The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure Paperback – August 20, 2019

My first thoughts after reading this book were, “I am glad I am no longer an active college professor: I never could walk on eggshells!”And as Lukianoff and Haidt well present, college professors, today, are walking on eggshells. Many are afraid to live up to their university goals of teaching the truth as they see it. Furthermore, they are afraid to support their fellow professors who do try to teach honestly for fear of retribution.But let’s back up: this book is not really about professors: instead, this book started as a serious observation that there is a rising rate of teen depression, anxiety, and suicides. But in the investigation of this problem, Lukianoff and Haidt discovered that this is but one of the outcomes. Among the other outcomes were the polarization of American politics, social injustices, and suppression of free speech, particularly on college campuses. And while Lukianoff and Haidt posit that these situations started in 2013 and continue today, I saw evidence of what is in the book as early as 2008 and perhaps even earlier at a state university. In other words, these didn’t just start with the “iGen” children coming of age at this time.Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt are well qualified to make such observations. Greg Lukianoff is the President of FIRE, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education. He has served in this position for more than a decade. Thus, he has been a keen observer of the challenges that people have had to face in American education. Jonathan Haidt is a Social Psychologist and a Professor at New York University. As a professor and social psychologist, he has first-hand experience with students as well the ability to understand the dynamics within these populations.Lukianoff and Haidt present the case that there are three great “Untruths” that are underlying our treatment of youth today:1) What doesn’t kill you makes you weaker.2) Always trust your feelings.3) Life is a battle between good people and evil people.Note that the first is a perversion of Nietzsche’s famous dictum: “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” The second is favorite advice of many pop psychologists today. And the third is a simplistic view originating from religion: “us vs. them.” The authors present convincing evidence that these “Untruths” are active and lead to bad ideas of how to treat children.One of the predominant themes, in this book, is that Cognitive Behavioral Psychology, CBT, presents valid tools by which to evaluate and rectify the situations which create harm from these Untruths in American society. I very much agree with the authors here. If I were to evaluate today’s political situations, the very distortions that CBT points out are active and frontmost in American polarization.Then Lukianoff and Haidt examine how intimidation and violence originate. A very quick synopsis is the quote they use from Nelson Mandela: “When we dehumanize and demonize our opponents, we abandon the possibility of peacefully resolving our differences, and seek to justify violence against them.” Here, the authors show how words have become defined as violence and the misguided concept that people need protection for their safety against speech that challenges their previously held conceptions. This then makes it possible for “witch hunts” to occur.The features of witch hunts are they arise quickly, there are alleged crimes against society, the crimes are often fabricated, and the proponents of the witch hunts invoke fear into anyone trying to defend the accused. Witch hunts are used to generate mob cohesion and to create a “common enemy” to destroy.As Lukianoff and Haidt show, witch hunts are occurring on US Campuses today in a “call out” mob mentality where the prevailing beliefs are challenged. Internally, it appears that the “call outs” are being made from the left while externally, the “call outs” are being made from the right. It is important to note here that 60% of the professorate is identified as being Far Left or Liberal while only 20% of the professorate is identified as Far Right or Conservative.Some of the witch hunts have been created by the professorate, themselves, in asking for condemnation of a professor who challenges their ideologies. Thus, it suppresses free speech as well as suppresses critical thinking. The witch hunts, particularly at universities where the leadership has been weak, has resulted in both harm to the employment of professors as well in some cases, direct violence to the professors. Other professors who might agree with an “outcast professor” stay silent as they fear the same thing might occur to them.The authors observe a cycle of polarization. A typical “polarization cycle” looks something like this: First, a professor says or writes something that is interpreted as provocative or inflammatory, regardless of what the intent was. Then, an activist retells the story to amplify the outrage. Next, a multitude of people writes angry posts on social media and threatening emails to the professor involved. The college or university administration fails to defend the professor and may take steps to sanction the professor regardless of the rights of the professor. Lastly, people that hear the story distort it to fit their views as confirmation bias. Things are out of control, and each side views the other side as evil, thus negating any chance for de-escalation.