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You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

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171–180 of 344 posts

Re: You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

#171
post #103

That's one big paradox. Coming from poverty, I work with plenty of talented people, but nowhere as talented as the people I've studied in shitty schools. Now most of those people from my poverty times continue to be poor, because of many problems poverty brought to them. I can clearly see that, and that I was the lucky one to find a way up many times. Yet, my new social circle believe that I'm talented because of my…

Some people are indeed much better. Anyone who played sports as a kid understands this. Huge differences are immediately apparent in small children. But generally, I agree that, for most life tasks, the differences between people are not enormous. Humanity could do a much better job eliminating poverty. In the future, we may view enormous disparities in wealth as evil as we do racism today.

> Some people are indeed much better. Anyone who played sports as a kid understands this.

Anyone with a little bit of nutritional knowledge knows that having a nutritious diet is a major part of athletic competitiveness. Poverty limits or eliminates the ability of a parent to provide nutritious meals.

There's certainly going to be a level of natural talent that exists, but everyone who comes from poverty are playing with major handicaps.

Poverty makes small children.

Re: You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

#172
post #133

> still don’t have contents insurance (a hangover from poverty, I just wasn’t in the habit of insuring things and now keep putting it off, because paperwork terrifies me) The author seems to be from UK. Is contents insurance a thing in UK? How many renters really do buy contents insurance? Genuinely interested to know how many think that contents insurance is worth it?

FWIW, I've seen rental contracts that insisted on it. I imagine it varies by jurisdiction how legal/enforceable that is.

Re: You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

#173
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you consider the actual context of the essay and that the person to whom the author is speaking directly is the sister of an MP and herself a MEP, this kind of well-actually does ring hollow.

When you make an argument in general terms, you can't call no-fair when someone takes it at face value and counter-argues in equally general terms. That's not cheating, it's just assuming good faith.

When people point out that one's counter-argument, by virtue of ignoring the context the original argument is steeped in, is not actually countering any argument, they aren't saying that the counter-argument is "cheating" - they are adding context.

Re: You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

#174
post #43
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And choosing to use your privileges to patronise people whose lives are entirely beyond your experience and comprehension, is a choice Not sure how that way of thinking is productive. Patronising people is bad in itself. Thinking that people you perceive as "privileged" can't comprehend you is a choice too and a form of ignorance.

> Thinking that people you perceive as "privileged" can't comprehend you is a choice too and a form of ignorance. In my experience they can't, and I do have experience in this. In one example, a few years ago I worked with some extremely rich people. I mean, exceedingly rich. Once kept negotiating on everything, even if it was to only save a few pounds. I asked for a little cash advance (£180) to allow me to do some…

Do the wealthy not read books or newspapers? Watch film? Listen to music? It's unfathomable to me how anyone can grow up without gaining some understanding of poverty. I know it can happen, but I personally think it's more likely they pretend to not understand because it is inconvenient.

Re: You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

#175

It's worth listening to this episode of Blocked and Reported on Jack Monroe: https://www.blockedandreported.org/p/premium-the-literally-u... tl;dr: She's not exactly honest about being poor.

How are we supposed to listen to that? It's behind a paywall.

Re: You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

#176
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people are indeed much better. Anyone who played sports as a kid understands this. Huge differences are immediately apparent in small children. But generally, I agree that, for most life tasks, the differences between people are not enormous. Humanity could do a much better job eliminating poverty. In the future, we may view enormous disparities in wealth as evil as we do racism today.

>Some people are indeed much better. At what? I consider myself a quick thinker and generally high IQ. But my sister has a way of connecting with children that I will never be able to replicate. So who is "much better"? And at what?

High IQ. I don’t believe in IQ but the commenters above are discussing inherent talents that our society chooses to reward.

Ps, I personally don’t find “I’m smarter than you but at least you can do X” to be a super comforting thing. I’m sure that comment makes sense in your context with your sister, but I definitely bristle whenever I read it. Smacks of prideful engineers & scientists trying to appear nice while still affirming their base insecurities about being superior to others.

But maybe all that’s just pedantic

Re: You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

#177
post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coming from the middle class, I've never met anybody talented coming from a shitty school who didn't also get filtered into a gifted program at a good school. Maybe your school system just wasn't competent at filtering people? Those that I know who have made bad life decisions (kids too early, dropping out of college, leaving extremely supportive parents) could totally have been expected to based off looking at GPA/S…

> I've never met anybody talented coming from a shitty school who didn't also get filtered into a gifted program I'm not sure I understand this one.. how would you know the gifted program missed them if they're now spending their life dealing with poverty? I'm guessing you don't mingle with the poors? I've never met anyone that lives their entire life in the middle of a rainforest. So weird! Also what the fuck is a g…

Even if such programs exist and exceptionally talented people get filtered into them, it completely ignores the fact that there is still a huge disparity in outcome for people who are merely modestly above average.

Re: You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

#178
post #139
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people are indeed much better. Anyone who played sports as a kid understands this. Huge differences are immediately apparent in small children. But generally, I agree that, for most life tasks, the differences between people are not enormous. Humanity could do a much better job eliminating poverty. In the future, we may view enormous disparities in wealth as evil as we do racism today.

Better at sports .. but I bet there's a fairly even distribution between people who have money and don't. > In the future, we may view enormous disparities in wealth as evil as we do racism today. A lot of people already do.

And a lot of people would be very wrong. There’s a floor to survivability, below which you can’t keep yourself alive, but there is no ceiling. If everyone is above the floor, there’s no reason for concern about those looking for the ceiling.

In the future we’ll pull people up to the floor, but that doesn’t require attaching a ceiling. The will never be a successful society that substantially punishes achievement above a certain point.

Re: You Don't Batch Cook When You're Suicidal (2020)

#180
post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better at sports .. but I bet there's a fairly even distribution between people who have money and don't. > In the future, we may view enormous disparities in wealth as evil as we do racism today. A lot of people already do.

And a lot of people would be very wrong. There’s a floor to survivability, below which you can’t keep yourself alive, but there is no ceiling. If everyone is above the floor, there’s no reason for concern about those looking for the ceiling. In the future we’ll pull people up to the floor, but that doesn’t require attaching a ceiling. The will never be a successful society that substantially punishes achievement abov…

You're wrong.

Fundamentally it requires redistribution and a complete change of mindset.

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