It seemed both alarmist and poorly researched, vague about when exactly this shift took place, and failing for some things (later marriage and moving from home) to look at factors other than parental smothering.

I found that bothersome, too. I also don't recall any mention of smaller families playing into this, both from the gene pool preservation standpoint (i.e. parents want to keep their 1-2 kids alive and aren't losing kids to infant mortality) and the sibling competition standpoint (which both Susan and I benefited from).

As one who moved late from home, as did my spouse, I can attest that in our case and the case of most of my friends, it really was the economy, stupid.

That was one problem for me. The other was that I was taught all my childhood to go to college and get a degree, but once I did I had no idea what to do with it.

If there's one thing I wish I had gotten from school, it was competition. I am OK with Annabel going to public school, but I'm afraid she'll never get pushed and prodded by her teachers and peers to be the intellectual superstar we all know she's going to be. It is very easy to just put on the cruise control and float through primary/secondary school without reading a book or studying, esp. if the school's purpose is less about educating and more about self-preservation and order-keeping. Then you hit college and have no study habits... and you end up being me.

My family calls Tulsa Public Schools "the TP Schools." Gawd, they were awful.

With the boys in school (Jake for nine years now), I've seen so many cases of parents asking for exceptions for their kids when they weren't needed.

Their case would have been stronger if they'd stuck to specifics like that. As it was, however, they seemed to blame everything that's gone wrong with people in the last twenty years to modern parenting trends.

I remember being surprised to read about Mary Karr having a friend who cut in the late '60s(in the second memoir "Cherry") because I had thought it was somehow new.

miserable, ill-behaved kids I'd ever encountered

Probably because of the "no limits". I know that with both my kids, they may not like the limits but they know them and they are enforced.

I'm 48 and cutting wasn't that common, or if it was we didn't talk about it in the bathroom. Of course, this was during the early to mid-70's so not being a virgin was BIG NEWS.

As far as parental smothering, I'm seeing more of it now. One parent in my youngest's class asked for their child to re-tested for GATE because they didn't feel that the child was at their best that day. This parent was frantic because their child didn't qualify for GATE - I can't imagine being that kid.... what pressure.

Gifted, right? I was Gifted and Special...shifting expectations, much?

It is very easy to just put on the cruise control and float through primary/secondary school without reading a book or studying, esp. if the school's purpose is less about educating and more about self-preservation and order-keeping. Then you hit college and have no study habits... and you end up being me.

YPSMV.

My high school was an IB school, back when there were only two in the state. We were a tight-knit group of kids all working very hard at one-upping each other for bragging rights. Despite my natural love of slacking, I found my love of winning was stronger, and thus I developed actual study skills.

I managed to lose my study habits in college, because I didn't need them there, and because without competition, there was no real incentive for me to give a damn about material I already pretty much knew.

As it was, however, they seemed to blame everything that's gone wrong with people in the last twenty years to modern parenting trends.

X years ago, "they" blamed everything going wrong to modern parenting trends, where X is any number between 0 and, oh, 2 million.

I mean, ten years ago we were still going on about the "plague" of teenage mothers. Now, the number of teenage mothers has fallen significantly, so it's on to something else to complain about.

I mean, hell, Seattle Public Schools are trying to ban "freak dancing." Fifty years ago, they wouldn't show Elvis' hips on TV for fear he'd drive teenage girls to get pregnant and/or cut themselves and/or play Doom. 250 years ago, it was the waltz making women wanting to get freaky and men wanting to shoot up their pedagouges and fellow students with blunderbusses.

YPSMV

Your Popsicle Stick May Vary?

erika, yup GATE in So Cal = Gifted and Academically Talented Education. My daughter was in GATE, I feel badly now because while it pushed and challenged her, now she's headed to AP classes in high school with a ton of extra homework which is good for college and stuff but the poor kid ends up doing homework until 10 every night. I tell her it's preparing her for college but I don't think she appreciates my humor.

I was Gifted and Special

And while I'm on a roll:

Dylan, I spotted you walking down Pacific two days past, when we were turning around so that Paul could go fetch his phone from his office. (There was no time to do that usually pointless and confusing to the person on the street window rolldown and shout, however.)

I probably wouldn't have heard you. I'm usually wearing my iPod when I'm walking on Pacific, since that's the walk to/from West Campus Garage.