Ezra's being snarky, but snark aside there is a deep current of "young people need to have their character built by trials-by-fire." It's rather nauseating especially when it comes from people who, you know, didn't sign up to go kill a bunch of people themselves.
More generally I really don't get the "they're children until they're 18 and then, magically, they need to face the cold hard reality of life as adults" attitude which seems to be pervasive in our culture.
