Yet another "gap"

The liberals used to think that if only poor kids would have computers like rich kids, they would become just like rich kids and there would be no more “gaps.” Guess what? It didn’t happen that way.

In the 1990s, the term “digital divide” emerged to describe technology’s haves and have-nots. It inspired many efforts to get the latest computing tools into the hands of all Americans, particularly low-income families.

Those efforts have indeed shrunk the divide. But they have created an unintended side effect, one that is surprising and troubling to researchers and policy makers and that the government now wants to fix.

As access to devices has spread, children in poorer families are spending considerably more time than children from more well-off families using their television and gadgets to watch shows and videos, play games and connect on social networking sites, studies show.

. . .

“Despite the educational potential of computers, the reality is that their use for education or meaningful content creation is minuscule compared to their use for pure entertainment,” said Vicky Rideout, author of the decade-long Kaiser study. “Instead of closing the achievement gap, they’re widening the time-wasting gap.”

It’s shocking. Who could have possibly predicted that computers wouldn’t be the magic bullet that would close all “gaps”?

Of course, this was completely predictable using HBD principles. And five years ago I wrote that “Publicly funded computers for … students are just a big waste of the taxpayer's money.”

As I wrote four years ago:

Why do people think that computers are some sort of magical panacea that will help poor kids do as well in school as middle class kids? This is leftist-liberal thinking. Leftist liberals like to think that all inequalities have to do with wealth and discrimination. They think that there is something that rich parents buy for their children that makes them smarter that poor parents can’t afford. The leftist liberals refuse to comprehend that poor kids are born less intelligent, and then, to make matters worse, their parents teach them lower class values instead of middle class values.

Teaching middle class values to poor kids would be inexpensive and the most effective possible policy to improve life outcomes of poor kids. But this is something leftist liberals refuse to do because it would be an admission that lower class values are inferior to middle class values. It would be an admission that poor people are partly responsible for their own poverty. It would be an admission that the poor scholastic performance of poor children isn't the fault of right-wing politicians.

Rich parents send their kids to private schools without any computers. Just a few months ago, “sabril” wrote in a comment: “Probably it won't be too long before NAM underperformance is blamed on the presence of computers. Which are after all a big distraction.” It looks like “sabril” should get some sort of award for predicting that.

Comments

[IHTG]

At least NAMs are off the streets when they play video games or chat on Facebook.

[HS: This seriously may be one of the reasons for why crime is down.]

[RandomMedStudent]

Sigma,
Do you have proposals as to how to teach "middle class values" to poor kids? There was an attempt to mix underclass children with middle class children through busing - it largely failed as kids from the hood stuck together.
I don't think teaching "middle class values" would be politically incorrect, as long as we don't call it teaching middle class values. It could even be spun into something left liberals would like; maybe be brand it "life skills head start for disadvantaged children." The question is how.

[asdf]

Public libraries are basically subsidies for facebook, especially in the inner city.

[sabril]

Thanks for the recognition :)

By the way, this discussion would not be complete if nobody mentioned the "laptops for African children" campaign:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpRRivQgpjc

The script to the video pretty much sums up Leftist thinking.

Of course, my own thinking is that laptops for Africans = more scam e-mails.

[Peter A]

"sabril" should start a foundation to promote that idea, he'd do well. Computers and technology are tremendously seductive. Most upper class parents complain incessantly about how their kids are "addicted" to the 'net, to video games, their iPad, etc. Giving this technology to undereducated, lower IQ children with poor impulse control is like giving them crack. It's tremendously irresponsible.

[Mild Speculation]

For future reference, could you give a list of some lower class values? In particular I'm referring to values that lower class parents would *want* to instill in their kids if they could do so effectively, and not values that do, in reality, get instilled (e.g., single-parenthood, unemployment, obesity, etc.). Or is that what you mean?

[BlogRaju]

The digital divide is now a "digital literacy" gap. From the article, we learn that the FCC wants to spend $200 million to create a digital literacy corps. All these attempts to close gaps are getting expensive.

[JP]

Academia thinks if you give NAMs stuff (a computer, a house, an education) they will magically become Middle Class despite not having strong work ethic, self-discipline, etc.

http://www.mindingthecampus.com/originals/2012/05/how_academics_concocted_a_new_middle_class.html

"Conflating outward appearance with underlying traits is typical of poorly educated Third World nations and, sad to say, America is increasingly drifting in that direction. In these societies, possessing a fancy paper saying "diploma" becomes irrefutable proof of being "educated." "Education" may also be acquired by dressing as an educated person--glasses, a three-piece suit, a briefcase, a fountain pen and similar theatrical props. Translated into current American society, one becomes "middle class" by owning a college diploma even if the acquired learning is less than what was once gained in high school and acquiring the degree required a small army of helpers.

Today's policies trying to build a "middle class," absent promoting the core psychology, makes failure inevitable though a financial windfall for those supplying ersatz diplomas. Employers will quickly grasp that the "college graduates" they interview are imposters with little self-discipline who lack the tenacity for tough tasks. If forced to hire them by some Department of Justice fatwa, the employer will relocate or substitute a machine rather than deal with an employee unable to show up in time. In other words, with no effort to inculcate old-fashioned middle class values, "middle class" status is being counterfeited and the shoddiness is quickly discovered by employers."

