The World Is Leaving David Brooks Behind

When David Brooks began to stipulate the “four levels of happiness,” I knew I was in for a night of groundless moral assumptions. Like his columns in The New York Times, Brooks overworked words like “soul” and “spirituality,” yet the elderly crowd at Seattle’s Temple de Hirsch lapped it up by nodding their gray (or bald) heads. Their welcoming of vague moral language allowed him the space to claim: Humans are “loving creatures, not thinking creatures” We need to aim for “spiritual achievements” in life Social media leads to “moral insecurity” The last bulls*** point there highlights a prominent theme that arose from Brooks’ speech: disparagement towards youth. And as a young man, it was very disheartening to hear—especially seeing as I grew up listening to Shields and Brooks on the PBS News Hour. Although I’ve come to disagree with many of his political philosophies, Brooks played an integral role in stoking my initial interest in politics. So it was difficult to hear him speak of my generation’s main social platforms (and my profession) in such discrediting tones. For baby boomers, I imagine it to be like when your grandparents told you that television was making you stupid—a criticism that came from nowhere but a lack of empathy and understanding. Following on from social media, Brooks bemoaned how we now “live in an individualist society.” (This coming from a man who subscribes to a political philosophy whose foundation rests upon the idolization of the individual.) This state of selfishness, he figured, meant that “millennials are on pace for the biggest mid-life crisis ever.” He never expanded upon this trite point, but it drew hearty laughter from the older crowd which filled the temple. So I suppose it achieved its purpose. Mercilessly, Brooks went onto complain about the dire state of free speech on college campuses and how my generation simply cannot stomach dissenting opinions.
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