and done facing a wall, corner, tree, whatever was handy and followed with an explanation for the punishment and a directive for future behavior was very effective. So effective in fact I would find no need for their use within a couple weeks time. I had compliance.
Now I'll admit these weren't my children - rather I was a nanny for a great many years, and parents tend to have to be around their children a bit more than I had to, so perhaps adjustments would be necessary to maintain effectiveness. Or other avenues explored. My point is simply that there are other ways and they can be much more effective, if done right.
I've heard of this. But what I want to know is this. Are the shortening of the telomeres caused by...
A:) poor diet, exercise, and lack of nutrition.
or
B:) Stress hormones causing destruction of our own DNA.
If it's "B", I'm really fucked! I have so much stress these last 5 years that I've about had breakdown (life, economy, working long hours to keep my job..ect). I don't drink, smoke, or do anything physically abusive. But I feel like I've aged 10 years. Now multiply that by however many American's and Europeans are going through the same shit in the Great Depression part 2.
Life is not for the lazy.
It's likely related. Telomeres don't shorten on their own. One (of several) environmentally-controlled systems in the cells is the epigenome - a string of proteins that controls how DNA is interpreted. It may well be that emotional stress alters the epigenome in areas affecting the immune system and telomeres.
(There's some evidence that highly stressed adult humans are also more susceptible to cancer, and cancer again is linked to both the immune system and the telomere system.)
I think we're going to find that a number of things we've taken for granted as the "right way" for a society to function will prove to be carcinogenic and/or physically toxic. It will be interesting to see if that results in societies changing or whether they deem subjecting carcinogens and toxins on others to be a fundamental freedom (or that people are expendable anyway, or that the science isn't agreed on by 107.3% of all toothpick manufacturers, etc).
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Forget the organizational level for a second, and consider on a human level. Officials working for schools and depend on them to put food on the table would have to understand that authoritarian regimes tend to target and eliminate education.
Target and eliminate? No. They aren't that stupid (would that they were). What they do is pervert education and use it for the purpose of social engineering and indoctrination. Any transmission of knowledge or understanding is incidental and only to the extent necessary that the peons/students can perform useful labor, to form the bottom of the pyramid. They would also encourage conformity and permit various bullying and other abuses to ensure that the immaturities of childhood extend well into adulthood. What they absolutely would not do is teach serious, tough-minded critical thinking skills and raise up people who can educate themselves and do not need to depend on an instructor to tell them what is important to learn.
Sounds just like what we have now in the USA. These things happen slowly from the perspective of a human life, but quickly from the perspective of written history. Just consider how much the USA has changed in the last three generations. Then you can get a feel for what's going on, where it is headed, what the ultimate expression of it would be, and why it would be done that way.
The USA's tyranny is not going to be hard tyranny, the kind that waves a gun in your face and demands that you submit. It is going to be a soft tyranny, the kind that knows what's best for you, that you have learned to depend on. That, however, is just a matter of style, the means. The result is the same.
I have to ask, were you trolling or did you truly not understand that? What real tyrants understand is that the average person is so caught up in their day-to-day affairs that they tend not to be long-term thinkers. They are not skilled at seeing the path something is taking and projecting what the end of that path will be and that skill is not taught to them and they are not self-educators who would acquire it on their own. So if you want to implement tyranny, you do it in baby steps, each one carefully justified and defended by its ardent little apologists. After all, you don't want the terrorists to win, do you? After all, you want to protect the children, don't you? After all, you want the poor to be taken care of, don't you?
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
I have a brain and put to its full use, I can't for the life of me figure out how the liberal bogeyman came into this for you, but I'm sorry to tell you that your reasoning is inherently flawed. First off, I have found that people of all political stripes are more than willing to take a study, apply it universally and try to force it on everyone.
I did not, in any way, suggest that timeouts would work for everyone. What I did find was that for the thirty or so children I cared for as the eldest of three, the neighborhood babysitter for twelve years and a full-time nanny for six years timeouts done in the fashion I described were effective for all of them. I got years of compliance after only a few of these. I would add that some jurisdictions around the country have found a similar effect in jail sentences, faster and shorter sentencing apparently reduces recidivism.
I emphasize again that there are alternatives. Some parents have found groundings of all sorts to be effective or ineffective depending on the child, the type involved and the method used to carry it out. Some parents have forced chores as punishments. Some parents force extra schoolwork using workbooks bought from the likes on Amazon - I discourage it because I don't believe education should be thought of as a negative / believe it could lead to some long-term harm, but for some it's arguably effective. Sometimes you just need to apply a little more time. I had one boy who needed two weeks straight before he got it.
What I can say is that there are universal truths. Spanking, whether it is effective or not for getting a child to stop a particular act, is bad for all children. It leads to aggression, lower test scores, etc. Whatever the manifestation for a particular child the point is, if I shoot you in the foot you're going to stop kicking me with that foot, but let's look beyond just getting you to stop kicking me. Put another way, when there is permanent harm, it doesn't matter if it is effective. It could be the most effective method out there and that would change that it is wrong, especially in light of alternatives.
This study may eventually prove to be yet another piece backing that.
Telomeres don't shorten on their own, as you say. The traditional understanding is that they shorten when DNA replicates itself. Cell splits into two copies and the copies have shorter telomeres, limiting the number of times they can reproduce. Applying Ockham's Razor, it seems that the simplest explanation for two otherwise similar individuals of similar ages to have differing telomere lengths is that the individual with the shorter telomeres has experienced more cell death over their lifetime, so more of their cells are replacements. That can be explained by exposure to drugs or alcohol in the womb, poor nutrition, heightened stress levels causing cell death through various mechanisms, as well as plain old physical trauma. Given that explanation of how growing up in an abusive home could lead to shorter telomeres, is another explanation necessary? Does there have to be some special mechanism shortening telomeres to explain the results of this study, or does the traditional explanation that telomeres shorten with every cell division cover it?
I have so much stress these last 5 years that I've about had breakdown (life, economy, working long hours to keep my job..ect). I don't drink, smoke, or do anything physically abusive. But I feel like I've aged 10 years.
Have you ever thought about indulging yourself a little and having a beer once in a while, just to take the edge off a little? Too much of anything is bad, of course, by definition, but a little can go a long way. I've long had the suspicion that people in cultures where alcohol is completely prohibited tend to get too worked up over small and unimportant things. I also treasure the evenings where my friends and I drink a little more than we should; we get to collectively step out of our normal controlled selves for a while, bond, and do stupid, childish stuff. In an utterly unscientific way, I suspect that whatever harm the alcohol does to our bodies will be offset by the fun we have. And even if our bodies are harmed a little, and our lives shortened a little, at least we had fun.
Just my 2 cents.
Ah, arrogance and stupidity, all in the same package. How efficient of you. -- Londo Mollari