Ep 963 ｜ The Dangers of Gentle Parenting, SEL & Empathy ｜ Guest： Abigail Shrier
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Summary
Author Abigail Schreier joins Allie to discuss her new book, Bad Therapy: Why the Kids Aren t Growing Up, and why it s so important that we all pay attention to why our kids aren t growing up.
Transcript
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Gentle parenting, empathy, therapy, all the things we're told are good for kids are actually
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Author Abigail Schreier is here today to break it all down for us as we are talking about
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her book, Bad Therapy, Why the Kids Aren't Growing Up.
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Guys, this is an amazing conversation that you need to share with every single parent
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Before we get into that, just want to remind you that the first installment of our subscriber
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exclusive series, Debatable, is out on blazetv.com slash Allie.
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Catholicism versus Protestantism, Trent Horn, Catholic apologist, Dr. James White, a Protestant
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So if you go to blazetv.com slash Allie, you will get a great discount on your subscription.
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This episode, this conversation with Abigail Schreier is brought to you by our friends
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Abigail, thanks so much for taking the time to join us.
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You've got another amazing book that's out after irreversible damage.
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Tell us why you went down this road and decided to write it.
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So first of all, thank you so much for having me on, Allie.
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I really love your show and I really appreciate the invitation.
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So I'm raising three kids in the rising generation.
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And what I wanted to know was why did the rising generation seem to be suffering so much?
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They seem to be in genuine distress, genuinely fearful, genuinely full of worry and anxiety
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And they hadn't obviously lived through anything that hard until the pandemic.
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They really hadn't lived through, you know, anything hard at all as a group, as a generation.
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Um, and, and, and the other strange thing was they received the most mental health treatment,
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the most coping techniques, the most mindfulness, the most, uh, therapeutic intervention, the
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most diagnosis, the most psych meds of any generation.
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So they really should have been the picture of mental health, uh, wellness instead, instead
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And, and the other thing I wanted to know is why they have no interest in growing up.
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Why did they, you know, you know, 18 to 25 year olds and numbers we've never seen want
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Why did they not want to get driver's license, you know, even more than millennials?
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Why did they not want to be parents or to get married?
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Um, so, so that's, that's what started me down this path.
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And did your last book, Irreversible Damage, where you talked about this kind of phenomenon of
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particularly young girls, quote unquote, transitioning into boys, did that book and the backlash it
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received from, you had, you know, libraries, institutions saying, oh, this book, your book
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Did that kind of have an effect on your desire to start looking into the therapy world?
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Well, remember that in every, almost every case where a girl's goes down this path,
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um, that, that the parents who called me, they already had a therapist for the girl.
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In fact, uh, the therapist played a big role, um, in the child's, you know, or teenagers revelation
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that she was trans, either a therapist, the family had hired or the school counselor invariably
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So I knew therapists were making terrible mischief with the kids.
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And, and what I want parents to know is it wasn't a gender therapist.
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It wasn't even necessarily an activist therapist.
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It was just a therapist that parents very often hired to deal with the girl's anxiety or depression
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who, when they were done, you know, talking about her, you know, uh, emotional trauma or
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whatever, you know, of, uh, she felt like she had gone through an adolescence, they would
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And that was really enough to get them off to the races.
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And so that is an example of something that you talk about in the first chapter, this
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This is a word that, you know, I wasn't aware of, but everyone should know because every single
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intervention, no matter how good can cause harm.
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So I atrogenesis refers to when a healer introduces the harm.
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And of course that doesn't mean any intervention is all bad.
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If given too much, too often x-rays cause harm.
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And there's actually a large body of research showing the harms of therapy.
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They include things like making depression worse, making anxiety worse, alienating from
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your, you, from your parents, making you feel inefficacious in your life.
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Like you can't do anything on your own, uh, making you feel, um, demoralizing you with
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All these are known side effects of therapy that all the academic researchers knew.
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Uh, uh, oddly though, most of the practitioners I talked to either weren't aware of them or denied
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And what is it about therapy that is causing that, particularly what you talked about, about
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I've noticed that too, the just complete lack of interest in getting your driver's license,
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What is it about therapy that is causing that kind of failure to launch?
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Well, the idea of, and it's, you know, the, these kids are getting therapy, not just from
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a therapist in school and from their parents who are reading the best, you know, the, the
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most popular parenting books written by therapists.
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And what it is, is anytime you are told to check in and double check and think about everything
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you're going to do before you do it, that you tell you can't handle any problems on your
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Every time you have a squabble with another kid, you have to go rushing to mom or rushing
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It creates what they call treatment dependency.
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And the idea is I can't take a risk on my own because I could ruin things.
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And so I have to bring everything to an adult and adults are always standing by.
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These kids feel unwell over half of the rising generation says their mental health is not good.
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You know, they, they report that, you know, that they don't feel well.
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And so they don't feel up to the responsibilities of adulthood, right?
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It means I'm ready to be someone other people can rely on.
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I'm ready to be a good neighbor and someone you can depend on.
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And, and really it's no surprise because if you feel weak, you don't think you're ready for
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those things and the irony is, is that going to therapy is marketed as the most responsible
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thing, the most mature thing, the most adult thing that you can do.
