I got a friend who honestly believes things like "Putin is crazy because he wasn't showed any love as a kid." Aside from the fact that my friend believes the whole "PUTIN IS CRAZY" meme, the friend also mentioned that Hitler wasn't shown any love either...

Anyone have any resources that debunk this nonsense?

EDIT: I found this: https://www.thesurvivorstrust.org/FAQs/if-someone-is-sexually-abused-during-their-childhood-they-are-likely-to-become-an-abuser-themselves ("The vast majority of child abuse survivors will never perpetrate sexual abuse and are utterly appalled by the insinuation that they are capable of such an act")

EDIT 2: Also found this study: https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/do-abused-children-become-abusive-parents:

Annotation

The belief that abused children are likely to become abusive parents is widely accepted, but the authors contend that this belief cannot be unconditionally supported.

Abstract

A review of case history, agency record, and self-report studies indicates that about one-third of all individuals who were physically abused, sexually abused, or extremely neglected will subject their children to one of these forms of maltreatment. The rate of abuse among individuals with a history of abuse is approximately six times higher than the base rate for abuse in the general population. Although this suggests that being maltreated as a child is an important risk factor in the etiology of abuse, most maltreated children do not become abusive parents. Many mediating factors affect the likelihood of intergenerational abuse. Consequently, unqualified acceptance of the intergenerational hypothesis is unwarranted.

  • BigAssBlueBug [they/them]
    ·
    2 years ago

    Childhood abuse is linked to becoming an abuser. Not linked to becoming a capitalist head of state

        • fratsarerats [none/use name]
          ·
          2 years ago

          The rate of abuse is six times higher amongst people were themselves subject to a use. While most would never, they are still six times more likely.

          Sure but then this line of reasoning is used to justify all sorts of bad things cuz "black ppl are X times more likely to commit crimes" or "hispanics are X times more likely" or whatever. In fact this style of argument is used by those STEMlord types who love to talk to about IQ, even though the IQ researchers themselves are VERY reluctant to say anything definitive (as they should be since any kind of science is pretty much subject to all sorts of biases)

            • fratsarerats [none/use name]
              ·
              2 years ago

              Perhaps but out there in the real world ppl do all the time, so it may in fact be a harmful myth, as others have suggested.

              • xXthrowawayXx [none/use name]
                ·
                2 years ago

                Okay then you have the choice of accepting those peoples deeply flawed premise that russias actions are 100% putins whims and debating correlation versus causation with em or saying “that’s fucking stupid, here’s a whole host of reasons that a nation might invade another in the particular geopolitical circumstances were under right now regardless of who’s ostensibly at the helm”.

          • Shoegazer [he/him]
            ·
            2 years ago

            what's the point of linking the source to support your claim if you don't even believe in the source

            • fratsarerats [none/use name]
              ·
              2 years ago

              I mean I'm not sure what part of the source I'm to believe. The abstract, or the annotation which says "but the authors contend that this belief cannot be unconditionally supported." And I've seen a at least two responses in this thread alone that seem to unconditionally support that contentious belief ("Childhood abuse is strongly linked to all sorts of behavioral issues, sorry." and "Yeah I mean that’s true. ", you can search them here). So maybe the belief that abusers behave that way because they were abused is not only not true (as UnicodeHamSic's response seems to suggest to me), but also harmful.