As if we didn’t have enough to hang on the Boomers already: unaffordable housing, New Age, monstrous RVs blocking highways and, of course, Phil Collins’ solo career. Now we can add something else to the list: a narcissistic culture that’s engendered a mental health crisis in young people.
As I wrote several times during the pandemic, Covid policies were what I dubbed the ‘Moloch Option’: sacrificing the young to spare the old. As we learned more of the dire consequences of lockdowns and school closures, not to mention hysterical fear-mongering, on a generation of kids, I changed that to the ‘Tlaloc Option’. Tlaloc, the meso-American deity, not only demanded children’s lives, but their suffering as well.
But the roots of this crisis long precede Covid. Covid was just the tipping-point into the abyss that has been growing wider and deeper for decades. In the ’90s, it was ‘Generation Prozac’.
Lurking at the bottom of it all, though, is decades of the culture of narcissism engendered from the ’60s on.
Across the West, the mental health crisis in children and adolescents has reached an all-time high, with one in five children breaking down. Although the causes of this crisis are multi-variable, the rise in self-orientation – otherwise known as narcissistic behaviour – is a major contributor to the epidemic.
No doubt enraged oldies will be shaking their flabby fists and shouting about TikTok and Instagram. Which is fair enough – but where did it begin? In the self-described ‘Me Generation’ of the Boomers. If the kids today are self-absorbed preeners, they learned it from the best (or worst).
Over the last 70 years there has been a shift in values away from a more relational, empathetic and family-oriented approach to a more self-focused one. Modern political movements in the 1960s brought positive changes, but every social and political movement also has a downside.
The women’s rights movement gave women increased opportunities in the workplace, and greater freedom of choice in many areas, but it also meant a rise in two-parent working families, where parents gave the responsibility of raising children to others, often placing them in care. Mothers doubted their value as nurturers and the myth was born that children were self-sufficient and could raise themselves and be just fine.
The “Me” movement gave individuals the opportunity to seek self-determination and self-fulfilment, but at the cost of nurturing relationships and family ties. Freedom replaced responsibility, and the pursuit of one’s singular pleasures outweighed caregiving.
One of the most grotesque social experiments in history – at least, until Covid – was the unholy rush by Boomer parents in the ’80s to dump their kids into childcare. Having become the most divorced generation in history, the Boomers not only shrugged off the responsibility for raising their kids, but bullied – both social and political-economic coercion – subsequent generations of parents into the same. Boomer TV shows, from Mary Tyler Moore to Murphy Brown, expounded the poisonous ideology that single parenthood and/or putting career ahead of family were the ultimate good.
An opportunity economy came with the promise of financial independence and promoted career achievement over relationships. These changes to the family ecosystem started to tear apart the social fabric.
Fast forward to today, and the legacy of these historical movements has been generations who value work and materialism over caring for vulnerable children and the elderly, the rise of social media which promises happiness through lifestyle, and a move away from a relational world of deep emotional connections towards a superficial, self-focused one.
And the kids are very much not all right.
Our children have been affected in many ways from this shift toward self-centredness. Some are just less happy, more dissatisfied, and more bored with their lives. Others are more obviously symptomatic, suffering from attachment disorders, addictions, depression, anxiety, ADHD, suicidal thoughts, personality disorders and loneliness – all of which are on the rise. Today’s young adults can no longer see the value of committing to deep and loving relationships through marriage or children.
They’ve learned from example.
Children are not born with a healthy or defined sense of self. They begin to develop a self as a result of the emotionally and physically present relationship with their mother or primary attachment figure in the first three years, who makes them feel safe and loved from moment to moment. When everything goes well a child feels securely attached, loved, valued, admired and understood. This secure attachment allows children to tolerate even wide swings of emotion in response to success or failure – what we call resilience today.
Except that mummy has got to put her career first. That glass ceiling won’t break itself. So, off to the daycare centre for you. One has to have priorities.
When a child’s needs are unmet because of a parent’s self-focus or self-interest, they feel misunderstood, abandoned, rejected, a deep sense of loss and sadness.
The good news is all is not lost.
Younger generations, even the much-maligned Millennials, might be marrying less than previous generations, but once they do, they’re staying married more often. There is a very real push to rediscover the traditional family values the Boomers spent their lives dismantling.
We can restore the value of the family, and turn around this mental health crisis. Our children are not destined to suffer from narcissistic disorders if we make different choices in how we raise them […]
If we model loving, attentive and selfless behaviour, we can see the results in their character, and resilience. When parents give their time and attention joyfully, without resentment or anger, they show that giving and self-sacrifice are pleasurable, meaningful and valuable.
Naturally, the left Establishment, who since the mid-’60s have been on a Long March through the Institutions, are fighting back. Hence the concerted effort to demonise the rediscovery of traditional values as ‘right-wing extremism’. Because, sure if a mother wants to raise a family, and raise them herself and see that they get healthy food, she’s just a goose-step away from being a full-blown Nazi – at least, if you believe cretins like Kate Hannah.
More and more, young people are seeing what a raw deal their parents and grandparents handed them – and they’re deciding it’s not for them.
Maybe there’s hope yet for their children – not to mention the Western civilisation built on the bedrock of the family.