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And in fact, it is the thing we are told that will help you finally be able to love other
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people while we've heard this kind of therapeutic mantra of you can't love other people until
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you love yourself and loving yourself has to look like constantly thinking about yourself,
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constantly focusing on yourself, constantly thinking about and examining your feelings
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and overcoming your trauma and all these things.
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You can't go out and love other people and be this dependable adult until you take care
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As long as you're going to therapy, you could think that, well, I still don't love myself
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Maybe I still can't be a responsible adult in a faithful relationship because I haven't
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perfectly figured out how to like every nook and cranny of myself.
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I mean, here's the thing to know that therapy with a child or teenager is totally different
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from therapy with an adult because with an adult, an adult can push back on a therapist.
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So a lot of the harms that are, that there are risks of are going to be less.
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I wouldn't call it, you know, I wouldn't call our relationship toxic.
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Or an adult can say, you know, honestly, I don't like the way I feel on these medications.
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It's very hard for a teenager to say those things.
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But also it's very hard for a teen who might be angry with mom to say, you know, I'm not
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sure I'd agree that my mother's emotionally abusive.
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And yet, um, so there isn't that pushback, but also there isn't the buy-in an adult who
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chooses to go to therapy decides, listen, I feel like I need someone to work on me, work
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But a teen or, or, or child who's, who's signs up for therapy is strong armed by an adult.
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So there's the incentive of the therapist to pander to the child, whatever will make the
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I can see why that made you feel terrible that your mom said that there's every incentive
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to do that because of course the child didn't even sign up to be there.
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So they have to do something to get the kids buy-in.
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Now, of course, if a child has a real problem, that's different.
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If a child is anorexic, if a child is severely, you know, obsessive compulsive disorder or,
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or, or, or has one of these other problems, then there's no question what the therapist
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But if you sign your, your anxious or moody teen up for psychodynamic psychotherapy, just
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general therapy, general talking about problems, there are real risks that the problems they
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have will be magnified or the therapist will introduce new ones.
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And in your research, how did you find that we got here?
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Not just in sending kids to therapy and going to therapy unnecessarily ourselves, but getting
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to the place of calling worry, anxiety, and sadness, depression, diagnosing a normal spectrum
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We didn't even realize, we almost didn't even want, you know, notice the water slipping in
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It totally changed our vocabulary, you know, and, and I mean, across the board, liberals,
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conservatives, religious people, it didn't matter.
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All of a sudden, we were seeing all of humanity as a series of pathologies, psychopathologies,
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and the whole human experience, every deviation suddenly was a diagnosis.
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And what that meant, and, and it was with the rise, there's been a dramatic increase in the
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growth of mental health staffs at every school, at every university.
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And, and of course, you know, they've, they've sort of sit atop our parenting, um, they write
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all the popular parenting books and, um, you know, I have various theories for why, you
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know, part of it may have been, you know, the rise in, uh, divorce among that started with
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We saw various problems in America and we thought the solution was to send everyone to therapy.
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We became convinced this really needed expertise.
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And, um, so adults started going to therapy in larger numbers, and then they sent their
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And here's the thing, you know, if your child is struggling and they go to their aunt, okay,
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for help, for advice, their uncle, what, whoever there, the, the, the, the family member in
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general, not only has, is generally going to reinforce the parents' values, not only generally
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wants the best thing for the child, but there's no incentive for them to keep the child coming
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And here's the problem with in general, sending a bummed out kid to therapy as opposed to grandma.
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You send a bummed out kid to therapy, the therapist's incentive is to treat the least sick for the longest
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They want that child coming back and there's no oversight.
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There's no one saying, you know, you're really undermining her, you know, um, respect for
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Unlike with medicine where they're tracking harms, therapists don't even track these.
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Meanwhile, you know, in many ways in a teen or adolescent could be getting worse.
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It also seems like social media has kind of glorified the idea of not just going to therapy
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as just something that you do if you're having any problem in your life, but also, I mean,
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taking anti-depression and anti-anxiety medications.
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I mean, there's a whole subset of TikTok that is about the different medications that teenagers
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can take to alleviate their symptoms of anxiety or whatever.
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And so probably, uh, maybe there's a lot of similarities between what you saw in the social
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contagion of what's referred to as gender dysphoria and somewhat of a social contagion
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here that, okay, all my friends are going to therapy.
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People are valorizing diagnoses, but it's so, it's so dangerous to valid, you know,
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to valorize a diagnosis or being on medication for various reasons.
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First of all, those medications come with real risks, but, but also because it's so limiting.
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See, if you say I'm a shy person, well, that doesn't limit you.
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You can just say, well, I'm going to try to get over my shyness.
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But if you have social anxiety or social phobia, now you're saying there's a problem with my brain
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So you, you naturally go down the road to feeling less powerful and less able to fix your life.
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You mentioned that they're not just getting therapy from a professional in an office,
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but I mean, they're getting it on social, social media.
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I mean, you follow these self-help accounts that claim to have the power to psychoanalyze
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you and tell you how amazing you are, but they're also getting it.
