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“Intensive parenting is a way for especially affluent white mothers to make sure their children are maintaining their advantaged position in society,” said Jess

“Intensive parenting is a way for especially affluent white mothers to make sure their children are maintaining their advantaged position in society,” said Jessica Calarco, a sociologist at Indiana University and author of “Negotiating Opportunities: How the Middle Class Secures Advantages in School.” I guess especially affluent mother of color don't do this? NYT conflating race and class to divide people again.

JoeAltmaier 8y ago
Agreed. Affluent mothers feed their kids well too. And give them proper medical care. And live in places safer for kids to grow up. It's actually the reason we try to make more money. Its not a game; we earn so we can live better. That's how its supposed to work.
- Pulcinella 8y ago
  Perhaps all children should receive good medical care, good food, and safe places to live.
  - JoeAltmaier 8y ago
    There is some minimum societal level of care that we could attain of course. Enlightened self-interest and whatnot. What is the limit? Are we there yet? Doesn't ever seem to be part of the discussion - just hearing ivory-tower claims that everything is possible and nothing is too much.
darkerside 8y ago
Yeah, that's upsetting. If I were paranoid, I'd consider whether it were intentional brainwashing designed to perpetuate the superiority of the white race. Of course, I'm not paranoid, so I don't think it's intentional at all. But, I do think it may have that unintended effect.
- telchar 8y ago
  I think it's become a meme, something many writers use without considering whether both affluence AND race are significant in a given situation. They often are and so I suspect some people use them together without thinking in situations when they're not.
- barry-cotter 8y ago
  Oh come on. They’re just doing the traditional American thing of dividing everybody into two groups and acting as if that’s all the important diversity politically. Before the groups were white and black. Now they’re black and not black. NYT reporters read Asians as white in every important sense. http://www2.law.ucla.edu/volokh/asian.htm http://www2.law.ucla.edu/volokh/asian.htm > Asians are now white. > Don't believe me? A recent MSNBC news headline announced a "Plunge in Minority University Enrollment" at the University of California, with UC Berkeley reporting that "minority admissions had declined 61 percent." Actually, the total percentage of racial minority students at Berkeley, Asians included, fell from 57% to 49%. If you exclude the burgeoning group of people who decline to state their race, the minority percentage fell only three percentage points, from 61% to 58%.
  - turtlecloud 8y ago
    I agree. As a former reader of the NYT, it infuriates me how they are portraying different groups in America and playing off the identity game. If the citizens of this country primarily identify as American then the NYT would have nothing to write about /s The Asian American point is a very interesting thing I too have been following the past few years.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - wasted 8y ago
      If you’ve been paying attention, the manner of social justice sexism pandering and race-baiting follows, almost to the letter, the pattern of the child pornography moral panic. It starts from the position of a comparatively rare bird (child molestor) as villain, and agitates the moral high ground so that people auto-polarize to the only tenable side. Then, the bandwagon get crowded, and casual conversation fatigue sets in, first at the water cooler, then the dinner table. Child molestors are everywhere. They’re hoarding jpegs on their laptops. Everyone’s a suspect. You’re either with us or against us. Throw them in jail, even the inmates hate them so it’ll be an instant death sentence. Serves them right. Scarlet letter registries, because there’s so many child molestors. Make them go door to door, but keep them a thousand feet from schools, because that’s where they molest children. When the panic fatigue starts to eat at people, and they get tired of the two minute hate, that’s when things get interesting, because to break with the party line is to question authority. How do you question moral authority? Are you advocating child molestation? Are you suggesting a molested child is no big deal? Are YOU a child molestor? Now take the next bracket of boogie man (neo nazi klansmen) and repeat. Seriously how many KKK neo nazis have you ever met? How many child molestors? And yet here we are, moral panic, fever pitch. So keep going until, what? What’s the end game? Maybe there is none? Just constant infighting as a steady state? Yeah, probably. Gotta stay perpetually vigilant in case zombie Hitler returns from the dead to kill us all. So there’s this angry mob constantly on the prowl, witch hunts for child molestors, witch hunts for bigots. But the mechanism is the same. Scare tactics with a handful of examples. Stereotype the villain. Demarcate the moral high ground. Send out citizen militias to patrol and brainwash. What do we get? A captive audience? More viewers for each spectacle? More lemmings to compound the number of spectacles? But it’s not just some ad money feedback loop. It’s there to keep people in line and afraid.
asdff 8y ago
NYT isn't conflating race and class here, Jessica Calarco is.
- darkerside 8y ago
  You're responsible as a publication for what quotations you choose to run and how they are framed

JoeAltmaier 8y ago

Agreed. Affluent mothers feed their kids well too. And give them proper medical care. And live in places safer for kids to grow up. It's actually the reason we try to make more money. Its not a game; we earn so we can live better. That's how its supposed to work.

