6 ms·

An Ode to a 'Poor Black Kid' I Never Knew: How Forbes Gets Poverty Wrong

114 points by pitdesi 15y ago

wglb 15y ago
The Gene Marks article is breathtakingly out of touch. He really ought to get to know some seriously poor people. Perhaps live among them for a time.
Anechoic 15y ago
To be honest, I don't know that this article is HN material (but I didn't flag it). That said, thank you for posting this. Poverty is not just something you can "The Secret" your way out of.
- pitdesi 15y ago
  There's a hazy line, but it gratifies my intellectual curiosity (as someone who is relatively ignorant of the subject) so I submitted it. From: http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html What to Submit: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.
js2 15y ago
At least this kid tried to gain some perspective before writing about it - http://scratchbeginnings.com/ http://scratchbeginnings.com/
paulhauggis 15y ago
"How best to prioritize learning to read rigorously over scheming to get home and be the man of the house in the stead of the father who left? How best to find joy in school with so much hate and embitterment poisoning the rest of your life?" How can we fix this? The problem is that no matter how much our teachers may push students to do better and work harder in school, their home life may work against it. It's one of the side-effects of freedom. To some degree, there will never be a way to fix it. Unless we can control what happens when they get home.
- klbarry 15y ago
  This is why I think KIPP works (and why it has been criticized as a cult by some). It creates an intense school environment ("work hard, be nice") in school and then keeps kids in the school environment for as long as possible, while making work mandatory for parents as well.
- Indy_Dh 15y ago
  You are bringing up the argument for Welfare, Universal Healthcare, etc., that there is nothing that the schools can do. The problems that these kids are facing stems from the fact that they live in poverty. This leads to issues such as the one mentioned by the author. The only way to solve the problem would be to try to figure out a decent Social Benefits system for the poor, to where poor parents do not feel the need to resort to prostitution, drugs, drinking, etc.
  - anamax 15y ago
    > try to figure out a decent Social Benefits system for the poor, to where poor parents do not feel the need to resort to prostitution, drugs, drinking, etc. Why do you think that the lack of a "decent Social Benefits system" is the reason why they do prostitution, drugs, drinking? To put it another way, you seem to be assuming that someone drinks because they're poor. Could it be (for some/many) that they're poor because they drink?
  - paulhauggis 15y ago
    "You are bringing up the argument for Welfare, Universal Healthcare, etc., that there is nothing that the schools can do" You can give people all of the healthcare and the free money that you want, but it still won't automatically create a productive member of society. This will only create generations of people that are dependent on the welfare system and can't actually go out and get a job. As long as you aren't mentally or physically challenged, you should be able to work.
ImprovedSilence 15y ago
Fantastic read. Being an aspiring entrepreneur, I tend to look to others that have made it, and see what I can learn from them. I became fascinated with biographies autobiographies of everyone from Richard Branson and Steve Jobs to Lance Armstrong to Anthony Kedis (red hot chili peppers). The single best one of them I've read is "From Pieces to Weight" by 50 cent. It written so well that you don't just understand why he made the decisions he did (becoming a drug dealer) you understand that you would have very likely make the same decisions, should you have been in his shoes. It really opens up another perspective on an individuals behavior, and has made me that much less quick to judge.
frankydp 15y ago
Although I agree that the original post was naive, I do not think that the misleading vividness and hasty generalization employed by Jefferson addresses the issue to which the OP was referring. There is massive hardship across all low income families but the use an outlier scenario does not negate the valid argument that having goals and knowing that there is a prize to win at the end of the race, is a strong motivator. I inferred that a lack of hope and knowledge of an achievable future, is one of the primary causes of lower performing low income students.
- andylei 15y ago
  > misleading vividness what? > hasty generalization there are no generalizations here. the article says that the author of the forbes article (as well as you), as a person or privilege, does not understand poverty and thus has no idea how to solve the problem. if anyone is making "hasty generalizations", its the author of the forbes article, who thinks that poor kids simply aren't trying hard enough. > the use an outlier scenario how do you know this is an outlier scenario? > having goals and knowing that there is a prize to win at the end of the race, is a strong motivator i doubt anyone would disagree with this statement, but it's irrelevant. the original forbes article suggests that having goals and determination are sufficient for escaping poverty. this article makes the argument that even with goals and determination, escaping poverty is still extremely difficult; furthermore, the very condition of poverty undermines the ability to develop goals and determination.
  - burgerbrain 15y ago
    I think it is pretty safe to say that "acts out in school to get suspensions to stop your mother from being a prostitute" is an outlier. I acted out in primary school. I did it because I was an asshole who didn't respect education. I suspect my peers were the same.
    - darklajid 15y ago
      Just for reference, since you're now directly comparing two schools (yours and the one in the linked article) here, how would you characterize the similarities or differences between your school and one described as "a primarily low-income, high-minority middle school serving sixth- through eighth-graders"?
byrneseyeview 15y ago
This article alludes to the "bee sting" theory of poverty (see http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2008/03/30/the_sting_of_poverty/?page=full http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2008/03/30/... ). That brings up an interesting question: in historical terms, the subject of this story is quite well-off; he's not always physically at risk, he has ready access to probably non-toxic food, he has shelter, etc. Over a long enough timeline, his life is pretty good. Even his home situation--mom is a prostitute, but he can't tell anyone lest the authorities separate them--is in all likelihood less common than it might have been centuries ago. So if these conditions are so awful that we can't possibly expect people to improve without fixing said conditions, how do we explain historical economic growth. We're descended from people who had really miserable lives: sleep in a cave, hope you can hunt or gather enough food to stay alive, go to sleep hungry more often than not, risk death by infection every time you get a cut that's more than skin deep, and reproduce through what any modern person would call serial rape. Beings that were physiologically human (basically us, but probably lactose intolerant) had to deal with all of those circumstances, and managed to bequeath to the next generation some slightly less miserable circumstances. It comes back to the anthropic principle: if misery is a strong disincentive for progress, how did we progress to the point that we have leisure time to discuss this? (I've asked the same question on Quora here: http://www.quora.com/How-do-adherents-to-the-bee-sting-theory-of-poverty-explain-historical-economic-growth http://www.quora.com/How-do-adherents-to-the-bee-sting-theor... . I am very interested in the answers.)
