Category: Social & Political Issues

Paul Sheldon pointed out to me a recent op/ed piece published in the New York Times by an Oregon high school senior, who tells of the many times in visiting college campuses that she heard the tour guide compare some aspect of the school to Hogwarts, which I understand is the imaginary school for apprentice practitioners of supernatural arts in the Harry Potter children’s books. 

Some examples of what Lauren Edelsen encountered:

• “…he points to a nearby field and mentions the sport students play there: a flightless version of J. K. Rowling’s Quidditch game — broomsticks and all.” (Middlebury)
• “…the admissions officer compared the intramural sports competitions there to the Hogwarts House Cup.  The tour guide told me that I wouldn’t be able to see the university’s huge freshman dining hall as it was closed for the day, but to just imagine Hogwarts’s Great Hall in its place.”  (Harvard)
• “…a tour guide ushered my group past a large, wood-paneled room filled with comfortable chairs and mentioned the Hogwarts feel it was known for.” (Dartmouth)

And on and on about other pretty laughable, if pathetic examples of colleges touting their Potteresque qualities. 

First off, hats off to Lauren for expressing her disappointment that the schools were connecting to children’s literature to sell themselves.  Universities should be creating free-thinking adults, not indulging the passions of childhood.

Now to put the information presented in this article into a broader context, which is the infantilization of American adulthood over the past 40 years.   Infantilization means to make someone into an infant in appearance or behavior, in this case, for adults to retain the habits and predilections of childhood which are in fact made for children.

I’m talking about adults in late 20th century and early 21st century America behaving like children and enjoying the entertainments of their childhood.   Some examples:

• Disney’s EPCOT Center, a theme park for adults, opened in 1982 and since then the growth in popularity of all theme parks among adults has skyrocketed.  It is absolutely amazing how many adults now go to theme parks for vacation.
• Around the mid-70s, there began a wave of children’s movies for adults, starting with the “Star Wars” and the Indiana Jones series.  Other children’s movies for adults are the movie versions of situation comedies for children such as “The Brady Bunch.” (But I’m not talking about “The Simpsons,” which like “Gulliver’s Travels” and “Huckleberry Finn,” is an adult entertainment that children can also enjoy.)
• The hundreds of computer games for adults.
• Glorified fast-food chains serving alcohol with video and other games for adults, such as Dave & Busters.
• The intervention of parents into the play lives of their children, e.g., over-organization by parents of all activities of children.

There is also some infantilization in the growth of experts to help us manage our lives such as closet consultants, professional organizers, party planners, life coaches, college selection consultants, etc.  The rise of the “Age of the Expert” results from a variety of social and economic forces, but one of them certainly is this trend of adults behaving like children (looking for an adult to tell them what to do).

Over the next few days/weeks/months/years, I’m going to try to identify and write about other aspects of the “infantilization of adult” trend.

Yesterday’s announcement that Citigroup is repaying the $20 billion it owes the federal government in TARP (aka  “bailout”) funds rightfully focused on the news that yet another bank was returning the loan.  Many new stories–but not all and none of the shorter ones–also mentioned the curious fact that Citigroup was going to sell $20.5 billion in stock to finance the return of the money. 

No one yet has connected the dots between these two facts, so let’s do it now as Socrates would have, which means we’ll ask a series of questions to which we already know the answers.

1. Why is Citigroup returning the money?  So they can have more flexibility in giving bonuses to executives (now that the crisis has passed).
2. Why is Citigroup floating stock?  So they can pay off the TARP funds.
3. What then are the new investors into Citigroup investing in?  Bonuses for executives.  

By buying the new stock, investors will water down the stock (since there will be more shares out now for a company worth the same, so each share represents a smaller piece than before).  The investment will also facilitate an increase in the company’s cost structure since it will enable the company to give out those bonuses.

I’m not a stock picker and I don’t give stock advice, but I don’t mind telling readers that I won’t be buying any of the new Citigroup stock.

I have been rereading the updated 1972 edition of Fernand Braudel’s The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II, which originally appeared in 1949.  Some of Braudel’s conclusions about economic and political trends of the 16th century resonate today.

I’m just at page 470 (of about 1,200 pages!) and here’s what I’ve already learned about the 1500s in the Mediterranean region and the wider world:

• The last countries entering any industry tended to quickly dominate older players.
• When regional or national economies started to get strong banking industries, it tended to weaken and eventually drive out other industries and commerce.
• In the trade between the west (Europe) and the east (Asia), hard currency, which in those days comprised gold and silver, tended always to flow to the east.
• Worldwide weather changes (the beginning of “The Little Ice Age”) had profound effects on local and international economies and on the way people lived.

