Inside or Out?

“No man is an island, entire of itself; 

every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main”.

John Donne, Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, 1624

The Long March through the Institutions

Traditional therapy, like so much else, is under sustained ideological attack.  Rather than practitioners focusing primarily on the needs of the individual sitting in front of them – listening to their story, and the conclusions that they have drawn from it – people are primarily to be seen now through the lens of critical social justice theory.  Professional membership bodies are weaving this highly contested interpretation of ‘human being’ into new, revised ‘ethical frameworks’.  

Practitioners are expected to comply.  A newly-elected trustee of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP), the UK’s largest membership body for the psychological professions, recently questioned whether those diverging from this ideological conformity, are even fit to practice

This means that before anything else is considered, ethnicity, sex and sexuality will be taken into account, regardless of whether or not they have a bearing on a person’s current situation. Unverified assumptions will be made, and ‘allyship’ established. That is not all – true believers have created innumerable diagrams illustrating intersecting aspects of ‘power and privilege’. These can also include the language a person speaks, their citizenship, educational attainment, disability, neurodivergence, housing and even body size.  By some magical equation, everyone can then be identified as ‘oppressor’ or ‘oppressed’.

Interestingly, ‘religion’ and ‘employment’ are sometimes included, but not always.  These two elements can undermine the whole exercise, because all sorts of people can work in the same sector, and share beliefs, making any generalisation on the basis of those indicators almost impossible.  There is a lesson there, from which the adherents of ‘intersectionality’ could learn.

Context versus Conformity

Of course, a competent therapist is always aware of context.  Human beings do not exist in a vacuum, neither were they designed to do so.  Life is relational, and difficulties with relationships are a major reason for seeking help and support.  Among young people, simply ‘feeling different’ and not ‘fitting in’ can be a cause of great distress.  Social, financial and practical difficulties also affect wellbeing.

What is now being proposed is, however, something entirely new. It effectively involves the arbitrary division of souls into the deserving and the undeserving. Seen through this lens, the underlying message is, “I am really not surprised you are suffering – these are the reasons why”.  This is profoundly unhelpful therapeutically, stripping individuals of agency and silencing their story.

Where is the curiosity?  Where is the effort to understand, to meet the ‘other’ as they are?  Judgement here lies merely in aspects of life which are important, but are often the least interesting, precisely because they reveal nothing personal, or about the environment, experiences or relationships which shape each person.

The Peculiar Paradox

While everyone is increasingly labelled and categorised, little attention is being paid to other social factors which have a profound influence on people’s lives, and which show no respect for race, sex or sexuality.  

When I say, as I frequently do, that the ‘mental health crisis’ is social in origin, rather than psychological, I mean that rather than something being ‘wrong’ with increasing numbers of people, they are suffering as a result of what is happening in their lives.  I am thinking about the choices individuals make, for whatever reason – and in the case of children and young people, the choices and decisions made by others which affect their lives.  

In an age of uber-individuality, it is profoundly unfashionable to draw attention to relational responsibilities, but it is the abdication of these responsibilities – in an increasingly fruitless hunt for personal fulfilment – which has led to so much distress. 

‘Parenting’, done properly, cannot be confined to evenings and weekends.  ‘Child care’ – looking after a child and keeping them safe – is a tiny part of the role. At stake is the physical, intellectual, moral, spiritual, emotional and social formation of another human being.  Young children are watching the adults in their lives all the time, and learning everything from their example, from practical skills to how to cope with setbacks.

Generally, the human race has proven to be pretty good at passing on the baton.  At any given point in history, each one of us knows with certainty that our direct ancestors lived in that moment.  Generation after generation has produced enough healthy, capable, resilient and adaptable people who were able to work together, under an overarching and accepted set of beliefs and values, to carry civilisation forward.  Until now.

As the west has become safer, healthier and wealthier than ever before, even very young children have ‘issues’ on an alarming scale.  Many young people are not at all resilient; they feel the full force of minor inconvenience, adversity and disappointment as if it were an existential threat.  When asked what is wrong, most cannot give an answer.  When asked what is stopping them from doing something – even as basic as attending school – the answer most frequently is “I just can’t”.

Alone on a Wide, Wide Sea

These young people are essentially cut adrift, and trapped in their own heads, in a way never intended for human beings.  The external influences which should carefully and lovingly curate young lives – parents and other relatives – have not been present when it mattered.  Stimulation from the outside world has, on the other hand, been overwhelming, from an ever-changing cast of casual carers, to dedicated and distracting devices before the child can stand up.

Babies are born to bond with their mothers, and a mother is primed to bond with her child.  This is an instinctive process which evolves over time and gives the infant the security and confidence to communicate, to look outwards and be ready to explore the wider world.  That is where fathers come in – they are an integral and important part of that process, leading the securely attached child safely out into the world beyond.

However, this natural process, which has sustained humanity for millennia and firmly grounded each new generation, is also under sustained attack.  At some point, it was agreed that not only is it acceptable to separate infants from the security of their mothers and their homes – it is to be positively encouraged.  After all, a mother in the workplace pays tax, as do all those paid to do what she no longer has time to do.

Some mothers return to work reluctantly, for financial reasons; others can’t wait to get back to the cut and thrust of ‘real life’.  Whatever the reason, infants are the losers.

Serve…and No Return

Many young children are being deprived of the vital ‘serve and return’ interactions with one committed, consistent, caring and responsive caregiver which builds connection.[1]  Instead, they become one of number of similarly tiny children in a child care facility.  Hours are long and shifts erratic. Provision is ordained by government diktat.  It is impossible to meet the needs of individual children in any meaningful way.