“How did we get here?” Lukianoff and Haidt ask this very question. There appear to be six explanatory threads, but the threads do not affect everybody, and even amongst the people affected, the effects are different. The six identified threads are 1) rising political polarization, 2) rising teen anxiety and depression, 3) changes in parenting practices, 4) the decline of free play and the restricted opportunities for childhood independence, 5) the growth of a corporate campus bureaucracy, and 6) a rising passion for “social justice” for major events where the concepts of “justice” have been perverted. These deserve more treatment in this already long review.First, there has been a growing shift towards the left in the college professorate. With the controversial election of President Trump, the campuses have become hotbeds of resistive political activity, and this activity is inflicted on the student bodies. Thus, there is and continues to be “witch hunt” activity in the long practice of universities to bring to campus a diverse set of provocative speakers. The major reason for doing this is to expose the student body to diverse views and to create discussions leading to the use of critical thinking. Conservatives speakers invited on many campuses resulted in violent displays of resistance and then either harassed on campus to prevent them from speaking or disinvited to prevent further violence.Second, the rising trend in teen depression and suicides has fostered an atmosphere of expectancy of depression amongst the student bodies on campuses. This trend is more significant with females than males, although very recent statistics show a sharp upturn for males as well. Much of this is attributed to the use of social media, which projects a distorted view of appearances and reality as well as creates in people the feeling of being left out of various activities. There also is a feedback mechanism at work here: students are more likely today than in the past to seek out mental health counselors for anxiety. As the mental health bureaucracy processes these visits, it may well suggest symptoms of mental unhealth. This is expanded on in the fifth thread.Third, parents have developed a fear of letting their children have unsupervised play. In part, some of this was caused by the highly publicized child abductions. Another factor in this has been the passage of child protection laws and the arrests of parents under those laws for letting their children be unsupervised. A culture of “safetyism” (that is, the child must be totally safe at all times,) has been built up and reinforced. There has been the observation that children seem to be growing up slower than in past years with regards to maturity. There are class distinctions: parents of the upper middle classes have the resources to involve their children in sophisticated activities such as music and art lessons. In the meantime, parents of generally the lower classes have subjected their children to adversity and possibly uncaring relationships as the parent struggle in their daily lives.Fourth, the decline of free and unsupervised play has resulted in children less competent to face the world as they age. Children are not able to take small risks and learn from them. Children spend more time on mobile devices than in engaging in physical and social experiences. The socialization of children has suffered. Children no longer have the opportunity to solve small disputes without parents or other adults being involved. They now rely on “third parties” to take over when a situation arises where they may be disagreements.Fifth, the bureaucracies of universities and colleges have greatly expanded the enforcement of the culture of safetyism. As an example, presented by Lukianoff and Haidt, a student visits a counselor for anxiety. During the visit, the counselor makes a leading statement, “Oh wow. People feel very anxious when they are in great danger.” The student now is being led to perceive danger. But this is not the end of it. The counselor then doing their required diligence under the campus rules reports to the Dean of Students that there was a cause for a visit. The Dean then sends a note to the student “I received a report that others are worried about your well being. … you are to refrain from discussing these issues with other students and use the appropriate resources listed below. If you involve other students … you will face disciplinary action. …“ A fictional example? No, it happened on a campus (references to it are given in the book.)Universities are big business today, generating over a half trillion dollars annually. To support this revenue, they have created bureaucracies to perform research, education, fundraising, (who here hasn’t received a fundraising letter from their alma mater?) branding, marketing, and legal compliance. Students are considered to be “customers” with all of which that connotes. They are sold a product. “The customer is always right,” so that students are invited by the university to author their educational experiences according to their desires rather than towards the need of the education purportedly being received. As a result, the university overreacts as in the example above. In demands to reduce dissension on campus, (under the thread of movement towards the left,) universities have tried to restrict free speech on their campuses.Sixth and lastly, the concept of social justice has been distorted. There is no widely accepted definition of “social justice,” but it would involve people getting what they deserve (distributive justice) and that the rules are applied fairly (procedural justice.) Social justice when it is consistent with these precepts is beneficial. Such social justice would remove artificial barriers and treat all people fairly. Today, under the various laws created with good intents, such as Title IX requiring universities and colleges to divide universities resources between female and male participants fairly, there are unintended consequences. Social justice is now being applied to the outcomes of groups rather than looking at justice for individuals. It is now considered acceptable to harm people for the desired outcomes. Thus, the distributive and procedural precepts of justice are being violated while reducing the fairness to individuals.Lukianoff and Haidt propose a large number of fixes to these problems under the title, “Wising Up.” Most of these are direct and logical consequences of the six threads discussed. The universities and colleges have a lot to do to clean up their cultures. Lukianoff and Haidt are optimistic that they can do the work needed. Probably the best recommendations are, 1) reduce child access to social media in both time and type, 2) Allow children the freedom to play and develop their socialization skills, and 3) get rid of identity politics in the nation as this is fueling extremism towards both the left and right.

