There is a variety of confounding myths in America which tend to hold us down. These include economic mobility, meritocracy, poverty, and the land of opportunity.

With respect to the "land of opportunity", does positive press of a small number of cases from an earlier generation outweigh the actual experience of the majority?

There was a study on The Blitz in London and England in general in World War II which showed that despite high losses in general, enough people knew one or more who'd lost someone or something to the extreme but that the losses weren't debilitating from a loss perspective and generally served to boost overall morale. Higher losses may have been more demoralizing and harmful, but didn't happen. (Find this source: possibly Malcolm Gladwell??)

Is this sort of psychological effect at play socially and politically in America and thereby confounding our progress?

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/09/opinion/culture/jeremy-strong-new-yorker-careerist-striver.html

Thomas Piketty's r > g shows that meritocracy is a lie in that the richest people aren't the ones that do the best or most productive work, but simply those who start of rich.

The Attack on "Critical Race Theory": What's Going on?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P35YrabkpGk

Lately, a lot of people have been very upset about “critical race theory.” Back in September 2020, the former president directed federal agencies to cut funding for training programs that refer to “white privilege” or “critical race theory, declaring such programs “un-American propaganda” and “a sickness that cannot be allowed to continue.” In the last few months, at least eight states have passed legislation banning the teaching of CRT in schools and some 20 more have similar bills in the pipeline or plans to introduce them. What’s going on?

Join us for a conversation that situates the current battle about “critical race theory” in the context of a much longer war over the relationship between our racial present and racial past, and the role of culture, institutions, laws, policies and “systems” in shaping both. As members of families and communities, as adults in the lives of the children who will have to live with the consequences of these struggles, how do we understand what's at stake and how we can usefully weigh in?

Hosts: Melissa Giraud & Andrew Grant-Thomas

Guests: Shee Covarrubias, Kerry-Ann Escayg,

Some core ideas of critical race theory:

• racial realism
  • racism is normal
• interest convergence
  • racial equity only occurs when white self interest is being considered (Brown v. Board of Education as an example to portray US in a better light with respect to the Cold War)
• Whiteness as property
  • Cheryl Harris' work
  • White people have privilege in the law
  • myth of meritocracy
• Intersectionality

People would rather be spoon fed rather than do the work themselves. Sadly this is being encouraged in the media.

Short summary of CRT: How laws have been written to institutionalize racism.

Culturally Responsive Teaching (also has the initials CRT).

KAE tries to use an anti-racist critical pedagogy in her teaching.

SC: Story about a book Something Happened in Our Town (book).

• Law enforcement got upset and the school district
• Response video of threat, intimidation, emotional blackmail by local sheriff's department.
• Intent versus impact - the superintendent may not have had a bad intent when providing an apology, but the impact was painful

It's not really a battle about or against CRT, it's an attempt to further whitewash American history. (synopsis of SC)

What are you afraid of?

Class stratification helps to create not only racist policies but policies that enforce the economic stratification and prevent upward (or downward) mobility.

I believe downward mobility is much simpler for Black Americans (find reference to OTM podcast about Obama to back this up).

How can we create social valves (similar to those in the circulatory system of our legs) that help to push people up and maintain them at certain levels without disadvantaging those who are still at the bottom and who may neither want to move up nor have the ability?

<small><cite class='h-cite via'>ᔥ <span class='p-author h-card'>Jeet Heer</span> in Freedom to Teach in North Carolina - The Time of Monsters (<time class='dt-published'>06/17/2021 09:41:33</time>)</cite></small>

Meritocracy was coined to describe and ridicule a society and its selective education system.

<small><cite class='h-cite via'>ᔥ <span class='p-author h-card'>Jeet Heer</span> in Freedom to Teach in North Carolina - The Time of Monsters (<time class='dt-published'>06/17/2021 09:41:33</time>)</cite></small>

Do we actually need social mobility?

Social mobility and the goods it can purchase can be a useful social motivation.

However, social mobility for the poorest amoungst us would be good, but how much additional marginal good does society derive from continued social mobility of the middle and upper classes continuing to gain wealth and moving up?

Perhaps there's a myth of social mobility confounding the issue with the myth of meritocracy as well.

Certainly the idea of raw capitalism without caps is at play as well. Could providing better governmental oversight of this be a helpful factor for society? (At least American society at the moment? As international competition may drive other broader problems vis-a-vis other pieces of global domination...)

I want to explore this idea a bit. Resources, citations? Which analysts?

the United States is a meritocracy

We've liked to tell ourselves this myth, but it's demonstrably untrue.

We need more research and details on the idea of the American myth of meritocracy.