privilege as a meme

Brad Pitt is hot, but whatever. Meatloaf is dece. I'm so sick of "Where Is My Mind" in film soundtracks.

I think that was one of the first uses of that song in a movie. I know it's been used more but I just associate it with that movie now.

i wonder if by "clockwork orange" the original post meant the movie, the book, or the book w/ the original ending, all of which are fairly different

i agree w/ difficult listening hour that catcher is painfully out of place in the list

Ugh holden caulfield is a prime blueprint alt-right wannabe fuckboy. How many assassins is that book linked to? The book is fine, but for it to be a modern guy's favorite???

Seeing your reaction, I suggest you RUN from such a guy!

Ha, it's ok. I make do with giving a mild side eye everytime some guys says they love to read and then lists one of these books as their favorite. Of. All. Time.

Just knowing what's your favorite book Of. All. Time. is a good indication you haven't read all that many books.

A lot of guys are this stupid, immature. RUN.

who gives a shit what movies or music or books people like

My all time favorite book is the Turner Diaries, but only because of the crystalline prose.

I don't see how Fight Club could be anyone's favorite movie, I feel like movies with "twists" don't really hold up (for me anyway), feels like saying Sixth Sense is my favorite movie or something....

ppl should decide whether or not they enjoy stuff based on what they imagine would look good on a dating site

my favorite movie is The Room but I identify most with Denny

My favorite tv show and book are Sex and the City and my favorite movie is Sex and the City 2.

But my favorite fictional character is Private Pyle in Full Metal Jacket.

well this sure was a thing that somebody felt they had to write

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/jun/04/incel-movement-literary-classics-behind-misogyny

Lit majors are required to act as if the world were driven by literature. Much as I love to read classics and literature of all kinds, its effect of the world at large is weak, vague and imprecise at best, and non-existent for the vast majority of people. To be honest, Ayn Rand seems to have more obvious real world effects than any of the books that article mentions.

having a great aul run on this term round the place today did an article run on it this week again or what

literally assigning an adversity # to college kids *chef finger thing*

link plz lol

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/sat-add-adversity-score-will-factor-student-hardships-college-admissions-n1006571

I think this could be a good thing, because it does an end run around recent conservative victories against affirmative action. Socio-economic factors will correlate to race to a significant degree and should be able to withstand court challenges.

Because my school district (a district of NYC) is going through a "diversity plan" process, I decided to listen to a couple episodes of this podcast -- Courtney Mykytyn (who, I didn't realize, just died a couple days ago) was mentioned as a significant activist on these issues

https://integratedschools.org/podcast/ep-16-too-bad-just-fine-whiteness-centered/

I came away with a very uncomfortable feeling about the whole thing -- it feels to me like is approaching a religious cult, where the focus is on self-purification and "not being complicit" in anything that can possibly be perceived as wrong. In another episode, the hosts tied themselves in knots about how even sending your kid to a poor minority school can be "opportunity hoarding" if you treat it as an experience primarily to benefit your kid (tbh I don't know if I'm relating this correctly bc I didn't understand it), but then at the same time, you also have to avoid the "white savior" mentality where you are sending your kid there to help the other kids, so somehow you are supposed to walk "down the middle" between these two things but I have no idea how that's supposed to happen.

In the linked episode, a listener asked when a school is "too bad," i.e. when it's ok not to send your white privileged kid or pull them out, and the answer basically boils down to "never." One of the hosts (or guests?) said her child cried every day coming home from school and they didn't pull her out. As long as some child is forced to go to that school, if you say it's not good enough for your kid, you are placing your kid above that kid and saying they are better or special, and that's evil. Which has a sort of internal logic to it but is unliveable and unworkable in reality.

imagine the memoirs twenty years from now

I run in the same circles as Mykytyn in LA but never met her. Her death last week hit people pretty hard. She was incredibly thoughtful about this stuff and apparently about all aspects of parenting. I think her ideas come across a little clearer in writing. The general point that you’re not necessarily doing a school a favour by sending your kids there and being involved, and that it depends on your definition of “involved” seems sound. I think in practice (at least in LA) the kind of people who most need to hear that already moved out of LAUSD or sent their kids to private school though.

