Book Review - The Anxious Generation

If you are the parent of a teenager or a preteen, run, don’t walk, to buy and read this book: The Anxious Generation - How The Great Rewiring of Childhood is causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness

Before I give you my take on this book, read what two of the most influential newspapers wrote about it:

Words that chill the parental heart… thanks to Mr. Haidt, we can glimpse the true horror of what happened not only in the U.S. but also elsewhere in the English-speaking world… lucid, memorable… galvanizing. —Wall Street Journal

[An] important new book... The shift in kids’ energy and attention from the physical world to the virtual one, Haidt shows, has been catastrophic, especially for girls. —Michelle Goldberg, The New York Times

When these two publications use the words horror, and catastrophic, to describe a phenomenon, we had better pay attention. What are they referring to? The incredibly damaging consequences of the use of social media by today’s teens.

First of all, the author is not some kook chicken little warning of a disaster that is only in his imagination. Read his bio:

Jonathan Haidt is the Thomas Cooley Professor of Ethical Leadership at New York University's Stern School of Business. He received his Ph.D. in social psychology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1992 and then did post-doctoral research at the University of Chicago and in Orissa, India. He taught at the University of Virginia for 16 years before moving to NYU-Stern in 2011. He was named one of the "top global thinkers" by Foreign Policy magazine, and one of the "top world thinkers" by Prospect magazine.

Haidt asserts that the brains of today’s pre-teens and adolescents have been rewired by constant smartphone and social media use and that the consequences are a significant and dramatic increase in mental health issues such as anxiety, depression, self-harm, and even suicide. And while many conscientious parents monitor the content their children can access on their phones, Haidt argues that is not enough. Harmful content abounds, but that is only half the problem. The actual practice of using social media has changed the way children interact with the world. He proves his point with research based facts that show that every metric involving teenage mental illness has skyrocketed since smartphones with social media apps gained market penetration in the last 8 or 10 years.

One alarming example of this dramatic change in teenage behavior precipitated by smartphone and social media use is described in detail in another important book, Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing our Daughters by Abigail Shrier. This author holds a J.D. from Yale Law School, a B.Phil from Oxford, and an A.B. from Columbia. Her research has indicated that, prior to the last decade, transgenderism was almost exclusively a phenomenon in adult males who wanted to live lives as women. But with the advent of the ubiquitous smartphone and social media, a monumental shift has occurred. Now, the vast majority of individuals professing to be transgender are teenage girls. Why? Her research shows that 65% of adolescent girls discovered transgenderism after prolonged social media immersion. And this makes perfect sense. More than any other demographic, teenage girls are insecure in their identity, their appearance, their emotions…everything. But up until a few years ago, they had no other option than to be teenage girls. Now, however, they have been presented with a socially acceptable, and even popular option - I can be something other than the teenage girl I’m dissatisfied with. And the influencers on social media and YouTube are teaching them exactly how to make it happen.

We can’t escape from the world we are living in, but we can certainly educate ourselves in its evils and do everything we can to protect our children from them. Your first step? Read The Anxious Generation - How The Great Rewiring of Childhood is causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness.

https://a.co/d/d2jazSl