Back in 2018, Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt released The Coddling of the American Mind, an examination of the increasing “censorship” on college campuses by– in their estimation– Gen-Z liberals. The book– and corresponding website and interviews given by the authors– decries the rise of “safe spaces”, the “weaponization of language”, the de-platforming of controversial figures, and the general hostility towards ideas and ideologies that the so-called liberal youth find “dangerous.”
NOTE: In this essay, I occasionally differentiate between “big C” Conservatives to represent the new far-right versus “little c” conservatives of a more centrist disposition. However, “big L” Liberals are the centrists (or really, center-right), whereas “little l” liberals represent the broader spectrum of progressives and further leftists. The distinctions are generally minimal, but in some cases may be useful to distinguish each group’s centrist faction from its more radical one.
The writers describe themselves as generally centrist with a liberal lean, and so their critique is meant to be a good-faith attempt at course-correction for what they seem to at least imply is exclusively a left-wing problem. Predictably, the book fueled the already-raging fire of conservative accusations that liberals are snowflakes and Gen-Z youth are fundamentally incapable of handling the basic pressures of the “real world.”
The book was generally received well by the public, as it provides a somewhat compelling narrative for its assertions (referred to grandiosely as the “Three Great Untruths”), and focuses on a few high-profile news stories of college campus incidents and a smattering of related anecdotes to generalize this behavior of, essentially, hypersensitivity as a nationwide epidemic of a chronically crippled generation and an overall weakening of civilization. Society was just beginning to encounter “wokeness,” and the book only helped to solidify the notion that this was some deeply troubling indoctrination by Marxist professors on college campuses nationwide.
It was, in essence, an insidious rebuke of “political correctness,” that tired trope of conservative ideology that society’s tendency towards compassion is some great blasphemy against the natural order of savagery and barbarism. Lukianoff and Haidt made a point to tout their centrist stances and support for free-speech absolutism, but in the political climate of the day– increasing anti-intellectualism and a resurgence of conservative backlash to social progress– it provided perfect confirmation bias for the right’s accusations against liberals.
The narrative continued to gain momentum in the wake of the #MeToo movement, where “traditional” masculine culture was threatened, and a great many white men felt that their last remaining privilege– to be a rapey asshole– was being unjustly torn away from them.
The narrative was further amplified by the rise of what is now called the “manosphere,” the podcasts and social media of pseudo-intellectuals like Jordan Peterson, Andrew Tate, Myron Gaines, and to some extent, Joe Rogan and his more general “bro-culture” ilk. These losers all preached some variation of “Alpha/Sigma” male ideology to millions of young men who were attempting to navigate this terrifying new landscape of having to actually consider women as equal human beings, and who were further terrorized by increased representation of trans and queer folk in society, surely the greatest affronts to their sacred maleness. Throw in a few years of COVID isolation and its subsequent anti-government conspiracies, and you suddenly have half of Gen-Z believing that they are the last line of defense against the collapse of Western civilization at the hands of liberals and communists and all the other tired shit that we all thought would die off with the Boomers.
As we have discussed before, there is a very well-established pipeline from online communities where incels and other disaffected young men stew in nihilism to the radical, far-right ideologies of white supremacy and extreme male chauvinism. Yesterday’s aimless young men are today’s masked ICE thugs ushering in a new era of white nationalist fascism in America.
Of course, I am not laying the blame of America’s descent into a fascist hellscape at the feet of this book or its authors. The book is not without merits, and even while reading it in 2025, I found myself agreeing with some of its basic gripes but, upon reflection and with the luxury of hindsight, fundamentally disagreeing with its conclusions. Let’s explore a few different topics.
Compassion Isn’t Weak
Coddling’s basic argument was that “Gen-Z” constructs such as safe spaces and trigger warnings are creating intellectually weak denizens that can’t handle being confronted with “uncomfortable” ideas. This recategorization of “everything is trauma” was, arguably, a real phenomenon, as popular discourse began to re-shape around the idea that everyone’s personal history was rife with long-lasting trauma that might “trigger” an emotional response. Comedians were “canceled” because of insensitive jokes, online forums were littered with pointless self-censorship like “r*pe” or “s***ide”, as if not seeing the full word somehow prevented the concept from being just as painful for someone with unresolved trauma.
These efforts were conflated throughout the media– both “conservative” and “mainstream”, if such distinctions really mean anything anymore– with the dissolution of traditional gender norms (“pronoun wars”), the continued fallout of the #MeToo movement, and even with absurd misinformation about children identifying as cats and being permitted to use litterboxes in schools. All of this painted a picture of a society on the brink of collapse at the hands of some undefined “Marxist” ideology being perpetuated by *checks notes* the Democratic party led by corporatist apologists like Nancy Pelosi. That anyone could believe a fraction of this narrative is tragic.
But believe it they did. And as additional bad actors piled on stories about “transgender grooming,” “soy-boy chemical castration,” and other hysterical nonsense, the line between valid concerns about intellectual rigor and fringe misinformation campaigns was completely erased, until anyone that defended one was accused of defending the other. Liberals retreated either into centrist assent or “radical” groupthink; the former group remained silent for fear of being labeled either a closet conservative or a radical liberal, while the latter dug in and refused to yield any ground in any part of the argument, for fear of invalidating the legitimate defense of trans/queer rights or of being ostracized by their own group for ideological impurity… which, I suppose, sort of validates Coddling’s concerns, but it most certainly is not confined only to the Left.
