I don't read the article as glorifying stress, merely acknowledging it.

Edit: on closer inspection, this is an example of the uncanny power of titles to focus attention, magician-style, on only one thing. Certainly Levchin didn't write the title and the interviewer probably didn't either. We shouldn't pick the most provocative detail and then react exclusively to that.

I can almost guarantee that if the headline had singled out his fierce astronomer grandmother instead, the comments here would be about fierce astronomer grandmothers. Which come to think of it would be a lot better.