Boston Latin Special Snowflakes melt in the rain

Or only "figuratively" proud? Whatever-- I'm proud of my education, too, but let's not pretend that getting into a top-level school or not confers any kind of superiority. I was just pointing out this person with their ten-pound ballbag and leather-bound books was being tedious.

To grant Bunker Hill grads the freedom to celebrate their accomplishments. The condescension is there whether you mean it, or realize it, or not.

Showing intelligence = bad
good at school = bad
bringing up your resentment of someone about five times in a day = good

How sad your life must be if this is all you have to brighten your day. If hating and attacking are all you have to show for yourself.

As of 2000, 35% of households in Boston had no car.

As for car ownership, you do realize that most people in Boston own a car, right? Especially in the neighborhoods where most of Boston's residents live, where people have things like driveways and parking lots?

Hmmm as a defense I'm not sure that "Don't like our parenting decisions? Tough!" is the best strategy since this is precisely the attitude Brett is complaining about. The notion that ones own personal desires and choices trump any other considerations. I'm reminded of the guy I saw once trying to push a double wide stroller down Hanover street at 9pm on a Saturday night. Okay, sure, you're the kind of guy who decides that you must buy the most disruptive and space hogging form of child transport available on the market. But one of the side effects of that choice is that you should realize that there's things you give up doing so. Like the right to push said transport down one of the most crowded streets in the city like a bulldozer. It's not the decision that's problematic but the lack consideration for others.

Do I think that this is mostly motivated by elitism as Brett seems to suggest? No. I suspect that this is mainly a problem at Boston Latin because more of the parents are able to take time off from work in order to pick up their kids. But I think there IS a point in the fact that a lot of the people involved simply didn't think that, "HMMM maybe there will be a lot of other parents trying to pick up their kids at the exact same time and that all of those cars might cause a traffic problem on the street."

I do find the horrified reactions to junior high kids riding the T to be more than mildly amusing and, in that case perhaps, indicative of a certain level of elitism. Oh yes the horrors, children riding the T where they might actually have to see and be in close proximity to, people who they don't know. Even people from, gasp, a different social background than them. In my day we had to walk uphill to school, both ways! Well not really, but I did take the bus. Albeit a school bus not a public bus. But as a junior high school kid we did stand out there on the public street waiting for the bus. Somehow we survived unscathed.

Frankly I'm also a little stunned by the lack of reading comprehension here. Perhaps some folks need to take a refresher course along with the "little snowflakes." At least from the OP it seems clear that Brett's problem is not with the children themselves but with what he sees as the over entitled and inconsiderate parents who feel that their "special little snowflakes" can't endure a little rain or a scary trip on public transportation. After all I doubt there's a lot of kids out there wailing and moaning for mom and dad to come pick them up because the rain is too much.

I also find it a bit amusing that people who were, in another blog post, giving Emily Rooney a, justifiable, raft of shit for acting like Dorchester is the dark side of the moon are now acting like the medical area is so ungodly far that only fleets of cars could possibly return the students home in a timely fashion.

And is the post perhaps a bit petty? Sure. But then most of the posts on this site are petty. At least Brett's is about something which actually impacts people's lives, albeit in a minor manner. As opposed to hand wringing about what the oldest house in Boston is or that Vermont advertising agencies don't know how the local public transit system works.

... your long trip to BLS from East Boston took about the same amount of time as our kids' far shorter (in miles) trip to BLS from Roslindale. Your schedule is about identical to the one we had in our household for (many many) years. ;~}

But the T is part of the experience of BLS, you're depriving them of 4-6 years of T torture Adam! Oh, and don't forget the anxiety inducing schedule of the E line, which runs approximately once every two days. How will your kids learn to make up excuses for being late if you're driving them in each day?

.

Me too!

And drumroll please: because I took public transit, like I do every day!

Funny how there are so many assumptions going on here, like the fact that I posted purely because my commute took longer. It didn't- not by a minute.

Perhaps his concern is not so much the maturity of the 12-year old girl, but the immaturity of some of the 13-14 year old boys she might encounter along the trip.

And I was thinking more about the first day of school to a place where she may not have taken the train before. And I'm not thinking about maturity, I'm thinking about being abducted. Probably .00000000000000001% chance of that but I would still feel helpless.

And there isn't a doubt in my mind that my daughter is going to be mature enough (She is already as tough as nails), but yea, I would feel better if she was able to travel with friends on the subway if there is a chance she might be going home at night alone from school.

I really don't think we're allowed to make comparisons about developmental wiring differences like that. Even if they're in the PC direction, and even if they might be true.

Just try to make an assertion about the "typical" 12 year-old white boy being "better developmentally wired" for some task than the "typical" 12 year-old black boy, and you'll have an opportunity to reflect upon the question from the luxury of unemployment and social ostracism.