Trophies For EVERYone!

Had a great day today and ended up chatting with my Mom.  It's a wonderful thing to be 'grown' and sit down with one, or both of your folks, if you're so Blessed.  Today, we were chatting about my twin Niece Nephew, who are both 8 years old.  I saw them both on the occasion of their last day of school and they were bragging about how the had "Graduated."  They were most thrilled at the prospect, but then I realized:  You're not "Graduating" you're merely moving on to the next grade....at the SAME school!

They could find no humor in my cajoling.  It wasn't until later that one of them removed an iPod Touch and asked me what the password for the wifi was.  "Wifi?!  Why?" I asked.  And they both held up their shiny new iPod Touches.  I nearly threw up!  Their 'Graduation Gift' from their other Grandmother was an iPod Touch for each of them.  Now, let's ASSume she is not entirely bat shit crazy and she bought them the 8gig entry level iPod Touch.  It's STILL $185.  So, that's $370 for graduation gifts.  WTF?!

I NEVER received a 'gift' for passing from 2nd to 3rd grade.  I DID one time earn cash for A's, but that was a short lived, one-off experiment in 'can we get Sean to get better grades' hopes.  Hopes = dashed. 

I mean, what do they get them for an ACTUAL Graduation with the midget cap and gown?  Ahem.  That ALSO never happened, EVEN at my actual graduations, that is until high school.

It's emblematic of this entire new society we have concocted where little league sports teams "Dont keep score" to save the self esteem of the losing team.  And, God forbid, to keep the kid in right field who likes to turn pirouettes during the game from dropping a ball and losing the game for his team.  "Harsh" did I hear someone cough into their handkerchief (does anyone still use those?)???  Poppycock.  That's right, I said "Poppycock!"  The idea that EVERY kid deserves an equal helping of self esteem despite him or her contributing nothing to the overall welfare of the team, being MORE important than the children learning about the 'zero sum game' that IS life strikes me as patently absurd!  

We are losing our edge...if we haven't lost it already...by buying into this touchy-feely hogwash!  Let them PLAY baseball AND keep score! Does EVERY kid make the high school team?  NO!  Because SOME kids cannot play football!  Let them play games like Dodgeball and learn that SOME kids ARE inherently more athletic than others...and that's okay...we ALL need to work to our strengths...and HOW on earth are we SUPPOSED to do that if we have no idea what our weaknesses are?!