One privilege my kids have is parents that can shower them with so many things to exercise their intellectual abilities, including love, time and means.
I think of the gap between my childhood and their own. My mother was attentive and 100% dedicated to baby me, but she didn't have money or means, and life was generally hard.
So my children and me both got love, but means makes so much of a difference.
Having educated parents is also a giant privilege. I didn't have that.
This house has over 1000 books. Not only are these kids expected to read, but it's...safe. They read what they want and take their minds in their preferred direction. That choice is amazing.
My life changed when as an 11-year-old child I got real access to a library. I started eating books. A common joke with my dad was "you are always reading." (He was so proud but didn't know how to express it)
There was this entire world for me to discover in books.
Anyway, I was thinking about the push to ban certain books for kids, and to control the useful knowledge they have access to. For kids without means, that will limit the world they'll be able to discover, and their place in it.
Sorry for the stream of thought thread.
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The amount of black PhDs and accomplished professionals I've seen on this platform dismissed as undeserving is mind blowing.
The ones that are embraced are often willing to toe the political line of being "not like the rest".
So some of us no longer really buy the lie of "meritocracy". We no longer have a desire to gain the approval of those for whom by being us, we'll never be good enough.
Malcolm X's words ring true to this day. And still, we rise.
It's been 5 years since Razib said this in 2017. I wonder if he'll pull it back or give the standard "5 more years".
They are not usually saying it's true. It's always just "it's an open question", and they always want policy and actions to take into account that "black" people are just genetically inferior.
The acceptance of this idea in the mainstream is telling.
We don't tend to do what we love the most, or what we could be best at. We do what is likely to make us the most money or see that our bills are paid.
That is such a loss to the world and ourselves.
I had another session teaching kids coding today. I really love teaching. Whether it's being a coding teacher, college teacher or chess coach.
But those were hard to get to or hard to make a good enough living from.
When you're the first of your generation to go to college or to get an advanced degree, the bar for what you have the luxury of doing is so much higher.
It's still a sacrifice though. We're rewarded with money at the cost of our dreams.
While skin color is immutable, skin color is not race. This idea misses the social formation and maintenance of racial categories and the structures around them.
This is not a lecture. We're all unlearning things we've been taught for centuries now.
The more we come to see the politics behind these categories, the more we can do to fight them.
When MLK said what he did in the 60s, the response was that there was little reason to protest. When activists make similar points today, they are told there's little reason to protest.
Yet, the material facts that drive the protests remain.
There was progress from MLK's birth to when he was protesting. There's been progress from his death to today.
Still, too many of the material facts driving protests remain. Social equality is still the aim.
The aim is still for a day when "race" predicts little about people's social outcomes. A day when a black child can grow up knowing that racism will have little meaningful impact on their life.