- fferen 15y ago
  I think it comes down to being relatively worse off versus absolutely worse off. Although people today are not worse off absolutely, what normally counts when one determines problems in life is one's relative situation.
- vacri 15y ago
  We're descended from people who had really miserable lives: sleep in a cave, hope you can hunt or gather enough food to stay alive, go to sleep hungry more often than not This is pure conjecture. risk death by infection every time you get a cut that's more than skin deep Reasonable point, but nothing to hang your hat on - it's the same for many poor people today that have poor access to medicine and reproduce through what any modern person would call serial rape. And we're back to just making stuff up again to make it sound like people in poverty have it easy. The poor black kid in the story doesn't have access to self-sufficiency that your hunter-gatherers had. Where are the animals he can hunt? Where is the food he can simply gather? He has markedly different restrictions on his life, but you're ignoring all that to try and paint him as wealthy compared to "ye olde ignorant savage"
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
michaeldhopkins 15y ago
At least of a few of the teachers outraged about Forbes will be working Google Scholar into their curricula because of the article.
stablechaos 15y ago
My mother and grandmother have devoted their lives to outreach to the low-income community. From what they have told me, "poverty" is not at the heart of this issue. Most of these parents have self-destructive habits which will persist regardless of the degree of social engineering thrown at the problem. The only thing that will save children like the one in the article is one-on-one support from caring individuals around him.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
ap22213 15y ago
Having started at the (US) 99th percentile and having luckily risen to the 2nd percentile, I'll say that the most difficult part was learning 'the language' of the middle class. By language, I mean all the nuanced understandings, cultural concepts, non-verbal stuff that is impossible to gain without being in it. And, as an adult I'm still learning. One example that I've recently become frighteningly aware of is that I have a vastly different understanding of what 'property' means than those who came from middle class US cultures. It's taken many years for me to understand this because in fact I know and understand the English definition of property as well as my counterparts. But, there are subtle differences in meaning that fundamentally filter my perspective. For instance, I never understood why my college friends became upset when I borrowed things and never returned them, nor why they thought it bizzare that I'd tell them, of my stuff, to just keep it. There are countless other examples. The article particularly makes me think of my adult friends and their relationships, in and out, rarely 'settling down' from an outsider view. But, just because they get divorced a lot and re-married, or cheat a lot, etc. It doesn't mean that their social conventions are any less valid than those of the middle class America. There are strong social consistencies and social language, unfortunately reinforcing. My models are very different still, the semantics don't align right with my current environment, and today I have difficulty teaching my son the middle class way.
- MaysonL 15y ago
  I'd be curious to know if you've looked at the Harlem Children's Zone project, and what your take on it would be.
  - ap22213 15y ago
    I took a look at the program, and it seems well intended and effective (at least from the web copy). I certainly and happily took similar help throughout my childhood: housing, food, clothing, education, health care, etc. and, I'm happy to now be able to support those types of programs. But, these types of programs supply the minimum requirements for a poor kid to be accepted to the party. For them to excel, they need integration. For instance, I owe a significant portion of my success to the various middle class connections that I've had along the way. Having friends in the middle class, and especially, having those friend's parents act as guides and mentors was incredibly helpful, looking back. Now living in one of the richest counties in the US, I see a big risk in having this income segregation. Poor kids need to have an environment where they may learn the middle class ways. And, they can't do it easily by living only among the poor.
abstractnonsens 15y ago
Learning requires only access to education and a stable living environment... and then of course actually doing it. Internet has mostly taken care of access to education. That leaves only living conditions and motivation as precursors to success.
- guard-of-terra 15y ago
  Motivation for grade hunting is a tricky thing. I don't understand where people are supposed to take that. Boredom counter clicks like hell when near any education system featuring grades.
  - fallous 15y ago
    How does "education" equate to "grade system"? Are you mistaking credentials for education?
- andrewfelix 15y ago
  "Internet has mostly taken care of access to education." Having access to a library of information does not equate to access to education. Education is much more involved and complicated than throwing information at any individual. Especially for people who haven't had access to certain learning processes from an early age.
- vacri 15y ago
  You have to already know how to study and research to get decently educated from the internet.
PGenes 15y ago
I must say, I'm surprised by the degree to which discussions of poverty in America are so racialised. I was under the impression that there are plenty of whites who are poor there. Is that not the case?
gradschool 15y ago
Is it off topic to wonder how the story of the badly behaved boy and his mother ended? Presumably with the police involved, they got separated and she was "protected" even more, albeit deprived of a livelihood. Maybe in another era, the consensus was that sex work was such a great job that legal penalties were needed to disincentivize it or there wouldn't be enough women left to be wives and housekeepers. In these more enlightened times, we consider it such a horrible job that anyone who would do it must be crazy or coerced, and needs to be shown that there are alternatives, but we retain the legal penalties in case we're not sure.

