June 11, 2025 • 9 mins
Jonathan Haidt Urges Fathers to Engage in ‘Risk-Taking’ Play with Kids and does Strength-Based Parenting Actually Work?
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
We have talked many times now about Jonathan Hate and
his book The Ancient Think, It's yours in mind new
It's like most contemporary parenting book, like The Favorite Yeah,
and specifically The Anxious Generation is about the impact that
technology has on kids, technology screen, specifically social media, all
(00:23):
of that stuff, and how we as parents aren't doing
our kids a favor by allowing them free reign on
an open market for stupidity or however you want to
put it.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
He draws a direct core connection in this book between
the fact that there's instant gratification and constant stimulus, and
how that the correlation, the connection of when those phones
smartphones started to phase into teenage society that so went
this draw or this increase in depression, anxiety, and a
lot of people, I don't get me wrong, a lot
(00:56):
of people want to blame social media, and I don't
know that it's necessarily social media specifically. I think there's
a bigger problem in that you have the phone becomes
a distraction where you don't know how to deal with
being bored, and then you also have this parenting movement
that makes where people don't know how to deal with
negative experiences like we pacify children at every turn, with
(01:17):
any opportunity that we can, and I don't know that
that's the right thing to do, for whatever it.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Seems to ourselves now, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4 (01:25):
Like it's hard to like it's a weird thing where
people go. You know what I did. I went on
a walk the other day and I just want it
was so nice. Yeah, it was so nice.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
I love standing in a line.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
I don't love standing in line, but I love standing
in a line without my phone or without you know,
looking at it, because then I get to look at
and judge everybody else because no one is looking up
at me, no, no one.
Speaker 4 (01:48):
I got five seconds. I laughed at myself. I put
my phone in.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
My pocket because I texted people that I was beating
for coffee. I set their line for what had to
be five mississips, and then I pulled my phone back
out again, and I giggled, and I did it and
then went about sending emails.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
There's a direct correlation.
Speaker 5 (02:03):
I firmly believe this, and don't think I'm so woo
woo for saying it, But a direct correlation between battling
anxiety and having moments of silence and peace. Yeah, whether
it's meditation or taking that walk without stimulation, whatever, there's
absolutely a correlation to reducing your anxiety the more moments
(02:24):
of peace that you have.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
And at its core, I think that's what he's talking
about in this interview where he points out that kids
need to be pushed beyond their fear and their comfort
zone in order to build resilience, and he kind of
says that he's really calling out dads because that traditionally
has been their role. He also says it doesn't mean
moms can't do it. He just said, for whatever reason, psychologically,
(02:47):
this seems to be the thing that dads do without
even thinking about it. They're the ones that are like, yeah,
go do this thing, or they want to play monster
when the kids are young because they want to just
scare them a little, but in a fun way.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
There's something very off putting about dads who are the
careful ones. To me, I'm looking right at you when
I say this, but I mean, yeah, okay, good.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
I'm not. But maybe emotionally.
Speaker 6 (03:17):
You can't laugh away if you are If you're a
dude and you have kids and you're the one who says.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Careful with that, it's sharp that stove is hot. Careful
all around the stairs, careful, careful, don't touch that, careful
with that, don't put your hand on the dog's face,
don't do like that to me is very off putting.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
It And as a there are obvious things that I
would want my kids to be careful about, yes, but
me telling them to be careful is nowhere near as
great a lesson as the dog biting their thumb or
the stove actually being hot, or the knife actually being sharp.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Yet consequences are awesome. They're great teachers. I say this
a lot, but one of the top, like I don't
know themes of parenting that my dad gave to me
was he would constantly tell the story about him and
my grandfather where my grandfather would just tell him to
go do stuff around the farm, and my dad, as
like a seven eight year old, would go, well, if
he's asking you to do it, it must mean I
(04:21):
could do it. But as he got older, he realized
that these were just tests. These were just him like
throwing it into a problem and seeing if he could
figure it out. And my dad learned as an adult
that that's where his self esteem came from.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Go fix that head, gasket leak on the tractor.
Speaker 4 (04:35):
You're not exaggerating.
Speaker 2 (04:36):
I mean my dad and my uncle drove a stick
shift pickup to feed the cattle on the ranch and
they got in a fight and took out about twenty
yards of fence and then had to go fix the fence.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
And my grandfather was like, this is just what it was.
These are all just.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Natural consequences presenting themselves, and so he talks about like
and my version of this was my wife hated this.
We lived on the same block as our elementary school
and my kids wanted to walk home from school by themselves,
and I said sure, and she's like, what are you doing.
