My Amazon Review of Greg Lukianoff's and Jonathan Haidt's "The Coddling of the American Mind....."

Spoiled Children go to Elite Universities

Free speech lawyer Greg Lukianoff and N.Y.U. professor of “Righteous Mind” fame Jonathan Haidt have written a very important book about what ails our elite universities and our society as a whole. The authors build on Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s work on the concept of antifragility. Put bluntly by overemphasizing safety we have raised a crop of very fragile middle-class children who find great difficulty in dealing with life in the real world. These kids have become oh so sensitive to anything they perceive as a slight and that sensitivity is exacerbated by the all-encompassing presence of social media.

Haidt and Lukianoff note the three great untruths of our age:

1.     What doesn’t kill us makes us weaker.

2.     Always trust your feelings

3.     Life is a battle between good and evil.

There is no subtlety here and this gives rise to a collegiate culture that is hostile to ideas and words that are outside of the mainstream. Although there is a great push for diversity by race, gender, and sexual orientation there is strong opposition to any notion of diversity of thought. Hence conservative speakers are subject to a heckler’s veto across most of America’s campuses. This situation is amplified by faculties that are overwhelmingly liberal.

The authors recount the all too many instances where conservative speakers were disinvited, shouted down, or precipitated a riot. However I would note that where there were significant disturbances at the University of Missouri and Evergreen State College freshman enrollment is way down.

The safety culture starts at a young age. Parents keep peanuts away from children out of fear of a potential allergy. In fact by doing this it makes peanut allergies far worse. Better to expose children to peanuts when they are young and they will build up a resistance to the allergy. Hence the concept of making kids antifragile.

Similarly the authors applaud the concept of “free range kids.” Kids should be free to explore their neighborhoods and play together without parental supervision. This teaches them how to work things out among themselves rather than seek out authority figures. Children looking to outside authority will become adults who do the same thereby impairing our democracy.

So what is to be done? The authors   recommend that colleges endorse the Chicago Principles on free speech and urge parents to limit their children’s use of social media. They also call for less homework in the early grades and less structure in the life of teenagers to give time for free play. The authors know that this goes against the grain of every hyper-competitive parent. Lastly they encourage college students to take a gap year to give them time to grow up in the real world.

I haven’t done justice to the book. It should be read by parents, college professor and administrators and citizens concerned about the future of our country. Although the book is too long the message is too important.

The full Amazon URL appears at: https://www.amazon.com/review/R1G8DL3Q5N4MZ7/ref=pe_1098610_137716200_cm_rv_eml_rv0_rv