my parents are here, the childcare crisis, and virtues of rule-breakers
My parents are here!!!1 We’re about halfway through their 11-day stay with us. Here’s a list of questions they’ve asked me, roughly in the order they’ve been asked:
How much did it cost to refinish our floors?
Why don’t we put a roof over our deck?
Why don’t we put a tent (?) over our deck?
Why don’t we get a gas grill?
Why don’t we have any plastic plates?
Why don’t we have more plates, in general?
Seriously, why don’t we get a gas grill?
Are our counters made of stone? If so, which stone?
Where is my bed from?
What is “CB2”?
Why is Andre so expensive here?
Why is everything so expensive here?
Where’s the plastic piece that holds up the blade in the food processor?
Well, do I think I might have left it back at the old apartment?
Why do I have so many meetings for work?
Why is Rich in a bad mood?
But then, my dad asked my brother a question that made it all worth it. My dad, a Russian-Jewish immigrant, asked my brother, a 24-year-old American male who partakes in online dating, why he wouldn’t get on JDate.
My brother said he doesn’t see why JDate would be better than any other dating site. To which my dad said that if he’s gonna do online dating, he’d at least like to see him with a Jewish girl.
“If you type for love,” my dad said, “Why not type Jew?”
The Next Big Idea Club, which I suggest you all sign up for, has launched an app, and they promoted a snippet I filmed about WEIRD recently.
I talked about how though the pull of social norms is strong, people with strong virtues can often resist following them, especially when they can see that those norms are leading to a dark place.
Here’s a related study I describe in the book:
In a 2003 study, [Matthew] Hornsey and some coauthors found that among students who felt that gay couples should be recognized under the law, those who felt their view was the morally correct one were willing to stick by their beliefs even when they were told their view wasn’t popular. For some people, it’s simply more important to stand up for their beliefs than it is to fit in.
Reminds me of all the norm-violating mask wearers that we saw early on in the pandemic.
Last week, I wrote about the child-care crisis that is hitting parents who can’t work from home. My colleague Adam Harris and I emailed every state with virtual learning. 15 of them told us they had no free child care options for parents who work remotely.
What are those parents doing?
Perhaps the most puzzling option, at least for parents, has been the opening of day camps in public schools and other spaces. In addition to public schools, 28 states and the District of Columbia now have YMCAs that operate virtual-learning labs for small cohorts of school-age kids.
These labs and camps operate very much like schools. Kids come in wearing masks, work all day on a computer, and then do an enrichment activity before returning home. To reduce the risk of infection, they don’t intermingle with other cohorts or eat in cafeterias. But there is a twist: Parents pay for this privilege. Judging by local news stories, the rate is about $100 to $200 a week.
Read more at The Atlantic, and stay safe out there!