Here’s an obit btw https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/school-integration-activist-dies-at-46/2020/01/04/9d22af06-2e57-11ea-9b60-817cc18cf173_story.html

Also the public school situation wrt diversity, funding, etc. in LA is very different (much worse) to that in New York and while her org was nominally national I get the feeling her ideas were very influenced by circumstances in LA.

One last thing: if you haven’t read it, this is a fantastic (and subtle and sensitive) piece imo https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/12/magazine/choosing-a-school-for-my-daughter-in-a-segregated-city.html

The general point that you’re not necessarily doing a school a favour by sending your kids there and being involved, and that it depends on your definition of “involved” seems sound

Maybe it is, but then why do it?

Don't do it for your kids' sake. Don't do it for other kids' sake. Why do it?

I am familiar with Hannah-Jones's work.

As a reporter, I’d witnessed how the presence of even a handful of middle-class families made it less likely that a school would be neglected.

So isn't that just "white savior"ism (except not "white" in this case but affluent)?

Don't do it for your kids' sake. Don't do it for other kids' sake. Why do it?

to expunge the sin from yr soul

I think the concern she had is that a certain kind of parent sends their kid to the local elementary school (always the elementary school, they go private for middle and high) with the idea that it’s a culturally improving exchange for everyone involved and elementary school is low stakes. But because they know how to do it, they aggressively advocate for their own kid at the expense of other (more needy?) kids in the school while they’re there. I can she why she’d end up focussed on this issue because it’s a particular problem in LA.

the idea of sending my kids to private school horrifies me. equally the idea of putting my kids into a terrible school where problem behaviour isn't addressed also horrifies me. the idea that i would get to weigh up this option is privilege. relative to what other parents' options are it's a privilege that's borderline obscene. i'm really grateful i don't live in a place where i have to make these decisions.

I am familiar with Hannah-Jones's work.

/As a reporter, I’d witnessed how the presence of even a handful of middle-class families made it less likely that a school would be neglected./

So isn't that just "white savior"ism (except not "white" in this case but affluent)?

who are these people who aggressively advocate for things at their kids' schools? who has time/energy for this?? i mean hats off to those who do i guess, if it's advocacy that helps the school at large but yes i can see big-time why that would be a mark of privilege. that said in my neighbourhood in london there is a not-insubstantial contingent of busybody working class mums (it's always mums) who are nobody's picture of privilege but who are constantly up in the head teacher's grill, pestering her about everything. i'm grateful for them tbh.

In another episode, the hosts tied themselves in knots about how even sending your kid to a poor minority school can be "opportunity hoarding" if you treat it as an experience primarily to benefit your kid (tbh I don't know if I'm relating this correctly bc I didn't understand it), but then at the same time, you also have to avoid the "white savior" mentality where you are sending your kid there to help the other kids, so somehow you are supposed to walk "down the middle" between these two things but I have no idea how that's supposed to happen.

i haven't heard the episode so obv i have no idea about how they discussed these things.

but is it possible that what you're hearing as "don't do this" and "don't do that" is closer to "be aware that some parents do this" and "be aware that some parents do that"?

I think the concern she had is that a certain kind of parent sends their kid to the local elementary school (always the elementary school, they go private for middle and high).

it sounds like, especially with "even sending your kid to a poor minority school can be "opportunity hoarding" if you treat it as an experience primarily to benefit your kid", you kind of extrapolated what they said into "if you think this should be a good thing for your kid, you're wrong"

who are these people who aggressively advocate for things at their kids' schools? who has time/energy for this?? i mean hats off to those who do i guess, if it's advocacy that helps the school at large but yes i can see big-time why that would be a mark of privilege. that said in my neighbourhood in london there is a not-insubstantial contingent of busybody working class mums (it's always mums) who are nobody's picture of privilege but who are constantly up in the head teacher's grill, pestering her about everything. i'm grateful for them tbh.

but is it possible that what you're hearing as "don't do this" and "don't do that" is closer to "be aware that some parents do this" and "be aware that some parents do that"?

