Hey…I COULD tell you that I never look for advice, but that would be a lie. That said……
Over the years, there were several instances in which my daughters would come to me and tell me that other students in their classes were cheating. EVERY time, I would tell them basically the same thing,” It doesn’t matter what everyone else is doing. WE DON’T CHEAT. If you don’t get as good a grade as them, that just means that you need to study harder. We go about things the right way. ”
But now I wonder, if by holding them to a higher standard than some of their classmates, was I tilting the playing field against them? Was I forcing them to play the game according to a set of rules that very few others were playing by?
I mean, I understand the lofty goal of taking the high road, doing the right thing, manning (or in their case “girling”) up, being a stand-up kind of guy so on and so forth, but is that type of idealism DEAD? Is it wrong to even teach it?
Is it just me, or does it seem that cheating has become more and more a part of the American mindset over the years? Is it still true that cheaters never win? Or have the cheaters taken over the game to the point where we all have to cheat at it just to compete?
Case in point, let’s look at all of the cheating scandals that have come to light over the last couple of years:
1) Harvard: http://nyti.ms/1i4FZ3N
2) Air Force: http://cnn.it/1m87TLX
Sure, these people got CAUGHT, but the bigger story lies in the question of whether or not they only STARTED cheating in their current situations, or is it more likely that they cheated to get TO that situation? How about those that didn’t get caught.? I’m sure that if we knew the whole story, the numbers would indicate that it is much more widespread (and accepted?) than we thought. I mean nowadays, cheating people out of money is almost considered a viable biz practice.
Does this lead to a bigger conversations regarding cheating within/between large corporations?
Anyway, I was just curious as to what you guys think of this? Is it just my imagination?
( Sorry about all the questions today. Chalk it up to the 5 cups of coffee coursing through my veins atop and sending my natural ADHD into overdrive.)
Daddy's Doing Hair?!?!? 