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Letter to Self Esteem Team from John Vasconcellos 
in response to 'alarm' raised in the appended email

I VERY MUCH APPRECIATE YOUR CALL TO ACTION IN THIS (below) EMAIL -

ONLY EXACERBATED BY LAST SUNDAY'S NEW YORK TIMES SUNDAY MAGAZINE

SECTION DIATRIBE AGAINST OUR SELF ESTEEM WORK.

I'M HOPING YOU + MICHELE BORBA + JACK CANFIELD + I (WITH ALL HELP WE CAN GET

FROM OUR ENTIRE SELF ESTEEM ROSTER) WILL RIGHT AWAY COMMIT OURSELVES TO

PREPARING A MAJOR REBUTTAL (ESPECIALLY 2 THE NEW YORK TIMES PIECE - EVEN IN

HOPES OF GETTING THEM TO PRINT IT).

SHALL WE COMMIT OURSELVES TO DONG THIS TOGETHER?

- IF SO, WHEN? (RIGHT NOW!)

- IF SO, HOW?

- IF SO, BY WHOM?

- IS THERE SOME ONE OF US (I EXPECT IT'S YOU, BOB) WHO CAN RIGHT AWAY COMPOSE

A THOROUGH-GOING POINT-BY-POINT REBUTTAL OF THE NEW YORK TIMES PIECE

(INCLUDING ANY POINTS RAISED BY THE OTHER ARTICLES YOU CITE - WHICH OUGHT BE

REFUTED)?

- THAT ESPECIALLY JACK & MICHELE & I COULD THEN IMMEDIATELY CRITIQUE TOWARD

MORE FULL REFINEMENT, ADOPTION?

- THAT ANY OTHER MEMBER OF OUR TEAM COULD AS WELL CRITIQUE?

- LET'S ALTOGETHER ENGAGE OURSELVES IN A DIALOGUE THAT HAS US BY MONDAY

AT LEAST DECIDING WHETHER - AND IF SO, HOW - WE'RE GOING TO TAKE ON THIS

ENORMOUS - HISTORIC - LIFE-SAVING - TASK.

JOHN (VASCONCELLOS)

In a message dated 1/14/02 2:46:14 PM, Esteem 1 writes:

<< Dear Friends,

Self-esteem is again under sustained attack following a research assessment

for the Rowntree Foundation in the UK by Professor Emler. It claims to show that

low self-esteem is not a risk factor for delinquency, violence, drug abuse,

alcohol abuse, educational under-attainment or racism.(For the original

report see http://www.jrf.org.uk/knowledge/findings/socialpolicy/n71.asp) However,

several journalists and academics are abusing this research to condemn all

efforts to raise self-esteem, the most recent being Polly Toynbee in the

Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,625237,00.html

Titus Alexander, a member of our International Council for Self-Esteem and

organizer of the Self-Esteem Network in the U.K. sent out a plea for

individuals in the field to respond. In his memo he states, "I think these

kinds of critiques are also a real "heads up" for people in the field. We need 

to more rigorously understand and do better ourselves in describing what we 

mean by self esteem, and what learned ways of thinking people pick up that 

can easily be confused with self esteem, and certainly have been confused 

with self esteem in the literature and the research cited by Polly."

I agree with Titus and felt that I would take this opportunity to see to what

degree we can agree on what self-esteem is and how we should define it.

Hence I am writing to you to ask about your perception and your response as

to what self-esteem is.

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