Self Esteem

[BlackCryptoKnight]

Why do so many people have low self esteem? Why do so many women have low self esteem? What can be done about it? :icon_ques

[Greatis]

hmmm ans to that is simple. Being ridiculed and laughed at a young age can do that. Being told your useless no good etc by parents can do that. the list goes on and on.

[Kitten]

Women tend to have a low-self esteem, because of their environment and how they are raised. Some people even raise their daughters and son's differently. They raise the sons to go out and achieve this and that. And they raise the daughter to be a wife. That is the first job most mothers give to their daughter. The mother teaches the daughter to be a wife and mother and how to be passive to a man. You have never seen how some moms say to their daughters if they are outspoken, ladies dont talk that way. And they dont do certain things. No man will want you talking like that. He will box if you dont mind your manners. I think that has alot to do with it. And also society, plays a key part in it. By the way they treat women and how men get the better jobs and so on. I'll give someone else a chance to answer :) Notice I said some people in how they raise the daughters ladies. :)

[philben]

Low self esteem does not happen in isolation - usually situations and environments compound it. For instance if a girl has been abused constantly with no reprieve, or just being aroung parents with low self esteem - parents without speaking give their children what they are (but you all knew this already)

[InkyP1]

I think you are all right. Put it all together a what do you have.

[Drew]

so its all about the young years ha.

[Xenocrates]

I know very beautiful women who have won many pageants who still have low self esteem. I know bossy women who have very strong leadership skills, and who usually get what they want in life, and still have low self esteem. I know women whose mothers have raised them as dominatrices and they still have low self esteem.

Low self-esteem in women is not affiliated with her upbringing. If it was, then these women I've described shouldn't be affected by it. But, they are, so how is that so? The answer is a lot simpler than you think. It is two-fold:

1. Women don't have egos. Men do. Women are emotional creatures. Men are not.

Unlike men, women don't usually have much of an ego. Therefore whenever they begin to doubt themselves for even a second, there is little or no ego to supercede that doubt. Their emotional nature subsequently exacerbates the self perception, and they fall into a trance of depression - usually for no good reason at all. Have you guys ever seen a female friend who just felt down but she has no idea why? One bad thought leads to another and another and so on, until she completely forgot why she felt depressed in the first place. It's called "wallowing in self-pity".

However, a man's ego (read: his tenacity to be 'cocky') coupled with his ability to be rational (read: non-emotional decision maker) usually overturns the self-doubt when he thinks to himself: "but wait a minute, why do I feel this way about myself? There is no rational reason to!". Since men aren't very emotional creatures, the situation is almost never exacerbated.

2. Women think in relation to other women. Men think in relation to themselves.

When a man looks in the mirror, even if he is not muscle-bound, he thinks himself to be superman (Every guy goes through this stage at least once in his life). He thinks so positively and so highly of himself, that women nearby may just get sick in the stomache. He will notice other men who possess better attributes than himself, but he always falls back on some strong point about himself that usually, it doesn't bother him to a point of being crippled by it, because men are strong believers in self-worth.

Women on the other hand ALWAYS compare themselves with each other. Women are not typically strong believers in self-worth. Even if a woman has a knock out body and is an irrisistable guy magnet, if she sees another girl who has some attribute that she doesn't possess, she begins to doubt herself, to the point where she even starts to doubt her own stronger attributes. She starts to ask silly questions like: "Am I pretty?", "Do I look fat?", "Am I even attractive?", "Am I ?".

Guys reason in a rational sense that: "[I]Hey, even if he is better @ X, I'm still better @ Y".

Application: "He may be stronger than me, but I'm smarter. So he may get the girls now, but when I'm rich, he'll be working for me. Hehehe"

Girls reason in an emotional sense that: "Hey, she's is better @ X, my Y is not good enough.".

Application: "She is prettier than me. Therefore even though she's fat and I have a knock-out body, she'll probably get more guy attention anyway..."

