Piers Morgan vs Zuby on Gen Z's Mental Health Crisis

Summary

The video is abnormal, and we are working hard to fix it.
Please replace the link and try again.

The video is abnormal, and we are working hard to fix it.
Please replace the link and try again.

The video is abnormal, and we are working hard to fix it.
Please replace the link and try again.

Outlines

The video is abnormal, and we are working hard to fix it.
Please replace the link and try again.

Mindmap

The video is abnormal, and we are working hard to fix it.
Please replace the link and try again.

Keywords

The video is abnormal, and we are working hard to fix it.
Please replace the link and try again.

Highlights

The video is abnormal, and we are working hard to fix it.
Please replace the link and try again.

Transcripts

good evening from London welcome to PE

Morgan un sens at no point in human

history have we been more self-aware

about mental health and if stressed as a

pandemic there's a multi-billion dollar

market for the vaccines you might start

your day by swallowing a Prozac before

unpacking your trauma with a therapist

popping a daer pan for your workplace

anxiety and winding down with meditation

or Wellness app at a desperate hope of

getting some sleep if you've got it

there's a product for it we' never be

more medicated more therapized or more

legitimized for confr ing our feelings

and many would say quite right too but

every study is now telling us that we've

also never apparently been more

depressed or riddled with anxiety

something is broken here and the answer

can't be that it's all in our minds a

new study published today said that genz

employees in Britain miss an average of

one work day every single week du to

mental health costing the nation a

rather stressful $1 138 billion dollar

uh pounds a year and to be clear from

the outset mental illness is a deadly

serious thing

like every serious illness it needs

serious treatment I would never question

people who are clinically depressed or

genuinely suicidal but I do think it's

time to draw a line between mental

illness and mental health Matt Walsh

who's been on the show many times has St

an oted debate about this in recent days

when he tweeted that depression is one

of the basic side effects of being

conscious he later said that labeling

negative emotions and behaviors as

diseases is exactly the problem

precisely what the psychiatric field is

done maybe has a point the global

therapy industry is worth $150 billion

and it's growing at a rate of knots

young people in particular are

relentlessly bombarded by content which

gives them every reason to feel

uncomfortable and anxious and the act of

encourage to then vaunt their suffering

is that part of the problem and Britain

used to celebrate the so-called stiff

upper lip I guess that boils down to

being resilient in the face of adversity

if times are tough but we were told to

Soldier on keep pounding in find a way

through it's become more fashionable and

again many people think this is the

right way to go to be perhaps more in

touch with your trauma to get help for

it to talk about it publicly criticism

though has now become recategorized as

shaming disagreement becomes very

quickly described as hate or

confrontation is categorized as violence

is that right it should be no surprise

that there's been a bit of a cultural

fight back hugely influential characters

like Andrew Tate for good or bad I've

encourage their millions of followers to

see depression as a man-made concept

which ironically is unbefitting of

men what do you believe about depression

do you believe depression is a real

thing I can't become clinically

depressed why' you know because I don't

believe in it I can't be haunted by a

ghost if I don't believe in ghosts well

that's saying I'm never going to die

because I don't believe in it it's

ridiculous well he's completely wrong as

I said there and there is a middle

ground though and I'll gladly call out

the esses on both sides of the argument

just as when I question Tate's creative

interpretation of the tears he shed in

jail did you shed tears in your cell

there were tears that ran down my face

but I did not cry I mean that's crying I

would disagree yeah you were crying

Andrew tape maybe you're a little bit

depressed as you sat in your prison C

nothing wrong with that just confront

your feelings but somewhere in his

bombast Tap maybe has a point podcaster

zubie struck a c with me this week

having just returned to the UK from New

York when he posted if you absolutely

believe you will get jet lag and that's

inevitable you will get jet lag I don't

get jet lag well as someone who just

flew back from New York and has jet lag

maybe I should think harder about not

having jet lag you might be right we do

talk ourselves into a lot of this stuff

and we maybe have lost sight of the idea

that everyday stresses and strains are

as much about our ability and will to

manage them as they are about whatever

is getting us down maybe we we've

forgotten how to keep calm and carry on

maybe we should stop thinking that's a

