Why Are so Many Young People Unhappy?
Why are young people so unhappy and so anxious about their future? Healthcare professionals and social scientists round up the usual suspects: drug addiction, social media, cyberbullying, fear of impending demise of the planet. See anything important missing from that list? Dennis Prager does.
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What did a 2019 Reuters report claim had doubled over less than a decade among U.S. college students?
suicidal thinkingsevere depressionrates of self-injuryall of the aboveThe United States was founded on two sets of values: _________________________.
Prussian and SocialistJudeo-Christian and AmericanCalvin and EuropeanZoroastrian and GermanicThe majority of births to millennials are to unmarried women.
TrueFalseUntil the 1960s, Americans grew up ___________________________.
skeptical of American valueseschewing the Foundersloving their countryignoring the bad parts of their historyWhat might be the biggest factor in the increasing sadness and loneliness among so many young people?
increased drug and opioid addictionfears for their futureless human interaction because of constant cellphone usethe decline of Protestantism, Catholicism, and Judaism
- Rates of severe depression, suicidal thinking and self-injury among U.S. college students more than doubled over less than a decade.
College students in America are struggling at an alarming rate with clinical depression. “Suicidal thinking, severe depression and rates of self-injury among U.S. college students more than doubled over less than a decade,” Reuters reported in August 2019, citing a study of hundreds of thousands of students from 2007 to 2018. “Reports of suicide attempts increased from 0.7% of survey participants in 2013 to 1.8% in 2018, while the proportion of students reporting severe depression rose from 9.4% to 21.1% in the same period,” reported Reuters. “The rate of moderate to severe depression rose from 23.2% in 2007 to 41.1% in 2018, while rates of moderate to severe anxiety rose from 17.9% in 2013 to 34.4% in 2018.”
View sourceRelated reading: “New Cigna Study Reveals Loneliness at Epidemic Levels in America”
View sourceRelated video: “The Key to Unhappiness” – Dennis Prager
View source- An epidemic of depression and loneliness among young people is impacting not only America but Europe as well.
Social commentator Kay Hymowitz writes in a recent op-ed on the growing “epidemic of loneliness” in the West: “Loneliness, public-health experts tell us, is killing as many people as obesity and smoking. It’s not much comfort that Americans are not, well, alone in this. Germans are lonely, the bon vivant French are lonely, and even the Scandinavians — the happiest people in the world, according to the UN’s World Happiness Report — are lonely, too.”
View sourceLoneliness has become such a prevalent issue in the U.K. that Britain felt it necessary recently to create a Minister of Loneliness. “Loneliness is one of the greatest public health challenges of our time, Theresa May said today as she launched the first cross-Government strategy to tackle it,” the British government announced in October 2018. “The Prime Minister confirmed all GPs in England will be able to refer patients experiencing loneliness to community activities and voluntary services by 2023.”
View source- Americans are better off than ever before—yet more depressed than ever. Why? The biggest problem is loss of values and meaning.
“Though people have more money, better health care, better health, better housing and more education, and live longer than at any time in history, they — especially young people — are unhappier than at any time since data collection began,” notes Dennis Prager.
View sourceWhile there are any number of reasons, including drug and opioid addiction, less human interaction because of cell phones and social media, and fears about the future, the biggest reason in the West is the loss of values and meaning.
View sourceRelated reading: “Happiness is a Serious Problem” – Dennis Prager
View source- A sense of a shared American identity and pride in being American has declined over the last half-century.
Since the 1960s, Americans have increasingly lost their sense of a shared identity and a unifying “American creed.”
View sourceA 2019 Gallup survey found that American pride reached a new low, with only 45% of Americans saying they felt extremely proud to be American, while 30% said they were either only moderately or not at all proud.
View sourceRelated video: “The American Trinity: The Three Values That Make America Great” – Dennis Prager
View source- The loss of shared American values has contributed to a breakdown in the sense of community.
The loss of key shared American values has resulted in the loss of community. Among some of these lost values is the belief in meeting community needs with civic organizations, like Kiwanis, Rotary and Lions Clubs, the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts, and churches — in which participation has dropped off sharply in the last half-century — rather than turning to the government to address them.
View sourceAn increasing number of young Americans have also lost middle class or bourgeois values — including prioritizing getting married before having a child, building a family, holding a full-time job, self-discipline, delayed gratification, and patriotism.
View sourceThe result is that loneliness has reached epidemic levels in America. A recent Cigna study of 20,000 U.S. adults found that over a quarter say they “rarely or never feel as though there are people who really understand them,” and over 40% say they “sometimes or always feel that their relationships are not meaningful” and they feel “isolated from others.”
View source- A majority of births to millennials are to unmarried women, while the percentage of unmarried adults with no children has reached new highs.
After decades of a sustained war on family values in America, the majority of births to millennials are to unmarried women.