I said, they're walking to school and they're walking home
from school, and she's like, that's not safe. I go,
(05:09):
there are hundreds of people around dropping their kids off.
If somebody grabs one of them and they're screaming or something,
somebody's gonna do something. But also, that's not the time
to grab a can do us. That's busy, prime time.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
It's lazy.
Speaker 4 (05:20):
They're not even crossing a street, lady like.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
And to me, the best example of this was that
when I would drop Jacob off at kindergarten, Jack was
maybe two or three, and he goes, can I go home?
And I and he loved it. He loved running around
the corner where I could not see him as soon
as we dropped him off, because he liked going into
the door, and he loved being in the house by himself.
Jacob was not this way, but he just loved all
of it. And so I was like, great, like knock
yourself out. And he told me one time this guy
(05:44):
stopped and said, hey, are you okay? And he said,
he goes, I know I'm not supposed to talk to trangers.
So I gave him a thumbs up and I ran
in the house.
Speaker 6 (05:52):
I buy a.
Speaker 5 (05:53):
Kid outside by himself walking some way in.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
You don't call your wife lady to her face. Yeah,
all right, rough housing. I've said it before.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
We're talking about Jonathan hate challenges that the dads should
be willing to challenge their kids.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
Get in there.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Maybe maybe not see how well they can take a punch,
but you know, understand the kids are going to scrape
their knees. One of the things we used to love doing,
and I've mentioned before, is my kids would jump up
on our bed and we would pillow fight and The
rule was, we'll do it as long as no one cries,
and then the first time someone cries, game over, and
(06:39):
I would hit them harder and harder.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
Your son harder, no, but rarely. He was the first one.
Speaker 5 (06:47):
I don't think i've ever I think I've seen my
brother cry once.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
It was like six. I mean, it wasn't like he
was fifteen or anything.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
I don't know if this is your intent, but what
I like about your example is is that you're not
saying they can't feel You're just but you're also teaching
them to push through and manage the emotion. If they
want the fun to continue, they just got to hold
it together. Because, in all honesty, I if I'm hitting
them with a pillow right now, you could you can
do some damage. But I'm hitting them with pillow and
(07:17):
they're falling down on a bed covered with pillows, like
this is the easiest.
Speaker 5 (07:24):
You weren't taking the pillow launching it in their face
to throw them up against.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
A wall in the first ten minutes, like sibling fights.
That's like twenty minutes in when Gary's starting to feel winded,
when I'm starting getting tired, I'm like, I need somebody cry.
Speaker 6 (07:36):
He starts.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
He starts putting onions in the pillow case just to
get anything, something going, something to get it started.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
But it's upun it's it's incumbent upon dads because just
by our nature to push that envelope, to push that
free play, to push the risk taking.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
I love his example. He says, starting at eight years old,
you should find activities that your kid could do on
their own. And one of the examples, he says, you
take up to a science center and you say, go
roam around and do whatever you want. I will meet
you in the cafeteria. And here's the I've traveled with
high school kids for a choir, and what's interesting is
is that you know, people go, what if the kid
(08:13):
gets taken and all that stuff. But I think that
there's also that's a safe environment, right, It's an enclosed
space that you can also teach your kids to exist
in that discomfort and if they feel fear, then that's
going to make them more aware of their surroundings. Like
one of the young men on the trip, he was
we were traveling on this metro station late at night
in downtown Dallas, and he actually said about one of
the girls.
Speaker 6 (08:34):
He goes.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
These girls have no survival skills, Like they have no
way looking out for themselves.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
They're not even aware of anything.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
That's because they're like standing on their phones right next
to the doorway of the train, waiting for somebody to
write before the closes, just to grab the phone, and
then the train's gone, and you're like, and they're not
even thinking.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
About that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
And I don't know how you can if you haven't
experienced any kind of fear or discomfort.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
My wife refers to that as aware bear. Ooh, people
to be being aware bear if you're ever in an
environment that you're not sure of, or you know, a
group of people whatever. It's childish, but it absolutely seals
the point of just just know what's going on, what's
aware of what's going on.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
And there's a I think we all could agree too,
there's a there's a there's a spectrum, right, there's a
boundary of what you don't want them to live in fear?
Speaker 4 (09:20):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
I don't know so far. This is what way I've
raised my kids, and it seems to be working out,
is it. I also don't teach them and everybody's out
to get them somebody's trying to grab them at every turn, like.
I don't want them to become a rodent where they're
just constantly looking over their shoulder at every moment like
that does.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
That's no way to live either, A moment rodent.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Hoffman's in there rhyming, hmmm, tips, I like a were
bear in a moment romrote, I gotta work on this.
