Permanent, irresponsible adolescence permeates modern Western society,
from those adults who spend more hours in the day on Xbox than they do
talking to loved ones, through to those for whom the failure of a sports
team is grounds for serious depression and even, in extreme cases,
thoughts of suicide. At least in the West we live in a world where the
battle simply for survival is, by and large, over, or at least not
imminent: few of us do not know when and whence our next meal is coming;
there are no famines in Britain and America as there have been in
Africa; and ethnic cleansing is not something that many of us experience
on a daily basis. We have plenty of material possessions and do not
struggle in the way that even our grandparents may have had to do in the
twenties and thirties. Yet we live in a world where anxiety levels are
high, where suicide is not that uncommon, and where the national bill
for anti-depressants is awe-inspiring.
Why is this the case? Mohler suggests, and I think he is right, that the coddling and over-protection of children has created a generation many of whose members have no sense of proportion, no ability to take responsibility for themselves, and no capacity for handling set-backs and contradictions. Just look at the blog world, where all kinds of crazy, extremist rhetoric is used about absolute trivia. Then just reflect on emails you have probably received, how rude and abrupt and extreme people are prepared to be electronically, compared to how sycophantic and spineless they often are face to face. The virtual world is a mirror of reality: a place where everyone demands to be heard on anything they want to speak about, yet where nobody has to take responsibility or face the consequences of their actions. Read it all HERE
Why is this the case? Mohler suggests, and I think he is right, that the coddling and over-protection of children has created a generation many of whose members have no sense of proportion, no ability to take responsibility for themselves, and no capacity for handling set-backs and contradictions. Just look at the blog world, where all kinds of crazy, extremist rhetoric is used about absolute trivia. Then just reflect on emails you have probably received, how rude and abrupt and extreme people are prepared to be electronically, compared to how sycophantic and spineless they often are face to face. The virtual world is a mirror of reality: a place where everyone demands to be heard on anything they want to speak about, yet where nobody has to take responsibility or face the consequences of their actions. Read it all HERE
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