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Now, would you say that's primarily from this social, emotional learning SEL curriculum
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Social emotional learning is now this giant, massive juggernaut.
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It can mean straightforward, you know, critical race theory, which the kids learn about, you
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But so sometimes it's just a cloak for that, but very often it, it is a process of breaking
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It claims to be, um, something that will help kids to make them more resilient.
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It will make them stronger by teaching them tricks for emotional regulation.
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Well, there are various reasons that focusing on yourself, focusing on your emotion, focusing
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But these, the, the discussions of emotion in the classroom old, almost inevitably end
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First of all, because the prompts actually direct you there.
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But second of all, it's just much more interesting.
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Actually, I'm feeling really sad because my mom was too busy to help me with my homework
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Um, they're all engaged in this constant psych, you know, this constant therapeutic kind of
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And it, you know, there's, there's lots of evidence of this, but basically there's a lot
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of research showing group therapy often makes people feel worse about their problems.
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Um, this has been true of breast cancer survivors, burn victims, first responders to catastrophe.
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Um, you know, um, all kinds of situations, um, in which, you know, sitting around with a group
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talking about your pain, bereavement, uh, people who had lost loved ones, they, they ended up
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feeling worse off than the control group who didn't go to therapy.
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When I first joined my sorority, my freshman year of college, and we had this retreat with
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the whole sorority and we all sat in a circle and I'm thinking back, I'm like, why did we
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And we were all supposed to share something like really difficult and sad that we had
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gone through or something like that we had never shared before or something like that.
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And we were all supposed to be very emotional about it and everyone, you know, ended up crying.
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But I remember feeling that it almost turned into a competition of who can give the worst
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sob story, who can shock everyone the most, who has been through the hardest thing.
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And like you said, valorizing trauma or difficulty or whatever it is, it, even in that just kind
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of like micro example, I can see that I could see that competing to see, you know, who's had the
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And what I want people to know is that's inevitable because they can say, oh, we're just working
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But as soon as you get kids in a circle talking about their feelings, there becomes a natural
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one-upmanship occurs to, you don't want to just say something boring, right?
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It becomes what, you know, what a great researcher said to me, it becomes like a memory poker.
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You start trying to, you know, dredge up the worst memory of a painful episode in your life
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because you want to sort of keep the group engaged.
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And we're doing this with kids right before they have to take a math test.
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And the worst part is parents are told this is really good for them.
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In fact, we're going to interrupt their lessons for it.
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But it really is, it's an incredibly good way to break kids down.
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And that isn't even, you know, the mental health surveys they're flooded with, many of
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them written by our CDC, which talk to them about suicide, self-harm.
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I mean, it goes through all these with middle schoolers or high schoolers in great depth.
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And as if, oh, we're just, we're just asking, no harm.
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And they do it, of course, in the name of saving lives.
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And they also do it in the name of representation.
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She had gone viral a couple of years ago for speaking at her school board because her eighth
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This public school had come home with this horrifying book that was not only very sexually
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explicit, but also detailed, like how this person was planning to commit suicide.
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And when she went to the school and she said, what in the world?
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Why is the English teacher recommending this book to my 13 year old?
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They said, well, we give these kinds of books to represent.
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What if a student had gone through something like this?
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What if there was a student who had thought about suicide?
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What if there was a student who was gender confused?
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And then by saying, well, what if the child has gone through this?
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And they say it's important to see themselves reflected in this literature, in this content
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I mean, to me, not only would it make it worse if a child had gone through that, but also
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for most kids, you are introducing very, very dark themes into their little form, you know,
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formative minds or their malleable minds that they can't really safely and fully process
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And Allie, when a mom goes in and objects, the first thing they do is make her feel stupid
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Well, I looked into the literature because I wanted to arm moms like that one.
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And actually, the literature backs up the fact that if you valorize suicide, if you present
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it as a coping mechanism, if you are repetitive in your talk of suicide, we know that that
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There's a great Viennese subway study in which that showed this when they stopped doing when
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they got the press to stop doing those things in reporting Viennese subway suicides in Vienna.
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Um, they were able to depress the rate of suicide just by stopping all the talk of it.
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Stop by, you know, talking about methods and valorizing the subject.
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It absolutely presents the world as dark and dangerous.
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Um, a lot of people think and they felt this way with my last book.
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You know, on the left, they kind of the react, the attitude was always like, why are you picking
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And on the right, the attitude is, why would you even bother?
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Like, you know, that that is sort of like irrelevant.
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Even in religious school, they bring this stuff in.
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And they they start to very much like DEI officers in a university.
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And they they that doesn't mean they mean to, but they sort of take over because they
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can oversee everything in terms of mental health.
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And now we're no longer talking about morality.
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We're not no longer talking about treating each other correctly or, you know, doing what's
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All of a sudden, we're talking about feelings and oneness with feelings and that's and and
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It's it's it's you know, it tends to really undermine, you know, even the most even in
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the most conservative districts or in the most religious schools.
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I mean, I think that we all have a natural tendency to be self-centered, to think about
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ourselves and to look at the world through the lens of like, what do I want?
