DCUM Weblog

The most active thread yesterday was titled, "Redshirting August boy?" and posted in the "Private/Independent Schools". The thread might be better suited for the "Schools and Education General Discussion" forum since the topic is not necessarily specific to private schools. Nevertheless, the original poster is considering redshirting her son who has a late August birthday and would be the youngest in his class. For those who are unfamiliar with the term, "redshirting" refers to having a child repeat a grade of school. Redshirting is a controversial topic on DCUM with a few posters absolutely obsessed with the issue. While the practice has traditionally been used to accomodate children with late birthdays or who may lag somewhat behind their peers in learning or maturity, some parents suspect that it is used to give unfair advantages to children who otherwise don't need to repeat a year. In the dog eat dog world of alpha parents whose entire self-value is tied to the academic and athletic achievements of their children, the thought of a rival child obtaining an advantage through redshirting is more than they can countenance. In less than 24 hours, this thread reached a whopping 23 pages, none of which I've read. I've seen enough of these threads to know that they offer little more than a depressing view into the perception of some parents that education is a zero-sum game.

Yesterday's most active thread was posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum. The thread was titled, "WARNING before you send your child to an upper Midwest cold weather college" and quotes from an article lamenting the lack of sunshine in Michigan in early January. The poster warns about the dangers of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) and cautions about all Midwestern states. As a native of the Midwest and graduate of the University of Illinois, I find the original poster's concern to be ludicrous in the extreme. Mark Twain is often credited with the saying, "If you don’t like our weather, just wait a few minutes", but at least one quote investigator has traced that expression to an anonymous resident of Chicago, a place where the sentiment is certainly fitting. The original poster may be shocked to learn that there are people who actually enjoy seasonal weather changes. Some of those responding share the original poster's antipathy for the cold and sometimes gloomy weather of the north, but others recall pleasant experiences in such places. Other posters note that the Pacific Northwest and parts of northern New York state also have similar weather. This thread is part of a trend where posters have fixated on weather as a major factor in college choice. This is the second thread about cold weather colleges that has been among the most active and weather was a big part of another most active thread about southern universities. The thread is also part of a second trend involving posters obsessed with the University of Michigan, which — as a proud Illini alumn — I am contractually obligated to hate. But, I actually have fairly fond feelings for the school.

Once again the most active thread of the previous day was related to the British Royal Family. This one, titled "PR lessons from Buckingham Palace" and posted in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum, addressed the topic from a different perspective. The original poster assured us that her intent was not to bash anyone, but to simply explore the public relations response by Buckingham Palace. In the view of the original poster, the response has been "never complain, never explain" by the Royals themselves, while their "servants" have been sent out to talk to the media. The original poster asks whether this has been an effective response. Many of those who respond believe the strategy to be effective. Others didn't comment on the efficacy of the response, but offered opinions about why such a response might be chosen. It really is impossible to prevent any thread about the Royal Family from turning into a hatefest and before the first page was even complete, multiple posters had ignored the topic of PR and simply posted criticisms of Harry and Meghan. Eventually, the thread was completely hijacked into a general discussion of the Royal Family with no connection to the original topic at all. As a result, I locked the thread.

Sadly, I am required to once again write about the Sussexes. The most active thread yesterday was titled, "Has Harry Completely Lost his mind?" and posted in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum. Today Prince Harry's book will finally be released so I suspect this will not be the last of these threads. The title alone in this case is enough to know which direction this thread will take and I simply can't motivate myself to read it. Within two hours of its creation, the thread had already reached 11 pages, at which point I locked it. This wasn't even the only Sussex-related thread created yesterday. I remain completely astonished about the popularity of discussing this couple. Most exasperating is the huge number of posts coming from those like the original poster of this thread who prefaces the first post in the thread by saying, "I don't care about Royals...". Clearly the poster cares enough to start a thread about them. The obsession, especially among the haters, is simply amazing. During the two hours that the thread was available, multiple posters posted over 10 times with one managing 25 posts. That's basically one post every 5 minutes. On top of the multiple threads per day being created about Harry and Meghan, posters are inserting the couple in to completely unrelated threads. Some posters appear to be viewing their entire lives through a Sussex prism.

Today I'll review the most active threads over the weekend. The three most active threads were threads that I've already discussed and will, therefore, skip. That left a thread titled, "How many here had students that missed being NMSF and were Commended instead" and posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum as the first to be described. Probably some background is in order for this thread. The "National Merit Scholarship Program" or NMSF is an academic competition for scholarships based on students' Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT) scores. Students whose scores are above a certain level but below the cut-off point required to continue in the competition are recognized as "Commended Students". There has been a recent controversy — one that was even the topic of a most active thread about which I've written — involving the recognition of Commended Students at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology (TJ). I don't know that this thread is related to the TJ situation, but the original post which asks whether Commended Students included that recognition on their college applications, addresses one of the main points of the TJ debate. A major argument of those upset with TJ was that Commended Students were harmed by not being able to included this recognition on their college applications. Others argued that since Commended status was more like a participation trophy and signaled that students were not at the level needed to continue the NMSF competition, it was not worth being mentioned and might even have negative ramifications. I haven't read all of this thread, but it looks like it consists mostly of a repetition of these two arguments. Many of those responding said they did include the recognition and considered it an important indication of academic success. Others argued that the recognition was meaningless with one poster saying it was considered a source of shame.

