WTF Wednesday?? Dusting Off the Soapbox or What The Hell Are People Thinking

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As my decade in review post indicated, self-reflection is not something I do often, however, once in awhile I come out of the rabbit hole and appraise the world around me. It scares me. The craziness of the world scares me. I'm not talking about wars in Iraq or genocide in Darfur. I'm talking little things, that seem innocuous enough until you sit and think about them.

Things like business cards for Moms. That's right, apparently one of the big trends on the playground is for Moms to have business cards printed with their stats; indicating that they are INDEED a mom (because little Johnny hanging onto their leg screaming for gummy bears isn't indicative of this fact), stating who their children are (often with pics of their kiddos) and how Mom can be reached to set up a playdate for little Johnny. WTF???? When did childhood become a "have my people contact your people" game? When did it become necessary to validate motherhood with a business card? Because let's get real here folks, cell phones (who EVERYONE has) these days can do everything but wipe your ass for you, this includes the ability to store phone numbers and schedules. These cards have nothing to do with necessity, it seems to me a way for these moms to feel validated in their role as mommy, and that need for validation - that's what scares me. Is the bond between a mother and child no longer validation enough?

USAtoday.com reports that research financed by the Sage Foundation and the Human Motivation research program at Rochester recently discovered that people are happier on the weekends. Researchers used pagers with 74 adults, ages 18 to 62, who worked at least 30 hours a week, paging them at random intervals to determine their level of happiness at that particular time. The researchers were shocked to discover that this rule of thumb (being happier on the weekends) did not apply to those that normally work weekends, leaving them to conclude that people are happiest when not working. WTF...you needed to do research to discover this......excuse me while I bang my head against my desk.

Educational experts calling for a "report card free" school system. This is akin to getting rid of the practice of passing out trophies to the "winning" team, or making a school policy whereby if a child is having a birthday party, they are required to invite everyone in the class...or no one at all.

Oh dear jesus just kill me now. As a society, could we get any more politically correct or touchy feely? Seriously. The world can be a harsh, cruel place. We all know that. Don't we, as parents, have a responsibility to teach this to our kids? I know I know, it's also our job to protect them. But at what cost? Google "teacup generation" and see what comes up. We're raising teacups. So the whole report card free way of thinking is so that teachers and parents are required to communicate (a good thing) and little Johnny is assessed on his effort rather than a grading system. I'm sorry, if I have a brain surgeon opening my skull, I take no comfort in the fact that he tried really hard in med school, and he played well with others. No, children are not doing brain surgery in K-12...but what alot of people don't realize is that as the bar is lowered in the K-12 system, this forces Colleges/Universities to also lower the bar. I know this for a fact. Post secondary educators spend (on average) 75% more time today doing remedial training (writing, math, language arts) than they did 10 years ago. What does this equate to? Rather than teaching College students how to assemble the engine for a plane, we're spending a significant amount of time teaching them how to do the math required for such a task, we're teaching them how to read manuals, and write a report with proper punctuation and spelling, things that you and I knew how to do when we graduated from high school.

And last but not least....American Idol. WTF?!?!?! Simon is leaving? And where the hell was Ellen? I was looking forward to watching Ellen give the gears to Simon. Instead we get Victoria Beckham? And consider this my PSA for the day -  just because you're really good at playing the video game version of American Idol does NOT mean you should go on National tv. Shake your damn head. Also, if you have a muffin top like one of those super sized muffins one would buy at a high end bakery....yeah....a belly top might not be the wisest fashion choice.

20 comments:

Vinomom said...
January 13, 2010 at 10:18 AM

I am so with you on this. I recently found out my county does not grade homework! WTF? Apparently it's not fair because some children get more help at home than others. Life's not fair! Better to learn it now and get it over with.

KristinFilut said...
January 13, 2010 at 10:31 AM

Seriously? I'm so right there with you! If you "protect" your kids from the shiz that goes down in the real world, they are gonna be so unequipped to deal and fail miserably. Our job as parents is to teach our kids how to successfully contribute to the world as an adult. That means they need to learn at a young age that the world can be an ugly place and life is so very far from fair.

Lee said...
January 13, 2010 at 10:35 AM

I completely agree. If you don't have a report card, then just have cut and paste time at school through high school, because your children won't learn. I think it's a way to cut down on the work the teachers do. Teach and do the damn report cards. We need a reason to praise or punish our kids...it gives the a small amount of power that we otherwise have lost.

GunDiva said...
January 13, 2010 at 10:51 AM

Amen, sister! To all of it (including Idol). I can agree that post-secondary instructors are spending more time teaching the basics, as I've had to institute "refresher" (wouldn't want to say remedial now would we and possibly hurt anyone's feelings)English and Math classes that are REQUIRED for every student who enters our college. And I never thought I'd see the day when I breathed a sigh of relief to see a student come in who has a GED, but I do. At least the GED standards haven't changed (yet) and I know that those students have the basics. A high school diploma don't mean shit anymore.