Notice the difference? Guys reason rationally. Girls reason emotionally (ignoring rationality altogether). Therefore girls tend to have lower self esteem. It has nothing to do with upbringing. Trust me. ;)

[AngelsKiss]

I know very beautiful women who have won many pageants who still have low self esteem. I know bossy women who have very strong leadership skills, and who usually get what they want in life, and still have low self esteem. I know women whose mothers have raised them as dominatrices and they still have low self esteem.

Low self-esteem in women is not affiliated with her upbringing. If it was, then these women I've described shouldn't be affected by it. But, they are, so how is that so? The answer is a lot simpler than you think. It is two-fold:

1. Women don't have egos. Men do. Women are emotional creatures. Men are not.

Unlike men, women don't usually have much of an ego. Therefore whenever they begin to doubt themselves for even a second, there is little or no ego to supercede that doubt. Their emotional nature subsequently exacerbates the self perception, and they fall into a trance of depression - usually for no good reason at all. Have you guys ever seen a female friend who just felt down but she has no idea why? One bad thought leads to another and another and so on, until she completely forgot why she felt depressed in the first place. It's called "wallowing in self-pity".

However, a man's ego (read: his tenacity to be 'cocky') coupled with his ability to be rational (read: non-emotional decision maker) usually overturns the self-doubt when he thinks to himself: "but wait a minute, why do I feel this way about myself? There is no rational reason to!". Since men aren't very emotional creatures, the situation is almost never exacerbated.

2. Women think in relation to other women. Men think in relation to themselves.

When a man looks in the mirror, even if he is not muscle-bound, he thinks himself to be superman (Every guy goes through this stage at least once in his life). He thinks so positively and so highly of himself, that women nearby may just get sick in the stomache. He will notice other men who possess better attributes than himself, but he always falls back on some strong point about himself that usually, it doesn't bother him to a point of being crippled by it, because men are strong believers in self-worth.

Women on the other hand ALWAYS compare themselves with each other. Women are not typically strong believers in self-worth. Even if a woman has a knock out body and is an irrisistable guy magnet, if she sees another girl who has some attribute that she doesn't possess, she begins to doubt herself, to the point where she even starts to doubt her own stronger attributes. She starts to ask silly questions like: "Am I pretty?", "Do I look fat?", "Am I even attractive?", "Am I ?".

Guys reason in a rational sense that: "[I]Hey, even if he is better @ X, I'm still better @ Y".

Application: "He may be stronger than me, but I'm smarter. So he may get the girls now, but when I'm rich, he'll be working for me. Hehehe"

Girls reason in an emotional sense that: "Hey, she's is better @ X, my Y is not good enough.".

Application: "She is prettier than me. Therefore even though she's fat and I have a knock-out body, she'll probably get more guy attention anyway..."

Notice the difference? Guys reason rationally. Girls reason emotionally (ignoring rationality altogether). Therefore girls tend to have lower self esteem. It has nothing to do with upbringing. Trust me. ;)

The ego is simple about the self. Who am I? What am I? How important am I?..etc. I don't know where you get this from but to say women dont have much of ego is illogical. Everyone has an ego, what is different is that some people have a more exaggerated sense of importance. There are women who think themselves to be extremely darn important, warranted or not.

Secondly, life isn't simply about women being emotional and so we fall into a state of depression. Yes we are made up diff, our hormones are diff too which results in many things. We also go thru child birth something not man can ever understand which also changes our bodies and results in our varying emotional states, which is not neccessarily wallowing in self pity as you so put it.

Not every guys is egotistical and "cocky." I have male friends who are very secure in them selves without being egotiscal and "cocky." There are men who are also very emotional, they feel things deeply.

As for girls reasoning in a emotional sense ignoring rationality (what a load of crock) and men reasoning in a logical sense thats a myth you need to check into again. Lots of us females can reason logically, its why there are so many of us who are into the sciences for eg. OMG this is laughable.

