How Safetyism Is Robbing Our Children of the Hero’s Journey

We must encourage children to take steps toward independence so they can grow into the competent adults that our society needs.

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About the Authors

Julian Adorney is a columnist at Reality's Last Stand and the founder of Heal the West, a substack movement dedicated to preserving liberalism. He’s also a writer for the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism (FAIR). Find him on X: @Julian_Liberty.

Mark Johnson is a trusted advisor and executive coach at Pioneering Leadership and a facilitator and spiritual men's coach at The Undaunted Man, an organization that helps men embody healthy masculine energy and cultivate path-agnostic spiritual growth. He has over 25 years of experience optimizing people and companies—he writes at The Undaunted Man’s Substack and Universal Principles.

Geoff is a Relationship Architect/Coach, multiple-International Best-Selling Author, Speaker, and Workshop Leader. He has spent the last twenty-eight years coaching people world-wide, with a particular passion for supporting those in relationship, and helping men from all walks of life step up to their true potential. Along with Mark, he is a co-founder of The Undaunted Man.

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It’s hard to shake the sense that safetyism—defined here as the belief that children and adolescents are more fragile than they truly are, necessitating protection from even minor bumps and bruises—is on the rise. Parenting magazine cautions against leaving children unsupervised on playdates in order “to make sure that no one’s feelings get too hurt if there’s a squabble.” Police have repeatedly been called to intervene when parents commit the “crime” of letting their kids play unsupervised in the park or wait in the car during brief errands. This overprotectiveness has contributed to a decline in free play—the type of unsupervised play we enjoyed in our youth, where children spend time with friends without adults constantly hovering in case someone got an owie.

The consequences of this shift are stark, as shown by data from the American Time Use Study which reveals a dramatic drop in the average daily time young people spend with friends over the last two decades. In 2003, young Americans (age 15-24) spent an average of over 150 minutes per day with friends. By 2019, this had halved to just over 70 minutes. Vadim Zipunnikov, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins, summarized the bleak findings of his study on physical activity levels across generations: “Activity levels at the end of adolescence were alarmingly low, and by age 19, they were comparable to 60-year-olds.” More and more, we are keeping our children indoors, sedentary, and under our ever-watching eye.

The overprotection extends beyond children and adolescents. In college settings, parents stepping in to try to resolve conflict between their child and a dorm roommate are so common that licensed mental health counselor Susan Fee often finds herself advising parents against contacting the school to request a room change. Earlier this year, The Hill reported that an astonishing 26 percent of Gen Z respondents had their parents accompany them to a job interview.