[Firepower]

Think BIG.
Computers are a small fraction of waste in education.

Public education in ITS ENTIRETY is a waste of taxpayer dollars.

[Tanizaki]

The article's writer is comically clueless:

"The concerns are brought to life in families like those of Markiy Cook, a thoughtful 12-year-old in Oakland who loves technology.

[...]

He particularly likes playing them on the weekends.

“I stay up all night, until like 7 in the morning,” he said, laughing sheepishly. “It’s why I’m so tired on Monday.”

His grades are suffering. His grade-point average is barely over 1.0, putting him at the bottom of his class. He wants to be a biologist when he grows up, he said."

Yes, all thoughtful students spend their entire weekends playing video games. This is how they get fine 1.0 GPAs to prepare them for a career in biology.

This family has their priorities straight: "At home, where money is tight, his family has two laptops, an Xbox 360 and a Nintendo Wii, and he has his own phone"

I bet the writer really cannot figure out why computers haven't made a bunch of Einsteins at a school where students get stabbed to death by their baby daddy.

[The Engineer]

Tying back into your last post, it seems to me that I see a lot of the neck-tatooed-masses with smartphones. What are they doing with those phones? And doesn't the poor-future-time-orientation of folks with neck-tatoos and smart phones say something? Those of us who question the value proposition of smart phones are not wrong.

[BlogRaju]

Half Sigma is busy today. It is now 1:30pm Eastern and no comments have been approved. Maybe Half Sigma is in a bad mood.

[HS: I had to attend some meetings, and then I was at lunch.]

[WRB]

On the other hand, giving young Afghans uncensored free broadband Internet would be more effective and cheaper than using armed men to forcibly civilize them (which is what we are attempting to do now.)

[Unbearably Sane]

@Mild Speculation, there is one lower-class value which many of us wouldn't mind seeing a little more often -- obedience. Lower-class (white) parents tend to value obedience as a high virtue in their children, while the middle-class parents are more concerned with letting the tykes be creative and express themselves, letting good behavior flow from learning rather than being taken from an authority figure's orders.

Obedience can be a terrible thing when taken to an extreme, but that's true of many values. All should be applied thoughtfully, at least after the person reaches adulthood.

As for computers in schools -- yeah, overrated. They're not useless, IMO, but having the very latest models is not important. Our local elementary school is laying off staff, yet holding fundraisers so they can buy the very latest Macs. Most of the kids don't even use them for anything other than taking tests and learning "computer skills" (which is that time of day when the three smart kids show all the others how to type in a URL or change the font in a word processor).

I guess it's nice to have a computer lab, for the benefit of those three smart kids and the other six who can pick it up when shown, but it isn't helping the other twenty or so in the class, and having ever-newer machines isn't likely to change that.

[MRM]

Ray Bradbury once said something along the lines of "why give children computers if they can't read, can't write and can't think". If this simple maxim were followed with regards to all government programs, we would save a ton of money and allocate resources far better than we do today.

There is no limit to the excuses that liberals will give for NAM socioeconomic failure. The irony is that they are the ones who cried about the '60s generals who always said that Vietnam was close to ending with 'one more turn of the screw'.

[not a hacker]

"For future reference, could you give a list of some lower class values?"

Yes, I can. The preeminent one is to hit anyone who criticizes you. I first saw this in 1970, when we had a black shortstop on our Pony League All-Star team. The coach sharply told him to get in front of ground balls instead of backhanding them and flipping the ball up into his throwing hand. His response was to slap the coach across the face. It was a prefigure of Sprewell-ism. There was always a good deal of debate about whether this tic was peculiarly black, or just a reflection of Southern mores. See Cash's "The Mind of The South." But whatever, my guess is that public school teachers realize this tic is central to black life, and so the one thing they can't do is say, "sit down and shut up," which is why urban schools are what they are.

[AllanF]

Education is a high-tech Cargo Cult.

[Jeremiah Johnbalaya]

The most interesting and terrifying question is what computers, via social networking and/or gaming, are doing to the mental/psychological development of children, and even adults.

Gaming obviously stunts social development through lack of practice. But, I believe that social networking is negatively affecting people at a really fundamental level. Among other things, people simply aren't designed (meant?) to socialize or communicate w/out the many subtle verbal and physical clues that are missing in that medium. Facebook, for example, is so obviously bad for people, I assume that in 20 or 30 years people will talk about it the way they talk about crack, or meth. This goes way beyond the focus-lacking, addictive behavior associated w/ surfing the internet or checking your mail. This is about how we behave and respond to people ... as people.

[Maximo Macaroni]

As a counselor at a juvenile detention center in Florida - nearly 100% African, including staff - I smiled to myself when the management installed an entire roomful of new computers. As I expected, they were untouched a year later. Not only did the boys have no idea how to use them, the staff didn't have a clue either.