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And you're actually told that self-centeredness, being self-centered, being self-focused is the
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best and most moral and the kindest and the most loving thing that you can do.
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You just understand your feelings more and more.
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And what you're saying is that it's actually doing the opposite.
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It's not only making kids, stunting their growth, but it's also making them more cruel,
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Like they're actually less able to see the pain of other people and understand other people's
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They're living under this tyranny of feelings in which they tyrannize each other with their
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When you think about your feelings all the time, you're going to conclude that you're
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You're going to think about every tiny worry and magnify it.
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I mean, I call them in the book sort of emotional hypochondriacs, by which I don't mean that they're
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They're just making it worse, just like hypochondriacs do.
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What they do is, you know, what they now call illness, anxiety disorder, somatic symptom
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And I talked to world experts in hypochondriasis.
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What they do is they magnify the pains we all have by hyper-focus on them, by relentlessly
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And that's what kids are doing with their feelings.
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What I learned is that empathy naturally, unlike things like fairness, it causes us, we can't
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So naturally, we privilege the person in front of us who's suffering very often at the expense
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So it actually, empathy can lead to a lot of cruelty.
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The title of chapter eight is Full of Empathy and Mean as Hell.
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And I'm actually writing a book that'll be out this fall about how specifically empathy
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tricks Christian women into taking the progressive position on everything.
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If you have empathy for the migrant, then you'll be for open borders.
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If you have empathy for these gender-confused young people, you will affirm them, use their
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And I never thought about what you said, though, that you can't really have full empathy for
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And so whoever is hoisted up in front of you as the worst victim, as the biggest victim
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based on their skin color, based on their sexual orientation or gender identity or whatever
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it is, that's the person that you're going to say is right, needs your full defense, needs
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your full celebration, needs your full affirmation, even at the expense of everyone else, even at
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the expense of truth, even at the expense of fairness, even at the expense of safety.
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Obviously, we see that in the gender issue a lot.
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But there are many other examples of that, how empathy can actually not just be unhealthy,
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So you say to a kid, whatever the issue, oh, well, we all need to feel bad for so-and-so.
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And I profile in the book a young woman who was treated so cruelly over supposedly a racist
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Now, it turned out the girl was Jewish and it wasn't.
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She hadn't made an anti-Semitic comment or a racist comment.
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But the administrators and the children who accused her of the anti-Semitism were not even
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Jewish, but they accused her of anti-Semitism based on a funny joke she had made that had
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You can see it in the book, but it really didn't have very much to do with anything at
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She was joking about Halloween costumes and they then persecuted her for the rest of
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the school year and that they felt, but they were only sticking up for the kids who
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And no one bothered to say, wait a second, what do you mean you're injured by her anti-Semitic
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No one said that because they completely forgot every sort of basic principle of what
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You know, it reminds me of a phrase that I heard echoed a lot in the era of George Floyd,
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That's what they would say, the activists would say, is that it doesn't matter what
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Like, obviously, if you run into someone, you didn't mean to run into them, you still
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apologize to say, I'm sorry that I hurt you, even if you didn't mean to.
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But I think that motto that it's always just the impact and the intent doesn't matter at
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all, it exemplifies what you're talking about there, that we always have to prioritize how
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someone feels about what you did or what you said over the truth of what someone might have
00:29:03.460
I mean, remember, empathy is not a moral concept, right?
00:29:07.140
In other words, you can do good in this world without having empathy for the person you're
00:29:14.080
You might say, I can't really understand what she's feeling, but I'm going to take care
00:29:17.360
of her anyway or him anyway or whatever the act is that's good.
00:29:21.720
Likewise, you can be, you know, very cruel and full of empathy.
00:29:25.620
So we know that con men and all kinds of, you know, bad people exploit the fact that they
00:29:32.020
can get inside other people's heads to take advantage of them.
00:29:35.780
So sometimes, you know, empathy is not a moral concept.
00:29:38.780
The problem is we're so pushing this with kids and it takes over.
00:29:43.140
It completely sort of, you know, submerges fairness, considerations like fairness, what's
00:29:50.600
And we think we're being so emotionally in tuned, but really we're being, you know, the
00:29:56.480
schools are often very tyrannical as they run supposedly with, you know, with to take
00:30:03.940
You know, I've thought about empathy and you can tell me if you agree or disagree with
00:30:20.260
this, but I've thought about empathy as something that can be in particular contexts helpful.
00:30:27.700
For example, before I had kids, when I went on an airplane and there was a bunch of crying
00:30:33.660
babies, I'd be like, seriously, seriously, can you, can the parents not just figure this
00:30:39.140
I can't believe that you have this crying toddler, this toddler running around, you
00:30:42.060
have all of these silly thoughts in your head of, oh, when I'm a parent, I'll never
00:30:47.580
And then you have kids and wow, you understand.
00:30:50.420
And you have so much compassion for those parents.
00:30:52.880
You completely know what they're going through.
00:30:56.040
They're much more stressed out about their crying baby than you are.
00:30:59.740
And that can motivate you to say, okay, how can I help?