Women are not typical believers in self worth? Heck I can't stop laughing at this generalisation (to put it mildly). I will stop now since I am an illogical female with no self worth and incapable of a logical thought :icon_lol:

[Zoley!]

The last part of your statement I dont agree with. It has nothing to do with their upbringing. Trust you.


I beg to differ with you and Im sure you have some proof into this summation.
Could you please show them in black and white were you got this information. What references did you use?

[Bashment Girl]

Why do so many people have low self esteem? Why do so many women have low self esteem? What can be done about it? :icon_ques

Oh my goodness where do we start?

Women that I know that have low self esteem have that problem because the feeling of inferiority was instilled in them from childhood. Also some I know have what I call AWAL DADDY'S.... they feel that they weren't good enough to be loved by the person who helped create them therefore no one else inthe world is going to love them either!

What can be done about it? From brith people should be making their kids feel that they are topp uh di top! YA SI MI? lol... Yeah but seriously... my cousins have been told from babies that they are destined for great things and look at the two of them now... they've lived up to that. So I think it starts with how children are raised. :cool:

[Xenocrates]

The ego is simple about the self. Who am I? What am I? How important am I?..etc. I don't know where you get this from but to say women dont have much of ego is illogical. Everyone has an ego, what is different is that some people have a more exaggerated sense of importance. There are women who think themselves to be extremely darn important, warranted or not.

- Agreed. But you know perfectly well that I'm not referring to ego in the strictest context (id->ego->superego). If that were the case, I'd have used a different expression. Attacking the misuse of an element from a technical perspective doesn't disprove the context of the excerpt. Furthermore, not once did I ever say that there is no such thing as a woman who does not have equivalent or strong self-perception. The view you have of yourself does not apply to every woman. You being a strong woman doesn't make the rest of them strong as well. That's the same thing as saying that all men are dogs.


Secondly, life isn't simply about women being emotional and so we fall into a state of depression. Yes we are made up diff, our hormones are diff too which results in many things. We also go thru child birth something not man can ever understand which also changes our bodies and results in our varying emotional states, which is not neccessarily wallowing in self pity as you so put it.

- You're assuming that women only fall into these states of depression because of hormonal influences. Not true. I know a LOT of women who are not pregnant, nor which have any condition that would incite hormonal influences that DO fall into depression and choose to stay there instead of trying to work their way out of it. You may not suffer from these conditions, but that doesn't mean there aren't women who don't. You're not every woman. You're just 1 in 3.odd billion.


As for girls reasoning in a emotional sense ignoring rationality (what a load of crock) and men reasoning in a logical sense thats a myth you need to check into again. Lots of us females can reason logically, its why there are so many of us who are into the sciences for eg. OMG this is laughable.

There are REAL psychological evaluations that CLEARLY show that most women use emotion over rationale in their thought process. This is not an issue up for debate. To challenge that, It would be like me saying that guys don't think about sex as often as women do. That doesn't mean there aren't guys who proactively think about sex, nor does it mean there aren't women who aren't proactively emotional. There is no mythicism about it. This is common knowledge.


Not every guys is egotistical and "cocky." I have male friends who are very secure in them selves without being egotiscal and "cocky." There are men who are also very emotional, they feel things deeply.

- You have an unnatural talent for stating the obvious. There's no point in me stating what is already common knowledge. The post that started the thread asks a question which is not necessarily common knowledge, which is why we are having this conversation in the first place. Everybody already knows that there are some girls who have stronger personalities than their fellow equivalents. Some of them so overly placed, they even rival their sexual counterparts. They're called tomboys (and not every strong woman is a tomboy, in case you want to attack that too... :rolleyes: )


Women are not typical believers in self worth? Heck I can't stop laughing at this generalisation (to put it mildly). I will stop now since I am an illogical female with no self worth and incapable of a logical thought :icon_lol:

- Now it's my turn to be unnecessarily technical:

Typical insinuates greater probability in the population set, not absolute dominance over the entire set. Hence the criticism is a little pointless don't you think?