View sourceThe percentage of American adults who have never been married and who have no children has recently reached historic highs.
View sourceA 2018 study by Cigna found that single parents are generally the loneliest of Americans.
View sourceRelated video: “Be A Man. Get Married.” – Brad Wilcox
View source- The biggest reason for the growing unhappiness in America’s younger generations is a lack of meaning resulting from a war on religious faith.
A belief that one’s life has meaning is essential to happiness. Renowned psychoanalyst Victor Frankl famously argued in his masterpiece “Man’s Search for Meaning” that, aside from food, the greatest human need is meaning.
View sourceMore than a third of Americans born after 1980 affiliate with no religion.
View sourceA 2016 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, JAMA Psychiatry, found that American women who attended a religious service at least once a week were five times less likely to commit suicide.
View sourceDennis Prager sums up the root cause of the increasingly pervasive unhappiness in America: “The reason so many young people are depressed, unhappy and angry is the left has told them that God and Judeo-Christian religions are nonsense; their country is largely evil; their past is deplorable; and their future is hopeless. That seems to be a major reason, if not the reason, for so much unhappiness: not capitalism, not inequality, not patriarchy, sexism, racism, homophobia or xenophobia but rather having no religion, no God, no spouse, no community, no country to believe in and, ultimately, no meaning. That explains much of the unprecedented unhappiness. And it explains the widespread adoption of that secular substitute for traditional religion: leftism. But unlike Judaism and Christianity, leftism does not bring its adherents happiness.”
View source
Why are so many young people unhappy?
To cite just one example, Reuters reported in 2019 that “Suicidal thinking, severe depression and rates of self-injury among U.S. college students more than doubled over less than a decade.”
And unhappiness is hardly confined to Americans. As the social commentator Kay Hymowitz recently wrote, “Germans are lonely, the bon vivant French are lonely, and even the Scandinavians . . . are lonely. The British prime minister . . . recently appointed a ‘Minister of Loneliness.’”
People have more money, better health, better housing, more education, and live longer than at any time in history, but people—especially the young—are unhappier than at any time since data began to be collected.
Why?
There are any number of reasons: increased drug and opioid addiction, less human interaction because of constant cellphone use, and young people’s fears for their future are the most widely offered explanations. But the biggest reason is the loss of values and meaning.
Let’s begin with values, and I'll focus on America.
The United States was founded on two sets of values: Judeo-Christian and American. This combination created the freest, most opportunity-giving, most affluent country in world history. This is not chauvinism. It is fact. That’s why people from every country on Earth have wanted to emigrate to America—and still do.
Chief among the American values was keeping government as small as possible. This enabled non-governmental institutions—Kiwanis, Rotary and Lions Clubs; book clubs; the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts; bowling leagues; music societies; and, of course, churches—to provide Americans with friends and to provide the neediest Americans with help. But as government has gotten ever larger, many of these non-governmental groups have dwindled in number or simply disappeared.
Another set of values is referred to as middle class or bourgeois values. These include getting married before having a child, making a family, getting a job, self-discipline, delayed gratification, and patriotism.
All of these have been under attack by America’s elites, with the following results: The majority of births to millennials are to unmarried women. Yet, according to a 2018 Cigna study, single parents are generally the loneliest of Americans. The percentage of American adults who have never been married and who have no children is at an historic high.
Then there is patriotism. Until the 1960s, Americans grew up loving their country, admiring the Founders, and believing in America’s values—most especially, liberty. Americans did not ignore the bad parts of their history, but they were wise enough to recognize that what made America exceptional was not its flaws, which were all universal, but its virtues, which were not. This strong American identity provided generations of Americans with roots, community, optimism, and meaning.
Which brings me to the most important reason for all this unhappiness: a lack of meaning. As Victor Frankl, the renowned Austrian-American psychoanalyst, wrote in his masterpiece, Man’s Search for Meaning, aside from food, the greatest human need is meaning. And nothing has given Americans―or any other people, for that matter―as much meaning as religion. But in the West since World War II, God and religion have been relegated to the dustbin of history. The result is that more than a third of Americans born after 1980 affiliate with no religion. This is unprecedented in American history. And it’s even worse in Europe.
Maybe, just maybe, the decline of Protestantism, Catholicism, and Judaism—those great providers of meaning—is the single biggest factor in the increasing sadness and loneliness among so many young people in America and around the world. A 2016 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, JAMA Psychiatry, found that American women who attended a religious service at least once a week were five times less likely to commit suicide. And common sense suggests this applies to men as well.
Young people have been told God is nonsense, their country is essentially evil, their past is deplorable, their future is bleak, and marriage and children are not important.
Why are so many young people depressed, unhappy, and angry? It’s not capitalism, or income inequality, or patriarchy, or even global warming. It’s having no religion, no God, and no country to believe in. And what does that leave them with? No meaning.
But there is always Instagram.
I’m Dennis Prager.
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