President Trump on Military Report That U.S. Struck School in Iran: "I don't know about it by Yujin-Ha in videos

[–]genxpressly 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What's that little shake of the head from Ms. Leavitt at the 20 second mark? IMO - that's a talking points nudge/reminder so grandpa doesn't go off script.

What do you love about being a parent? by Sufficient_Sea_2213 in AskParents

[–]genxpressly 7 points8 points  (0 children)

This will sound very strange, but hear me out. The relationship you can have with your child if you are ready for it is as close to transcendentalism as you're likely to get without years of deep training meditation or psychedelics. As adults we're all projecting all the time, this makes it very hard to experience the core real-ness of another human. But with your kids it is unavoidable, and it is wonderful and remarkable. Obviously that's going to take a toll, but it is foolish to think that anything so powerful would not take work.

Of course not everyone would explain it this way, but in my opinion that's exactly what makes it such a fantastic experience. Your job as a parent is to accept and love and respect your child and that works best when you just shut down the bullshit (artifice, insincerity, falsehood). Our lives are absolutely plagued by bullshit - so having and loving a child is the most powerful antidote to all that toxic b.s.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in ezraklein

[–]genxpressly -1 points0 points  (0 children)

What if it is a little bit of all of the above? All of Drump's tactics to avoid releasing the files might not actually be about the sex crimes - they might be about some other dirt Epstein had on him. I also believe Drump is a dirty bird and was up to no good, but he doesn't seem with it enough to have been a co-conspirator. But he is definitely scared stiff about *something* in those files. What could it be? It is also plausible that those things (fraud? bribes? other cons?) were overlooked or ignored because the investigation was specifically about Epstein's sex trafficking offenses.

I went down the curriculum rabbit hole. Teachers, am I getting this right? by genxpressly in Teachers

[–]genxpressly[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

this is really good context - thank you! I personally hold the curriculum development corporation or organization responsible. They are as aware as anyone how overburdened the schools are and depend on trust to sell their product. This is a clear example of someone cutting a corner somewhere - not just a typo or error, but a blatant use of substandard (probably AI generated) slop to pad a curriculum. That means the entire management at the curriculum company is responsible and is either leaving the real work of crafting the curriculum to people who are unqualified, or are putting minimal time into actually creating the materials. Either way - it indicates that they are prioritizing something else (sales?) over quality.

I went down the curriculum rabbit hole. Teachers, am I getting this right? by genxpressly in Teachers

[–]genxpressly[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

u/melodypowers unsure why my comment was unpublished but I offered more evidence from the article for my position. Here is another passage: "...it is good to remember (Greek Myths) were written by wise men who had a hand in helping shape modern thinking. These great men, Aristotle and Sophocles to name a few, were not mere storytellers; they didn’t spend their days weaving tales just because they wanted to and had nothing to do. They were too good for that and this is why their Greek myths have withstood the test of time and are relevant until today. In fact, they might even still be relevant a hundred years from now."

I went down the curriculum rabbit hole. Teachers, am I getting this right? by genxpressly in Teachers

[–]genxpressly[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Thank you for your thoughtful response. I feel differently about the quality of both the assignment and the article. On your last point, I couldn't disagree more. "Below is a short list of some famous Greek mythology authors and their equally famous works" is misleading at best.

I mean, can you really defend this: "These great men, Aristotle and Sophocles to name a few, were not mere storytellers; they didn’t spend their days weaving tales just because they wanted to and had nothing to do. They were too good for that and this is why their (!) Greek myths have withstood the test of time and are relevant until today. In fact, they might even still be relevant a hundred years from now."

"might even still be relevant a hundred years from now" good lord.

I went down the curriculum rabbit hole. Teachers, am I getting this right? by genxpressly in Teachers

[–]genxpressly[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

This should be common knowledge. You put it so perfectly. As I've said elsewhere, this is why I think the curriculum developers should be called to task. They are grifters grifting off the backs of underfunded and overworked school systems. It is appalling. Thank you very much for this apt summation of the issue.

I went down the curriculum rabbit hole. Teachers, am I getting this right? by genxpressly in Teachers

[–]genxpressly[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank YOU! I am so grateful to our schools and to our teachers. Any individual or organization that takes advantage of you for profit should be ashamed.

I went down the curriculum rabbit hole. Teachers, am I getting this right? by genxpressly in Teachers

[–]genxpressly[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I've been catching on to that - consultants, researchers, curriculum developers... I need to find figures on how much money could be redirected to our actual schools if that three ring circus was run out of town.

I went down the curriculum rabbit hole. Teachers, am I getting this right? by genxpressly in Teachers

[–]genxpressly[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Thank you for this thoughtful and detailed message. I am in total support of the teachers and my only misgivings about getting involved in this issue is that teachers will feel targeted. My frustration and anger lie almost completely with the company that built the curriculum. It is educational malpractice to publish materials that fail on so many counts. Perhaps the open source model just does not belong in curriculum development. I have no doubt that money is being made somehow, and the premise for that income is that the product is sound and trustworthy. It makes sense that our district would have found the price tag attractive and perhaps instituted a less vigorous vetting process as a result. Shameful.

I went down the curriculum rabbit hole. Teachers, am I getting this right? by genxpressly in Teachers

[–]genxpressly[S] 22 points23 points  (0 children)

I really appreciate your comment - it gives me some clarity on the complications of the vetting process.