Throughout your entire response, you're making 2 fallacious assumptions:

1. That because you think the way you do, all women therefore think likewise.

2. That I've specifically insinuated that this affects EVERY woman.

Go back and read what I said carefully. It is responses like these why I chose my words carefully in my response (so as not to offend - clearly it didn't work). If you are not willing to re-read what I had said before responding (which, knowing you, you probably won't), you will prove two things:

1. Judging by your choice of words, you're probably too offended/perturbed/upset/[insert negative emote here] to (hence proving my first point about women and emotions)

2. You think I'm a chauvenist pig (hence proving my second point about women's tenacity for being irrational)

But I don't think you're either an irrational or an overtly emotional creature. I think that you will be willing to have an uncharged, impartial and intelligent discussion about the matter, without taking on the offense or being offensive (with respect to my talking "crock" or "Generalising" women). It is cynical responses like yours, AngelsKiss, that prove my point.

So whatever response you choose to elicit hereafter, try as hard as you possibly can to NOT prove my point. Tell me that I'm wrong and show me how without getting so cynical about the issue. You can't think when you're too offended to rationalise.

But I have faith in your ability to prove me wrong. I afterall, can't possibly be right all the time, now can I? :cool:

[AngelsKiss]

- Agreed. But you know perfectly well that I'm not referring to ego in the strictest context (id->ego->superego). If that were the case, I'd have used a different expression. Attacking the misuse of an element from a technical perspective doesn't disprove the context of the excerpt. Furthermore, not once did I ever say that there is no such thing as a woman who does not have equivalent or strong self-perception. The view you have of yourself does not apply to every woman. You being a strong woman doesn't make the rest of them strong as well. That's the same thing as saying that all men are dogs.



- You're assuming that women only fall into these states of depression because of hormonal influences. Not true. I know a LOT of women who are not pregnant, nor which have any condition that would incite hormonal influences that DO fall into depression and choose to stay there instead of trying to work their way out of it. You may not suffer from these conditions, but that doesn't mean there aren't women who don't. You're not every woman. You're just 1 in 3.odd billion.



There are REAL psychological evaluations that CLEARLY show that most women use emotion over rationale in their thought process. This is not an issue up for debate. To challenge that, It would be like me saying that guys don't think about sex as often as women do. That doesn't mean there aren't guys who proactively think about sex, nor does it mean there aren't women who aren't proactively emotional. There is no mythicism about it. This is common knowledge.



- You have an unnatural talent for stating the obvious. There's no point in me stating what is already common knowledge. The post that started the thread asks a question which is not necessarily common knowledge, which is why we are having this conversation in the first place. Everybody already knows that there are some girls who have stronger personalities than their fellow equivalents. Some of them so overly placed, they even rival their sexual counterparts. They're called tomboys (and not every strong woman is a tomboy, in case you want to attack that too... :rolleyes: )



- Now it's my turn to be unnecessarily technical:

Typical insinuates greater probability in the population set, not absolute dominance over the entire set. Hence the criticism is a little pointless don't you think?

Throughout your entire response, you're making 2 fallacious assumptions:

1. That because you think the way you do, all women therefore think likewise.

2. That I've specifically insinuated that this affects EVERY woman.

Go back and read what I said carefully. It is responses like these why I chose my words carefully in my response (so as not to offend - clearly it didn't work). If you are not willing to re-read what I had said before responding (which, knowing you, you probably won't), you will prove two things:

1. Judging by your choice of words, you're probably too offended/perturbed/upset/[insert negative emote here] to (hence proving my first point about women and emotions)

2. You think I'm a chauvenist pig (hence proving my second point about women's tenacity for being irrational)

But I don't think you're either an irrational or an overtly emotional creature. I think that you will be willing to have an uncharged, impartial and intelligent discussion about the matter, without taking on the offense or being offensive (with respect to my talking "crock" or "Generalising" women). It is cynical responses like yours, AngelsKiss, that prove my point.

