I'm a writer, therapist, and cancer survivor from Ohio. Read my blog here: http://the-orbit.net/brutereason. Support me on Patreon here: http://patreon.com/brutereason.
We tend to believe that accusations of privilege imply we have it easy, which we resent because life is hard for nearly everyone. Of course we resent these accusations. Look at white men when they are accused of having privilege. They tend to be immediately defensive (and, at times, understandably so). They say, “It’s not my fault I am a white man,” or “I’m [insert other condition that discounts their privilege],” instead of simply accepting that, in this regard, yes, they benefit from certain privileges others do not. To have privilege in one or more areas does not mean you are wholly privileged. Surrendering to the acceptance of privilege is difficult, but it is really all that is expected. What I remind myself, regularly, is this: the acknowledgment of my privilege is not a denial of the ways I have been and am marginalized, the ways I have suffered.
1. It likely won’t be different this time, and this is not your fault. Diets fail because they do not work sustainably over time. You may be thinking that you aren’t going to diet (I’m just going to watch what I eat and be healthy) but if weight loss is the goal you seek, you will likely approach change with a dieting mindset. This mindset, by design, gives rise to perfectionism and promotes superhuman expectations. Participating in dieting culture supports the illusion that weight loss leads to happiness and health. Honestly, for most people, weight loss just tends to lead to more worry about weight re-gain.
Amazon brags that when a child says, “Alexa, I’m bored,” Echo Dot Kids will respond with a game or activity. This feels like a win for parents and kids: A child is entertained, and her caregiver can attend to other tasks. But boredom, unfun as it feels, is crucial to healthy development. By finding something to do on their own, kids learn to think creatively and tolerate mild discomfort. According to pediatrician and media researcher Dr. Jenny Radesky, “These two skills—creative initiative and distress tolerance—are incredibly important in life success, but may become harder for children to develop if they become accustomed to immediate boredom relief through a virtual assistant or other device.”
More than that, the “play” offered by FreeTime Unlimited benefits Amazon’s corporate partners much more than it benefits children. Play is how kids learn about the world and their place in it, which is why the best play is open-ended and child-directed. But on FreeTime, play is driven by companies like Nickelodeon, which described Echo Dot Kids as “an exciting new arena for our audience to engage with our brand”—a troublesome thought when you remember that their audience is kids as young as 4 year olds and that “engagement” is brand-speak for “buying stuff.” This kind of branded play is more like interactive marketing, which limits children’s creativity and leads to a host of negative outcomes, including increased family stress (like the kind that happens when your child asks 20 times for that SpongeBob macaroni). A truly kid-safe product would give children the opportunity to play creatively, independently, and free of marketing messages.
The concept of queer time offers an alternative to the notion that one ought to discontinue particular practices or behaviors simply because one has “aged out” of them.
feminist-space