114 points by pitdesi 15y ago

wglb 15y ago

The Gene Marks article is breathtakingly out of touch. He really ought to get to know some seriously poor people. Perhaps live among them for a time.

Anechoic 15y ago

To be honest, I don't know that this article is HN material (but I didn't flag it). That said, thank you for posting this. Poverty is not just something you can "The Secret" your way out of.

pitdesi 15y ago
There's a hazy line, but it gratifies my intellectual curiosity (as someone who is relatively ignorant of the subject) so I submitted it. From: http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html What to Submit: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.

js2 15y ago

At least this kid tried to gain some perspective before writing about it - http://scratchbeginnings.com/ http://scratchbeginnings.com/

paulhauggis 15y ago

"How best to prioritize learning to read rigorously over scheming to get home and be the man of the house in the stead of the father who left? How best to find joy in school with so much hate and embitterment poisoning the rest of your life?" How can we fix this? The problem is that no matter how much our teachers may push students to do better and work harder in school, their home life may work against it. It's one of the side-effects of freedom. To some degree, there will never be a way to fix it. Unless we can control what happens when they get home.

klbarry 15y ago
This is why I think KIPP works (and why it has been criticized as a cult by some). It creates an intense school environment ("work hard, be nice") in school and then keeps kids in the school environment for as long as possible, while making work mandatory for parents as well.
Indy_Dh 15y ago
You are bringing up the argument for Welfare, Universal Healthcare, etc., that there is nothing that the schools can do. The problems that these kids are facing stems from the fact that they live in poverty. This leads to issues such as the one mentioned by the author. The only way to solve the problem would be to try to figure out a decent Social Benefits system for the poor, to where poor parents do not feel the need to resort to prostitution, drugs, drinking, etc.
- anamax 15y ago
  > try to figure out a decent Social Benefits system for the poor, to where poor parents do not feel the need to resort to prostitution, drugs, drinking, etc. Why do you think that the lack of a "decent Social Benefits system" is the reason why they do prostitution, drugs, drinking? To put it another way, you seem to be assuming that someone drinks because they're poor. Could it be (for some/many) that they're poor because they drink?
- paulhauggis 15y ago
  "You are bringing up the argument for Welfare, Universal Healthcare, etc., that there is nothing that the schools can do" You can give people all of the healthcare and the free money that you want, but it still won't automatically create a productive member of society. This will only create generations of people that are dependent on the welfare system and can't actually go out and get a job. As long as you aren't mentally or physically challenged, you should be able to work.

