Screaming at children over their grades, especially to the point of the child’s tears, is child abuse, pure and simple. It’s not funny and it’s not good parenting. It is a crushing, scarring, disastrous experience for the child. It isn’t the least bit funny.

Stein’s statement condemns a culturally familiar form of “achievement pressure” by reclassifying it as abuse rather than discipline or humor. By emphasizing tears and lasting psychological harm (“crushing, scarring, disastrous”), he argues that the damage is not merely momentary but formative, shaping a child’s sense of safety and self-worth. The repeated insistence that it “isn’t… funny” pushes back against social normalization—jokes about parents berating kids for grades, or the idea that harshness produces excellence. The quote’s moral force lies in its clarity: adult frustration and status anxiety do not justify intimidation, and academic performance should never be leveraged through fear.