Happy Weekend Readers, it’s Summer, I have pies to bake, let’s get to it…
Lester Davis didn’t realize how important being a Dad was until he became one.
Leah Torres is an OB/GYN, and a good one. Just don’t ask her to get pregnant herself.
The way we look at (and legislate around) pregnancy is profoundly backwards. We completely fail to recognize the risks pregnant people take on. Why aren’t we celebrating these brave and selfless folks on a weekly basis? Instead, we shrug at them in order to express an unimpressed “That’s just what you do” sentiment. Pregnant people suffer for months and risk disease and death in order to give birth to an actual human being and all society can do is say, yup, sounds about right *yawn*. That we do not uphold these individuals (some of you may refer to them as “mom”) with the utmost reverence is shameful.
Meanwhile, we shame those who do not want to be pregnant. “Oh, you’re pregnant and you do not want to risk your life and health in order to give birth? Why wouldn’t you want to feel so weak that breathing hurts for days or weeks on end? Why wouldn’t you want to be at significant risk of a blood clot going to your lungs that might kill you and your baby? Seizures and strokes can’t be that bad, what’s the big deal?”
A woman asks Evangelical pastor and author Michael Pearl what he thinks about her having to go back to work full time while her husband stays home with the kids. His advice is predictably awful and Libby Anne has the complete breakdown on why at Love, Joy, Feminism.
We Americans put a lot of stock in family meal time as a panacea for all sorts of perceived familial failings. Kathryn Jezer-Morton at Jezebel thinks we should Forget a Family Dinner (at First.)
“Having kids who have really good manners at dinner, and who love kale, for people today that’s like what having a Jaguar was like for people in the ’80s,” says Fred Morin, a chef and co-owner at Montreal restaurants Joe Beef, Liverpool House and Le Vin Papillon. Morin has three kids under the age of 10, and he eats dinner with them when he can, but he recognizes that the importance of kids who love adult food is as much tied to adult narcissism as it is about raising healthy kids. “Listen—I want my kids to like stuff that’s sustainable, that’s not garbage. I want them to eat mackerel and like it. But I mean, is it really worth the wasted food trying to teach your kids to eat stuff they won’t eat?”
High pressure and social isolation reinforce the rigidity of mealtime in young middle-class families. No one is going to drop by and interrupt you—they wouldn’t dare. And so parents are isolated for this supposedly convivial evening ritual, focused on their kids, annoyed with each other or at the very least indifferent. Family dinner has become a moral ritual as much as a social one.
Aaron Schatz at Football Outsiders shared a nifty link to a program to teach critical thinking skills through fantasy football. GM Genius will allow teens to compete for college scholarship cash while learning about decision making and critical thinking.
I always wondered about this…
Featured Image: Blueberry Pie, Cook’s Country Magazine.
