On the danger of coddling.
Coddling children produces mental illness.
Coddling produces mental illness. (But there are other factors at work as well.) This is a great quote.
But brief periods of normal stress are not harmful; they are essential. A 2013 review of stress research titled “Understanding resilience” made the analogy to the immune system explicit: “Stress inoculation is a form of immunity against later stressors, much in the same way that vaccines induce immunity against disease.” What, then, would happen if we suddenly stopped immunising children with this kind of stress? https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/10/by-mollycoddling-our-children-were-fuelling-mental-illness-in-teenagers
It’s a fine line to raise a child between pushing them out of their comfort zone, so they can get used to being outside their comfort zone, to abuse. But with knowledge it can be done. A child needs love and support. A parent that provides only room and food, which is what a dog needs, is not getting that love, encouragement, and support. A child might get lots of love and support, but still have days without food, and they can still end up with an anxiety disorder. There are a lot more children at your school that are hungry than you think. They are embarrassed to talk about it, just like I was.
The book “The Coddling of the American Mind” by Greg Lukianoff also talks about this. Making safe spaces for children so they never have to be exposed to different ideas produces neuroticism.
Neuroticism means the person grows up to be an adult who thinks the world is a dangerous place when it’s not. It’s the MSM that is pushing the fear porn trying to reprogram people to think the world is mostly dangerous. Look up videos of “random acts of kindness” and you will find there are many more kind people out there.
Free play time is also important for kids of all ages. Without free play time we see that kids grow up into adults that cannot make their own decisions. Independent decision making is critical in a many jobs. These people cannot get the higher skilled jobs so they get low pay jobs, and they are tired of them and just don’t know why they can’t handle a job with more responsibility. Responsibility means decision making, which they cannot do because their helicopter parents didn’t let them make their own decisions.
Free play is also important for developing social skills. Maybe fewer people actually have autism and they just have poor social skills due to helicopter parents.
Norwegian play researchers Ellen Sandseter and Leif Kennair wrote about the “anti-phobic effects of thrilling experiences.” They noted that children spontaneously seek to add risk to their play, which then extends their coping abilities, which then empowers them to take on even greater challenges. They warned: “We may observe an increased neuroticism or psychopathology in society if children are hindered from partaking in age adequate risky play.”
Kids born after 1994 suffer much higher rates of anxiety disorders, it’s likely this is due to dysfunctional helicopter parents. (In source link see graph of major depressive episodes by year.) https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/jul/12/sharp-rise-in-under-19s-being-treated-by-nhs-mental-health-services
Part of the problem is social media, but also permissive parents. Children can use social media more as an escape mechanism to avoid developing social skills, but it’s not the websites’ fault, it’s the fault of permissive, clueless parents.
Emotional flexibility
Emotional resiliency (which I call “emotional flexibility”) is at an all-time low. This means younger people are less open to constructive feedback. By pushing kids to win at sports games, the thinkin of parents has become linear. But children are not linear objects. https://health.usnews.com/wellness/for-parents/articles/2018-11-08/why-you-shouldnt-coddle-your-kids They believe “constructive criticism” actually means hurling insults at them.
Narcissism
Narcissism is also on the rise. Key points of narcissism are:
A narcissist has such deep insecurities that they often manufacture a fictional reality around them. Social media helps them do this easily. But anyone with facts becomes a threat to their facade.
A narcissist is intolerant of other views. They will sometimes go to great lengths to censor the other person. For example, when psych journals refuse to publish articles about coddling or narcissism.
They will often use people until they get what they want from them. One way they can use people is by being extra nice until they get a social media “like” or “upvote” from someone else. Then the other is ignored.
They can sometimes gaslight people just to have a semblance of control over their own lives which are often miserable. Or they can exist simply to make sure the world burns. “If I’m this miserable then others are not allowed to be happy.”
They often have trouble with understanding the feelings of another person, this is called “lack of empathy”.
A chronic sense of entitlement.
Grandiosity. When a person thinks they are better than they think.
A desperate need to seek attention from others.
Some reasons for the rise of narcissism.
Using celebrities too much as figures they look up to.
The culture of materialism. People are led to believe that to be happy and accepted by society they need to buy material things.
The rise of social media which makes it convenient to make a fake manufactured life.
The decline of empathy, perhaps due to less person-to-person interaction.
The trophy generation. Kids are given awards and trophies without having earned them.
https://www.mentalhealthmatters-cofe.org/the-rise-of-narcissism-in-our-society/
Narcissism is a personality disorder. PD’s are normally incurable and untreatable, however psychologists would still like to try and help someone.
Some companies fear a lack of leadership of the right quality due to all the narcissists running around.
Simon Sinek on Millennials, the trophy generation
More links
It’s all about all of us: The rise of narcissism and its implications for management control system research. https://experts.illinois.edu/en/publications/its-all-about-all-of-us-the-rise-of-narcissism-and-its-implicatio
A message to young people: The psychosis of the coddled American mind. The problem isn't that life is unfair -- the problem is your broken idea of fairness. A great explanation of why people fail, especially younger people born after 1990. https://oliveremberton.com/2014/the-problem-isnt-that-life-is-unfair-its-your-broken-idea-of-fairness/ (This one has a comic which explains it.)
More Sources
The Rise of Narcissism. https://www.tero.com/articles/rise-of-narcissism.php This is a good source for theories on why narcissism happens.
The Rise of Narcissism. https://nscg.com/insight/the-rise-of-narcissism/
"Narcissism is a personality disorder. PD’s are normally incurable and untreatable, however psychologists would still like to try and help someone."
Not if the narcissist wants to change. Bringing enough social pressure on one to induce this may be more effort than it's worth, though.
"Neuroticism means the person grows up to be an adult who thinks the world is a dangerous place when it’s not. "
Neuroticism is feeling negative feelings more strongly than is typical, or helpful.
The world is in fact, a very dangerous place. There's at least a hundred different ways you can die every single day (many of them hilarious).
But, you don't: Because you've learned to navigate the world to avoid those dangers. Doing dangerous things on purpose to demonstrate and develop this capability is critically important, especially for young men. They intuitively know this, this is why they seek adventure. Preventing this natural behavior produces weak, cowardly, feckless manchildren that are easily manipulated with fear.
Encourage young men to do adventurous things. The reward is worth the risk.
Here is my take. Narcissism is a psychiatric disorder, which usually requires some kind of treatment to affect change. Therapy, drugs, exercise. (Floating your own boat)
Gas lighting is a learned behavior, and much of it involves lying. Government and mainstream media need to stop.
We need to stop. I believe that we will start developing emotional/psychiatric disorders from trying to determine which threats are threats, and which threats are lies.
It is abuse, and our population will start acting like battered and abused individuals en masse.
I think that it would be helpful if we could find a way to re-establish our equilibrium. Our health is suffering in so many ways that our emotional health is finally failing.
That would be a boon, refreshing our mental health.