Harvard Shmarvard

I have noticed over the years that writers who are Harvard graduates will be sure to let us know early in articles that they went to Harvard. Often they will do so in an offhand, parenthetical fashion, as if it is not really worth mentioning. Looking back, I can't recall if I've ever seen graduates from other universities do the same thing. It is as if, in one simple statement, the writer has earned instant credibility.

This article waits until the third paragraph. Notice how unnecessary it is.

This article can only wait until the third sentence.

White Trash

The last racist thing you can say in America?

A badge of pride?

A tool of oppression?

White Trash. For many, the name evokes images of trailer parks, homegrown meth labs, and beat up Camaros, rural poor whites with too many kids and not enough government cheese. It’s a putdown for the down and out and white. White trash is the name given to those whites who don’t make it, either because they’re too lazy or too stupid. Or maybe because something’s wrong with their inbred genes. Whatever the reason, it’s their own damn fault they live like that. They’ve got nobody to blame but themselves.

On the other hand, white trash these days sometimes gets used as a badge of honor. Much like the way African American youth turned the despised word nigga into a word expressing pride and solidarity and the way that GLBT activists have turned queer into a source of dignity and respect, some white youth now use the term to signal rebelliousness and cultural difference—their refusal of a bland, mainstream white society that oppresses and stifles.

And there is another popular use of the term as well. It’s sometimes used to name the rich and famous when they act badly or misbehave. So, despite her millions, Paris Hilton can be called white trash for her pornographic lifestyle, and George Clooney can tell us, in a self-mocking kind of way, that he’s really just white trash. This trend, like so much else in the world of white trash, was probably started by Roseanne Barr, who once famously said of her marriage to Tom Arnold, “We’re America’s worst nightmare—white trash with money!”

All of which makes the reality that white trash names pretty complicated and confusing. Is it, as John Waters once said, “the last racist thing you can say and get away with?” Or has it transformed into a symbol of something like ethnic pride? Or is it just a comical phrase used to condemn—or sometimes excuse—bad behavior, like too much drinking, cussing, fighting, and general screwing around?

Click on the title of the post to read the entire article.

The New York Times--I hate to love you

I love the New York Times. I love their liberal bias. I love their arts coverage. I love their opinion pieces. I love their cultural observations. I love A.O. Scott's movie reviews.

I love the New York Times.

But I hate the New York Times when they publish pieces that assume every one of their readers is fretting that their kids won't get into Harvard, or worried that their summer homes are outdated. Or pieces like this.

ANGELA KIM spends two days a week baby-sitting for her 2-year-old grandson, Noah, while her daughter, Andrea, a doctor, works nine-hour hospital shifts.

Only Mrs. Kim, 57, lives in Houston and her daughter and grandson live in Dallas — 250 miles away.

This long-distance child care arrangement means that on Tuesdays Mrs. Kim wakes at 4:45 a.m. to catch a 6:30 a.m. Southwest Airlines flight to Dallas Love Airport, where her daughter and Noah pick her up at the curb.

At the hospital, her daughter hops out of the car to make her 8 a.m. shift and Mrs. Kim slips into the driver’s seat. Then she and Noah drive to his preschool, and after that, home, where Mrs. Kim fills her grandson’s next two days with brown rice, seaweed and Konglish, a mix of Korean and English.

On Wednesday night, Mrs. Kim does the trip in reverse, catching a 7:30 p.m. flight to the Houston airport, where her husband picks her up.

Terri P. Tepper of Barrington, Ill., made a similar trek every week for a year to help care for her granddaughter so that her daughter could pursue her career. Beginning in 2001, Ms. Tepper flew to New York on Sundays and returned to Chicago on Thursdays.

“It was cheaper than getting a nanny,” said Ms. Tepper, 64. The round-trip tickets, which her daughter paid for, cost between $190 and $230. “I actually saved them a lot of money,” Ms. Tepper said. Her daughter later made partner in her consulting firm.

Read the entire article here.