Letters on Liberty: The Tyranny of Campus Wellbeing

Partners:

Since 2020, the Academy of Ideas has published Letters on Liberty – a radical pamphlet series aimed at reimagining arguments for freedom today and inspiring rowdy, good-natured disagreement.

In her Letter – The Tyranny of Campus Wellbeing – writer and student Felice Basboll argues that a focus on mental health and wellbeing is making us ill. The stressors that used to be considered inevitable parts of adult life are now seen as oppressive, she writes. Young people are assumed by everyone – themselves included – to be incapable of dealing with adversity. Rather than meet the difficulties that life might throw at them head on, she argues, the prioritisation of wellbeing means that disagreeable views must be censored, and harsh realities avoided. As a result, students and other young people are convincing themselves that they’re not able to handle real life.

Join Felice and respondents to discuss whether thinking about our wellbeing is good for us. While the destigmatisation of mental health has its benefits, is there a danger in blurring the lines between negative emotions and serious illness? Is wellbeing in danger of being weaponised as a means to censor views we don’t want to hear? And is it possible to push back when society’s priority seems to be feelings over action?