Why are some posters here in the college forum so nasty?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"at least 10 years away from starting the college process"...is your child in Kindergarten??

No, 1st. But I have some interest in some of the issues discussed here, have extended family members who have recently gone through the college application process or will soon, and am just curious what the future holds. I wonder whether my spouse and I will become single-minded, stop-at-nothing-to-get-my-child-into-an-Ivy types in a few years. Right now, we do have reasonably high expectations, but are fairly laidback, I like to think. Will that change? Or were the types of parents here who are calling others idiots and morons always that way, even in the earlier years?

Don't worry about what's going to happen 10 years down the road. And don't worry about other people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"at least 10 years away from starting the college process"...is your child in Kindergarten??

No, 1st. But I have some interest in some of the issues discussed here, have extended family members who have recently gone through the college application process or will soon, and am just curious what the future holds. I wonder whether my spouse and I will become single-minded, stop-at-nothing-to-get-my-child-into-an-Ivy types in a few years. Right now, we do have reasonably high expectations, but are fairly laidback, I like to think. Will that change? Or were the types of parents here who are calling others idiots and morons always that way, even in the earlier years?

I don't think you're nearly as "laid back" as you think. Your kid is in first grade, you're hanging out on DCUM college forums, you're getting offended by people, and you're openly weighing the possibility that you may very well be a "stop-at-nothing-to-...-Ivy" parent, almost as if you assume just pushing your kid the right way can guarantee acceptance to a top college. You clearly think that it's more a function of your parenting than your kid's individual ambition and abilities.

All in all, that's not a picture of someone who's "fairly laid back."

[Anonymous]

Come on over to the Kids w/ SN forum. Better perspective and high fives all around just for surviving the weekend or getting your child to get on the bus, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Come on over to the Kids w/ SN forum. Better perspective and high fives all around just for surviving the weekend or getting your child to get on the bus, etc.

+1.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"at least 10 years away from starting the college process"...is your child in Kindergarten??

No, 1st. But I have some interest in some of the issues discussed here, have extended family members who have recently gone through the college application process or will soon, and am just curious what the future holds. I wonder whether my spouse and I will become single-minded, stop-at-nothing-to-get-my-child-into-an-Ivy types in a few years. Right now, we do have reasonably high expectations, but are fairly laidback, I like to think. Will that change? Or were the types of parents here who are calling others idiots and morons always that way, even in the earlier years?

Don't worry about what's going to happen 10 years down the road. And don't worry about other people.

And don't think that the rules will all be the same in 10 years because they won't be.

[Anonymous]

Because they bounced off the private school forum pumpkin truck and didn’t know where they were.

[Anonymous]

Often times high academic achievers are endowed with inferior looks and have low sexual power. This makes them angry and idiosyncratic from dysmorphia. They freak out worried about normal or attractive people taking their spot in a highly ranked college leaving them with nothing. Also when they graduate from a well ranked school, they clutch onto it like a life raft hoping it floats them above the ugly rabble of moon crickets and let's them hang with the good looking, cool crowd.

[Anonymous]

Two reasons:
1) They don't get laid frequently enough.
2) They are currently drunk on cheap red wine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Often times high academic achievers are endowed with inferior looks and have low sexual power. This makes them angry and idiosyncratic from dysmorphia. They freak out worried about normal or attractive people taking their spot in a highly ranked college leaving them with nothing. Also when they graduate from a well ranked school, they clutch onto it like a life raft hoping it floats them above the ugly rabble of moon crickets and let's them hang with the good looking, cool crowd.

Because high academic achievers are NEVER good looking or sexually voracious, right?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

thank you, for an enormous laugh.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Often times high academic achievers are endowed with inferior looks and have low sexual power. This makes them angry and idiosyncratic from dysmorphia. They freak out worried about normal or attractive people taking their spot in a highly ranked college leaving them with nothing. Also when they graduate from a well ranked school, they clutch onto it like a life raft hoping it floats them above the ugly rabble of moon crickets and let's them hang with the good looking, cool crowd.

Because high academic achievers are NEVER good looking or sexually voracious, right?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

thank you, for an enormous laugh.

Very rarely. The Ivys are famous for horrible looking coeds.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Often times high academic achievers are endowed with inferior looks and have low sexual power. This makes them angry and idiosyncratic from dysmorphia. They freak out worried about normal or attractive people taking their spot in a highly ranked college leaving them with nothing. Also when they graduate from a well ranked school, they clutch onto it like a life raft hoping it floats them above the ugly rabble of moon crickets and let's them hang with the good looking, cool crowd.

I lol 'd at "moon crickets". I'm adding it to my repertoire.

[Anonymous]

a lot of resentments from all sides - white and asian families think blacks and latinos kids are unqualfied (or under-qualified) and taking their spots; URMs think white and Asian kids are "one-dimensional" and missing certain traits schools are looking for... can't say things in IRL so they come here to vent and show their true colors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Often times high academic achievers are endowed with inferior looks and have low sexual power. This makes them angry and idiosyncratic from dysmorphia. They freak out worried about normal or attractive people taking their spot in a highly ranked college leaving them with nothing. Also when they graduate from a well ranked school, they clutch onto it like a life raft hoping it floats them above the ugly rabble of moon crickets and let's them hang with the good looking, cool crowd.

This gave me a good chuckle - thanks!

a lot of good responses (psychology) in this thread. If you see mean, ad hominem, aggressive, useless rants - report them - it will help improve the forum for the rest of us. The 'broken glass' theory of Rudy Guiliani seems to work here as well (i.e. if you see broken glass in the neighborhood, bad behavior is more likely, so keep the glass from being broken).

And keep in mind what the ultimate objective of sending kids to school (and parenting) is: for them to learn to be kind, caring, competent people who are curious, honest and hard working.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think it's the anonymity.

I think it's because manipulators are trying to undermine our universities along with our other institutions. They're spending a fortune on getting talk radio and Fox News viewers to hate our universities.

Of course, plenty of brilliant conservative people go to those universities and teach at those universities. But some suggestible people get riled up by those campaigns and start coming on message boards to denounce the selective university monsters.

I think what the selective university haters miss is that kids who find high school too easy need a chance to attend a brutally tough school with similar kids. Breezing through school without doing much work is crippling. In the real world, people with IQs of 190 struggle, too. If they never have a chance to do something hard in school, they'll get lost and drift once they're out working.

So, regular bright kids might not need MIT, but kids who teach themselves calculus when they're 12 need that or the equivalent to have a hope of having a normal life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it's the anonymity.

I think it's because manipulators are trying to undermine our universities along with our other institutions. They're spending a fortune on getting talk radio and Fox News viewers to hate our universities.

Of course, plenty of brilliant conservative people go to those universities and teach at those universities. But some suggestible people get riled up by those campaigns and start coming on message boards to denounce the selective university monsters.

I think what the selective university haters miss is that kids who find high school too easy need a chance to attend a brutally tough school with similar kids. Breezing through school without doing much work is crippling. In the real world, people with IQs of 190 struggle, too. If they never have a chance to do something hard in school, they'll get lost and drift once they're out working.

So, regular bright kids might not need MIT, but kids who teach themselves calculus when they're 12 need that or the equivalent to have a hope of having a normal life.

Huh. You and I must be reading different posts - I don't see a lot of elite university hating. I see a lot of the opposite...calling those students who go to non-elite schools schmucks or using dismissive phrases like "Tailgate State" or flyover state or act like elite Us are the only path to success.