ImprovedSilence 15y ago

Fantastic read. Being an aspiring entrepreneur, I tend to look to others that have made it, and see what I can learn from them. I became fascinated with biographies autobiographies of everyone from Richard Branson and Steve Jobs to Lance Armstrong to Anthony Kedis (red hot chili peppers). The single best one of them I've read is "From Pieces to Weight" by 50 cent. It written so well that you don't just understand why he made the decisions he did (becoming a drug dealer) you understand that you would have very likely make the same decisions, should you have been in his shoes. It really opens up another perspective on an individuals behavior, and has made me that much less quick to judge.

frankydp 15y ago

Although I agree that the original post was naive, I do not think that the misleading vividness and hasty generalization employed by Jefferson addresses the issue to which the OP was referring. There is massive hardship across all low income families but the use an outlier scenario does not negate the valid argument that having goals and knowing that there is a prize to win at the end of the race, is a strong motivator. I inferred that a lack of hope and knowledge of an achievable future, is one of the primary causes of lower performing low income students.

andylei 15y ago
> misleading vividness what? > hasty generalization there are no generalizations here. the article says that the author of the forbes article (as well as you), as a person or privilege, does not understand poverty and thus has no idea how to solve the problem. if anyone is making "hasty generalizations", its the author of the forbes article, who thinks that poor kids simply aren't trying hard enough. > the use an outlier scenario how do you know this is an outlier scenario? > having goals and knowing that there is a prize to win at the end of the race, is a strong motivator i doubt anyone would disagree with this statement, but it's irrelevant. the original forbes article suggests that having goals and determination are sufficient for escaping poverty. this article makes the argument that even with goals and determination, escaping poverty is still extremely difficult; furthermore, the very condition of poverty undermines the ability to develop goals and determination.
- burgerbrain 15y ago
  I think it is pretty safe to say that "acts out in school to get suspensions to stop your mother from being a prostitute" is an outlier. I acted out in primary school. I did it because I was an asshole who didn't respect education. I suspect my peers were the same.
  - darklajid 15y ago
    Just for reference, since you're now directly comparing two schools (yours and the one in the linked article) here, how would you characterize the similarities or differences between your school and one described as "a primarily low-income, high-minority middle school serving sixth- through eighth-graders"?

byrneseyeview 15y ago

This article alludes to the "bee sting" theory of poverty (see http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2008/03/30/the_sting_of_poverty/?page=full http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2008/03/30/... ). That brings up an interesting question: in historical terms, the subject of this story is quite well-off; he's not always physically at risk, he has ready access to probably non-toxic food, he has shelter, etc. Over a long enough timeline, his life is pretty good. Even his home situation--mom is a prostitute, but he can't tell anyone lest the authorities separate them--is in all likelihood less common than it might have been centuries ago. So if these conditions are so awful that we can't possibly expect people to improve without fixing said conditions, how do we explain historical economic growth. We're descended from people who had really miserable lives: sleep in a cave, hope you can hunt or gather enough food to stay alive, go to sleep hungry more often than not, risk death by infection every time you get a cut that's more than skin deep, and reproduce through what any modern person would call serial rape. Beings that were physiologically human (basically us, but probably lactose intolerant) had to deal with all of those circumstances, and managed to bequeath to the next generation some slightly less miserable circumstances. It comes back to the anthropic principle: if misery is a strong disincentive for progress, how did we progress to the point that we have leisure time to discuss this? (I've asked the same question on Quora here: http://www.quora.com/How-do-adherents-to-the-bee-sting-theory-of-poverty-explain-historical-economic-growth http://www.quora.com/How-do-adherents-to-the-bee-sting-theor... . I am very interested in the answers.)

