The Paradox of Protection: When Care Turns into Cruelty
Fragment of Chapter 8 of Coddled Children
You can find Goya's "The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters" in the Open Access collection of The Met.
What if our attempts to create a kinder world are unintentionally undermining the very qualities that make us human?
The hallmark of Western societies has been seeking balance between supporting the vulnerable and fostering resilience. But in our modern democracies, we must ask: have we tipped the scale too far?
Over the years, safety nets have expanded to embrace all – including billion-dollar corporations. Regulations have spread like wildfire. Government involvement in daily life continues to grow. These developments likely sprouted from genuine concern for human welfare—but they carry an unexamined cost.
What happens to self-reliance when others manage our risks? What becomes of resilience when we're sheltered from consequences? How does character develop when challenges are systematically removed?
The paradox of protection is that our intentions to help ultimately harm. Like parents who never let their children fall, we create adults who never learn to stand. By solving every problem, we atrophy the problem-solving muscle. By smoothing every path, we create travelers unable to navigate rough terrain or face adversity.
The most troubling aspect isn't just the growth of systems designed to help, but the gradual fading of qualities that make help unnecessary: self-reliance, resourcefulness, resilience. These aren't merely practical skills—they're fundamental to human dignity. To be responsible for oneself is to be fully human.
This doesn't mean abandoning compassion or dismantling support for those truly in need. Rather, it means reexamining what true support entails. Perhaps real compassion isn't removing obstacles but equipping people to overcome them. Perhaps true kindness involves faith in human capacity rather than distrust in human competence or believing your solutions fit all.
Human diversity thrives on difference, on debate, on the friction of opposing views. When we silence opposition in the name of harmony, when we assume good intentions are always good, we pave the way to tyranny.
In the end, a society where people are perpetually guided and guarded is no society at all—but a prison. Perhaps with golden bars and soft pillows, but still a prison.
Aren't we humans meant to be free?
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive."
C.S. Lewis
Enjoy this fragment from Chapter Eight of Coddled Children!
Gladys can still vividly recall the many debates they had during the construction of the dome. How bureaucracy had taken over society suffocating it under layers of regulations that placed every aspect of life under government control. How more and more people had become dependent on the state losing their autonomy and personal responsibility. And how in the process fundamental rights had been steadily eroded.
"But," Graham always said, "the government could never have taken that freedom if we hadn't given them the mandate to do so. A good leader makes sure there is always opposition. Without it a nation becomes nothing but a mindless herd. Our society was already collapsing under its own weight long before the first bomb fell.
"If we want to build a strong people we must teach them to solve their own problems, to take care of themselves, to take responsibility for their own lives. A good government gives every citizen the freedom to shape their own future and only steps in when one person's freedom comes at the expense of another's.
"Every nation needs individuals, Gladys. Too few and the people become a flock of sheep. Sheep need fences. People don't."
Graham had always been direct and to the point. His words could be blunt but they were never cruel and there was no arguing with his logic. More than once Gladys had realized that her good intentions got in the way far more than Graham's simple factual reasoning ever did. And whenever he noticed her struggling with those intentions he would chuckle, throw an arm around her, and say cheerfully:
“Ah, Gladys, we forgot where the road paved with good intentions always leads. But you and I—we have the chance to do things differently. Isn’t that incredible?”
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