Lies We Tell Kids

My mother was not at all worried about the fate of the boys in my life when I was fifteen. She was worried about me, and her ethics included my caring for me. She was worried young men who had the power advantage would manipulate her child. She was worried about my own weakness and desire to please. My mother did not think I would regret wholeheart

My central claim in this book is that these two trends—overprotection in the real world and underprotection in the virtual world—are the major reasons why children born after 1995 became the anxious generation.

After sex, death is the topic adults lie most conspicuously about to kids. Sex I believe they conceal because of deep taboos. But why do we conceal death from kids? Probably because small children are particularly horrified by it. They want to feel safe, and death is the ultimate threat.

Life can be pretty good at 10 or 20, but it's often frustrating at 15. This is too big a problem to solve here, but certainly one reason life sucks at 15 is that kids are trapped in a world designed for 10 year olds.