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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
You should know enough by now to know that public schools are not all the same.
I went to diverse public schools until college and was glad to be exposed to everybody. I found that the worst effect of segregating adolescents away from the real world, the formation of popularity-based hierarchies with defined in- and out-groups, goes away when the student population is too large and too diverse to be confined in a linear hierarchy. As I told adults about my school, "Columbine couldn't happen here."
I'm sorry that you had a difficult time navigating the public schools. I got a 1420 SAT score when I was 12 (if we're going to talk about scores), and my middle school arranged for me to take math at the high school, and the high school principal arranged for me to graduate in three years. Of course, my mom was my teacher and advocate, especially in the early years, but the schools were more than happy to help. In fact, it was the high school principal's idea to accelerate me through HS.
I'm also sorry that you feel so negatively about "retards." It's definitely not true that they are beyond help. My brother was severely learning-disabled when he was young, but through intensive tutoring, he's reached the point now where he's navigating college and looking at an independent career. A lot of his improvement was due to my mom's efforts, but the school's willingness to assist and mainstream him was crucial. I think that if a school has to make a choice between special education and programs for advanced kids, perhaps it is better to help those who need help to merely function independently in society. I and the other advanced kids would have turned out OK regardless, but every special ed kid you can educate potentially represents one less person in jail or on the public dole.
Why are women excoriated for having household help and staying at home? I think they're pretty lucky of you ask me. Instead of running around rabidly cleaning and cooking when the baby sleeps (as all the child rearing books proclaim a mother should do) or, on the other end, letting all go to pot, they can enrich themselves in the manner that they please. If this means writing, then great. If this means spending a few more hours reading or catching up on their entrepreneurial ventures, then, well, great for that too.
In the past, stay-at-home mothers had servants, often more than one. They weren't expected to do everything themselves. There was also community and safe places for children to run wild in the streets. You knew who your neighbors were, and people often kepts eyes on each others' children. Now, such community efforts are few and far between as we further isolate ourselves in our large roosts with bigger and bigger lawns and taller and taller fences.
Now at-home mothers are expected to hold up the entire load singlehandedly. If they do it with some help, then they aren't really mothering their children -- as many have expressed here. They're frauds, because they refuse to present themselves as burnt offerings where self-sacrifice defines the self in the eyes of all the mothers in the same misery-loves-company boat.
And I believe Caitlin Flannagan has fallen into the trap of believing the dross that she peddles rather than fess up to the notion that she actually lives a pretty charmed life. She isn't fooling anyone. Most women don't fall into one striated camp or another, they work sometimes, or always, they may be lucky enough to stay at home if that's what they want. Let's just call it what it is and get on with things. Like dinner, because our 7:00 pm conference calls aren;t letting up these days.
...then she would have not disappeared into compulsive homemaking to escape my authoritarian father. And would have had the means to kick his sorry ass out the door. And, we, her children would felt her strength and protectiveness and admired her instead of trying to pretend that homemade meals and hospital corners on our perfectly made beds were worth her subjugation.
50% of marriages fail.
Single mothers with children make up our poverty statistics.
Women are free when they have the ability to support themselves. Stay at home with the kiddies long enough and you will be unmarketable and not be able to make a life elsewhere should your life implode.
Work.
Flanagan Works.
That she works is key.
It doesn't matter if it's writing essays or assembling widgets at the kitchen table or going to an office. Women need to have some means of support other than their husbands. Period. To me that's feminism--and Flanagan is a feminist, even if she is annoying.
"I found that the worst effect of segregating adolescents away from the real world, the formation of popularity-based hierarchies with defined in- and out-groups, goes away when the student population is too large and too diverse to be confined in a linear hierarchy."
Yeah, that's why large schools don't have any cliques. Or dependent clauses.
"As I told adults about my school, 'Columbine couldn't happen here.'"
Wow. The null hypothesis. And sisnce it hasn't happened yet, you must be a fucking genius.
"I got a 1420 SAT score when I was 12 (if we're going to talk about scores)"
Prove it. So far your inability to establish a cogent line of reasoning (and later, your grammar) leads me to believe you're full of shit.
"In fact, it was the high school principal's idea to accelerate me through HS."
I bet a lot of people are happy to get you out of their way in a hurry.
"I'm also sorry that you feel so negatively about "retards." It's definitely not true that they are beyond help. My brother was severely learning-disabled when he was young"
A retard isn't the same thing as having a learning disability. Any retard could tell you that.
"I think that if a school has to make a choice between special education and programs for advanced kids, perhaps it is better to help those who need help to merely function independently in society."
Why does it always have to be "either/or"?
"I and the other advanced kids would have turned out OK regardless, but every special ed kid you can educate potentially represents one less person in jail or on the public dole."
Or, as we 1420s are fond of saying, "The other advanced kids and I..."
And thanks for taking offense at the term "retards" then essentially labeling every one of them as potential jailbirds or welfare hounds. Nice.
And thanks, too, for the assumption that all self-identified smart kids always turn out OK.
You are so full of shit your eyes are brown. I'd rather hang out with your brother.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Once seen as a lunatic fringe, reactionary anti-women groups are courting respectability
Salon headlines in your mailbox
