American Teenagers in Crisis

First the shocking data:

The above is from Derek Thompson's article in The Atlantic: "Why American Teens Are So Sad: Four forces are propelling the rising rates of depression among young people."

The four forces are:

1. Social-media use

Social media isn’t like rat poison, which is toxic to almost everyone. It’s more like alcohol: a mildly addictive substance that can enhance social situations but can also lead to dependency and depression among a minority of users.

2. Sociality is down.

More social media means less unstructured face-to-face time with others.

3. The world is stressful—and there is more news about the world’s stressors

"Fears about finances, climate change, and viral pandemics are smashing into local concerns about social approval and setting oneself up for success."

4. Modern parenting strategies

Today's helicopter parents are depriving their teenagers of opportunities for learning how to tolerate discomfort and developing a sense of personal competence. Further, Thompson notes "a broad increase in an “accommodative” parenting style."

In conclusion, here is an excerpt from Thompson's article:

The world is overwhelming, and an inescapably negative news cycle creates an atmosphere of existential gloom, not just for teens but also for their moms and dads. The more overwhelming the world feels to parents, the more they may try to bubble-wrap their kids with accommodations. Over time, this protective parenting style deprives children of the emotional resilience they need to handle the world’s stresses. Childhood becomes more insular: Time spent with friends, driving, dating, and working summer jobs all decline. College pressures skyrocket. Outwardly, teens are growing up slower; but online, they’re growing up faster. The Internet exposes teenagers not only to supportive friendships but also to bullying, threats, despairing conversations about mental health, and a slurry of unsolvable global problems—a carnival of negativity. Social media places in every teen’s pocket a quantified battle royal for scarce popularity that can displace hours of sleep and makes many teens, especially girls, feel worse about their body and life. Amplify these existing trends with a global pandemic and an unprecedented period of social isolation, and suddenly, the remarkable rise of teenage sadness doesn’t feel all that mysterious, does it?

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Bill Maher: “Colleges: Where Comedy Goes to Die.”

Bill Maher explaining Jokes to idiots: Oscar Edition. This is not just about Will Smith. This is about elite intolerance of comedians. Elite colleges are where students go "to lose their sense of humor."

Maher's ending line:

For all those who are constantly demanding an apology for jokes maybe it's you who should apologize to us for all the great jokes that we never got to hear, the brilliant thoughts that were never uttered those are the invisible scars of cancel culture. let's have a moment of silence for that . . .

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Jonathan Haidt Explains Why Progressives Should Support Heterodox Academy

Jonathan Haidt, speaking on behalf of Heterodox Academy, which he co-founded. Here is an excerpt:

Universities are by their very nature progressive institutions. They encourage students and faculty to study the existing order and try to come up with something better. They broaden students’ minds and encourage curiosity about different people and ways of living. The ranks of nearly all progressive institutions are full of the top students from our top universities.

But something started going wrong on many campuses in the early 2010s. The combination of more polarizing social media, an intensifying culture war, and a changing Republican party drove an intense new kind of activism among a subset of progressive students that — whatever its noble motives — is damaging what is most precious about university life: the ability to have open and wide-ranging conversations. Students and faculty across the political spectrum now say that they are “walking on eggshells,” afraid that one slip could bring about terrible social consequences. As they learn to avoid making verbal “mistakes” in an unforgiving environment, students are being trained in habits of mind and heart that are antithetical to their own mental health, their own success in life, and the success of their political activism.

This is why many leading progressives have been warning, since 2015, that the new university culture is harmful to the country overall and to the Democratic party in particular . . .

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How to Be a Human Animal, Chapter 27: The Exaggerated Benefits of Moral Rules

This is Chapter 27 of my advice to a hypothetical baby. I'm using this website to act out my time-travel fantasy of going back give myself pointers on how to avoid some of Life’s potholes. If I only knew what I now know . . . All of these chapters (soon to be 100) can be found here.

Today I’m here to warn you to watch out for those who cast about moral rules when they try to get you to obey them. Our most popular moral rules include these:

  • The Golden Rule
  • Utilitarianism
  • The Categorical Imperative

These rules do a very bad job of telling you what to do with your life. They don't even do a good job of telling you what to do next.

