Jean Twenge: “It may be human nature to silence people you disagree with, but that doesn't make it right”

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Jean Twenge is a psychologist and author of a series of important and influential books, including Generations: The Real Differences Between Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, and Silents―and What They Mean for America's Future (2023); iGen: Why Today's Super-Connected Kids Are Growing Up Less Rebellious, More Tolerant, Less Happy--and Completely Unprepared for Adulthood--and What That Means for the Rest of Us (2018); and The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement (2009).

Twenge is also sometimes a coauthor to Jonathan Haidt, whose new bestselling book The Anxious Generation argues that society must significantly restrict social media use among children and adolescents. Social media is creating anxiety and depression, reducing resiliency and risk-taking, and contributing to the coddling and closing of the American mind, Haidt, Twenge, and many other psychologists believe.

I spoke to Twenge recently to ask her about how entitlement, a key characteristic of narcissism, appears to be a key element in the rising demand for censorship. She agreed that it was. But Twenge also pointed out that “in most times and places in world history free speech has not really been a thing.”