Rage Against…Grades? (Or Against Anti-Grade Zealots, Part III)

In my first post, I wrote: “Preliminary grade from me? B+” (emphasis added).

In my second, I wrote: “I understand that giving grades is premature and overly simplistic. I trust that most of our readers do, too. But Aaron, if the guys giving grades are just wasting time, what about the guys who write long posts opposing the guys who waste time giving grades?” (That was a joke.)

And I end my third by acknowledging that the entire exercise is “mental masturbation.”

And yet Aaron’s response is to pretend he’s caught me agreeing with him that these things are meaningless? Uh, uh. I agreed with Aaron from the beginning — in a sense before he even weighed in — that these grades are not something people ought to take seriously. I never imagined that anyone would take them seriously enough even to oppose them. Indeed it was that fact, and the rage-filled condemnation of the practice, that prompted me to offer my half-hearted “defense” of grades in the first place.

If Aaron’s Radio City post was an “A”, and his previous post was a gentleman’s “C,” then this latest one is an “F.”

Which means he’ll have to try again next year.

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