"Congratulations, liberals... You've raise a generation of whiny, snot-nosed brats who can't cope."

alp227

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Sun May-16-10 09:45 PM
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"Congratulations, liberals... You've raise a generation of whiny, snot-nosed brats who can't cope."

That's a comment from someone in response to the San Jose Mercury News article "Local high school students say school pressures cause them the most stress". The article, written by Julia Prodis Sulek, reported on a community meeting hosted by US Rep. Mike Honda (Democrat of California's 15th district). At the meeting, some local high schoolers who were part of Rep. Honda's youth committee presented findings of a survey that showed that students felt that "school-related pressures cause them the most stress and that school officials don't do enough to help them cope":

The survey findings are "scary," said KC Ham, an 18-year-old senior from Presentation High School in San Jose who is a member of Honda's committee, established to provide a youth perspective on national issues.

"A lot said they didn't have contact with or very little interest from counselors — and if they had it, it wasn't helping," Ham said. "That it wasn't working was sad and troubling."

Without proper help or understanding from adults, she said, teens "turn to a lot of different things to cope, and they're not usually the right things."

Drug and alcohol abuse, eating disorders, sleep problems, conflicts with parents and friends and, in extreme cases, suicide can all be linked to some kind of stress, Ham said.

The survey of 180 students found 75 percent attribute the stress they face from school-related activities and more than 60 percent said school officials don't take effective measures to deal with student stress. The survey also found that 68 percent claimed to know someone who has suffered serious consequences as a result of stress. The survey was conducted by handing out questionnaires to students in classrooms.

Honda, who attended Sunday's conference, said adults need to pay more attention to the pressures put on their children.

Yes, if you want to be successful, high school IS tough, right?

But it's really really really stupid to just point the finger at liberalism as the culprit of the high school culture of excessive sadness and competition.

After all, do realize that a lot of conservative parents send their children to uber-competitive private schools. Because conservatism is more of a "me first" ideology (compared to liberalism as a societal ideology...conservatives call that "socialist"), conservative parents often stop at nothing to get their kids ahead of the game. After all, conservatives led white flight (they didn't want their kids coexisting with other types who threatened their place). They want to raise classy "good ol' kids" so they a lot of times complain belligerently to teachers when their little angels don't get an A. They're the ones who believe that children should be 200% obedient and always always always "follow the rules" when human nature doesn't let every kid behave that way. Don't even get me started about how the wealthiest conservative parents run their families' economies like George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan ran the government's budgets (into massive debt while preaching "fiscal responsibility") and raise their kids to be self-centered and entitled to everything (while teaching them to oppose health care reform and Social Security and other big bad government entitlement programmes).

OK, I'll not be one-sided here and won't deny some liberal parents act that way too, but this liberal-bashing just makes the commenter a talk radio-poisoned melted-brain zombie. I've seen all sorts of anti-liberal rhetoric on the comment boards on the San Jose Mercury News and San Francisco Chronicle website, but this comment was so crazy and so ignorant I just HAD to share and analyse it with y'all. 'K mates?