Post-pandemic America is not okay. People are grumpy, if not just angry. Privileged people complain about the cost of things at Costco or on their cruise ships. Poor people know the food bank schedule. Middle-class people live paycheck-to-paycheck with some getting lucky and hitting the student loan forgiveness lotto. We are on the cusp of criminalizing homelessness; in Georgia, the state paid a foster parent $6,000 to shelter homeless children vs. giving $6,000 to the children’s mother so she could live someplace with her children.
The under 40 crowd is over the capitalistic hustle of work. Our 23 year old calls work a “scam” as she leaves for work everyday. She’s identified that going through the maze to get money to have a roof and food is not living. Sigh. Generation X might be the most conservative group of voters yet. Post Civil Rights America’s politics were in large part about thwarting the agenda of the Civil Rights Movement. AKA true Black Freedom. Myth making will have you believing that the goal was colorblind integration. Meanwhile, Dr. King in the months leading up to his assassination was increasingly critiquing the classist underpinnings of America and the Military Industrial Complex. That King is seldom talked about. Instead we get soundbites from his speech at the March on Washington.
It is unsurprising that Gen X who came of age under Reagan and to adulthood under Clinton would skew conservative. Currently, I am grappling with a Zero-Tolerance op-ed by the student newspaper. But then I think about who these kids parents most likely are – Gen X’ers – and it makes more sense. Or rather, is explainable. Not understandable, at least to me. Or maybe it is if we remember that students who are currently in high school have grown up post-9/11, post-pandemic, with school shootings, online bullying, police brutality, the January 6 insurrection, Obama, Tea Party, Trump, Biden, etc. What is surprising is that my community has seemingly embraced carceral solutions vs progressive reform to deal issues. The man that called for jail for the parents of truant students stands out to me.
A series of unfortunate events coupled with pending school construction and expensive eggs/increased vacation costs has laid bare the empty promises of yard signs. Detracking and Deleveling are unwanted reforms. It’s interesting to see a real world example of “interest convergence.” Safety concerns will get you into a room with people who want to keep your kids out of their kids classes. And you aren’t even negotiating the terms of your support. Fear is a blinding force. Black parents best recognize that they, and all too often they alone, are the only people who care about the best-possible outcomes for their children. The status quo sees “good-enough” outcomes as okay, perhaps even preferable. American education is still most concerned with producing future workers as opposed to educated citizens. The increasing diversity of America’s school children appears to be hardening this mission. School Integration = being parsley on the plate. You’re there, but not ancillary to the project at hand.
When I get frustrated, I often turn to books for solace. Books have buttressed my hopes that a better world is possible AND helped me to understand the world we inhabit. So instead of Godzilla-ing my way into the comment thread on various SM posts, I started a list of books. {You should also know that I completed all of the course work for my PhD; I really enjoy reading and thinking.} So here is a non-comprehensive list of books and a few articles that have informed me and my understanding of things related to various things. There are a lot of history books that are not on this list. I will lift up When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race & Sex in America by Paula Giddings. I purchased that book at the Doubleday Bookstore at 57th and 5th Avenue when I was worker charged with providing luxurious shopping experiences to wealthy women. Thirty-five years later, the lessons of that book and that job still help me to navigate the spaces I work and live in.
Face's Facts 