Snowflakes, Snowflakes, Read All About Them!

This just in...

By DAVID CRARY, AP National WriterTue Feb 27, 12:32 AM ET

Today's college students are more narcissistic and self-centered than their predecessors, according to a comprehensive new study by five psychologists who worry that the trend could be harmful to personal relationships and American society.

"We need to stop endlessly repeating 'You're special' and having children repeat that back," said the study's lead author, Professor Jean Twenge of San Diego State University. "Kids are self-centered enough already."

Twenge and her colleagues, in findings to be presented at a workshop Tuesday in San Diego on the generation gap, examined the responses of 16,475 college students nationwide who completed an evaluation called the Narcissistic Personality Inventory between 1982 and 2006.

The standardized inventory, known as the NPI, asks for responses to such statements as "If I ruled the world, it would be a better place," "I think I am a special person" and "I can live my life any way I want to."

The researchers describe their study as the largest ever of its type and say students' NPI scores have risen steadily since the current test was introduced in 1982. By 2006, they said, two-thirds of the students had above-average scores, 30 percent more than in 1982.

Narcissism can have benefits, said study co-author W. Keith Campbell of the University of Georgia, suggesting it could be useful in meeting new people "or auditioning on 'American Idol.'"

"Unfortunately, narcissism can also have very negative consequences for society, including the breakdown of close relationships with others," he said.

The study asserts that narcissists "are more likely to have romantic relationships that are short-lived, at risk for infidelity, lack emotional warmth, and to exhibit game-playing, dishonesty, and over-controlling and violent behaviors."

Twenge, the author of "Generation Me: Why Today's Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled — and More Miserable Than Ever Before," said narcissists tend to lack empathy, react aggressively to criticism and favor self-promotion over helping others.

The researchers traced the phenomenon back to what they called the "self-esteem movement" that emerged in the 1980s, asserting that the effort to build self-confidence had gone too far.

As an example, Twenge cited a song commonly sung to the tune of "Frere Jacques" in preschool: "I am special, I am special. Look at me."

"Current technology fuels the increase in narcissism," Twenge said. "By its very name, MySpace encourages attention-seeking, as does YouTube."

Some analysts have commended today's young people for increased commitment to volunteer work. But Twenge viewed even this phenomenon skeptically, noting that many high schools require community service and many youths feel pressure to list such endeavors on college applications.

Campbell said the narcissism upsurge seemed so pronounced that he was unsure if there were obvious remedies.

"Permissiveness seems to be a component," he said. "A potential antidote would be more authoritative parenting. Less indulgence might be called for."

The new report follows a study released by UCLA last month which found that nearly three-quarters of the freshmen it surveyed thought it was important to be "very well-off financially." That compared with 62.5 percent who said the same in 1980 and 42 percent in 1966.

Yet students, while acknowledging some legitimacy to such findings, don't necessarily accept negative generalizations about their generation.

Hanady Kader, a University of Washington senior, said she worked unpaid last summer helping resettle refugees and considers many of her peers to be civic-minded. But she is dismayed by the competitiveness of some students who seem prematurely focused on career status.

"We're encouraged a lot to be individuals and go out there and do what you want, and nobody should stand in your way," Kader said. "I can see goals and ambitions getting in the way of other things like relationships."

Kari Dalane, a University of Vermont sophomore, says most of her contemporaries are politically active and not overly self-centered.

"People are worried about themselves — but in the sense of where are they're going to find a place in the world," she said. "People want to look their best, have a good time, but it doesn't mean they're not concerned about the rest of the world."

Besides, some of the responses on the narcissism test might not be worrisome, Dalane said. "It would be more depressing if people answered, 'No, I'm not special.'"

I, Mudgeon

So, yeah. It was a day of fighting off my own inner 'mudgeon. She's a bit singular, as the 'mudgeons tend to be, considered narrowly. Considered broadly, it is her imagination of her singularity that constitutes the very soul of the 'mudgeonliness. Permit me sloppily to quote one of my favorite wide-mouthed vixens: "Every schmo as the fantasy that the world revolves around the them. It rains. A car crash stops traffic. You say 'How could this happen to me.'" How indeed. C and I were just talking about these candid interviews that various shows (remember Street Smarts anyone? . . . um... anyone?) air where a camera crew asks seemingly common sense questions to people on the street, and we all get to chuckle at how shockingly ill-informed the American public is. It's a fun game, and helps cultivate a bit of the 'mudge in even your average, similarly shockingly-informed TV audience.