00:31:04.380
Now, of course, you can have compassion for someone without having been in their shoes
00:31:08.960
before, but it helps having been in their shoes.
00:31:11.540
It helps having experienced something yourself.
00:31:14.120
It helps to be able to say, not only can I have compassion for you, but I have felt what
00:31:20.060
And that is what inspires me to help you out or to see things differently or to be
00:31:31.200
You answer that because I think I've spoken enough about it.
00:31:35.640
I, you know, I would say just to push back on you that it's actually coming from your
00:31:40.620
So in other words, you could also have empathy just as easily for the stewardess who is trying
00:31:51.180
In other words, your values lead you to, to empathize with that mother.
00:31:56.020
But it, the goodness is coming from your values, feeling like a young mother is doing something
00:32:01.660
She's raising the next generation and she's trying to tend to her kids.
00:32:08.440
I mean, you see people empathizing with terrorists, empathizing with vandals all over the place
00:32:21.400
You know, it can manipulate us and, and be misapplied all over the place.
00:32:30.080
Empathy has to be submissive to your values and submissive to the truth.
00:32:36.840
I mean, I've argued before that there really can't be true love without truth.
00:32:42.740
You're not loving someone well by lying to them.
00:32:45.780
You can empathize with someone and lie to them.
00:32:48.380
I don't think you can love someone and lie to them.
00:32:51.220
So empathy can be good when it is submissive to those superior values of love, truth, principles.
00:32:59.900
Um, and so I, yeah, I agree with you there, but it is definitely,
00:33:03.660
it's definitely seen as like the reigning, um, you know, stamp of virtue today that if you are empathetic, you will do X, Y, Z.
00:33:13.900
It's a total tool of manipulation and coercion.
00:33:20.120
You know, if you empathize with a child too much, when you're going to give them a shot, you won't give it to them.
00:33:25.920
If you empathize with a child too much, who's upset that he's been sent to his room, you'll never punish him.
00:33:33.080
Like empathy is neither necessary nor sufficient for doing good in this world.
00:33:38.140
And often over empathizing with certain people will keep us from taking care of each other for keeping us from doing the right thing.
00:33:46.960
If a police officer over empathizes with someone who is, you know, a criminal, he might not arrest him.
00:33:55.540
And then the criminal could go on to harm others.
00:33:58.060
So, you know, in all kinds of situations, empathy is just not, it's, it's amoral and it, it won't necessarily produce the best result.
00:34:13.080
Would you say that it is, that the idea of gentle parenting, that it is led by the idea that empathy must be first and must be foremost when it comes to,
00:34:31.220
That's not how I described it in the book, but I love your characterization.
00:34:37.500
It is a therapeutic method, which constantly solicits the child's feelings, focuses on the feelings, puts the parent at the same level as a child.
00:34:48.180
And it's constantly a conversation about how are we feeling about this?
00:34:52.740
Do we, and, and giving a child endless options.
00:34:57.040
There are another reasons that it is not good for kids.
00:35:00.080
And, and the number one thing is that we've known now for really millennia that kids need parental authority, which doesn't mean cruelty.
00:35:08.420
It doesn't mean, you know, an unloving laying down of rules, but ultimately the parent has to be in charge.
00:35:14.500
A child will feel much more safe and secure if the parent is in charge.
00:35:18.800
But if you empathize too much with a child, you'll never do what's right for the kid.
00:35:25.240
Yeah, this is such a debate right now among young moms.
00:35:30.140
And I think that there is some, there's somewhere in between.
00:35:34.580
I mean, obviously only being a disciplinarian or a nag or a nitpick or someone who never gives credit to what your child is feeling.
00:35:51.240
We surround our kids with these therapeutic, empathic adults.
00:35:54.920
No one is laying down any rules or high expectations, almost in any situation they're in.
00:36:01.480
The problem isn't that they have empathetic mothers or empathetic fathers.
00:36:06.020
It's that they're getting therapy from every angle and no one's saying, you're fine.
00:36:16.640
No one's saying, handle your problems yourself.
00:36:27.140
Let's say you don't set down rules for your child.
00:36:36.920
You never punish them when they punch their little sibling, right?
00:36:40.520
Now you're going to send them off to school where they have to obey the teacher's rules.
00:36:46.680
So tell me what ended up the most compassionate.
00:36:50.760
The teacher's going to now want to put your child on drugs.
00:36:55.320
And even beyond that, I mean, if that problem extends until they're a teenager, until they're
00:37:00.280
an adult, and they never learn how to work with other people, learn how to share, learn
00:37:06.400
how to not have outbursts or violent reactions when they don't get their way.
00:37:11.140
I mean, you're talking about not you disciplining them, but the state disciplining them.
00:37:17.080
At the end of the day, which was the more compassionate option.
00:37:20.960
The last book, people were always talking about, you know, oh, what about, you know, what we teachers
00:37:38.700
have to get in there and liberate the kids and protect the kids from their horrible, you
00:37:43.500
know, homophobic parents who won't affirm, you know, who are so homophobic, they would
00:37:50.460
And they invented this bugaboo that didn't exist.
