Going back to the topic of the thread, one piece of "advice" I heard that really annoyed me was from my 7th grade math teacher who thought telling her students, "Life's not fair" was some kind of earth-shattering but "Chicken Soup for the Soul" like wisdom that she was passing on to her students who would remember it for the rest of their lives.
I guess it worked, because I thought that was the most B.S. advice I ever received, and I still do now. At the time, I was growing up poor, and my best friend had moved away a year ago back leaving me to deal with my classmates that I really didn't held to high esteem and like wise. So that "advice" wasn't exactly a stunning revelation to me.
Besides, if you were to use that reasoning, then blacks shouldn't have fought for their civil rights, feminists shouldn't have fought for gender equality, and gays shouldn't be pushing for legalizing gay marriage because "life's not fair", you know.
Just because life's unfair, it doesn't need to stay that way, Mrs. Allen.