Let’s assume that you are Hitler trying tact in accordance with any of these rules. Imagine Hitler hearing about the Golden Rule of “Do Unto Others” at the peak of his tyrannical reign. Sure, he would think. “If I were any other intelligent person, then I would want me to run Germany exactly how I am running Germany!” If you think that Hitler would be applying the rule incorrectly, he would disagree. Further, there are no rules on how to apply the Golden Rule.

Utilitarianism has the same problem. It rule requires you to maximize well being by doing the thing that is the greatest good for the greatest number. Hitler would say: “I’m doing everything I can to bring the greatest good to the greatest number! You won’t believe how good this empire will be when I’m finished building it.” Again, you might disagree with Hitler here, but the way you apply utilitarianism depends on how you define “good,” and even reasonable people disagree intensely about what is “good.” Even massively dysfunctional and dangerous people like Hitler think they know what it means to be "good."

Kant’s Categorical Imperative demands that we take the maxim by which we propose to act and ask ourselves whether we could make that maxim a universally applicable maxim. Hitler would say that he was doing great things for Germany so, absolutely yes, everyone should act in accordance Hitler’s personal maxims of conduct. BTW, Kant famously declared that a proper maxim is to refrain from lying. He concluded that if a madman with a weapon asked you to tell him where your friend was (so he could kill him), you should not lie.

I'm not done kicking around our simplistic moral rules. People cavalierly state that we need to properly “apply” our moral rules as though “applying is a simple action akin to "applying" a band aid to a paper cut. It's clearly not that simple. There are many ways for people to consciously (and unconsciously) interpret our simple moral rules. They must:

• Decide what particular words of rule means.

• Distinguish the connotation from the denotation.

• Decide whether to read the rule narrowly or broadly.

• Decide whether the rule is persuasive and thus applicable in this particular case.

The bottom line is that our moral rules are hopelessly vague. They would never pass Constitutional muster. “Your Honor, we have alleged that the Defendant failed to act in such a way to result in the greatest good for the greatest number.” Although such a rule would tell us that we shouldn't set a forest on fire because we are bored and cold, we already knew that without the rule. [More . . . ]

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How to Be a Human Animal, Chapter 21: Listen to the Sage Advice of the Stoics

I hope I haven't been away for too long!  Even though you are a hypothetical baby my absence might have caused you to get hungry for another lesson! What I'm trying to do here is to help you navigate this convoluted world.  I'm trying to teach you things that I did not know while I was growing up. I learned these lessons the hard way. You can find links to all of these (soon to be 100) lessons in one convenient place: Here.

Here's a couple mini-lessons. First of all, if someone wants you to offer some good advice but you can't think of anything, just offer them some of the wisdom of the Stoics of ancient Rome. Your audience won't even know that these writings are ancient. Here's another cool thing: Even though this is "philosophy," it is practical advice to help you in your daily life. This is the opposite of academic philosophy. 

Check this out. One of the key tenets of the Stoics is essentially the Serenity Prayer. Epictetus writes:

The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control. Where then do I look for good and evil? Not to uncontrollable externals, but within myself to the choices that are my own.

— Epictetus, Discourses, 2.5.4–5

Compare to the Serenity Prayer:

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.

Here is another Stoic version of this same idea:

“Who then is invincible? The one who cannot be upset by anything outside their reasoned choice.”

— Epictetus, Discourses , 1.18.21

Why is this lesson so valuable? Because human animals screw this up so often! They need to hear this advice over and over, because we are wired to obsess and fret over things we cannot change. But here's a caveat: you shouldn't make excuses when you could change something but you are too lazy to put in the effort. You need to be honest with yourself about what you can change.  Then get to work on something you can handle. Don't waste your life away by fretting and obsessing. Many things have changed over the past 2,000 years, but the wisdom of the Stoics is as relevant as ever. Here's my favorite Stoic quote: “The Obstacle Is the Way.” Marcus Aurelius Is it possible to fit more wisdom into such a short quote?

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