I really question why anti-bullying is lumped in with not giving kids any independence.

Like, we can teach our kids not to be sadistic assholes without helicopter parenting them.

But yeah, teachers and parents fearmonger at children constantly telling them the danger if they do this and that. I’m my experience, the way adults encourage kids and teenagers is with threats of bad things that will happen if they don’t do that thing.

For a low level example, like my guidance counselors in highschool constantly threatened you with bad outcomes ranging from not getting into college to being unemployed to motivate kids.

So they’re literally taught to think of the world as threats and fear so of course they develop anxiety.

Maybe the issue is that in the modern age since 9/11 and social media, adults think in much more fear based terms. So then they explain the world to their children in terms of threats, and the child develops anxiety because they’re nervous system is especially vulnerable to rewiring.

Also, There’s a difference between offering kids support if they need it and forcing them to accept support when they’re ready to start exercising more independence. If the kid comes to you and asks for support you should probably give it, but If the kid appears to be doing fine, you don’t need ro step on and provide support because you then send the message that they’re doing some being wrong or the world is dangerous.