Anyway. Yes. A day for battling my 'mudge. Made all the more difficult by challenging myself to read the majority of Said's Culture and Imperialism. (On a mostly unrelated side note, for some reason I find this incredibly difficult to say. The syllables want to glide together in my mouth, inevitably coming out something like "cultulal imperialism") I almost made it, too. I let my self stop a few minutes ago to make dinner, rationalizing my slacking by owning silently up the fact that after 200+ pages, nothing the honorable Said wrote was any longer penetrating my rock hard 'mudgeonly cranium. The last forty pages will have to wait until another day.

What else? I have no idea, except that the bandying about of this film keep bringing to mind another film with a structurally similar title. If you haven't seen it, you might want to.

Chapter 2ish

Clearly, rock isn't dead. And for that matter, neither is punk, metal, industrial, gothic, etc. Those of you who would make such a proclamation must do so repeatedly and quietly, lest the rising hysteria of your assertions attract too much of the wrong kind of attention and throw suspicion on your project. I feel your fear. It's much too quiet out there in the world of adulthood. We miss the louder, more raucous days of our youths with all the eyeliner and the fuck-the-system sentiment. I know, I miss it too. Where the hell do all these 18 year olds get off talking about punk anyway? Since when is Hot Topic an authentic subcultural shopping mecca? This is a frightening world, my friends. These are frightening times. But I digress. . . What I mean to say is, rock is alive and well. For evidence of this fact, I need only urge you to navigate to the following URL. You will at once be overcome and astounded, and, I hope, in time, filled with hope: http://www.metalmontana.com/index.php . Let this put an end, once and for all, to the epitaphs for real music. Now I must go make cookies. Respectfully submitted, asenath.

You're On...Bio-techs.

Apocalyptic Ape-Men?

Incidentally, if I've subjected you to this dream-like, meandering description of a film I vaguely remember seeing thanks to my father's (thankfully) questionable judgment as to what constitutes appropriate viewing for children (A & T, take note), you might want to check this out: http://monsterhunter.coldfusionvideo.com/2019.html. I do not make this shit up. Now look into Mina's eyes.... deeper....deeper....

Fe-Mina Simone, AKA...

She looks sweet, doesn't she? C and I this morning were calling her hell-beast because she apparently took a disinclination to letting us sleep. She tried to bite my earlets out of my ears, puked on the kitchen floor, and harassed C out of bed rather earlier than she was hoping. This in addition to here usual game of plant-eating and trying in vain to open the closet door. I can't blame her for trying, I suppose, since it is the place in the whole apartment where she is most likely to want to be: dark, quiet, out of the way, vaguely musty, lots of shoes and clothes for her to cover with a stubborn coat of white fluff. In one of my old dwellings, she would crawl inside the furnace, which was bizarrely mounted on the wall. It was very disconcerting to me, but there wasn't much I could do about it.

See the look of insane determination? It's all in the eyes, see. Stare too long, and you, too, will be doing her bidding.

Two Nightmares about Teaching

1. The night before last: I was hanging out at a lunch table outside at some university campus. You know how geography smears into a weird bricolage of impressions of various places? So, yeah, I think it was a mixture of UB and UM, not that this is SO very important. Anyway, I'm at this table, probably doing research (because, what the hell else would I be doing?) and I suddenly have to leave right away. There's a younger guy sitting at the table as well, but I barely look at him. Anyway, I get up, gather my books, and leave right away. THEN I realize that, shit, I'm not wearing my glasses and I definitely had them at the table. I go back there, only to find a new group of students at the table. I ask them if they've seen my glasses, and they produce a pair that they found sitting on the table after the guy who was sharing it with me left. A light dawns and I suddenly know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that this guy schemed in order to switch my glasses with his, which aren't even close to my prescription. I'm enraged, fuming, really, as angry as I can ever remember having been in my life. I know that new glasses right now (since I already used up my once a year free lenses and reduced fee schedule for frames) would cost me at least $300. I can't even think too clearly about that, though, because I'm so angry. Then, miraculously, campus police show up because they've apprehended the guilty party who is, indeed, wearing my comparatively quite stylish glasses. I'm so filled with rage that I start slapping him across the face repeatedly, calling him every bad thing I can think of, and it isn't doing anything to quell my anger. He just stares at me with this slight smile, totally unbothered. He's one of my students this semester.

