"A Girl's Life on PBS" propagates falsehoods about education, suicide, etc.

Submitted by fibtastic on Tue, 2010-01-05 05:34

Just caught this documentary on my local PBS affiliate. It seems to rehash the tired and disproven tropes from the 1992 AAUW report on "How schools short-change girls" as though they were facts. Excerpt:

'Girls growing up in America today have more opportunities than their mothers and grandmothers ever imagined. They do well in school; by fifth grade they’re equal to boys in math and science, and they’re significantly better at reading and writing. They have more career choices, more flexibility in family roles and more female role models in positions of political power.

But even as doors open, girls may not be able to walk confidently through them. When they get to middle school, girls’ self-esteem plunges. Twice as many girls as boys attempt suicide. Twice as many show signs of depression. Girls have a higher risk of abusing alcohol and drugs, and violent physical assaults by girls have skyrocketed since 1990.'

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"...have more opportunities than their mothers and grandmothers ever imagined"

Yes, and many more now than boys have, too.

PBS at it again. They just can't help themselves, can they? The NIMH has the facts and they paint a much different picture:

Straight from: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/suicide-in-the-us-statistics-and-prevention/index.shtml#children :

Are women or men at higher risk?
  • Suicide was the seventh leading cause of death for males and the sixteenth leading cause of death for females in 2006.
  • Almost four times as many males as females die by suicide
  • Firearms, suffocation, and poison are by far the most common methods of suicide, overall. However, men and women differ in the method used, as shown below.
Suicide by: Males (%) Females (%)
Firearms 56 31
Suffocation 23 19
Poisoning 13 40

Is suicide common among children and young people?
In 2006, suicide was the third leading cause of death for young people ages 15 to 24. Of every 100,000 young people in each age group, the following number died by suicide:

  • Children ages 10 to 14 — 1.3 per 100,000
  • Adolescents ages 15 to 19 — 8.2 per 100,000
  • Young adults ages 20 to 24 — 12.5 per 100,000


As in the general population, young people were much more likely to use firearms, suffocation, and poisoning than other methods of suicide, overall. However, while adolescents and young adults were more likely to use firearms than suffocation, children were dramatically more likely to use suffocation.


There were also gender differences in suicide among young people, as follows:

  • Over four times as many males as females ages 15 to 19 died by suicide.
  • More than six times as many males as females ages 20 to 24 died by suicide.
You know, I can't find any stats on suicide attempts among children in the middle school age range. Where are these "documentarians" getting their numbers? I think it's time to start asking questions and demanding answers. This is a classic case of people saying the sky is green and the grass is blue.

Contact PBS Parents: http://www.pbs.org/parents/contact/
About the host: http://www.pbs.org/parents/raisinggirls/girlslife/about.html
Other credits: http://www.pbs.org/parents/raisinggirls/girlslife/credits.html

I cannot seem to find ready contact information for the managing personnel listed on the credits page. Gee, wonder why?

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Submitted by Matt on Tue, 2010-01-05 17:50

Yep, they are definitely running old news that's been long debunked by Christinna Hoff Sommers, even if it's a new show. I've read that girls in that age range do attempt more suicides (cry for help), but that boys (as you point out) succeed at a much higher rate. Once again, taxpayer funded PBS runs gender feminist propaganda as fact. I want my money back!

Hoff-Sommmers book, The War Against Boys, largely goes into this as I recall, and Who Stole Feminism, may also have a little info.

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Submitted by MR on Wed, 2010-01-06 21:34