Generation of "Yes" Parenting

I apologize if this entry comes from varying directions, and confusing thoughts, in my head they all make sense but I am not too sure how they will look on paper (or should I say your screen).

I had a very interesting morning. I was at school by 7:30 a.m. and had a class to attend at 8:30 a.m. So that left me about 50 minutes to sort out my day and sort out my messy disaster of a desk. I checked my mailbox and saw that I had some graded papers handed back to me, after reading those responses my head started to spin. While I do not disagree that they may have not been my best work, I found that the comments I received were about things that weren't in the listend "instructions/inclusionary items". So after sorting through the critical feedback I started re-working one of the papers I was preparing for this week. Only a few minutes later I had to head to class where my thoughts really started spinning.

Within 5 minutes of class beginning we had a few moments of a student experiencing what I would perceive to be extreme negative stress. What a horrible way to start a Monday morning! Now, don't get me wrong, the student did deserve some 'straight up-you screwed up' talking, but I feel they were met by a shit storm (pardon the language) of crap being thrown at them.  The student responded as one would expect a puppy being scolded too; head down, sit down, don't say much for the rest of class. The professor ended up apologizing to the student in the middle of class and outrightly said, they were in the wrong by placing so much stress on them at the beginning of class. This got me thinking more...

We currently live in a generation of "YES" parenting. According to Generation text: Raising well-adjusted kids in an age of instant everything By Michael Osit this is called Generation Text. These kids are growing up in a culture of:

• Technology-enhances, push-button, "get what you want it, when you want it" 
• Immediate access to the things they want and "need"
• Exposure to an excess of material goods and privileges
• Child centered families
• "Yes" parenting

While this might not be the generation of the student in University at the moment, some of them certainly have this "entitlement" personality about them (you would be AMAZED at what you hear when you are GA...). I can only imagine what havoc this will cause in the education system in years to come. If children aren't use to hearing an adult tell them no, or maybe not receive the marks they were expecting what is going to happen? Is the education system going to bow down more than they already have? [Do you know that it is basically IMPOSSIBLE for a child to be held back a grade level anymore?] Or are the children all of a sudden going to have this conflicted home life and school life? How are we prepared to handle these issues?

To tie all of these ideas back together, I was thinking about what happens now when instructions aren't clear? We usually discuss and come to some sort of agreement, or consensus about what is suppose to be included. What happens when you cause someone extreme negative stress? You usually (or at least should) buck up and talk to them about it, you explain why you were upset/reacted the way you did, and then the other person get the opportunity to talk about how they felt. What happens when these children grow up and don't follow or understand instructions? What happens when someone expressess thoughts that don't align with their own? I can usually spin things to have a positive outlook, but I am really struggling to see the positive responses the Generation Text is going to have.

Call me cynical, call me old school, I don't care. I believe in open and honest communication, and being able to handle constructive criticism (something even I constantly need to work on). I am concerned that future generations won't be able to handle any of the above...