21st-Century Virtues: How they are failing our democracy

By Lucinda Holdforth

by Reg Naulty 6th June 2025

What are the twenty-first century virtues which Lucinda Holdforth argues are a threat to our democracy? They are, first, ‘authenticity’, by which she means one’s individual self: genuine, up front. Then ‘my truth’, which is reality as I know it; and ‘vulnerability’, which is the open self and its quest for acceptance. There is another: ‘empathy’. How this functions in the real world is somewhat obscure, but it seems to be restrained by ‘self care’, another core virtue.