We have talked many times now about Jonathan Hate and
his book The Ancient Think, It's yours in mind new
It's like most contemporary parenting book, like The Favorite Yeah,
and specifically The Anxious Generation is about the impact that
technology has on kids, technology screen, specifically social media, all
(00:23):
of that stuff, and how we as parents aren't doing
our kids a favor by allowing them free reign on
an open market for stupidity or however you want to
put it.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
He draws a direct core connection in this book between
the fact that there's instant gratification and constant stimulus, and
how that the correlation, the connection of when those phones
smartphones started to phase into teenage society that so went
this draw or this increase in depression, anxiety, and a
lot of people, I don't get me wrong, a lot
(00:56):
of people want to blame social media, and I don't
know that it's necessarily social media specifically. I think there's
a bigger problem in that you have the phone becomes
a distraction where you don't know how to deal with
being bored, and then you also have this parenting movement
that makes where people don't know how to deal with
negative experiences like we pacify children at every turn, with
(01:17):
any opportunity that we can, and I don't know that
that's the right thing to do, for whatever it.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Seems to ourselves now, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 4 (01:25):
Like it's hard to like it's a weird thing where
people go. You know what I did. I went on
a walk the other day and I just want it
was so nice. Yeah, it was so nice.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
I love standing in a line.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
I don't love standing in line, but I love standing
in a line without my phone or without you know,
looking at it, because then I get to look at
and judge everybody else because no one is looking up
at me, no, no one.
Speaker 4 (01:48):
I got five seconds. I laughed at myself. I put
my phone in.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
My pocket because I texted people that I was beating
for coffee. I set their line for what had to
be five mississips, and then I pulled my phone back
out again, and I giggled, and I did it and
then went about sending emails.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
There's a direct correlation.
Speaker 5 (02:03):
I firmly believe this, and don't think I'm so woo
woo for saying it, But a direct correlation between battling
anxiety and having moments of silence and peace. Yeah, whether
it's meditation or taking that walk without stimulation, whatever, there's
absolutely a correlation to reducing your anxiety the more moments
(02:24):
of peace that you have.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
And at its core, I think that's what he's talking
about in this interview where he points out that kids
need to be pushed beyond their fear and their comfort
zone in order to build resilience, and he kind of
says that he's really calling out dads because that traditionally
has been their role. He also says it doesn't mean
moms can't do it. He just said, for whatever reason, psychologically,
(02:47):
this seems to be the thing that dads do without
even thinking about it. They're the ones that are like, yeah,
go do this thing, or they want to play monster
when the kids are young because they want to just
scare them a little, but in a fun way.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
There's something very off putting about dads who are the
careful ones. To me, I'm looking right at you when
I say this, but I mean, yeah, okay, good.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
I'm not. But maybe emotionally.
Speaker 6 (03:17):
You can't laugh away if you are If you're a
dude and you have kids and you're the one who says.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Careful with that, it's sharp that stove is hot. Careful
all around the stairs, careful, careful, don't touch that, careful
with that, don't put your hand on the dog's face,
don't do like that to me is very off putting.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
It And as a there are obvious things that I
would want my kids to be careful about, yes, but
me telling them to be careful is nowhere near as
great a lesson as the dog biting their thumb or
the stove actually being hot, or the knife actually being sharp.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Yet consequences are awesome. They're great teachers. I say this
a lot, but one of the top, like I don't
know themes of parenting that my dad gave to me
was he would constantly tell the story about him and
my grandfather where my grandfather would just tell him to
go do stuff around the farm, and my dad, as
like a seven eight year old, would go, well, if
he's asking you to do it, it must mean I
(04:21):
could do it. But as he got older, he realized
that these were just tests. These were just him like
throwing it into a problem and seeing if he could
figure it out. And my dad learned as an adult
that that's where his self esteem came from.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Go fix that head, gasket leak on the tractor.
Speaker 4 (04:35):
You're not exaggerating.
Speaker 2 (04:36):
I mean my dad and my uncle drove a stick
shift pickup to feed the cattle on the ranch and
they got in a fight and took out about twenty
yards of fence and then had to go fix the fence.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
And my grandfather was like, this is just what it was.
These are all just.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Natural consequences presenting themselves, and so he talks about like
and my version of this was my wife hated this.
We lived on the same block as our elementary school
and my kids wanted to walk home from school by themselves,
and I said sure, and she's like, what are you doing.
I said, they're walking to school and they're walking home
from school, and she's like, that's not safe. I go,
(05:09):
there are hundreds of people around dropping their kids off.
