Safetyism, fragility, and community design [cnu.org]

I am reading The Coddling of the American Mind by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt, which speaks, in part, of the culture of “safetyism” that has taken hold in American discourse and higher education. The authors draw from ancient wisdom, psychological theory, and science to make the case that it is bad for human beings to be made too safe. Research has recently shown that diligently keeping young children away from peanut products—the norm since the 1990s in the US—has vastly raised the prevalence of peanut allergies. Similarly, it is psychologically harmful to protect students from ideas that challenge their worldview and that they may find offensive, the authors say. To put it succinctly: What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.

The book draws on theories of author and polymath Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who says that people are “anti-fragile”—which means that they thrive on a certain amount of conflict and challenge. People get stronger, for example, by going to the gym. Sitting on the couch too much will make you weaker and ultimately kill you.

Haidt and Lukianoff discuss many ways that safetyism has impacted our culture, including not letting children out to play without supervision, attitudes towards eating and health—but they don’t mention how we build communities. For me, it is not hard to see a parallel in community design.

[For more on this story by ROBERT STEUTEVILLE, go to https://www.cnu.org/publicsqua...and-community-design]

I watched Bill Mahr last night and the group discussed the points made in this book. Mr. Mahr frequently mocks the millennial generation as being entitled and fragile so the conversation quickly turned towards the extreme. One example given by the author that I found particularly dangerous discussed parents having conversations with their kids verses barking orders and expecting compliance. From my experience in using Positive Discipline and other more relational communication techniques with both adults and children, having conversations that build a vocabulary around dialogue does not make people weak. Rather, it strengthens not only the skill set but also the confidence and capacity for understanding different points of view.

I also found it ironic that in almost the same breath as Mr. Mahr pointed out the fear mongering of our current president, he encouraged parents to instill fear in their children as the solution for 'toughening them up."

If we choose to take what we're calling a "trauma-informed approach" across the board, pointing out inconsistencies can be helpful. Neither the extreme of "helicopter parenting" nor "authoritarian parenting" is going to offer us a solution to the issue of lacking connection within our communities. We only further separate ourselves from one another. "This is real, and this is all of us." ~Dr. Nadine Burke-Harris

Safetyism, fragility, and community design [cnu.org]

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