Posted on 07/09/2015 1:01:36 PM PDT by Sopater
Heavy metal was the No. 1-selling music genre in 1989, and parents feared the worst: that Satan worship, drug use, loads of sex, and suicide went along with it, write researchers in the journal Self and Identity. Records were burned, "Parental Advisory" warning labels were born, and some '90s research suggested that teens who were into metal had a boatload of problems. And then decades passed. How did those metalheads turn out? Pretty OK, found the team led by Humboldt State University psychologist Tasha Howe, reports Billboard. It found that while middle-aged metalheads were more likely to have engaged in risky behavior as youths, they in no way differ from both non-metal-loving peers and college students in terms of "life satisfaction and current functioning."
To get to that conclusion, researchers surveyed 377 adults, both metal-lovers (groupies, musicians, and fans), peers who preferred different music, and California college students. It turns out the metal groups' recollections of their youth were "significantly happier" than the comparison groups', and they had fewer regrets (about a third did, compared to 44.9% of students and 51.3% of non-metal peers). As for why they possibly turned out like they did, the researchers point to a "kinship in the metal community ... a way to experience heightened emotions and intense connections with like-minded people, which seemed to contribute to their eventual positive identity development." This suggests, they write, that "fringe style cultures can ... serve a protective function" for youth. The authors do note, however, that "this was a community sample of relatively high functioning individuals who volunteered to participate," which may have skewed the results. (Another study found excessive headbanging could kill.)
Thank for that. :)
40s and 50s I’m 50 now.
49 and holding for another couple months at least.
I agree YOU have been productive.
Have you seen TODAY’s kids?
It seems the majority are slackers living in mama’s basement collecting EBT.
Check out this link. There’s a lot of oldies but goodies on there.
The first time I heard “Rock You Like A Hurricane” my life changed! lol!
Gotta love this. 4 of the biggest bands together on one stage.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__j5Z_WcVgE
You want one to blow your mind?
11 yo Japanese girl doing Ratt’s Lay it down.
You tell me if she missed a note ;)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sK6vdhYeiRQ
How about just hair any length ?
I do love the talent on youtube. There’s some remarkable young musicians out there.
Sorry Norm, but that is a ridiculous comment.
Casting a broad net while requiring only one example. Good!
And they were pretty locked it too! ;)
You know, I really feel bad for millenials sometimes. There is NOTHING that will touch the Big 4, Maiden or Dio. Yea they got great multimedia shows and array sound systems now. But it isn’t the same.
The Boomers were right about ‘you had to be there’ I guess. 60s or 80s.
I don’t know whats ridiculous about it. It IS true. We all didn’t evaporate into a cloud of pot smoke.
I’m STILL a metalhead.
My daughter is a huge Ratt fan. That video spun her head out completely. Mine too ;) Most guys that have played for years couldn’t play that song that well. But an 11 yo Girl? 11 yo boy OR girl? Amazing talent.
You make it sound like metalheads did everything great.
Then you strawman to support it by saying there is at least one metalhead in every industry at every level.
That is not hard to achieve.
I am absolutely sure there is one country dude and one punk dude for every such position, too.
And Halford in his prime. Nobody could touch him.
Dio was head-and-shoulders above all the others.
And I actually preferred Paul Di’anno to Bruce Dickinson.
What does that have to do with the actual article that we’re discussing? The article is about the metalheads of the 80’s.
Most of the kids I know are hard working. They’re struggling to FIND full-time jobs. It’s tough out there.
They’re delaying adulthood because they cannot get full-time work.
My son finally had his breakthrough when he got a job as a tower climber.
$13 an hour and he’d nearly been killed three times so far. One of his co-workers just broke his back last month.
But hey! He’s got full-time work finally!
My daughter has full-time work, but somehow her employer has gotten away with offering NO benefits. No insurance. Forget vacation time or anything like that. People don’t complain because they need the money and are grateful for the hours.
The young people are leaving our area in droves for work. Texas, the oil fields, new real estate markets that aren’t as depressed... The problem is that most of them have no idea where to go.
And you can forget the old days of working a stable job for 30 years and getting a pension. They know that they’ll never have job security like that in their lives.
Those who tried to do better by getting a college education are finding that it’s not helping. All they have now is debt.
The military was a refuge, but now even that’s limited.
And it’s really hard to get two part-time jobs when BOTH employers want you at their beck-and-call. If you can’t do it, you’re fired for someone with more ‘flexibility’. I personally know of young men with families living in RV’s while they scrounge the internet for odd jobs - and they take anything that they can get.
It’s not just the kids. My own husband is about to retire from the military and we have no idea where we’re going to be in two years. Normally, men in his position would transition to contractor work, but Obama’s DOD is cutting back on that.
This economy is horrible. For the young people who want the career, the house, the family, and the white picket fence; it’s damn depressing.
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