00:37:54.120
I mean, I don't know what, how many decades we have to go back in order to make that a
00:38:00.620
But it has been so many decades until since that even existed.
00:38:04.960
And they were saying this in the most liberal districts in our country, in California, there
00:38:09.740
was this idea, oh, that we couldn't trust those homophobic parents.
00:38:13.140
And I think the same gets true when you talk about basic authority and rules and expectations
00:38:18.780
Where are these cruel, unloving parents who demand obedience?
00:38:25.320
Now, we know authoritarian, which is unloving and rule bound.
00:38:28.600
Um, those kids don't fare very well, but neither do the permissive parents.
00:38:36.200
The ones who, or as I call them, the therapeutic parents are even worse than permissive because
00:38:42.340
They give them no independence and they constantly solicit the kids' feelings on everything.
00:38:47.380
Neither of those kids has, has done very well in terms of happiness, uh, anxiety, depression
00:38:52.320
and, and success and all kinds of, uh, a good relationship with parents long-term.
00:38:57.000
Uh, none of the, the, those have had good, you know, results, but authoritative parents
00:39:08.600
Do you think that it's changed because of how the different generations were parented?
00:39:17.020
My grandparents were part of the silent generation.
00:39:19.480
I think like within my age, it's probably grandparents in the silent or the great generation.
00:39:25.140
And so, you know, early 20th century to the thirties and forties, my parents, baby boomers,
00:39:31.120
and obviously they didn't have as much of an emotional or even affectionate upbringing as
00:39:38.900
And I have a great relationship with my parents and they certainly were not permissive.
00:39:44.660
They were authoritative and they weren't as, even though I never, ever, ever have doubted
00:39:49.900
that my parents love me so much and love my brother so much.
00:39:57.500
My husband and I are much more affectionate as parents and maybe a little bit gentler as
00:40:06.900
And a lot of my friends say the same, say the same thing, that we are just much more
00:40:12.140
affectionate and kind of like gushy with our children than our parents were, even though
00:40:23.620
Because we, I think we bought into the idea that it was cruel to lay down rules and just
00:40:41.120
We were afraid to do it even when we needed to.
00:40:44.600
And it became, we also poured way more time into the kids than any generation.
00:40:49.940
We are so devoted to these kids and we're so determined to have a close relationship with
00:40:55.000
them in part because we spend all our time devoting ourselves to them.
00:41:01.240
And the problem is, look, you can be as affectionate to a kid as you want.
00:41:11.420
See, if you stop being in charge, that's when the harms come in.
00:41:17.540
The kids don't do as well in all kinds of metrics because kids know that someone has
00:41:22.980
And very often when a kid wasn't raised by anyone who was willing to be in charge, they
00:41:30.400
And we see radicalism, political radicalism in this generation in rates that are new,
00:41:37.940
They are, you know, and many, you know, I interviewed several immigrant parents and
00:41:41.680
people who work with parents whose families have become radicalized, the kids have become
00:41:47.000
radicalized and they tell me very often these come from the most liberal, these kids come
00:41:51.100
from the most liberal homes before they join Antifa, BLM, whatever it is, but they're really
00:41:57.680
And I, you know, that is a consequence of never having high expectations or rules for
00:42:05.540
I can see that the importance of discipline and setting, not just setting the boundaries,
00:42:13.600
Like even when it comes to non, not, not just discipline, but when you see a toddler start
00:42:21.400
developing, they're putting everything kind of into categories, into definitions.
00:42:25.180
They know the difference between mom and dad, male and female from a very early age.
00:42:34.200
You can tell that they are looking for those definitions.
00:42:40.060
And I think part of their development is to test those boundaries.
00:42:43.160
And it sounds like what you're saying is that parents in the name of being empathetic
00:42:47.700
and gentle have said, yeah, keep testing them, just keep pushing them out.
00:42:51.820
And we will keep moving the boundaries further and further out until they basically don't exist.
00:42:57.900
And these radicalized teens are out in search of those boundaries.
00:43:02.580
Finally, like, you know, how extreme can I get?
00:43:05.500
How radical can I get until someone finally tells me to stop?
00:43:13.540
Say you don't punish a five-year-old who's hitting his sister.
00:43:19.820
Second of all, now he's in charge because he's dominating things.
00:43:25.420
He's, you know, asserting a certain rule over his sister.
00:43:30.960
Now you're sending a kid who hits other kids off to school.
00:43:37.120
Is he likely to be, you know, get, have friends at school, have people like him, have
00:43:43.660
No, because nobody likes a kid who's going around hitting other kids, right?
00:43:52.540
They start telling you he has oppositional defiant disorder, right?
00:43:57.880
And if you think that having your kid set up to believe there's something wrong with him,
00:44:03.120
just because he, he, he never heard the word no.
00:44:06.820
Well, to me, that's far less kind and, and, and compassionate to a kid.
00:44:13.660
I worry about my kids being put in school and being around other kids whose parents did
00:44:33.740
not give them boundaries and did not discipline them and did not lay a good foundation for
00:44:39.600
them, did not tell them that self-control was a virtue.
00:44:43.800
Of course, I believe it's a fruit of the spirit.
