Why not OP?
It’s all really worrying and complex. We have several children in our wider family who will probably never live fully independently or be in meaningful employment. Yet they have normal IQs and are able bodied. None of them have been raised by pandering parents. But I think they’ve suffered from ‘2020s syndrome’ as I call it where social media, lack of in person connection, constant ‘anxieties’ which are contagious in their cohort, and a general perception of themselves as children who should be provided and cared for long past what would’ve been expected 20 years ago, has rendered them helpless and frankly very selfish.
We took the view sometime around 2010-2015 that under 18s are ‘children’, and should be treated as such, and that parents are basically their master and creator who are completely and utterly responsible for their every mood and happiness. It’s almost expected now for parents to run themselves into the ground and deplete themselves ‘supporting’ their teenage children. They panic over everything - they see what used to be ‘teenage nonsense’ as something seriously indicative of a mental health issue, and dive into therapy/‘caring’ in such a way that it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy and the kid believes they’re unusual and different and somehow in need of protection.
Then there’s the anger. I work in crime and my colleagues and I were discussing lately what an absolute explosion we have seen in random acts of extreme anger and violence from otherwise unremarkable young men (aka the ones who don’t have a history of MH or crime, haven’t been in care and so on). Random serious attacks on passersby, big acts of criminal damage, all in a ‘red mist’ style where they just lash out in a way that is actually terrifying, citing their ‘uncontrollable rage’ which they’re not sure why they have. I’ve never known teens and young people so angry and full of rage, for no reason.
I suspect all of the above is because they simply don’t have normal childhoods any more. They don’t play out. They don’t get bored. They don’t get creative or make things out of boxes. They don’t have family meals round a table. They don’t go to church, or have a community, or spend time with relatives and wider friend groups building social skills, or have part time jobs, or hang out in town with their friends just spending time together. They just spend their lives on screens, or in a highly structured activity environment, and when their stressed out brain eventually reacts they end up introspecting in therapy and BOOM, they’re neurodivergent and now have a final diagnosis which explains why they ‘can’t’ hold down a job or do anything for themselves.
It’s all so sad. We really need a societal conversation about what a normal childhood should look like and how important seemingly banal activities and exchanges are. I feel sorry for them, it’s not their fault, it’s ours.