bad thing to be frowned upon a lot of

people making a lot of money by telling

us we're not okay what joing me to

discuss this is my pack talk Tov

contributor eser CRA associate Daily

Mirror Kevin McGuire legal journalist

Ava Santina and we're joined from across

the pond by the podcast host I mentioned

earlier zubie uh zie let me start with

you um because I liked your comment

about jet lag it hasn't worked for me

but I like the inspiration that you gave

me to try and make it work and I'm

working on my I don't have jet lag

skills um on The Wider point it's a mind

field this whole area of mental health

there's no doubt to me uh I've got three

sons in their 20s and I know lots of

their friendship groups there are a lots

of young people suffering from genuine

anxiety I wouldn't categorize it as

clinical depression um it may be in some

cases but just general levels of anxiety

that I don't ex think existing did when

I was that age a lot of it may be uh

phone driven you know being subjected to

endless terrible imagery which we never

used to have to be exposed to When We

Were Young I'm not sure what it is but

when you look at this whole situation

what do you

think yeah Piers I think it's one of

those situations where multiple things

are true at once and people often go to

extremes when it's not necessary it can

absolutely be true that there are people

who suffer genuine serious traumas which

require things like Ser therapy and that

there are people who have real mental

illnesses or severe mental health issues

where medication temporarily or even on

a perhaps longer term may help and that

can be true it can also be true that

many things are being overdiagnosed and

that The Human Condition itself has been

pathologized in various ways and that

there are all sorts of influences out

there which are not necessarily serving

people's best interest interests because

they do make money billions of dollars

and pounds off of certain medications

you said the therapy business itself is

worth I think you said

$150 billion dollar um per year and so

there are very misaligned incentives

here but I do think that one thing that

happens with a lot of these

conversations is people are very willing

to talk about the symptoms but as a

society we don't often go deep on what

some of the causes are we'll talk about

mental health we'll talk about

depression and anxiety but there won't

be a lot of talk about the family

situation and the households that people

are growing up in their friends uh

social networks not not online social

networks but their real social network

are they part of a church are they part

of strong communities what are their

beliefs what are their what's their

physical health status physical and

spiritual health are connected to mental

health so similar with many other issues

we talk about everything at the symptom

level and try to find a pill or a potion

or a therapy that is going to work for

everybody but I think in many cases

we're not really getting to what the

root of the issue is you touched on one

other thing which is the rise of use of

smartphones and social media that's

absolutely having an impact on people's

mental well-being being bombarded by all

these images and opinions and just pure

amount of information every day this is

something very new that our ancestors

didn't have to deal with so I'm not

surprised that there are more young more

and more young people every year who are

reporting that they're having anxiety

depression or whatever else it may be

yeah AA it is a Minefield just to even

talk about this you know I could almost

feel us all you know you're treading on

eggshells with this not to say the wrong

thing not to be insensitive but also to

recognize this survey that's come out

it's pretty shocking that you know gen Z

kids are missing a day a week at work

and the on cost of all that what do you

think is going on here well I agree with

the premise there of your guess uie

because you need to be talking about

like what are the causes of this if you

look at gen Z at the moment some of most

of gen Z are spending up to 60% of their

paid packet on rent they're poor and

they're not having a nice time at home

and I think that really drives into

anxiety and also as you talked about

their phone dependency but yeah I mean

look there is a conversation we need to

be having about self diagnosis that is

going on particularly on Tik Tok

argument I do understand we're not in

the best of economic circumstances but

you know like I said there's less

poverty now in this country than there's

ever been exactly and I grew up I grew

up Rel Absol but the thing is I I grew

up population that we we categorize as

poor but the thing is I grew up in Ghana

and I I've seen triple the amount of

depressed people in this country than

there so I don't think necessarily

material dep I also well of people who

are extremely depressed very riddle with

anxiety I'm not sure that money or

whether you're poor or Rich I'm don't

sure that's really what the core here I

actually think the dopamine impact of of