00:44:47.460
The Bible tells us that we're supposed to practice.
00:44:52.000
I worry about, I mean, my kids aren't Gen Z, they're younger than that, but I worry what
00:44:57.480
kind of generation they're going to grow up with.
00:45:00.820
Kids who put their feelings first only and are unable to really function in a healthy
00:45:20.520
You must, um, you know, we're seeing it in the workplace.
00:45:23.540
Do you know how many young people are having their parents call the, their bosses to tell
00:45:28.980
them that they've got, that they're too stressed out on the job.
00:45:32.920
And they're so infantilized and their feelings are always front and center.
00:45:37.800
And honestly, they're tyrannizing others and they're tyrannized themselves by their
00:45:44.040
No wonder they don't want to get married and don't want to, don't want to have kids
00:45:47.860
because those things, they do require commitment.
00:45:50.900
They require you to give up some of what you want, your complete autonomy and your complete
00:46:02.020
And when sacrifice is seen as not just inconvenience, but as trauma and as something that is actually
00:46:08.440
immoral and dangerous, of course, you are going to avoid any kind of commitment that causes
00:46:20.040
You know, um, I, I, you know, I think of at any time when, I mean, when do moms do what
00:46:28.660
I mean, you spend so much time just suppressing your own needs.
00:46:36.940
And, um, I'll tell you what the best email response I got was from, uh, someone passed on
00:46:42.680
It was from a mom who said, you know, I listened to Abigail on a podcast.
00:46:46.400
And for the first time this morning, I punished my son without guilt.
00:46:51.400
And the reason I liked that was not because she had punished her son.
00:46:57.420
Not because I told her when to punish or how to punish or whether to punish.
00:47:03.760
But because she was doing what she believed was right without guilt for the first time.
00:47:13.500
I'm not, I'm not even sure I believe in parenting experts.
00:47:16.720
Most of the ones I've seen are not terribly impressive, but I do believe in parents exercising
00:47:23.180
their, their better instincts without being told they're going to traumatize the child
00:47:31.620
I think also just like the overemphasis on individuality that everyone is special and that
00:47:39.280
you don't have any similarities to anyone else and you shouldn't.
00:47:42.300
And every single kind of misbehavior or any kind of, um, you know, lack of character that
00:47:56.400
It's just something special and beautiful about you that doesn't actually need to be worked
00:48:03.420
I think that also gives parents a sense of guilt that like, I can't punish, I can't discipline
00:48:09.060
because I am suppressing this snowflake of a person.
00:48:13.320
Um, and while there are, you know, beautiful, unique characteristics of each person, the fact
00:48:20.720
of the matter is, is that we do have to learn how to function in society with other people.
00:48:26.060
Gosh, there's so much to say about what you just said.
00:48:30.180
It's why, of course, it's a huge part of why religious families tend to do well.
00:48:33.920
People who pass on religion because they're always pushing the kids to look outward, to
00:48:38.400
think of themselves as connected to something higher, to a higher purpose.
00:48:47.100
Instead, we tell their kids exactly as you said, they're so unique in the world, right?
00:48:50.440
They don't need to ever worry about anyone beyond themselves.
00:48:53.060
Well, that's actually very detrimental to their, to their wellbeing.
00:48:57.720
Um, telling them they're part of something greater is actually really good for their wellbeing.
00:49:01.940
But you know, there's, there's another thing too.
00:49:04.800
And that is that it, part of the reason parents never took away the phones and never even limited
00:49:10.400
their use, even during the school day was because they became convinced that the child
00:49:14.980
would be cruelly treated and emotionally, you know, tormented if they weren't with their
00:49:20.240
friends, if they weren't always connected to their friends.
00:49:23.060
I can't, that was the most common response I got when I said, why don't you take it away
00:49:27.380
If you feel like it's harming her, if you feel like her, you know, transgender identification
00:49:32.740
If you feel like, you know, she's getting more anxiety, more depression, more sleeplessness,
00:49:39.560
And the parents would often say to me, because she's connected, that's how she talks to her
00:49:46.460
And of course, a generation ago, parents had no trouble saying, I'm sorry, you're grounded.
00:49:54.560
But in this generation, we were so afraid of the trauma that would come in if we ever,
00:50:04.460
They said that explicitly, that, you know, very often kids need to be connected to their
00:50:09.880
friends over their phone and that it was good for them.
00:50:12.660
And they warned parents that it might undermine your relationship with your child if you take
00:50:18.020
And so parents couldn't even follow their best instincts.
00:50:22.900
I think that also parents just want to avoid bad feelings as much as possible.
00:50:28.300
And if their child says that they feel bad without their phone or they feel bad because
00:50:33.500
their child says they feel bad, the easiest way to numb that pain is to just give your child
00:50:40.060
So it takes not only discipline for your kid, but discipline in yourself.
00:50:43.940
Like parents have to be able to manage our bad feelings and to say, it doesn't feel good
00:50:54.560
I have to deal with the consequences of doing this hard thing.
00:50:58.860
Parents also have to be willing to go through hard things and to deal with hard feelings if
00:51:04.180
we are going to discipline and parent our kids.