All four of these observations apply to the current situation.  Strange as it may seem, the U.S. is repeating many of the mistakes of 16th century Spain.

I have never thought to compare the current age to the 16th century.  Nor do I believe that these four observations on the 16th century demonstrate that we are living through its rerun. 

What I do think is that Braudel’s observations are truisms of economics and politics that transcend centuries and levels of economic development.  It’s a shame that we never seem to learn the lessons of history.

And here’s another truism that I know will dominate much of the rest of the book (as I remember from my reading of Braudel some 25 years ago):  a sure way to deplete your nation’s treasury and destroy your economy is to fight a distant war against a smaller but highly motivated foe on that foe’s land.

I’m referring to the 80-year war between Spain and its unhappy possession, the Netherlands, which started in 1568.  The similarities to Viet Nam, Iraq and Afghanistan are compelling and disheartening.

In this past Sunday’s “Week in Review” section, New York Times’ food writer Mark Bittman describes the shared emotions of millions of people when approaching the task of cooking the sacred and sacrificial bird of late November.  Does Bittman describe an experience of joy?  Or the satisfaction of completing an important family task?  Or reverence for a tradition?

No, what Bittman says we Americans feel when roasting a turkey is extreme anxiety in our efforts to “become The Next Food Network Star or, just as difficult, the fantasy version of your grandmother.”

Here is some language Bittman uses to make the reader feel the anxiety of having to roast a turkey is a terror similar to what Polanski made people feel in “Repulsion” (in his pre-child molesting days):

• “But Thanksgiving is a special challenge, one where panic, insecurity and worry…” (Note, too, the incorrect use of “where,” since a challenge is not a location.)
• “It’s scary and it’s a lot of work…”
• “Perhaps even more stressful…”
• “Put this all together, along with your own sense of inadequacy…”
• “Everyone is aware of the stress of Thanksgiving…”

The “you” that is either written or employed throughout the article stands for all of us: for “you” the collective whole of the (middle-class) American experience, and for you the individual reading the piece.

But in fact he makes it up.  His question at one point is “when did performance anxiety and guilt become prerequisites for offering family and friends nourishment…?”  It never did.  It’s something Bittman made up to sell the ideological subtext, which is both subtle and multi-pronged.  Let’s go to what I think are the key paragraphs for understanding the subtextual prescription of the article:

“Perhaps even more stressful is that in your role as The Modern Cook, you may feel obligated to make certain your food is politically and environmentally correct, or that you’re using only the “best” ingredients.

“Your grandmother did not have to worry about this; a turkey was a turkey. Your turkey, however, must be free range and organic, and your sweet potatoes should be heirloom and local.  Not only should you pick your own pumpkin, you should process it yourself (while hearing the voice of Martha Stewart say that she would never throw away the seeds — such a tragedy that would be!), and not only should you make your own fudge, but you should use the appropriate (fair trade and high cocoa content) chocolate. It’s a wonder you’re not making your own marshmallows, though Martha thinks perhaps you should.”

In other words, your anxiety comes down to the fear of failing to live up to today’s suddenly higher standards in food products and preparation.  Those standards actually reduce to a few important principles:

• Use organic and locally grown produce
• Cook from scratch as opposed to using cans and mixes.

Note that Bittman’s examples exaggerate in a semi-satirical way that makes the action seem ridiculous and yet representative of the principles:

• Use sweet potatoes that are not just organic, but also heirloom
• Pick your own pumpkin
• Make your own fudge (an item that I can’t remember ever seeing at a Thanksgiving groaning board!).

The subtext, never stated, is to go ahead and use canned gravy and frozen string beans.  What is stated is that we should just take a deep breath and realize that everyone is going to love you no matter how the meal turns out.  So what the article does is spin an anxiety which it assumes that most cooks will have, and then tells you to slough off the anxiety by ignoring two very good precepts of healthy and environmentally sound cuisine which he presents in their most extreme and therefore absurd incarnations.  It’s not the judgment of others or long-time open family disagreements that makes you anxious at Thanksgiving, no it’s those damn foodies!

Creating anxiety in the reader is a prime function of both advertising and the “how-to” features of reporters covering fashion, food, fitness, home furnishings, investments, college selection and house gadgetry, since the way to assuage the anxiety is usually to buy something.  Virtually every time a feature story in a U.S. magazine, website or newspaper or radio or TV show talks about anxiety, it will offer the purchase of a product or expertise as the solution. 