KCSherri said...
January 13, 2010 at 11:02 AM

AMEN!!!

And Ellen will be on tonight...along with Mary Blige, as the guest judge.

I have to admit - I DID like it when Victoria chewed on Simon for rolling his eyes.

Blessings!

BigSis said...
January 13, 2010 at 11:32 AM

Great post. And, about American Idol - what was even worse than the belly top was the fact that she kept jumping up and down. Vomitous!

Yankee Girl said...
January 13, 2010 at 12:12 PM

I am a firm believer that certain articles of clothing shouldn't even be made in a size higher than medium. It may sound bad, but really, if you need to get a large in a tiny tshirt, you probably shouldn't even be wearing the tiny tshirt.

And yes, I am much happier when I am not working.

I worked my ass off in school to get good grades. Since I am not a parent I don't really know, but are schools/people not pushing kids anymore? Are they promoting laziness? That is too crazy for words.

SurferWife said...
January 13, 2010 at 3:05 PM

One of those moms with the 'mom cards' here! LOL! My friend makes them and they were cute. So yeah. I did need the validation at the time and it worked. For about a minute. :)

Anonymous said...
January 13, 2010 at 3:51 PM

Wow - A mommy card? Thats just weird.

And a report card free school?? Never heard of anything so absurd. Holy hell. I must live under a rock! I swear I wouldnt know aything if I didnt read all these blogs. lol

Unknown said...
January 13, 2010 at 8:38 PM

Mommy Business cards? Get a life!

I hate that people are constantly trying to phase out competition in schools and handing every damn kid an 'achievement' award. For what? For showing up? Ugh.

Tracie said...
January 13, 2010 at 10:21 PM

We have report cards without grades for K thru 3rd. The just get at grade level, below, or above. It's stupid. They take tests but the tests don't get graded. What's the point?

Ducky said...
January 13, 2010 at 10:38 PM

Bwwahaaaa! My hubs said almost the exact same thing about that idol chick. I didn't see much of the show but I did manage to sear that image into my brain.

Can't.Get.It.Out

gayle said...
January 13, 2010 at 11:22 PM

I so agree with everything you said!! These mommy's that have business cards...hope I don't offend are just trying to look I don't know???the word I want here..and yes who is so dumb to not be happy on their time off and I have a child in my class or should I say his mother that wanted a report on her sons conduct everyday and love it the first few days, when it was new and he was getting stickers but then when it got old to the child and we were writing down eveything he did that he wasn't suppose to do like....shouting out, making noises, not doing his work, touching other kids............well then his mom didn't like it anymore and said this report just wasn't working anymore... oh her poor child has some time of problem...........yes well his problem is he is spoiled and mom doesn't make him mind at home and does nothing to him when he doesn't do what he should in school. He's in first grade now...oh won't that mom be surprised when he gets to middle and high school. Sorry can you tell I had a bad day.

Anonymous said...
January 14, 2010 at 12:06 AM

Mommy cards?? Seriously, I don't get it. That's a very weird way of validating a role in your child's life.

Our school system doesn't grade homework either, which bothers me. I want the kids to see if they are doing well or not, they don't need to be protected from what their performace is.
How else are they supposed to want to achieve more or try harder?
Then again, I have friends that went to a college that didn't have grades, just written assessments. I never understood that.

Together We Save said...
January 14, 2010 at 12:08 PM

Love the post... mommies have their own cards now?!? How weird.

Lifeofkaylen said...
January 14, 2010 at 4:45 PM

Oh - you can get free business cards at my giveaway going on right now!! Come on over!!! It will validate you!!! :)

What a total waste of money!! We have to do research to determine happiness levels? Ridiculous.

I rarely ever watch American Idol, but my son and I were both excited for this year with Ellen-she's wonderful!!! What a huge letdown to have that bobblehead Beckham there instead!!!! No good, no good at all!!!

Liz Mays said...
January 14, 2010 at 5:46 PM

Eliminating grades is the most ridiculous idea I have ever heard of. I'm so sick of how we're coddling kids these days. To not grade them is absurd. If Simon leaves, I leave!

Kat said...
January 14, 2010 at 8:13 PM

Ok, now...the brain surgeon thing? Really scary! WTF? Honest to God I don't know where this world is headed, but my grandfather (rest his soul gently please) would have said we are heading to Hell in a Handbasket! LOL

Mae Rae said...
January 15, 2010 at 2:46 PM

holy wtf motherload! You have to be kidding on some of these. Business cards for mothers? That has to be taking place in some freaky part of the country right? Not all over. No way.

Laura said...
January 19, 2010 at 1:12 AM

I'm right there with you all the way on this. Especially on the school thing. Oh I shouldn't even get started on the school issue. Yeah and I'm fairly pissed about Simon as well!