Pulcinella 8y ago
Perhaps all children should receive good medical care, good food, and safe places to live.
- JoeAltmaier 8y ago
  There is some minimum societal level of care that we could attain of course. Enlightened self-interest and whatnot. What is the limit? Are we there yet? Doesn't ever seem to be part of the discussion - just hearing ivory-tower claims that everything is possible and nothing is too much.

darkerside 8y ago

Yeah, that's upsetting. If I were paranoid, I'd consider whether it were intentional brainwashing designed to perpetuate the superiority of the white race. Of course, I'm not paranoid, so I don't think it's intentional at all. But, I do think it may have that unintended effect.

telchar 8y ago
I think it's become a meme, something many writers use without considering whether both affluence AND race are significant in a given situation. They often are and so I suspect some people use them together without thinking in situations when they're not.
barry-cotter 8y ago
Oh come on. They’re just doing the traditional American thing of dividing everybody into two groups and acting as if that’s all the important diversity politically. Before the groups were white and black. Now they’re black and not black. NYT reporters read Asians as white in every important sense. http://www2.law.ucla.edu/volokh/asian.htm http://www2.law.ucla.edu/volokh/asian.htm > Asians are now white. > Don't believe me? A recent MSNBC news headline announced a "Plunge in Minority University Enrollment" at the University of California, with UC Berkeley reporting that "minority admissions had declined 61 percent." Actually, the total percentage of racial minority students at Berkeley, Asians included, fell from 57% to 49%. If you exclude the burgeoning group of people who decline to state their race, the minority percentage fell only three percentage points, from 61% to 58%.
- turtlecloud 8y ago
  I agree. As a former reader of the NYT, it infuriates me how they are portraying different groups in America and playing off the identity game. If the citizens of this country primarily identify as American then the NYT would have nothing to write about /s The Asian American point is a very interesting thing I too have been following the past few years.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - wasted 8y ago
    If you’ve been paying attention, the manner of social justice sexism pandering and race-baiting follows, almost to the letter, the pattern of the child pornography moral panic. It starts from the position of a comparatively rare bird (child molestor) as villain, and agitates the moral high ground so that people auto-polarize to the only tenable side. Then, the bandwagon get crowded, and casual conversation fatigue sets in, first at the water cooler, then the dinner table. Child molestors are everywhere. They’re hoarding jpegs on their laptops. Everyone’s a suspect. You’re either with us or against us. Throw them in jail, even the inmates hate them so it’ll be an instant death sentence. Serves them right. Scarlet letter registries, because there’s so many child molestors. Make them go door to door, but keep them a thousand feet from schools, because that’s where they molest children. When the panic fatigue starts to eat at people, and they get tired of the two minute hate, that’s when things get interesting, because to break with the party line is to question authority. How do you question moral authority? Are you advocating child molestation? Are you suggesting a molested child is no big deal? Are YOU a child molestor? Now take the next bracket of boogie man (neo nazi klansmen) and repeat. Seriously how many KKK neo nazis have you ever met? How many child molestors? And yet here we are, moral panic, fever pitch. So keep going until, what? What’s the end game? Maybe there is none? Just constant infighting as a steady state? Yeah, probably. Gotta stay perpetually vigilant in case zombie Hitler returns from the dead to kill us all. So there’s this angry mob constantly on the prowl, witch hunts for child molestors, witch hunts for bigots. But the mechanism is the same. Scare tactics with a handful of examples. Stereotype the villain. Demarcate the moral high ground. Send out citizen militias to patrol and brainwash. What do we get? A captive audience? More viewers for each spectacle? More lemmings to compound the number of spectacles? But it’s not just some ad money feedback loop. It’s there to keep people in line and afraid.

asdff 8y ago

NYT isn't conflating race and class here, Jessica Calarco is.

darkerside 8y ago
You're responsible as a publication for what quotations you choose to run and how they are framed