The Coddling of the American Mind

[Lothar]

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc ... nd/399356/

[callmeslick]

agreed.....college is the precise point, educationally and developmentally where virtually ANYTHING should be able to be put forward. If the educational system has produced students capable of critical thinking, they will sort out reality on their own. That such is not happening might explain the coddling to some degree.

[vision]

Holy crap, what a terrible article. It's all over the place and makes not one convincing argument.

It is creating a culture in which everyone must think twice before speaking up, lest they face charges of insensitivity, aggression, or worse.

Wait, so what's bad about that? The article never says...

Ironically, this article is a ridiculous overreaction to people allegedly overreacting. Even the headline is baited. The writing is heavily inflated and emotive and full of terrible analogies. It successfully convinced me there actually isn't a problem with kids today. Great job. I get the feeling the authors are quite a bit out of touch with reality themselves.

[Sergeant Thorne]

... If the educational system has produced students capable of critical thinking, they will sort out reality on their own. That such is not happening might explain the coddling to some degree.

I felt that this was a good point.

I can't help but wonder if this isn't liberals being uncomfortable with the fruits of a lifestyle developing beyond their personal boundaries in the next generation--young people developing unrestrained by anchors to reason unaccounted for in the previous generation's pet ideologies passed on.

[callmeslick]

Holy crap, what a terrible article. It's all over the place and makes not one convincing argument.

It is creating a culture in which everyone must think twice before speaking up, lest they face charges of insensitivity, aggression, or worse.

Wait, so what's bad about that? The article never says...

well, it did more or less imply, and I spelled it out for you above.

[callmeslick]

... If the educational system has produced students capable of critical thinking, they will sort out reality on their own. That such is not happening might explain the coddling to some degree.

I felt that this was a good point.

I can't help but wonder if this isn't liberals being uncomfortable with the fruits of a lifestyle developing beyond their personal boundaries in the next generation--young people developing unrestrained by anchors to reason unaccounted for in the previous generation's pet ideologies passed on.

I don't know, Thorne.....most of more liberal or at least progressive-thinking folks I know are pretty strong at critical thought. So are many older, true conservatives. I find the loss of critical thinking has occurred in the past 30 years or so of education. And, with that, you would have students objecting to such silly crap as 'trigger words' or whatever. Oversimplified article, perhaps, but a glance at a real core issue for our society. We have dumbed down, and that should be obvious to anyone, younger or older who views closely the writings of common men from years past. We might, collectively KNOW more, or have access to more facts, but we are rapidly become worse as a society at processing, analyzing and acting upon those facts.

[Lothar]

I grew up on the tail end of Gen X; my parents had rules about how far I could ride my bike alone at different ages, starting with being able to ride to the neighborhood school (a block away) when I was like 6, and escalating to "anywhere in the city, but tell us where you're going first" when I was 12. Starting just a few years later, a lot of my younger siblings' friends were not allowed to be out of sight of an adult until they were 13 or 14 years old, and then the parents had to have telephone numbers for the other location, or the kid had to have a pager. This style of "helicopter parenting" faced a lot of ridicule...

... but I feel like a lot of parents transitioned to "mental helicopter parenting", where instead of hovering physically close to protect their children from kidnappers and creeps, they mentally police their children to make sure they're not bullied, their self-esteem isn't threatened, etc. It's led to a generation of now young adults who seem to view any sort of disagreement as a personal affront, who view any sort of negativity as a threat, and who view any sort of criticism (no matter how constructive) as a full-on violation (and who view any "violation" as morally equivalent to sexual assault).

A handful of examples:

- as you all know, I disagree with people online. I argue. Many of my friends are cool with this. But on a handful of occasions, I've had people -- mostly women who are somewhat younger than me -- treat the very first online disagreement we had as grounds for unfriending (in person as well as online). And I don't mean, after a back-and-forth argument that got heated, I mean like, they'd post an idea and I'd disagree with it (maybe by noting that snopes says it's false) and bam, blocked.