All of this hysteria is rooted in the Conservative backlash against compassion and empathy. The notions that we should be empathetic to people with real trauma, be accepting of people that reject traditional norms, and be mindful of the pop-culture we produce because it shapes societal attitudes… these are the hallmarks of a mature civilization, not its downfall.
These ideas are offensive to conservatives that continue to believe that “might makes right,” that survival is only for the strongest, and that strength is selfishness and savagery. That is the way of life that they claim is under attack when they “defend whiteness.” Nevermind that most of them are so far below the benchmark of the ubermensch they envision themselves to be that they would be the first against the wall if it weren’t for the institutional power of the elites that manipulate them; that is a topic for another day.
Professors Aren’t At Fault
Generally speaking, the arc of human history bends towards compassion and unity. Yes, it is a very long arc with a lot of appalling setbacks, but every advancing step in civilization has resulted in (or because of!) greater compassion, cooperation, and equality. To pretend that this is at risk now is founded on precisely zero evidence.
And so every generation naturally becomes more compassionate than the last, as some of the larger injustices are corrected and they then seek to address the remaining transgressions that affect smaller populations or that have simply been ignored.
This is not a species growing weak, it is a civilization eliminating savagery. This is the natural result of intellectual progress and has been happening cyclically throughout recorded history, and although it is often the result of higher education and the increased critical thinking that accompanies it, it is absurd to act as though this is some new wave of “Marxist” indoctrination by radical professors at colleges.
For one, most evidence suggests that “Gen Z” has been fostering these attitudes before most of them were of college age. Thus, most of these sensibilities were ingrained in them by social factors established by the previous generations.
Those previous generations are the parents and elders– Boomers and Xers, if we want to keep using the somewhat useless generalization by generations– that are also largely the ones decrying the very ideals they instilled in their children. They are the hippies and the punk rockers who promoted free love and non-conformity and then raised children with similar values.
The ones who were assholes back then and continue to be assholes now, but whose children fortunately still developed greater compassion, are the ones that feel alienated and chastised and therefore lash out at “wokeness” and the general softening of society. But history is a spectrum, and those same generations lived in the brief window of the greatest prosperity, security, and comfort in modern history. They benefited from all the privileges of worker protections, high wages, health and environmental regulations, and so many other things that made them far “weaker” than the generations before them. Yet they perpetuate the same, tired, hypocritical accusations against the next generation.
And anyway, most social progress starts as a “radical overcorrection” and eventually scales back to a more mainstream compromise. It is because of this expected downscaling that the initial correction must be radical, so that it can settle into something acceptable. If #MeToo had only targeted instances of, say, violent rape, perhaps the backlash to it may have been less, but so many of the other horrible transgressions that occur against women in our society would not have been addressed. So the movement initially made space for everyone who felt exploited or abused, but once the movement began to attack people because of what would reasonably be considered an awkward handling of consent, or some implicit power imbalance rather than any overt coercion, society collectively began to push back, leaving some of the most heinous behavior exposed while dialing back the persecution of mild inappropriateness.
So it goes with everything. Progressives and leftists are willing to tolerate these extreme overcorrections for a while to see whether they make sense and whether they actually impact any transgressions before they begin pushing back at the fringe cases and establishing a “generally accepted” baseline. But conservatives will attack this open-minded as wholehearted endorsement, and then will continue to portray those “rejected” fringe cases as being legitimate parts of the ideology. Thus, the conversation is skewed from the start, and centrists and liberals have to cede ground for fear of looking like the “crazy radicals” that the right accuses them of being.
Real Coddling is De-Skilling
The real coddling of the American mind is the continued decline of critical thinking, intellectual rigor, and practical skills proficiency. It is not conspiratorial to observe that primary education was in steady decline for at least the past 50 years, well before the alarmingly-sharp dropoff in the last two decades that is largely attributed to cell phones, social media, and COVID. Every year brings increased reports of high school students– or graduates!– that struggle with 5th-grade reading and mathematics. There is no push for curriculum around logic, debate, media literacy, or any of the truly necessary skills to navigate the modern world.
Concurrent to this, they are also victims of the profit-driven motivation to de-skill everyone in every way. Everything is a subscription, and a shit-paying “gig economy” solution is available to address your every need or want. Don’t cook, use Postmates. Don’t hang a shelf, use Taskrabbit. Take your car to a mechanic for basic maintenance. Buy another pair of fast-fashion pants instead of mending a small hole. Become a content creator; that’s the only skill that still pays… until AI kills that in a year or two.
That modern world is also increasingly shoveling “brainrot” content into our collective maws. Faced with a seemingly-inevitable ecological collapse, ever-worsening economic prospects, and a generally bleaker future, people of all ages are doomscrolling or distracting themselves into a stupor, stripped of agency and feeling powerless to affect the horrors they encounter daily. We are all riddled with anxiety and depression, chronically-elevated cortisol levels, unhealthy lifestyles, no community, no spiritual fulfillment, minimal interpersonal relationships, commodified intimacy, and a barrage of AI-generated misinformation and propaganda… it’s no fucking wonder that our youth feels timid and ill-equipped to handle the stresses of everyday life.
Yet despite this, a of Gen-Z continues to forge a path of greater social justice, anticapitalism, anticonformity, and freedom of self-expression. And that, to me, does not feel all that coddled.
