I'm struggling, this week, with how to engage in conversation with people who are making sweeping generalizations with which I disagree. Specifically, sweeping generalizations that claim that everyone is going about things the wrong way (where "everyone" has at different times been used to mean all parents, all Americans, all Progressives, or all members of a club I belong to) when, in fact, there are many people (myself included) who are *not* doing things the way the speaker assumes "everyone" does. (Sometimes I also disagree with the assertion that the mainstream way is necessarily *wrong* -- I agree that it's not right for everyone, and it's important to recognize that and have other options available, but there are also plenty of people for whom the mainstream approach genuinely works just fine.)

Yeah, it's partly my ego raging against being lumped in with goobers. But it's also partly about being able to take part in the conversation authentically, allowing myself to acknowledge that my experience (with school, with academia, with the decision to stay home with my daughter, with particular group dynamics, or whathaveyou) is different from the experience of the other people in the discussion but is equally valid.

I don't know how to present my viewpoint without squelching other people's enthusiasm for whatever new idea or approach it is that's gotten them all revved up, or without coming across as a special snowflake.