- Today I overheard a school administrator talking to a parent about a problem his child was having with another child -- how the two wanted to be friends but sometimes had difficulty getting along. (It was obviously the first time the problem had been brought up.) He jumped straight to "I want my child moved to a different class." Like, in the span of 15 seconds while I waited for a line of kids to walk by, it went from "let me explain this minor issue" to "uproot my kid so the problem goes away".

- A few days ago at school pickup, a mom was yelling at someone else's elementary-aged child. Her posture, body language, and tone of voice suggested that she was considering violence. Why? Apparently this ten-year-old girl had said something insulting to her similarly-aged daughter earlier in the day, as she so loudly explained to a school administrator who stepped in between the two parties. It wasn't "she keeps saying things", it was "she said one thing" -- and the mom's idea of dealing with a problem between two children was to yell and scream and get in a little girl's face.

The net result, it seems, is young adults who are less able to cope with challenging situations than my autistic five year old son. The sort of things that we intentionally train autistic children to do -- being aware of their inner self, settling their emotions, considering others' feelings, deliberately showing respect even when they're upset, and coping with disagreement in a controlled way -- seem to have completely escaped the grasp of neurotypical people a decade or two older. As if the whole system, from parents to teachers to television to social media, has created a set of neuroses for those currently in the age ~12-25 bracket.

[vision]

I have yet to see any evidence kids are "coddled" nowadays. I'm sure the same was said about most everyone here who didn't work 10 hour days in a coal mine or sewing room when they were 10 years old. Everyone thinks their childhood was the best. I heard my grandmother say it, my friend's parents say it, my friends with kids say it, and my friends with grandkids say it. Nothing to see here, and definitely nothing of substance in that article.

[Krom]

Just yesterday one of the newer seasonal people at work was discussing how she had relocated their children to different schools and was considering doing it again because of bullying and or other socializing problems... She said she "turns into a demon when it is about my kids". I thought it was a little extreme, but then it was time to start working so I didn't think any more of it but Lothar's comments reminded me of it, probably was a pretty similar thing.

[Spidey]

I didn’t read the link, but I do see evidence of this kind of thing all of the time, but I don’t have any specific example that would change anybody’s mind, and I don’t have the time to make a list.

But yea, I agree with the premise.

[Lothar]

Everyone thinks their childhood was the best.

Yes, but this is different -- it's not just people being curmudgeons and complaining that "kids these days" aren't subject to as much physical labor as them, or have more conveniences. It's college professors, mental health professionals, etc. pointing out that young adults are reaching college not merely unprepared to face challenges, but actually suffering from a debilitating inability to handle challenging ideas.

And it's taking a specific form -- young adults have grown up being taught, literally, the opposite of proven psychological methods for dealing with issues. Instead of being taught to recognize when they're "mind-reading" or "labeling" or "catastrophizing" or "blaming" or "overgeneralizing" or "emotional reasoning" and then replace those flawed thought patterns with more accurate ones (the basis of CBT), they're actually taught to keep those patterns and relish them and demand that the world capitulate to their own flawed thoughts.

[vision]

You've all been roped in. I've never seen confirmation bias on a scale this big here at descentbb.net. Yes, everyone has an anecdote about that the crazy helicopter parent they know (even me), but it's not the norm, not by a long-shot, and you would be hard-pressed to find compelling evidence that kids are being coddled. If anything I've witnessed the opposite (as long as we are using anecdotes). Again, there is so much BS in that article if I would have a hard time keeping my rebuttal shorter than the original piece.

[woodchip]

roped in? Here's a link to the pro football player who had his kids take back the "Participation" trophy's they were given at school. It seems schools are more worried about hurt feelings than having kids learn that you have to work for what you want...and not all the time will you succeed and reap the rewards. Teaching that life is just one big easy button does not prepare kids for the real world.