2. Another miscellaneous college setting that, for some reason, I think is Illinois. I've never been there and perhaps that's why this dream is set there. It's a weird time. The sitting is being bombed by some enemy forces of some sort, and people keep assuring me that when they call in the leafblowers it will all be okay. A huge plane kind of collapses into the ground, killing everyone aboard, which was supposed to include me. But I'm teaching in this private high school, with the same students I have now. I'm trying to lecture about something, and one of my students keeps talking. I ask him once to stop, nicely, and then I slam my fist into the desk and tell him he needs to shut up while I'm talking. Everyone is completely horrified, the class ends, and the next teacher comes in. The offended student walks up to her, because she is my superior, and tells her (she's really one of C's past professors in AMS) that I struck him. The next thing I know, the school is considering firing me for hitting and student and I know that I'll never get another job if this happens. Meanwhile, people outside the university are freaking out about getting enough food, and these weird little gadgets that make polluted water drinkable. The funny thing is that I don't think I've ever even heard this particular student speak.


Everyone bored now?

A Viscous Cycle

I'll soon be done grading (read commenting extensively) on my first batch of papers from my new class. They are, predictably, mostly horrific and occasionally encouraging. Watch out, though, everyone, next Wednesday, a whole flock of snowflakes will fall from the sky, laden down with my critical penmarks pointing out that either a) they have no argument, b) they don't understand their own argument, or c) they may not be able to read. It will be a sad, sad day. Freshmen are bits of stardust, blown from the hand of god. *sigh*

Aside from the the horrors inevitably attending this kind of grading, I've had a pretty productive week. I managed to draft a chapter, which you should not understand to mean that I've finished a chapter. What I've actually accomplished is to spew about 40 pages of absolute drek, which I will now sit on for about a month while I work on another chapter. At the end of this time, I'll haul its mutilated but still semi-living carcass (in the loosest sense possible, you semantic nazis) up onto my table and begin the vivisection. Think of me as Dr. Moreau. It's the pain, you see, the pain makes my creatures...docile. They know that I am the giver of pain, and if they don't obey me, I'll do some of that flying chain shit from Hellraiser. I hope I'm not mixing my genres too much for you people. This is a fairly accurate description of my writing process, though. Unlike some people (ahem, C and B), who looove their MA theses, I rather tend to look at mine as a pile of my guts that I was somehow able to remove from my body and survive. I bled my ass all over the fucking project. Say what you will, 110 pages in two weeks is no fucking joke. I still have twinges of pain when I think about it, but my pain-go-bye-bye juice keeps the thesis weasels away.

I suppose you can chalk this up to the aforementioned paper grading. One particular gem reads something like this (because I want you all to share my pain): "This may sound racist, but I feel like black people are always acting in really exaggerated ways to call attention to themselves. They do this so that when someone reacts to them, they can accuse that person of being racist! I feel like they are the ones who are racist." All together: grrooooaannnnn.

Intervention?

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Seriously, I might need one. The terrors of writing are sending me fleeing as fast as my fingers can take me to the internet, and I've been dwelling a bit too obsessively on the message boards at vegweb. This is bad. A couple of nights ago, I was so worked up about the stupid shit some people said that I couldn't sleep for endlessly formulating the most appropriate and productive response. Of course, it is more than likely that my anxiety about the vegweb boards is really just spillover from my comp class where people say and write the most offensive shit imaginable, but I have pretty strict limits on to the extent to which I can call them out on it. Not that there aren't bright moments of glee. One of my better students described something in our reading as a "viscous circle." I think I'll be adding that one to my arsenal of "putting people up on peddle stools," and "lowering their self of steam," though it still doesn't touch my all time favorite about men being "escape goats." ahhhh... the joys of higher education. Where would we be without it, seriously? I'm pretty sure I'd be slinging candles and wicker at my own Pier One store, maybe in Washington or Colorado, and drinking myself into oblivion every night. Oh wait, ahem. (just kidding!)

Afterall, it really is SO much easier to rail on the vegwebbers than it is to figure out what the hell Bhabha is talking about and what it might have to do with the Gothic.