5 ms·
>What people are obsessed with is the idea that someone's "good at" something as an inherent trait, as opposed to skill being learnable and, therefore, transfer
by imbnwa 5y ago
>What people are obsessed with is the idea that someone's "good at" something as an inherent trait, as opposed to skill being learnable and, therefore, transferable
I use to coach high school policy debate in a major metropolitan public high school and the level of "I can't do this, I'm just not good at this" that shows up the minute kids encounter difficulty/obstacles, and specifically in non-physical labor, is mind-blowing.
We tell children "anything is attainable if you put your mind to it" then turn around and imply to children through our actions, cause they're good at reading those, that some people have "it" and most don't, e.g. sequestering the smart kids into completely different tracks from the regular kids; math teachers demonstrating disappointment that a student doesn't understand something while praising the kid who grasps it much quicker.
What's striking to me is that social media, and specifically IG culture, has made strides in tearing at this contradiction in the domain of personal appearance, e.g. not only weight loss/fitness transformation but even the celebration of 'confidence is all you need' for women with more robust bodies. But in the final analysis, I find physical accomplishment in our culture to still be a distinct domain from mental accomplishment.
- ghaff 5y agoI agree up to a point and up to a certain level of achievement. But, for example, while I was good enough at math to get through an engineering program at a good school, I'm pretty confident that a physics or math degree would have been very tough and I doubt I could have done it. If I tried really hard and spent lots of time with the TAs? Maybe but I doubt it.
- imbnwa 5y agoOh I agree, and I hope my wording didn't convey some sort of unbound ceiling if you just "put your mind to it". I more wanted to point at the first bump in the road.
- msla 5y agoBoth sides sour into toxicity if taken too far, which can happen if a corrective is applied too broadly: If someone is saying they can't learn a skill they're manifestly capable of, then focusing on how they can likely do more than they think is the correct corrective to apply. However, everyone does have limits, and ignoring those limits and insisting that the same level of attainment is possible for everyone through effort is a toxic mindset which implicitly (or explicitly!) punishes people for being human as opposed to idealized automatons. On the other hand, if someone is insisting that they can learn everything up to the highest levels and become a 21st Century Renaissance Genius, focusing the replies on how limited time is and how much there is to know is the proper corrective to apply. Apply that corrective too broadly and it's crab-bucket or tall-poppy mentality, and anti-intellectual bilge. We do need to tear down the idea that people are inherently "good at" learned skills, however. That's never a proper corrective, it's always nonsense, and it devalues the hard work the successful people put in while demoralizing the people who wish to become successful in something.
- imbnwa 5y agoIndeed, the former corrective is more what I wanted to get at. I wanted to point out that the "you can be anything if you put your mind to it" narrative is doubly harmful as children very much observe the contrary in reality but nevertheless still have the naive platitude repeated to them. I think this contradiction contributes to making the first bump in the road, never mind getting into AP Trig or something, so much more intolerable.