If somebody grabs one of them and they're screaming or something,
somebody's gonna do something. But also, that's not the time
to grab a can do us. That's busy, prime time.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
It's lazy.
Speaker 4 (05:20):
They're not even crossing a street, lady like.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
And to me, the best example of this was that
when I would drop Jacob off at kindergarten, Jack was
maybe two or three, and he goes, can I go home?
And I and he loved it. He loved running around
the corner where I could not see him as soon
as we dropped him off, because he liked going into
the door, and he loved being in the house by himself.
Jacob was not this way, but he just loved all
of it. And so I was like, great, like knock
yourself out. And he told me one time this guy
(05:44):
stopped and said, hey, are you okay? And he said,
he goes, I know I'm not supposed to talk to trangers.
So I gave him a thumbs up and I ran
in the house.
Speaker 6 (05:52):
I buy a.
Speaker 5 (05:53):
Kid outside by himself walking some way in.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
You don't call your wife lady to her face. Yeah,
all right, rough housing. I've said it before.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
We're talking about Jonathan hate challenges that the dads should
be willing to challenge their kids.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
Get in there.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Maybe maybe not see how well they can take a punch,
but you know, understand the kids are going to scrape
their knees. One of the things we used to love doing,
and I've mentioned before, is my kids would jump up
on our bed and we would pillow fight and The
rule was, we'll do it as long as no one cries,
and then the first time someone cries, game over, and
(06:39):
I would hit them harder and harder.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
Your son harder, no, but rarely. He was the first one.
Speaker 5 (06:47):
I don't think i've ever I think I've seen my
brother cry once.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
It was like six. I mean, it wasn't like he
was fifteen or anything.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
I don't know if this is your intent, but what
I like about your example is is that you're not
saying they can't feel You're just but you're also teaching
them to push through and manage the emotion. If they
want the fun to continue, they just got to hold
it together. Because, in all honesty, I if I'm hitting
them with a pillow right now, you could you can
do some damage. But I'm hitting them with pillow and
(07:17):
they're falling down on a bed covered with pillows, like
this is the easiest.
Speaker 5 (07:24):
You weren't taking the pillow launching it in their face
to throw them up against.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
A wall in the first ten minutes, like sibling fights.
That's like twenty minutes in when Gary's starting to feel winded,
when I'm starting getting tired, I'm like, I need somebody cry.
Speaker 6 (07:36):
He starts.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
He starts putting onions in the pillow case just to
get anything, something going, something to get it started.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
But it's upun it's it's incumbent upon dads because just
by our nature to push that envelope, to push that
free play, to push the risk taking.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
I love his example. He says, starting at eight years old,
you should find activities that your kid could do on
their own. And one of the examples, he says, you
take up to a science center and you say, go
roam around and do whatever you want. I will meet
you in the cafeteria. And here's the I've traveled with
high school kids for a choir, and what's interesting is
is that you know, people go, what if the kid
(08:13):
gets taken and all that stuff. But I think that
there's also that's a safe environment, right, It's an enclosed
space that you can also teach your kids to exist
in that discomfort and if they feel fear, then that's
going to make them more aware of their surroundings. Like
one of the young men on the trip, he was
we were traveling on this metro station late at night
in downtown Dallas, and he actually said about one of
the girls.
Speaker 6 (08:34):
He goes.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
These girls have no survival skills, Like they have no
way looking out for themselves.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
They're not even aware of anything.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
That's because they're like standing on their phones right next
to the doorway of the train, waiting for somebody to
write before the closes, just to grab the phone, and
then the train's gone, and you're like, and they're not
even thinking.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
About that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
And I don't know how you can if you haven't
experienced any kind of fear or discomfort.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
My wife refers to that as aware bear. Ooh, people
to be being aware bear if you're ever in an
environment that you're not sure of, or you know, a
group of people whatever. It's childish, but it absolutely seals
the point of just just know what's going on, what's
aware of what's going on.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
And there's a I think we all could agree too,
there's a there's a there's a spectrum, right, there's a
boundary of what you don't want them to live in fear?
Speaker 4 (09:20):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
I don't know so far. This is what way I've
raised my kids, and it seems to be working out,
is it. I also don't teach them and everybody's out
to get them somebody's trying to grab them at every turn, like.
I don't want them to become a rodent where they're
just constantly looking over their shoulder at every moment like
that does.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
That's no way to live either, A moment rodent.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Hoffman's in there rhyming, hmmm, tips, I like a were
bear in a moment romrote, I gotta work on this.
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