On Sundays I generally discuss the most active threads of the past week. However, all but three of the top 15 were previously included in daily posts. So, today's threads will be limited to the three remaining topics. The first of those was titled, "Covid permanently harms immune system, repeat infections increase damage" and posted in the "Health and Medicine" forum. The original poster links to an article in Canada's National Post newspaper about findings by Ontario public health officials concerning changes in immune cells in some of those infected by COVID-19. The original poster overstates the findings and ignores the caveats included in the article. Based on a very superficial look at the responses in the thread, I think the attitudes towards COVID among those replying have hardened to the point where few posters are open to new information. Essentially, everyone simply promotes their previously held viewpoint. Some posters doubt the findings, some don't care, and some question the source. But, those with preexisting strong concerns about COVID, see this as justifying their worries. A few posters argue for moderate, nuanced approaches, but they are largely drowned out. I fear that we are rapidly reaching a point where COVID is another topic that is not really worth discussing on DCUM. Posters, like the original poster in this instance, are so eager to spread awareness of COVID dangers that they misrepresent or overstate scientific findings. This reinforces allegations that they are simply fearmongering and causes others to tune out. Those who have basically given up on doing anything about COVID interpret everything to support their point of view regardless. If a finding is that COVID is not serious, they don't want to take preventative measures because the COVID is not serious. If the finding is that COVID is very harmful, they don't want to take precautions because it will kill you anyway and there is nothing you can do about it. We basically have two groups that don't want to hear each other.

The two most active threads yesterday were the Speaker of the House thread and the thread about Prince Harry's book. But, since I've already discussed those threads, I'll move on to a thread titled, "Anyone else here struggle with your feelings about ppl who don’t work?" and posted in the "Jobs and Careers" forum. This thread, which managed to rack up 13 pages in a single day, discusses the original poster's feelings towards what I believe are stay at home moms, though she doesn't identify them that way. The original poster says that she works very hard at a well-paying job and disliked the period in which she stayed home to care for her children. She is upset by social media posts from friends who don't have jobs and whose kids are in school. She wants to know what is triggering her. Regardless of the original poster's intentions, the thread is really little more than a dressed up stay-at-home-moms vs work-out-of-the-home moms debate of which DCUM has had countless. I wouldn't say that the arguments are any different from any previous discussions, though the discourse does seem to be a bit more highbrow than usual. However, that impression might just reflect selective reading on my part. The thread also has its low points such as when one poster unwisely describes those who don't have jobs as "parasites".

I knew that it was going to happen, I could see it coming, but that makes it no less disappointing that yesterday's most active thread was about Prince Harry's book. Titled, "Spare" (just like the book) and posted in "The DCUM Book Club" forum, the thread is nearly 40 pages long already. Obviously I am not going to read 40 pages. For that matter, I'm not going to read even 4 pages of this thread. What I can say is that very few posts have been reported so either fans of the Sussex dual have grown surprisingly tolerant of the haters or the couple's detractors have failed to find their way over from the Entertainment forum. Mind you, the book is not even available to read yet so all of these posts are either based on excerpts or just posters' general feelings about Harry and Meghan. Once people are actually able to get their hands on a copy, there will likely be a lot more posts so this thread or others like it will probably continue for some time.

Just a reminder that I skip threads that have already been included in earlier blog posts. Yesterday, for example, the top two most active threads were the thread about the Speaker of the House vote that I described yesterday and the weight loss drugs thread from earlier this week. I won't discuss them again. The thread that followed those two sort of fell into a loophole. It was on a topic about which I recently wrote, but is a new thread. So, technically, It can be included today. Titled, "Governor Glenn Youngkin Calls for Attorney General Jason Miyares to Investigate the Leadership of Th" and posted in the "Advanced Academic Programs (AAP)" forum. The title has a typo — the school concerned is the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology or TJ — and, as I wrote last week, there is a controversy surrounding the school's notification of awards given to some TJ students. Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin has now asked Virginia's Attorney General Jason Miyares to investigate the allegations. This seems like a blatant misuse of power to me and part of a worrisome trend that Youngkin and Miyares have shown toward investigating schools. Not everyone shares my opinion, of course, and a range of views are presented in the thread. But, like almost all TJ threads, this one eventually became little more than a rehashing of the oft-repeated arguments about the school's admission policy. Since that debate has been well-covered in other threads, I locked this one.

The most active thread yesterday was titled, "Speaker of the House Vote Thread" and posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. For those who avoid news about politics in the way that I avoid news of the British Royal Family, yesterday Republicans were supposed to elect a new Speaker of the House. California Republican Representative Kevin McCarthy had not only measured the drapes, he had already moved into the Speaker's office. But, to paraphrase ESPN host Chris Berman, that's why they have a vote. Not only did McCarthy fail to get elected speaker, on three consecutive votes Democratic Representative Hakeem Jeffries actually came out ahead in the vote count. But, since no candidate received a majority of those voting, no one was elected. The failure to elect a speaker stalled all other work by the House — Members could not even be sworn in — so the US does not currently have a functional House of Representatives. The DCUM thread documented the play-by-play on the Hill as it happened, intermixed with commentary and opinion. While the intrigue surrounding the voting may have had something in common with "The Game of Thrones", it lacked the drama of a George R. R. Martin novel. A dragon or two would have gone a long way to spice things up.