Is chasing The Dream incompatible with having a family?
The COVID-19 impact on society and particularly families leads me to an easy “yes”.
Last week, NYC schools announced a partial, at best, fall school opening. Other US states are leaning in the same direction.
Yet at the same time, parents have to work, in order to make money to survive in The Dream chasing economy.
For most of society, the two are incompatible. (I’m excluding those that hold enough privilege to not have to worry about this.)
It’s not possible to raise healthy children full-time while both parents hold down full-time jobs.
The incompatibility ranges from inconvenience to near impossibility. Where a family falls on that spectrum depends on the level of privilege a family holds in society.
Some parents are Dream Chasing and need to keep two parents working to maintain the chase and the standards it demands be upheld.
Others are simply trying to put food on the table.
Either way, it’s impossible to raise healthy children without help during working hours, while both parents are working.
At least in the US, yet another severe shortcoming of The Dream chasing capitalistic structure is laid bare when we’re asked to do both.
On top of it all, the current political administration preys on the fear this conflict causes, using it to continue sowing deeper disconnections throughout society.
For now, I leave you to consider how impossible it is to nurture a healthy family full-time while both parents work. Even so, it’s the only option our Dream chasing society is able to provide, as the virus continues to spiral out of control in the United States, The Dream capital of the world.
Catch you soon,
Chris
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Current Reading List
The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable
by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
My Seditious Heart by Arundhati Roy
Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
Bums: An Oral History of the Brooklyn Dodgers, by Peter Golenbock
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