Dr. Marianne Legato, MD, on the unique challenges adolescent boys face

At the Male Studies conference 2011, Dr. Marianne Legato, MD, spoke on adolescent boys. She is the founder and director of Columbia College of Medicine’s Partnership for Gender-Specific Medicine, editor of the first text on gender medicine, and founder of the journal, Gender Medicine. Her most recent book is Why Men Die First.

The problem with the adolescent male navigating that difficult transition from puberty to young adulthood is a disconnect in the timing of an abrupt increase in gonadal hormones that occurs in both sexes at the time of puberty, but which for boys produces intense emotional lability, and high intensity feelings, while the part of the brain that develops risk assessment and emotional control and stability, lags well behind. Girls do not have a similar retardation of that center of the brain and therefore are much less likely to incur the kinds of disasters that face adolescent boys until they are 20.

Remember that the next time an adolescent boy is charged with a crime for dating an adolescent girl who is likely at least as physically developed as he is, and more emotionally developed.

Links to part 1 & 2 of the conference where Dr. Legato spoke (she speaks in part 2):

Part 1: http://www.vimeo.com/23289124

Part 2: http://www.vimeo.com/23294130

Discussion at Reddit.

Stupid Texas vice laws

Texas presents itself as against big government but they have a lot of stupid laws restricting vices in the name of morality (religion, see blue laws).

One example, the Texas Beer Laws: http://www.brewtiful.com/?p=219

Not to mention dry counties and that you can't buy liquor on Sundays. Fuck arbitrary religious "morality".

And Texas, too, has an arbitrary blood alcohol limit of .08 for driving even though they state explicitly in the Texas Driver's Handbook that different people may have different tolerances to alcohol - in other words, some people are not actually impaired enough to affect driving ability even if their BAC is above .08, and that's a fact.

They also have strict laws against "minors" - under 21 - drinking. It's called extended adolescence. So although you can be drafted to die in a profiteering war before you're 21, and you can go to jail for having sex with your 17 girlfriend when you're 18, God help you if you have a swig of beer or smoke a joint!

And of course, any cop can throw you in jail using public intox as an excuse if he doesn't like you if he claims he smells alcohol on your breath, even if you aren't harming anyone.

*Cough* police state.