― But guess what? Nobody gives a toot!😂 (Karl Malone), Tuesday, 7 January 2020 16:24 (twenty-two minutes ago) link

As far as the other episode, one of them literally said you should never pull your child out of a school and never reject a school as "too bad." Another host was slightly more measured about it, but only slightly.

since moving to Paris we've sent our kids to schools where they've been pretty much the only white kid, because these are the local schools. The laws give these schools considerable extra funding, so class sizes are smaller and "the best" teachers get recruited there. I have colleagues who fight/cheat to get their kids into "the best" schools but I scorn all parents who do that kind of thing; and those who move "because of the schools", usually to some loathsome suburb; but that's more a usa thing afaict.

the idea of sending my kids to private school horrifies me. equally the idea of putting my kids into a terrible school where problem behaviour isn't addressed also horrifies me. the idea that i would get to weigh up this option is privilege. relative to what other parents' options are it's a privilege that's borderline obscene. i'm really grateful i don't live in a place where i have to make these decisions.

― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Tuesday, January 7, 2020 11:16 AM (thirty-two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

But living in a place where you don't have to make those decisions is the very same "borderline obscene" privilege.

since moving to Paris we've sent our kids to schools where they've been pretty much the only white kid, because these are the local schools. The laws give these schools considerable extra funding, so class sizes are smaller and "the best" teachers get recruited there. I have colleagues who fight/cheat to get their kids into "the best" schools but I scorn all parents who do that kind of thing; and those who move "because of the schools", usually to some loathsome suburb; but that's more a usa thing afaict.

― juntos pedemos (Euler), Tuesday, January 7, 2020 11:49 AM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

That's another topic the podcast addresses. They call this the "hidden gem" narrative, which basically means being a parent who sends your kid to a "hidden gem" mostly minority school that is "actually much better than people think" by the same "privileged" standards. This is also not ok. You have to be willing to send your child to a school that is actually bad.

But yeah things are diff in the USA, and also wildly different by state/municipality/school district.

Is it ok to homeschool your kid if you do a really shitty job at it?

yeah I didn't know these schools are "actually" good! I just followed where we were assigned by the city/académie.

nb until hs I went to bused schools in the deep south which were violent places of disregard for education and it didn't matter for my education, so I'm pretty nonchalant about these things for my own kids. feel like a lot of white american parents overthink schooling, probably because their parents did so and it was a formative stressful experience

that's one of the things i'm trying to keep in mind as we get ready for this (eldest is still a toddler, but it's coming): the strongest predictor of any kid's "success" (for pretty much any definition, from the bringing up bebe free range kids view to the "must go to stanford" view) is the economic circs and education of the parents. and honestly we're rich and overeducated.

if you find it frustrating to hear someone tie themselves in knots trying to figure out if using their privilege to dismantle privilege is privileged or whatever then take what you need and leave the rest. i'm glad she did the work she did.

(i mentioned the hannah-jones piece btw because if you talk to Integrated Schools it's literally among the first couple of things they suggest you read. the list might be interesting https://integratedschools.org/resources/)

In full disclosure I am following this topic because they are proposing changing the way middle school is done in my own school dist (kids are elementary school right now) in ways that could include dezoning, which would mean sending my kids 45 minutes on public transit to schools I consider "actually bad."

feel like a lot of white american parents overthink schooling

I heartily agree. otoh, gabbneb would disagree.

I also attended a busing school and a mostly black magnet school fwiw, and had good experiences. But that doesn't mean I think I would have been ok attending any school on the planet no matter the problems there.