Bittman’s article appears to go against this grain, but in fact by demeaning organic and locally-grown as the cause of anxiety (and as examples of the commercialization of emotions), he subtly argues for a different set of products and services that won’t give people the sweats.  He therefore transfers the anxiety from a social situation to a set of goods and services, which creates his deepest level of ideological subtext: that our emotional life should be and is played out through buying things.

Note to readers: Paul Sheldon points out that I should have left Boston off of the list of low-cost, medium-sized cities in my last blog entry.  Thanks, Paul, for the clarification.

Business Week has published a list of the best places to raise children and surprise, surprise, the Top 10 are all small suburbs or rural towns except for Honolulu.  All these suburbs are without mass transit and most have very low minority populations.

The Business Week Top 10 for raising children includes:

1. Tinley Park, Illinois
2. Arcadia, California
3. Warner Robins, Georgia
4. Honolulu, Hawaii
5. Quincy, Massachusetts
6. Woodbury, Minnesota
7. Tonawanda, New York
8. Beaverton, Oregon
9. Clarksville, Tennessee
10. San Marcos, Texas

Here is what BusinessWeek says about the criteria that guided its selection of the best places to raise kids: “Tinley Park, with its top-rated schools, low crime, beautiful parks, relatively affordable houses, and easy access to jobs, is the winner of BusinessWeek‘s Best Places in America to Raise Kids,” and “Safety, along with school test scores, air quality, and affordability, were weighted especially highly in this year’s calculations.  But we also considered job growth, diversity, and amenities such as museums, parks, and theaters.”

An analysis of this list of criteria, plus the criteria that BusinessWeek didn’t use, will reveal that behind the construct of the survey was an ideological predilection towards middle-class suburbs.

Let’s start with disputing the claim that diversity was a criteria:  According to the latest U.S. census report, seven of the top 10 places for raising children have African-American populations of less than 3% (with one of the other three having an African-American population of 5.53%).  Six of the 10 locations have Hispanic populations of less than 5% (with one of the other four having a Hispanic population of 6.03%).  None of the top 10 have anywhere close to the U.S. average for both African-Americans (13.4%) and Hispanics (14.8%); it’s a case of either/or or none.  So much for diversity.

Now let’s look at some squishy criteria, that is, criteria for which there is room for interpretation: safety; schools; and nearness to museums, parks and theatres.  In the case of safety, we are caught in a battle between superlatives versus absolutes.  Yes, location X may be safer than location Y, but that does not mean that location Y is not safe.  We already know that test scores are not an adequate measure of school performance, and we also know from the many absurd school ratings that have come out in recent years that it’s possible to cook school ratings on ancillary factors.  As far as museums go, how can Tinley Park rate highly unless you say that being only 25 miles from the Chicago Institute with no reasonable mass transit option for getting there counts as being close to a museum?  How can you count Warner Robbins as great for museums unless you equate (and I would say conflate) the Macon Museum with the Milwaukee Art Museum or the Carnegie in Pittsburgh (let alone the L.A. County Museum or the Metropolitan Museum of Art)?

In short, there is plenty of room for manipulation in each of these broad categories.  It seems odd then that the list appears to be drawn up by mall developers, suburban real estate agents and car dealers.  It’s mind-boggling how similar the places in the top 10 are to each other, from dependence on malls and chains to emphasis on single-family housing and the automobile.

Here are some factors that BusinessWeek did not consider and which I, at least, think are very important for raising children:

• Mass transit:  Mass transit makes children more independent at an earlier age.
• Walkability to commerce and public places:  Again, children who can walk to places are more independent earlier.
• Average commute to jobs: The less time mommy and daddy spend commuting, the more time they can spend with the kids.
• True diversity, which I believe teaches children what the real world of work and commerce is going to be like.
• Immediate access to cultural resources like theatres and museums:  The closer you are to these resources, the more you will use them, and so this factor should give weight to how far a community is from museums and to the quality and stature of those museums. 
• Size of daily newspaper:  The daily newspaper is still the window on the world and a bigger one creates a bigger window.
• Access to hospitals and health care: Needs no explanation.

I would find the BusinesWeek survey far more believable if it included a few low or medium cost cities which I know to be quite livable and wonderful places to raise children, such as Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Boston, Portland or Seattle.  As it stands, the BusinessWeek survey is a fine piece of propaganda that reinforces the myth that the suburbs are the best places to live (and that cities are bad places to raise children).