phones bringing so much stuff into their

heads all day in a way you never ever

had to experience When We Were Young

when I was young you just you didn't

have any phones there was no internet

now if there's a war somewhere they're

seeing you know kids heads being blown

off in real time all day long to have a

bad effect but there was also suffering

in silence after the first and second

world war people came back they were

absolutely traumatized and it wasn't

recognized and their lies were blighted

uh as a result now I love Zubie's

positive view of overcoming jet lag but

it exists mental illness exists but you

have a scale where there will be people

clinically depressed and you'll have

just have other people who feel down for

whatever reason they're in a completely

different category and if we're

medicating them is there a danger that

you talk too much about these things you

encourage people as with everything in

life yeah if there's too much

conversation yeah right and it's pretty

well been wall toall 247 now for a few

years I see no evidence necessarily that

it's working in reducing the number of

people saying they're feeling bad that's

right it's the reverse of not talking

about it and denying it and then people

hurt uh you know real pain problem talk

you can talk yourself into it there's no

we've medicalized real life that's the

problem someone who has lost a spouse

for instance of course we feel sad and

depressed but to say that they have

depression and has to take a pill that's

a problem because you're not treating it

the way that it should be treated real

life happens sad things happen and we

have to have a way to deal with it young

people also lack purpose right if

they're seeing all these you know people

getting rich and having Bugattis online

they're thinking how am I supposed to

have that what is my purpose in life

missing out the Envy factor I mean

bringing zubie back in here

um you know I think all these things

come into play the difference like I

said between when I was young and young

people now is there ability to have all

this staring at them all day long you

know when I was young the most exciting

thing you had in front of you was a

conquer fight you know and you'd be

studying conquers outside in fresh air

we didn't have any phones there was no

internet there was nothing like that um

you you weren't really aware of all the

bad stuff going on unless you watch the

one TV News Bulletin now kids are not

only aware of it they're seeing it in

real

time yeah there are a lot of different

factors I mean social media and

smartphones absolutely play some role in

here I'd say another thing that has

massively changed over the decades as

well is just the situations that people

are growing up in their environment how

many different communities that they're

plugged into and how strong are those

communities we we know that there's an

epidemic of loneliness that we talk

about we talk about the epidemic of uh

suicide particularly male suicide we're

talking about all of this mental health

things and it's like all of the things

that help to keep individuals and

societies sane and stable from family to

Faith to community to um you know the

the sense of meaning and purpose that uh

someone else brought up earlier all of

these things have also been eroded over

the past let's say 50 or 60 years so

when it comes to these situations I mean

why are people so Desperately Seeking

therapists I think in many cases sure

there might be people who really

genuinely need a professional therapist

but I think there are also people who

just need someone to talk to and they

don't really feel like they have friends

or they have parents or family members

that they can confide in and talk about

these day-to-day issues and then it

builds up and it gets to a stage where

they feel like the only thing that they

can do is go to a therapist or take

medication or perhaps even do something

that's far more drastic I mean in the

United States for example I read

recently that 80% of the world's

painkillers are sold in the United

States

80% I mean we think we're over medicated

here my God I mean in in in the US it's

it's really out of

control yeah it's crazy I mean the USA

has I believe 4% of the world's

population and then as you said they're

taking 80% plus of the pain medication

and things like o opioids and the these

things are causing massive crises in the

USA every year over a 100,000 people in

the USA American citizens are dying of

drug overdoses that's 100,000 deaths so

imagine how many other people are

abusing those substances and these are

genuinely scary numbers 100,000 people

dying per year of something that is

completely avoidable um I think that

should be much bigger news but as I said

I I don't know every single solution um

but I think for the diagnosis we have to

go down the tree a little bit and not

just hack at the branches and the Twigs

but we need to get to the root of the

problem and it's not going to be one

single thing it's going to be me

multiple things and I think several of

them have been mentioned

and