Why Are Young Liberal Girls So Depressed?

Why are young liberals so depressed? How do we help them?

I did not create my own title for this video. I got it from a number of liberal writers who are genuinely concerned about recent data showing a high level of depression among youth generally but especially among liberal teenage girls.

The Center for Disease Control released data showing that 60% of young girls felt persistent sadness, double the rate for boys. 25% had formulated a suicide plan. Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt stated, “We are now 11 years into the largest epidemic of adolescent mental illness ever recorded…. one in ten adolescents now say they have made an attempt to kill themselves.”

Girls who lean liberal are the most depressed. Conservative boys the least. In fact, liberal boys are more depressed than conservative girls. The problem affects all adolescents but those who lean liberal are suffering the most. 

So, according to these liberal observers what’s the cause of all this?

First, one thing it’s not: According to Haidt, Covid barely moved the needle. No, this depression is not caused by the pandemic. They give three major reasons.

1.    Haidt blames social media. “Social media didn’t just cut into offline socializing. It precipitated a revolution in consciousness, in which people are constantly packaging themselves for public consumption and seeing their popularity and the popularity of others quantified. It’s not shocking that this new mode of existence would be particularly fraught for those in a stage of life where both fashioning the self and finding a place to belong are paramount.” So you can blame Facebook and TikTok for teen depression and congress is discussing right now what to do about social media apps.

2.    Another reason continually put forth is misogyny; girls are being mistreated by men. Of course this does not explain why liberal girls would be far more depressed than conservative girls.

3.    Haidt suggests that the biggest reason is that in the last decade all of America’s youth, but especially liberal girls, have embraced what he calls cognitive distortions or the great untruths. What are these great untruths?  That the world is full of evil people who say evil things and have evil ideas.  Worse yet, these young girls have no control over any of this. They cannot change reality and so feel helpless, hopeless, and depressed. Our educational institutions reaffirm these untruths on an hourly basis and have become one of the great sources depressing our youth.

At the end of the day a young liberal girl has saturated her brain in social media more than anyone else. She is told that the world is out of control and there is nothing she can do about it. Another way to put this is young liberals are constantly, incessantly taught that they are victims.

This is such a tragedy. Young women in 21^st century America are the most liberated in human history; they are the richest; they have the most educational opportunities; the best medical care. What would a young woman from a village in India give for their lives. What would a young woman from 18^th century America give for their lives. But they do prove one thing. Human beings are not fundamentally material. Just because someone is well fed, well clothed, well housed, and generally well cared for does not mean they will have joy. Just because they have every political and social advantage does not mean they will be fulfilled. No, mankind is basically a spiritual being. And when his or her spiritual needs are not being met then life is indeed depressing.

The biggest reasons have been completely left out:

I have summarized the reasons given by secular observers but I think they have overlooked other reasons that I would argue are more important.



1.    The constant drumbeat of climate catastrophe; youth today are told that soon the planet will burn to a crisp and theirs could be the last generation to ever exist on earth. They get this message from everywhere and it is nonsense. There is no reason to believe the earth is about to be destroyed by global warming any more than any of the other catastrophes put forth in my lifetime, all of which were supposed to destroy us. See my videos below of the Great Deceptions of the last two generations.

2.    Our students today get a steady diet of Marxist ideology and Marxist utopian visions are impossible to achieve; a society that is socially just; crime-free; egalitarian. It will never happen and it leaves people depressed.  The Left stays in power by promoting one crisis after another. But the result is depression.

3.    The role of religion. The above writers all agree that conservative kids are less depressed; and they all agree--conservative kids are more religious; think about that for a minute. Let me put it a bit differently. Bad theology depresses people. World magazine quotes Dr. Karl Benzio, of the American Association of Christian Counselors. He sees these trends as the result of our society’s moral relativism, when people stop believing in absolute truth, they are left with a host of contradictions. All this leads to greater depression.

What’s the solution?

·     The secular world needs to shut up about climate Armageddon; adults are spewing nonsense that they do not believe themselves. Their appalling hypocrisy is a dead giveaway, as they fly to climate conferences in private jets and stay in five star hotels, while telling the rest of us to live simply so the planet can be saved.

·     Stop teaching Marxism. How does it help a teenage girl if she goes into a classroom and taught she is a racist; that she should resent white people, and that if she is white she should resent herself. Wouldn’t that depress you? The liberal writer Matt Yglesias has such an interesting comment:       “Life is complicated, and this is difficult. But for a very wide range of problems, part of helping people get out of their trap is teaching them not to catastrophize.” Well Matt, guess what? It is your Progressive Left Wing brethren who are teaching kids to catastrophize—on race, gender, climate, and everything else. Preaching catastrophe is the Left’s constant modus operandi. Forty years ago I began giving a lecture at the University of Colorado called “Understanding the Left.” I made this statement: “The Left is inevitably angry. Since Leftist ideals cannot be achieved in the real world its aims will always be frustrated.” We are seeing my prophecy come true. We have a generation of youth who are depressed and frustrated because they are trying to achieve goals that cannot be achieved.

·     And finally, the most obvious thing we should do: Proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ; Jesus is the Great Healer of depression. He replaces it with joy. Do not grow weary in proclaiming biblical truth. It is ultimately the only hope.

Thanks for listening. May our God bless you this day in a mighty way.

More: If you would like my PowerPoint presentation, “Understanding the Left”, email me and I will send it to you.

See my video: The Green Cult(which received a “misinformation” warning from YouTube); https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuHrMp6J-Wo

See my series on, “The Great Deceptions.” They are similar to Jonathan’s Haidt’s “Great Distortions.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VJgr4wQBss&list=PLkHlTST983SpNT5Z37B6qlPsTjYMAm_qP

Matt Yglesias, Why young liberals are Depressed: https://www.slowboring.com/p/why-are-young-liberals-so-depressed

World Magazine: American Teenagers are Desperately Unhappy; https://wng.org/roundups/american-teenagers-are-desperaStely-unhappy-1677791630?mkt_tok=NzEwLVFSUi0yMDkAAAGKVf-VeeoIiDnt2Bs9hPhqdTFOW0SQse0En5ulu_DxD-XslWf73Q_PZ6mLhqOXpeU68bF8y56MyvXsjyNqNnp8hU-IsZinRK43eI_X9z6n9o0

Jonathan Haidt: The mental health of liberal girls; https://jonathanhaidt.substack.com/p/mental-health-liberal-girls?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=email

A key driver of teen anxiety: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/how-american-schools-manufacture-anxious-teens/ar-AA18mqKv