00:51:07.320
I think that's, you know, a whole other layer to this.
00:51:17.020
I mean, the easiest thing to do would be, you know, what, what, you know, the wonderful
00:51:20.920
psychologist Jonathan Haidt has suggested, and we have known for years, they take the
00:51:25.720
kids out of, they take the phones out of schools.
00:51:28.840
At least during the school day, don't have them on their phones.
00:51:33.980
Parents had been complaining about the harms to their children, but they got no support.
00:51:37.900
And they were undermined all the time, so they couldn't trust their own instincts.
00:51:46.720
There's nothing harder than sending a kid away from the dinner table because he's been
00:51:52.580
rude or disrespectful or done something bad at the dinner table.
00:51:59.340
If anything, you know, it's the hardest thing you ever have to do is discipline your kid or
00:52:09.740
I know moms who are trying now to get other parents on board to take the phones out of
00:52:18.980
They want other parents support and saying, hey, can't you get on board with this initiative
00:52:25.540
And the biggest impediment to that, like the biggest obstacle those, you know, anti-phone
00:52:32.040
in school moms have is other moms, other parents.
00:52:36.380
And the biggest reason is I want to be able to text my kid immediately.
00:52:44.100
For thousands and thousands of years, we never had that luxury.
00:52:47.540
And now it's parents who are conditioned to that instant gratification of knowing their
00:53:02.500
And look, I can tell you my own kids' school, you know, they tried to limit the phones.
00:53:06.600
But I can tell you that every time we have an expert who comes in, they say, well, the
00:53:12.600
And even the, you know, American Psychological Association, which was so late in issuing
00:53:18.180
any statement when they finally mentioned, you know, the harms of social media, it was
00:53:27.240
You know, they never, the Surgeon General never did this with cigarettes, right?
00:53:31.420
When they warned parents of the harms, which by the way, cigarettes also have positive things
00:53:40.580
There are things that are good about them, but bottom line is they'll give you cancer.
00:53:47.160
The psychological associations won't even, haven't even issued a clear warning about these
00:53:53.700
So it makes it so much harder for parents to organize and try to take them out of schools,
00:53:59.760
even though we've known for eight years that they're bad for kids.
00:54:04.960
What would you say, and I know that we have to end, there are a million other things I could
00:54:10.580
What would you say to the physician that says, okay, I hear you, Abigail, but there are some
00:54:18.780
There are some good things about children learning how to express their emotions and talk about
00:54:25.280
difficult things and talk about their feelings.
00:54:27.640
We don't want all of that pin up because maybe it can manifest itself in bad ways down the line.
00:54:33.140
What do you say to people who say, I've seen some benefits to SEL or to therapy?
00:54:42.240
So, um, I think that, you know, I, I try to look at the studies because, um, I think that
00:54:51.440
You, you often see this with young mothers, they'll see one, you know, one thing that was
00:54:57.300
And then they go around telling every, in their five-year-old and they go around telling everyone,
00:55:03.940
I mean, you have to wait and see how these things play out over time.
00:55:07.300
Now, um, so, so I do think it's good to look at research.
00:55:12.120
Um, there's new research out of Australia and England in which they had a control group.
00:55:17.560
One was a meta study of several different kinds of SEL and the other, and then the other looked
00:55:23.480
at, um, coping techniques and teaching specifically kinds of regulation skills, coping techniques
00:55:31.280
The other looked at anti-bullying techniques that were taught.
00:55:34.160
They had a control group, they had, um, and they followed these kids over a year and
00:55:39.120
the kids ended up sadder, more anxious, or not helped at all and, um, more alienated from
00:55:47.600
So, um, does giving kids a vocabulary about their emotions help them?
00:55:52.680
Of course, but that's not actually what the schools do.
00:55:56.440
You see what they do is they go in and they, they give them gobbledygook.
00:55:59.820
Sometimes one parent shared with me that her child was being taught anger is red.
00:56:10.180
They aren't always, I mean, I'll give you an example.
00:56:14.900
I'll give you an example to, to strengthen that point that you were making.
00:56:19.800
And my, my husband told me the story when he was a little boy, um, his father came to
00:56:25.300
And he's gotten to the car and he said to his dad, I'm so angry that you picked me up
00:56:36.740
And that was helpful because now he was saying, no, you're not, you're not angry.
00:56:43.260
That's actually going to help you because it's not exactly anger.
00:56:47.960
But if you go into the schools and look at what they're actually doing, all of this
00:56:52.440
feelings focus inevitably funnels towards obsession over bad feelings, obsession over
00:56:58.520
bad pain, and who's in charge of you when you're a kid, who's in charge of making sure
00:57:05.880
Inevitably, it ends up as a criticism of the parents, the people who were supposed to keep
00:57:10.760
So in practice, those things very, very often go together.
00:57:18.180
I'm so excited for people to read this book, Bad Therapy, Why the Kids Aren't Growing Up.
00:57:23.940
And I just want to say like your chapter titles are amazing.
00:57:27.040
The chapter titles are sufficient and getting someone to want to read this book.
00:57:34.400
This book, I'm guessing, is available everywhere.