In our modern discourse, people often use statistics to make arguments or to justify beliefs. Statistics can be very useful for this purpose, but parents should not always take all statistics at face value.
Parents must realize that statistics can be skewed by many different factors. Before we put all of our faith in statistics, we should try to understand the context of the data first.
How Statistics Can Be Skewed by Popular Worldviews
Our kids are growing up in a different world than we did—a world where media can virtually control every thought. Knowing that statistics are only as good as how they are gathered and interpreted, some polls show that 60% of Americans now approve of gay marriage. This is a huge shift from just a decade ago. What these polls don’t reflect are all those who feared giving politically incorrect answers.
Today, the media has so legitimized the gay lifestyle, who dare speak against it for fear of personal, public and professional backlash? Before we mindlessly accept poll results, let’s be sure we, and our kids, understand the deeper dynamics involved here—lest we too become victims of skewed data and a tainted worldview.
Picture Provided by: Andrew Tarvin