[Conquistador]

"sabril" should start a foundation to promote that idea, he'd do well." - Peter A

Sabril is a she!

[E. Rekshun]

RandomMedStudent: "There was an attempt to mix underclass children with middle class children through busing - it largely failed as kids from the hood stuck together."

And beat up the middle class kids!

Under forced busing & desegregation, the hoped-for values osmosis ran in the wrong direction - middle class kids picked up underclass behavior.

[BlogRaju]

I googled "teaching middle class values" to see if anyone had done some research.

The first search result is this:

http://www.halfsigma.com/2008/06/middle-class-values-a-response-to-aph.html

[Mild Speculation]

Unbearably Sane -- thanks for suggesting obedience as one such value.

Not a hacker -- while I believe your story, it's not relevant to my question.

To rephrase, what values in their kids would lower class parents like to see? What types of adults might those kids turn into that would make their lower class parents proud (yet, because the values are misguided, they still burden the rest of society by aspiring to them).

A couple guesses I have are these: having babies, fighting against and complaining about discrimination, staying close to family, loyalty to family and friends to the point of breaking the law.

[IHTG]

"Sabril is a she!"

No.

[sabril]

One lower class value is that if somebody is stupid enough to loan you money, it's a good thing to renege on your obligation if you can get away with it. You just outsmarted another person.

The middle class value is that you are a better person if you pay on your obligations even if you can get away with not paying.

I first noticed this 5 or 10 years ago since I run a business which used to extend credit to customers. It's not just that the blacks wouldn't pay. It also seemed that they were happy about not paying; that they were putting one over on the man. To a large extent they did not seem to appreciate that they were doing something wrong.

The above distinction is probably part of the reason why blacks tend to have terrible credit ratings. I'm not sure if the middle class way of thinking could be taught to them, but it's probably worth a shot.

[realist]

I was born in a lower-class family. As sometimes happens, I am much more intelligent than my immediate relatives; my mother was abnormally stupid for her family, so I could only interact equally with my maternal uncles and grandmother. Everyone else was a po' white trash disaster.

As such, I think I have pretty good insight into "lower class values."
These aren't necessarily things that the lower class instill, but rather things that come along with their lack of understanding.

1 - Pleasure is everything. The wealthy and middle class drink when they can. Some use drugs, like cocaine or marijuana. The lower class is obsessed with these things, and will willingly do things that destroy their body and lives in order to pursue pleasure. They will also fuck anything living that's of the correct gender, because they don't have a concept of consequences that can arise from this.

2 - Smarter people are stupid. The lower class think that they're smarter than you, in any interaction. They are likely to come out of a dispute thinking that *they just showed you*. This ties in to the pattern of reneging on deals mentioned above; there is not even the first concept of thought or planning.

3 - Paranoia. Since they themselves are out to put one over on everyone else, they assume that everyone is. Coupled with the environments (familial and social) that the lower class lifestyle generates, the paranoia becomes somewhat justified... but it has the effect of preventing effective interaction with real society. My mother, for example, has always been terrified when she learns that I have done something at night in the city -- she associates the night with crime and debauchery.

There are others, but these three govern every interaction.

[Firepower]

If the author stated all these ideas years ago, it's certainly fueled paid journalists and scores of plagiarizing bloggers to unashamedly copy the concepts.

My initial thoughts on blogging as parroting good ideas and taking credit for them as if they're your own are now, fully validated.

[not too late]

On the other hand, giving young Afghans uncensored free broadband Internet would be more effective and cheaper than using armed men to forcibly civilize them (which is what we are attempting to do now.)

Posted by: WRB | May 30, 2012 at 01:54 PM

Or maybe they would just learn how to correctly type the word "porn"

[not too late]

Under forced busing & desegregation, the hoped-for values osmosis ran in the wrong direction - middle class kids picked up underclass behavior.

Posted by: E. Rekshun | May 30, 2012 at 06:48 PM

Yup

Contrary to their messiah complex, the dirty make the clean dirty. The clean don't clean up the dirty. Duh.

Have you ever touched something with your clean hand and made both your hand and the dirty thing clean?

Neither have I.

But I have often touched something dirty and got my hand dirty without cleaning the dirty thing.

Stupid magical thinking that smart kids will make dumb kids smarter. Now a whole class of unruly dumb kids makes it hard for them to do what they might be able to do without constant disruption, but dragging their disruption to the good schools and foisting it on good kids just ruined the school for the good students.

[Conquistador]

"Sabril is a she!"

No. - IHTG

Yes.

[Conquistador]

"The most interesting and terrifying question is what computers, via social networking and/or gaming, are doing to the mental/psychological development of children, and even adults.....Gaming obviously stunts social development through lack of practice. But, I believe that social networking is negatively affecting people at a really fundamental level....I assume that in 20 or 30 years people will talk about it the way they talk about crack, or meth." - Jeremiah Johnbalaya

In East Asia digital addiction is already seen as a major public health epidemic. The same problems are happening here but since they're only affecting lower class people the worst nobody cares (like the WoW addict that lives in his mom's basement).