fferen 15y ago
I think it comes down to being relatively worse off versus absolutely worse off. Although people today are not worse off absolutely, what normally counts when one determines problems in life is one's relative situation.
vacri 15y ago
We're descended from people who had really miserable lives: sleep in a cave, hope you can hunt or gather enough food to stay alive, go to sleep hungry more often than not This is pure conjecture. risk death by infection every time you get a cut that's more than skin deep Reasonable point, but nothing to hang your hat on - it's the same for many poor people today that have poor access to medicine and reproduce through what any modern person would call serial rape. And we're back to just making stuff up again to make it sound like people in poverty have it easy. The poor black kid in the story doesn't have access to self-sufficiency that your hunter-gatherers had. Where are the animals he can hunt? Where is the food he can simply gather? He has markedly different restrictions on his life, but you're ignoring all that to try and paint him as wealthy compared to "ye olde ignorant savage"

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

michaeldhopkins 15y ago

At least of a few of the teachers outraged about Forbes will be working Google Scholar into their curricula because of the article.

stablechaos 15y ago

My mother and grandmother have devoted their lives to outreach to the low-income community. From what they have told me, "poverty" is not at the heart of this issue. Most of these parents have self-destructive habits which will persist regardless of the degree of social engineering thrown at the problem. The only thing that will save children like the one in the article is one-on-one support from caring individuals around him.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

ap22213 15y ago

Having started at the (US) 99th percentile and having luckily risen to the 2nd percentile, I'll say that the most difficult part was learning 'the language' of the middle class. By language, I mean all the nuanced understandings, cultural concepts, non-verbal stuff that is impossible to gain without being in it. And, as an adult I'm still learning. One example that I've recently become frighteningly aware of is that I have a vastly different understanding of what 'property' means than those who came from middle class US cultures. It's taken many years for me to understand this because in fact I know and understand the English definition of property as well as my counterparts. But, there are subtle differences in meaning that fundamentally filter my perspective. For instance, I never understood why my college friends became upset when I borrowed things and never returned them, nor why they thought it bizzare that I'd tell them, of my stuff, to just keep it. There are countless other examples. The article particularly makes me think of my adult friends and their relationships, in and out, rarely 'settling down' from an outsider view. But, just because they get divorced a lot and re-married, or cheat a lot, etc. It doesn't mean that their social conventions are any less valid than those of the middle class America. There are strong social consistencies and social language, unfortunately reinforcing. My models are very different still, the semantics don't align right with my current environment, and today I have difficulty teaching my son the middle class way.

MaysonL 15y ago
I'd be curious to know if you've looked at the Harlem Children's Zone project, and what your take on it would be.
- ap22213 15y ago
  I took a look at the program, and it seems well intended and effective (at least from the web copy). I certainly and happily took similar help throughout my childhood: housing, food, clothing, education, health care, etc. and, I'm happy to now be able to support those types of programs. But, these types of programs supply the minimum requirements for a poor kid to be accepted to the party. For them to excel, they need integration. For instance, I owe a significant portion of my success to the various middle class connections that I've had along the way. Having friends in the middle class, and especially, having those friend's parents act as guides and mentors was incredibly helpful, looking back. Now living in one of the richest counties in the US, I see a big risk in having this income segregation. Poor kids need to have an environment where they may learn the middle class ways. And, they can't do it easily by living only among the poor.

abstractnonsens 15y ago

Learning requires only access to education and a stable living environment... and then of course actually doing it. Internet has mostly taken care of access to education. That leaves only living conditions and motivation as precursors to success.

guard-of-terra 15y ago
Motivation for grade hunting is a tricky thing. I don't understand where people are supposed to take that. Boredom counter clicks like hell when near any education system featuring grades.
- fallous 15y ago
  How does "education" equate to "grade system"? Are you mistaking credentials for education?
andrewfelix 15y ago
"Internet has mostly taken care of access to education." Having access to a library of information does not equate to access to education. Education is much more involved and complicated than throwing information at any individual. Especially for people who haven't had access to certain learning processes from an early age.
vacri 15y ago
You have to already know how to study and research to get decently educated from the internet.

PGenes 15y ago

I must say, I'm surprised by the degree to which discussions of poverty in America are so racialised. I was under the impression that there are plenty of whites who are poor there. Is that not the case?

gradschool 15y ago

Is it off topic to wonder how the story of the badly behaved boy and his mother ended? Presumably with the police involved, they got separated and she was "protected" even more, albeit deprived of a livelihood. Maybe in another era, the consensus was that sex work was such a great job that legal penalties were needed to disincentivize it or there wouldn't be enough women left to be wives and housekeepers. In these more enlightened times, we consider it such a horrible job that anyone who would do it must be crazy or coerced, and needs to be shown that there are alternatives, but we retain the legal penalties in case we're not sure.