Adult coloring books are a normal and popular thing. They’re generally seen as a relaxation activity and I think are mostly popular with women, although maybe I’m wrong about that. They’re usually done with colored pencil and have small cells (or whatever the term is). If you’re not familiar with them then just do a Google search and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

I’ve seen people giving college kids a bunch of crap for having “coloring books” as an activity along with snacks or whatever set up in university libraries and student unions in places offering study breaks in university libraries and student unions, ect, and people online freaking out over how kids now are turning into babies because someone is giving them coloring books to relax during finals week. Honestly, people freaking out over this get a giant eyeroll from me. Adult coloring books don’t appeal to me, but I really don’t think it’s the equivalent of what Norville was talking about.
I said “normal-ish” because of it happening in context of helping college kids cope with the re-election of Donald Trump, vs. just having a table with some coloring books on a table in the library to give students something relaxing to do during a study break. If it was just free snacks during finals weeks you wouldn’t see the same level of scorn over it, free snacks to help kids deal with Donald Trump would still be weird and pathetic.