Dumbing Down America

Let me preface this morning's rant with the following personal perspective. That which I am about to state and profile will not affect me personally one iota. Unfortunately, my grandchildren and great grandchildren will be adversely affected over time as will yours.

Everywhere I look I notice the minimizing of standards and expectations. It would appear that Benjamin Spock's 'feel good' child rearing has spilled over into many social, educational and entertainment institutions thus accommodating the mediocre to falsely embrace some notion of excellence.

Once public schools held a standard of 70% as the 'passing' grade. Today many public school districts subscribe to a lower passing standard of 60%. In the past many colleges and universities held a standard of a 3.28-to-3.9 GPA with a SAT Score between 1010-to-1200 for entrance requirement. Today the barometer looks more like 3.3 GPA with NO SAT Score submitted. At the University of Illinois most disciplines require an ACT minimum score of 28 for admission expect for the athletes who are accepted with a 17 ACT. Shame Shame.

Youth sports has been dumbed down drastically for fear of bruising some little turd-blossoms fragile ego. We don't keep score. Everybody bats and nobody strikes out. At season end, we all receive a  'show-up' trophy.

It does not stop at the amateur level. Our pro-athletes think they are 'all that' when they are NOT!
In 1957, Ted Williams (Boston Red Sox) had 420 at bats; struck out 43 times; had a batting average of .388 with 38 home runs. Williams made $150 thousand that season. Fifty-nine seasons later, Giancarlo Stanton (Miami) went to the plate 413 times and struck out 140. His batting average was .240 with 27 home runs. Stanton was paid $15 million for being a pimple on Ted Williams' butt.

Once in awhile a school teacher comes along and demands excellence and insists on classroom environment integrity. Her methods prove successful as strongly supported by her students' standardize scores. Yet, her methods are questioned because she demands disruptive students be handled by administrators. Of course, just as everybody can coach ten rows back in the bleachers, everybody will tell this teacher how to do her job.

My advice? Dumb it down, teacher. Give everybody an 'A' grade and allow chaos. Parents, student and administrators will love you. Speaking of dumbing-down, our current President epitomizes the new American standard for excellence!

My advice for my grandchildren and great-grandchildren: You will often try and fail. This is why you should develop the ability to focus on your strength to recover and succeed. You may find yourself walking slowly at times, just don't walk backwards. And finally, nobody can 'give' you success.