What is happening on the college campus? Is it really as bad as the news stories report? What can be done about it? Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff have put together a book to help. The title is long enough to make a puritan blush, but it certainly sums up the message of the book: good intentions and bad ideas can do a lot of damage. The book was born out of a 2015 article written for the Atlantic by the same title (You can read it here). This is the second book by Jonathan Haidt I have reviewed. The Righteous Mind here. This book is not a screed against the “kids today” and how we just need to get back to the good old days. Haidt is a moral psychologist who works as a professor at NYU. Lukianoff is the president of FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights in Education) which focuses on defending First Amendment rights in higher education. Both men independently noticed some disturbing trends which led them to co-author their initial article. Afterward, they decided to put their research into a book to delve deeper into the problem and offer solutions. The book is divided into four parts:Part 1: Three Bad IdeasThe authors explore three key bad ideas which seem to be accepted more and more in society:1) Kids are incredibly fragile.2) We should always trust our feelings.3) Life is a battle between good and evil people.These ideas are bad because they are false. First, children are anti-fragile. They are not like glass which shatters. Rather they are more like a muscle that gets stronger when tested. This is not to say trauma is acceptable any more than we would say an athlete getting injured is getting stronger. The point is that kids are stronger than we think.Second, the problem with always trusting our emotions is that we can be easily fooled. We lose the ability to have a healthy confrontation because we stop caring about someone’s intent and only care about their impact on our emotional state.Third, when we boil relationships down to only a conflict between good and evil people we will not be open to compromise or even listening to the other side. If I think my opponent is basically Hitler then I am not going to reason or persuade him. I am going to fight him.These three key ideas are being taught and reinforced in our education system, entertainment, and social media. The problem with these ideas is not the intent behind them which is protection and the betterment of society. The problem is that these ideas in action make everything worse and actually do the opposite of what they intend: we become more fragile, more angry, more stressed and anxious and so on.Part 2: Bad Ideas in ActionThis section catalogs cases where these bad ideas were put into play. The authors are careful to note that events are not indicative of every college campus. However, they are present in major universities predominantly on the west and east coasts. The authors review some of the riots that occurred in recent years on college campuses as well as the march in Charlottesville. They examine the nature of intimidation and violence that is trending in the news. Then they look at why our society is so prone to witch hunts and the importance of viewpoint diversity.Part 3: How Did We Get Here?This section was the most emotionally difficult part of the book for me. The authors dissect how we arrived in this situation focusing upon polarization, anxiety and depression, the decline of play, the rise of safety policies, and the quest for justice. They examine the influences of social media, screens, overprotection, and misguided efforts to achieve social justice. This section is not blasting those who want justice, school administrators, parents or children. The authors are interpreting the data in terms of “six threads” that together help explain how it is we arrived in our present state.Part 4: Wising UpAgain, the book is not just old men yelling to protect their lawns. The authors present solutions along three lines: families, universities and society. They encourage parents to allow their kids to take calculated risks while resisting the urge to jump in as soon as they struggle. The authors talk about teaching children how to cope with disappointment and pain. They strongly recommend limiting screen time. There are more solutions, but if you want to know them you should read the book!REFLECTIONSThis book came out at the right time for me as I had just finished reading Haidt’s The Righteous Mind. I also watched the news and was actively wrestling with my own use of social media. Normally it takes me less than five minutes to fall asleep at night (apparently I’m overtired). Yet there was one-night last spring (2018) that I couldn’t go to sleep because I was so angry about things someone I didn’t know said on social media. My mind wouldn’t rest as I rolled over what my response would be to this person and how I would show them how wrong they were. I think it was around 1:00 am that I finalized my brilliant rhetorical salvo I would unleash in the morning. However, when I woke up I knew something was wrong with me. I needed to back off social media. Last fall I even deactivated my Facebook account. I didn’t even self-righteously announce it beforehand! The point is that I was primed to read this book.This book thoughtfully and fairly engages with serious issues in our society which will get worse unless we commit to making serious changes. I appreciate the authors’ desire not to castigate or vilify anyone. They want to make things better. They assume that the people involved in these issues on the campus are acting in good faith. This allows for thoughtful analysis and generous criticism that actually contributes to the conversation. My only criticism is that the final three chapters which present solutions are very short. Perhaps in time, the authors can present how they and some of the groups they point to as good examples are handling these modern challenges. Also, this book cannot give us the reason why we ought to live this way except for the general improvement of society. For Christians, grace and holiness are central for how we interact with others (or at least they should be!). There are core reasons why we are compelled as followers of Christ to live differently than society. As a holy people (set apart by mercy) we do not participate in that which is abhorrent to God. But as people who have been saved by grace, we explain our hope and commitment to Jesus with gentleness, respect, and love. This is not really a criticism. It is an acknowledgment of the limits of a non-Christian book.I was challenged by this book to consider how I am raising my children particularly in terms of allowing them to take risks and giving them the room to fail. This book also led me to reflect on how I interact with others. I found myself reading this book saying, “Yeah, the Bible says we should do that…” We know it yet we don’t do it. For example: thinking the best of others or at least giving them the benefit of the doubt. Or how about not be hasty with our words in person and especially online? I seem to remember something about taking every thought captive. A good sign to me that this is a good book is that you leave it hopeful that we can do better or at least how I can do better.THE BOTTOM LINEI said in my review of The Righteous Mind that I would likely recommend this book over that one. That turned out to be true. This book does a wonderful job explaining current trends and what can be done about them. Positively there seem to be reasons for hope that things are changing already on the college campus. While this is encouraging, the pressure to unnecessarily self-censor seems to be increasing and there remains a cause for concern. This book is well written, engaging and challenging. It is not a Christian book (I'ma pastor) so don’t expect biblical answers or a biblical worldview. I do recommend this book if you are looking for an insightful cultural analysis of the rise of terms like “trigger warning” and “safe space” and the current state of social discourse in America. Overall, an excellent read and well worth your time.

I liked the Anxious Generation better but this was pre- AG. Lots of useful information and tips for parents