More often than not, these facilities are staffed by well-meaning girls, lacking both initiative and insight, for whom ‘child care’ was the only possible career choice.  More personal ‘child minding’ options – being looked after in a child minder’s home – are increasingly unavailable, as administrative and financial pressures squeeze their viability.

All this is matters greatly, because relational security and communication skills underpin brain development, ‘executive function’ and emotional regulation.  Our success in life as human beings depends upon these things. Deficiency in these skills seriously affects a child’s ability to learn.

Rising rates of children apparently diagnosed with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) is the inevitable outcome. 

Unsurprisingly, the “primary need identified” for a quarter of children requiring SEND support in school relates to “speech, language and communication needs”.  A very similar number present primarily with “social, emotional and mental health needs”. 

The most recent year for which figures are available, the academic year 2024-25, saw a 5.6% increase in pupils with special needs, in just one year.  The trajectory is steadily upwards.[2]  Now, around 20% of school children have a ‘diagnosis’ of some kind.

Flexible and Flailing Families

Family life, more generally, is also influencing the wellbeing of children.

This is the second and third generation of parents who were themselves deprived of meaningful and consistent relationships in childhood, at scale.  Many are also struggling.  A survey entitled The State of Motherhood in Europe 2024, carried out by the international NGO Make Mothers Matter, found that around 50% of mothers suffer with their own mental health issues.[3]

Too many young people find themselves ‘parenting the parent’ and keeping silent about their own challenges, so as not to burden parents further.  This has a very negative effect on child development.  Children who take on an adult role in childhood frequently grow into infantilised adults – and so the cycle starts again.

There is also a lack of the necessary stability in many homes.  Dramatis personae are not reliable and recognisable, but come and go.  Fathers are often optional, or play occasional bit-parts.  Other partners come on to the scene, fulfilling a parent’s romantic needs, but frequently causing acute anxiety and confusion in children.  These are the young people who when asked how many siblings they have, think – then maybe count on their fingers – before saying “I’m not sure”.  They are the children with seven or eight ‘grandparents’.

Research has consistently demonstrated that children are most likely to thrive in households where their two committed, biological parents love each other and love them.  However, rather than encouraging this – politically, socially and financially – culture and society has moved in the other direction.  The clear message is that ‘families come in all shapes and sizes’ and that the fulfilment of adult desires is paramount, regardless of the cost paid by their offspring.

Eyes off the Ball – and the Board

Increasingly government agencies have stepped in, to take over a parental role.  Not only is the impersonal, number-crunching nature of officialdom a totally inadequate substitute for the intimacy and individuality of family life – the agents of the state are failing children too.

There is insufficient space here to address the grotesque dereliction of duty by the ‘care’ system in the UK, which at its worst, has left thousands of children at the mercy of rape gangs.  Absconding, ‘county lines’ involvement, drug and alcohol misuse and early sexual activity are rife among the rising number of so-called ‘looked-after children’.  

However, regular schools are failing children, awash as they are with ideology which indoctrinates, separates and scares young people, rather than educating, uniting and nurturing confidence in them.  Utility and uniformity rule, and individuality and creativity have been the casualties. It is no surprise that boys make up a majority of those labelled with autism and ADHD, by a feminised system which consistently overlooks their needs.

Even after the Supreme Court ruling of April 2025, on the biological reality of the terms ‘man’ and ‘woman’, schools invite in external ‘educators’ publicly to teach as fact their misplaced fantasy that there are multiple genders and ‘sexualities’, and that human beings can change sex.  Addressing these concepts with young children, and exploiting their kindness and creativity at an age when they are incapable of understanding fully, is a form of child abuse – in which the establishment is complicit.  The damage done by early sexualisation to developing minds is well-understood, and it is no surprise that we see a surge in gender-confusion, among lost children searching for answers.

Meanwhile, the continual focus on mental health issues, the adoption of therapy speak in the classroom, plus endless adjustments and accommodation, does nothing to build resilience or prepare children for the real world. In secondary school, it drives the labelling of children with so many acronyms, that they regard themselves as ‘disabled’ and unfit for any contribution to adult life.

Now ‘ed tech’ is the latest buzzword, despite emerging evidence that it is degrading education, downgrading achievement and fuelling screen addiction.  Many young people’s entire day is now screen-based, with human interaction limited to the bare minimum – and yet nobody joins the dots, to explain the levels of social anxiety and detachment.

The younger generation has a very tenuous grasp of the difference between fantasy and reality, when a firm hold on reality is a prerequisite for a stable and successful life. The adults – parents and professionals – have very clearly been asleep on duty.

Let Children be Children

The ‘mental health crisis’ is indeed being fuelled by social, rather than psychological, factors – just not the social indicators, or ‘protected characteristics’, which fit so neatly into categories of competitive victimhood. The wellbeing of children and young people will only improve when adults fully acknowledge and accept responsibility for the developmental needs of the next generation, and prioritise this over short-term personal fulfilment and economic reward.

As I said earlier this year, on the British Thought Leaders podcast They’re Kids, Not Patients,[4]  “we have to have a conversation about the kind of society that we want, what do we actually value”.  Until we address this and stop putting the needs of children at the bottom of the pile, the situation will only worsen.

[1] Harvard Center on the Developing Child, Serve and Return.

[2] gov.uk, Special Educational needs in England – Academic year 2024/25

[3] Make Mothers Matters, The State of Motherhood in Europe 2024.

[4] British Thought Leaders, They’re Kids, Not Patients, 03 March 2026.