Drown proofing the "Organization Kids" *

Is this is the same Annie Lowrey that head-of-the-household Ezra Klein lists as an "unmarried partner" on his Census form? Things that make you go ... Hmm.

We are self-critical. We know that we would do well to think less about ourselves. We took pause at the painful irony of Opal Mehta-gate—the frenzy surrounding a book about an organization kid who learns to lighten up which was exposed as plaigarized and reviled in the media as the prototypical example of glory-mongering. The recent hunger strike for living wages showed that we as a student body want meaningful changes.

Largely, I went with the organization-kid tide at Harvard. I over-did extracurriculars and elbowed for internships. I joined Teach for America, which caters to organization kids just like Goldman Sachs does. But sometimes, I felt that sinking feeling as I did in the pool: The system is sick, because of the organization kid mentality. I overheard one student describe writing a thesis as “Hoopes-ing it up.” I saw one student cry with envy when another student won a Rhodes scholarship. I know someone who took a class hoping that the big name professor would help her with an internship.

And I know I’m not alone in hoping that Harvard students can craft a healthier ethos. Knowing that you have a problem—and we do know it—is the precursor to change. If only Harvard required drown-proofing.

Annie M. Lowrey ’06-’07 is an English and American literature and language concentrator in Quincy House. She was a Crimson associate magazine chair in 2005

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* Before they take the rest of us down with them. "No Bail Outs" indeed is a bit like: "Reach or Throw: Don't Go."

In other words, take care not to endanger others in trying to save them, because some of these "Organization Kids" unfortunately never learned the value of real-life consequence in their boarding schools and Ivory schools. The lack of ethics, the mindlessness and competition for its own sake -- a rather foreshadowing article.

I think Ezra linked to the wrong piece by his unmarried partner today. But I understand: sometimes being so close to the source and interlinked and all, it's hard to be critical about the writing's worth. He's an incentive to plug her more recent work, afterall, if indeed this is the same woman.

ADDED:
Here's Brooks' original piece, that Lowrey references. If we're interested in bringing about change by treating the system, and not just messing around with fixing up the symptoms, this seems a good place to start...

The old order haunts this one, and whispers that maybe something was lost as well as gained when we sacrificed all for the sake of high achievement, safety, and equal opportunity. In some of the imposing old portraits, for example, I saw a moral gravity and a sense of duty that are missing from the faces of the recent presidents, who look like those friends of your parents who encouraged you to call them by their first names—friendly, unassuming guys in tweed jackets. Those old Princetonians were not professional administrators ministering to professional students. The code of the meritocrat was not their code, and maybe in some ways theirs was the more demanding code. For the most striking contrast between that elite and this one is that its members were relatively unconcerned with academic achievement but went to enormous lengths to instill character. We, on the other hand, place enormous emphasis on achievement but are tongue-tied and hesitant when it comes to what makes for a virtuous life.
...
When it comes to character and virtue, these young people have been left on their own. Today's go-getter parents and today's educational institutions work frantically to cultivate neural synapses, to foster good study skills, to promote musical talents. We fly our children around the world so that they can experience different cultures. We spend huge amounts of money on safety equipment and sports coaching. We sermonize about the evils of drunk driving. We expend enormous energy guiding and regulating their lives. But when it comes to character and virtue, the most mysterious area of all, suddenly the laissez-faire ethic rules: You're on your own, Jack and Jill; go figure out what is true and just for yourselves.
...
This young man took me to lunch in his college dining room, and when I asked him about character-building, he spoke more comfortably and thoughtfully than anybody else I had met. He wasn't easy on himself, the way supercharged achievers have a tendency to be. "Egotism is the biggest challenge here," he said. "It can make you proud if you do well. It can make you self-assured and self-sufficient. You don't need help from other people. You won't need help from your wife. You won't give yourself over to her when you are married." He went on, talking calmly but faster than I could write. He was talking in a language different from that of the meritocrat—about what one is, rather than what one does. He really did stand out from the other students, who were equally smart and equally accomplished but who hadn't been raised with a vocabulary of virtue and vice.