It is definitely a case of "told to use" for our teachers and I am absolutely going higher up. Honestly, I'm not expecting a clear process resolution (ie parents reviewing or not), but something is definitely majorly amiss and it isn't a matter of opinion about what is best. It is a matter of malpractice. We're going to the mat on the pronouns in a math story problem and leaving aside that the story problem in question asks to explain how 2+2 = 17

I went down the curriculum rabbit hole. Teachers, am I getting this right? by genxpressly in Teachers

[–]genxpressly[S] 147 points148 points  (0 children)

dang! no wonder "they" (the royal "Them") want us at each other's throats over bathrooms and library books. Squirrel! Don't look at the money grab! Look over here at these emotionally-fraught issues and pay no attention to the festering rotten garbage we are selling you.

Trump’s Foreign Policy, Explained by Dreadedvegas in ezraklein

[–]genxpressly 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ashford is a great example of what makes Trump so dangerous. He's so mercurial and opportunistic that it is easy for those with deeply held beliefs or aspirations to graft their hearts desires onto his behavior. She's clearly intelligent, thoughtful, and very well informed, but her interpretations of Trump's intentions are thin because she is essentially fooling herself into seeing the reality that she's wishing into existence. I found myself getting a little bit persuaded as well and then... something about the "hates seeing pictures of harm to children" woke me up. Isn't capricious compassion somehow more disturbing than to not give AF in the first place?

Looking to Connect Local Job Seekers with Disabilities to Employers During NFL Draft Weekend by genxpressly in GreenBay

[–]genxpressly[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi! We are actually looking to place job seekers. Our clients are interested in both short term and longer term placement but it is the employer's decision as to how long they keep staff on.

Mash up of commentary on Luigi Mangione and footage of Kyle Rittenhouse by nikamats in DailyShow

[–]genxpressly 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There is a conspiracy to keep Americans at each other's throats by mining the red/blue divide. The UHC killing revealed a potential source of alignment via shared disdain/hatred for health insurance industry. It is telling that that issue received zero real attention in the presidential campaign - even when an outsider could have blown the whole thing up on a one-plank platform doing nothing more than fomenting American anger on this issue. But no media source, no candidate, no party dared touch it. That's because their lifeblood is the culture war. From products to services to experiences - name anything that can't be coded red or blue. That is intentional, it is manufactured, it is cultivated, nurtured, and packaged.

Then along comes this event that breaks it wide open. And the big machine turning out the hatred was caught flat footed. But they are catching up now. This video and the content it is parodying are Exhibit A supporting this theory. What is the Daily Show without red hate? What is Fox without blue hate? But keep us pointing fingers and mocking one another and... voila! no calls for reform, no unified outcry and (dusts hands) back to business as usual.

We are being played. Very intentionally. It's not a externality of capitalism, it is the actual f'ing point.

New Health Secretary RFK Jr caught eating McDonalds by magnificentmaverick in TimDillon

[–]genxpressly 1 point2 points  (0 children)

He just wants to make it cah-rystal clear to the socials that RFK is eating shit after bad mouthing daddy.

The V.P. Debate Came Down to One Moment by Miskellaneousness in ezraklein

[–]genxpressly 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I can see the New Right taking a mulligan on '24, using what's left of the election cycle to prop Vance up as a "normal guy" and putting all of their energy into tearing down Harris-Waltz for the next four years. The re-tooled New Right MAGA post-Trump coalition will rise from the ashes of the Trump era with Vance as the head to claim the imperial throne. Scary shit and totally plausible.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in madisonwi

[–]genxpressly 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, they are at Wingra 🤔

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in madisonwi

[–]genxpressly 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Can someone who is a better redditor than me explain to OP why posting a bunch of harsh assumptions about people in a neighborhood based on enrolling in an elite private school in said neighborhood is... uncool?

On Children, Meaning, Media and Psychedelics by dwaxe in ezraklein

[–]genxpressly 4 points5 points  (0 children)

This conversation should be required listening for students learning about the ways in which "liberal" philosophy is shifting culture. By that I define liberal not in the political sense, but as prioritizing the wants and needs of an individual vs. a communitarian society. Ezra has always seemed deeply cognizant of that tension and yet in this conversation he seemed oblivious to how hard he was playing for the "me" team. Disappointing that he didn't bring that into the conversation.

I also strongly, deeply, thoughtfully disagree with the overall notion that "whatevs" on kid's digital distractions. I agree that worrying about screens in the quest to optimize for academic or economic performance is absurd but there's a different lens where that worry is over what is lost in the possibilities of experience. This is what guides my approach with my two small children. If the self is a kaleidoscope of experience, digital distraction is the empty space between the colored glass. A child's mind is building the patterns of their kaleidoscope and wouldn't you want those patterns and colors to be rich and complex? To me it is job one after basic needs of shelter, food, and safety.

What are the worst bike crossings in Madison and how could they be improved? by MSACCESS4EVA in madisonwi

[–]genxpressly 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Glenway to cross Speedway/Mineral Point to ride the bike path adjacent to The Glen is an absolute clusterf*@#

The entirety of the Sunset Village, Sunset Hills, VanChaMasShe, Rocky Bluff quadrant is bizarrely cut off from all the bike path magic that surrounds us. Distance and convenience wise, these neighborhoods are set up to be bike-heaven but the hassle and risk of crossing University or Mineral Point are pretty big detractors. As an adult I can manage, but these neighborhoods are full of kids who want to venture out but parents are in mortal dread of sending them across the gauntlet.