Salon: Rich Mommy Freaks When Confronted with Middle America

Anyone who reads this blog regularly (all four of you), knows that I read Salon.com and occasionally bring back some of their insanity to share. Well, this one is HUGE. The lead in blurb where a mom starts crying because her son learned the Pledge of allegiance, and no, they weren't tears of joy, pretty much guaranteed that I would read it.

Our family first arrived in Narrowsburg in 2000, as city people hunting for a cheap house. For barely $50,000 we were able to buy the "weekend house" we thought would complete our metropolitan existence. But soon after we closed on the home, we moved to Paris, spurred by the serendipitous arrival of a book contract. When our European idyll ended after two years, and with tenants still subletting our city apartment, we moved into the Narrowsburg house. After growing accustomed to the French social system -- with its cheap medicine, generous welfare, short workweek and plentiful child care -- life back in depressed upstate New York felt especially harsh. We'd never planned to get involved in the life of the town, nor had it ever occurred to us that we might send our son to the Narrowsburg School. But suddenly we were upstate locals, with a real stake in the community.

TRANSLATION: We're friggin' rich, can live where we want, but circumstances forced us to rub shoulders with real people in, of all places, a small town in the United States. Life is just awful.
I'll bet if life in Upstate NY is harsh when compared to her life in Paris, that she was not living in the Paris burbs that so recently were going up in flames on a nightly basis.

Still, for the first few months, we felt uneasy. Eighty of Narrowsburg's 319 adults are military veterans and at least 10 recent school graduates are serving in Iraq or on other bases overseas right now.

TRANSLATION: Oh crap. Evidence that there are other people in the world that might just have a point of view that disagrees with ours.

The school's defining philosophy was traditional and conservative, starting with a sit-down-in-your-seat brand of discipline, leavened with a rafter-shaking reverence for country and flag. Every day the students gathered in the gym for the "Morning Program," open to parents, which began with the Pledge of Allegiance, followed by a patriotic song, and then discussion of a "word of the week." During the first few weeks, the words of the week seemed suspiciously tied to a certain political persuasion: "Military," "tour," "nation" and "alliance" were among them.

TRANSLATION: And they're patriotic... and they're Christian... we're in Hell.
Crap lady, do you really think that all of America looks just like the Upper West Side? Honestly? I'll bet you think of yourself as a member of the "fact based community" too.

Shortly afterward, another parent casually told me that she wanted to bring her daughter's religious cartoon videos in to share with the class, but couldn't because "some people" might object. When we later learned that the cheery kindergarten teacher belonged to one of the most conservative evangelical churches in the community, we were careful not to challenge anyone or to express any opinion about politics or religion, out of fear our son would be singled out. Instead, to counteract any God-and-country indoctrination he received in school, we began our own informal in-home instruction about Bush, Iraq and Washington over the evening news.

I have to admit, I wouldn't be crazy about a fundamentalist teaching my kids, but based on all of this author's carping so far, the "most conservative evangelical" church in the area was probably Episcopalian or Presbyterian (for those who don't know, they're about as benign as it's possible to be and still call 'em Christian). But I'm sure her "instruction" about Bush was based on facts... No really.

That November, at the school's annual Veterans Day program, the children performed the trucker anthem "God Bless the USA" (one of the memorable lines is "Ain't no doubt I love this la-aand, God bless the USA-ay!"), as their parents sang along. About a dozen local veterans -- ancient men who had served in World War II, and men on the cusp of old age who had served in Korea and Vietnam -- settled into folding chairs arranged beneath the flag. When the students were finished singing, the principal asked the veterans to stand and identify themselves. Watching from the audience, I wondered if anyone would speak of the disaster unfolding in Iraq (which was never a word of the week).

No one did. The men rose and stated name, rank and theater. Finally, a burly, gray-bearded Vietnam veteran rose and said what no one else dared. After identifying himself, he choked out, "Kids, I just hope to God none of you ever have to experience what we went through." Then he sat down, leaving a small pocket of shocked silence. No one applauded his effort at honesty. On the contrary, the hot gym air thickened with a tension that implicitly ostracized the man, and by extension -- because we agreed with him -- me and my husband.

Oh, and you take the statement that he hopes the kids never have to go through what he did as anti-war? Wake up lady. Everyone hopes their kids never have to go through bad stuff. Some of us are capable of acknowledging that, hope though we may, bad stuff will come. Some of us are even capable of preparing for those bad things by doing crazy stuff like choosing to join the military which can, does, and will, defend this country that, despite your view of it, really is one of, if not the, best places on the planet right now.

In simple language, I told my son that our president had started a war with a country called Iraq. I said that we were bombing cities and destroying buildings. And I explained that families just like ours now had no money or food because their parents didn't have offices to go to anymore or bosses to pay them. "America did this?" my son asked, incredulous. "Yes, America," I answered. He paused, a long silent pause, then burst out: "But Mommy, I love America! I want to hug America!"

You go kid. By the way lady, we're not raining bombs from the sky in Iraq. For the most part the fighting is between the elected, representative Iraqi government and hard core Jihadists who would kill you and your son. Which side are you on? By your statements, I'm pretty sure it's the side of the Jihadists. Your child, thankfully, isn't.

Now it has been almost a year since my son scampered down the steps of Narrowsburg Central Rural School for the last time. We've since returned to the city, driven back to urban life more by adult boredom than our children's lack of educational opportunities. Our son is enrolled in a well-rated K-5 public school on Manhattan's Upper West Side; not surprisingly, the Pledge of Allegiance is no longer part of his morning routine. Come to think of it, and I could be wrong, I've never seen a flag on the premises.

And she's happy about it... No wonder the country is going to hell in a hand-basket. Lady, teaching your kid to love this country doesn't mean teaching him to be blindly obediant to anyone that happens to wrap themselves in a flag. It means that you can be proud of the things this country stands for despite the fact that it isn't perfect. Let's face it, no country on the planet is perfect. France is a pretty messed up place to be unless you're a native or a rich American.

My husband and I realized, though, that Narrowsburg did more than mold our boy into a patriot. He can, it turns out -- despite the warnings of other city parents -- read at a level twice that of his new peers. Since we returned to the city, he has learned how to ride a bike, long for an Xbox, practiced a few new swear words and, somehow, learned the meaning of "sexy." He has pretty much stopped favoring red, white and blue.

He'd have learned all that stuff in Narrowsburg, but he'd probably still "favor" red, white & blue.
This story made me very sad, but it does help explain why I'm having such a hard time understanding people like this lady. It really does seem to be breaking down to a divide between rich & poor, between those who can afford one house and those who can afford something on the Upper West Side (which, I jokingly referred to earlier, but which is where she actually lives) and a "weekend" house, and occasional sojourns in Paris.