So whatever response you choose to elicit hereafter, try as hard as you possibly can to NOT prove my point. Tell me that I'm wrong and show me how without getting so cynical about the issue. You can't think when you're too offended to rationalise.

But I have faith in your ability to prove me wrong. I afterall, can't possibly be right all the time, now can I? :cool:

Actually I have no interest in proving you wrong or right. That would mean I think what you have to say is important. I dont.

Secondly, no where in my post was I implying that I am an example of the typical type of women out there, esepcially since I dont consider myself typical. LOL call that a super ego if you will. :icon_lol:

Thirdly, I dont read minds so I cant know that you refer to the ego meant that you were talking about the super ego. I can only go by your post. I am not about to make assumptions for any one so its best if you post precisely what you mean.

You probably should take your own advice and read my post...since I never implied that hormones were the only reason for women fall into depression. I was simply pointing out the fact that there are many reasons. Hence the reason why I state that its not that simple.

As for me stating the obvious, thats relative isnt it? If I am going to state my opinions I am going to do my best to do so that it doesnt come across as a generalisation.

I dont need to attack any thing you say, just responding to something I find ludicrous. Again just my opinion to which am entitle to. Oh and dont try to do my thinking for me, like I said before your post only serve to amuse me. As for thinking you are a chauvinist pig, now aren't you getting a bit emotional here?

Anyway, if nothing else thanks for the laugh, darn but you amuse me no end. Over and out :icon_lol:

[BlackCryptoKnight]

<BCK digs up the Kevlar once more...>
:icon_neut

[Drew]

yo, these posts are getting long. oh well, time to sit back and read.

[AngelsKiss]

<BCK digs up the Kevlar once more...>
:icon_neut

LOL @ BCK...hey you don't need Kevlar for this. This is lightweight, merely amusing stuff. :icon_mrgr

[BlackCryptoKnight]

LOL @ BCK...hey you don't need Kevlar for this. This is lightweight, merely amusing stuff. :icon_mrgr

Just hope it stays that way... I can't duck for cover as quickly as I used to do back in my younger days. ;)

[Xenocrates]

LMAO :icon_mrgr

Angelskiss, thanks for your participation. This was a most entertaining discussion. I'm glad to have been a source of amusement for you. I am equally grateful and entertained. ;)

Hey BCK, you should learn to say "checkmate" in 5 languages!

- niederlage (Ger)
- jaque mate (Spa)
- échec et mat (Fre)
- oute (Jap)
- vici (Lat equiv.)

Because sometimes people don't know when the game (of chess) is already over and it's usually when they speak another language. Furthermore, Kevlar is VERY expensive! :D

LMAO - I'm going to need a new supply of tears after this... :icon_mrgr

[Cocoa]

Thread revival.
...
...

[Manu]

We know why. The media. Society. It depicts what is perceived to be perfect and people are not comfortable with themselves unless they are as close to that as possible. It's a pity we're not striving for true perfection :rolleyes:

[BlackCryptoKnight]

We know why. The media. Society. It depicts what is perceived to be perfect and people are not comfortable with themselves unless they are as close to that as possible. It's a pity we're not striving for true perfection :rolleyes:

But with some people, when they consider what true perfection is, they feel even more insecure instead of being motivated.

[Virus]

I aint perfect but i can work with what i have...
I was watching americas next top model on vh1, and these girls are gorgeous. The second runner up kahlen i think, she was such a nut; i mean the slightest little thing she start bawl, then there was michelle... yea i mean she had skin problems but she broke down i guess bcuz she wasn't feeling apart of the group (unbelievable)

In my opinion ppl who arent surrounded by alot of ppl tend to have more self esteem, bcuz if u have ppl tell u ur the greatest and then noone's telling you all of a sudden u start to doubt urself; im not good enuff, blah blah blah... thats what happened to tiffany and some of the others


On the other hand, i was watching MTV... "Made" or one of them programs; this guys a body builder.. he says: That guy has great Hamstrings..... yea but i have a better upper body, my back is better than his.... End of discussion.