| If you think 'millions' of parents have that kind of wealth, you are sorely ill-informed of what the socio-economic state of the country is. What irks me, like I said before, is that so much of this is attributed to 'individual decisions' and 'responsibility', and no doubt a non-zero amount of one's 'success' is determined by these things, but the political agenda I push is one of rationalism. Consider this: Imagine a olympic athlete -- This person has been training since a very young age, has had private lessons and has competed all around the nation in top teams. Some would say this person is truly 1 in a million because of the talent they demonstrate, but I ask you, "how many people have the resources to even realize that kind of potential?" The lessons, the travel, the time parents need to take to ship their kids to these things and competitions. The costs of coaching and training. These things are all very expensive in terms of raw money and time. To say that everyone has access to them, or even 'a lot' people have access to them is mistaken. The truth is, that only families with wealth have access to the kinds of resources that give a person the best chance at being a world class athlete. This applies to nearly every aspect of life -- Whether it's a sport, or career, or an extracurricular in some other field, if your family has the resources to commit to your success (time, money, connections, 'i know a guy who...), then you are more likely to succeed there. There is a comic here that explains the idea much better than I ever could: http://www.upworthy.com/a-short-comic-gives-the-simplest-mos... |
The type of success that the author celebrated was things like raising healthy children, having them earn good degrees and start a good career, be financially independent, finding a spouse they deserve etc. Things which millions of parents surely feel is within reach, or even expected (but not guaranteed). It's not about raising an Olympic medalist. Trying to draw that equivalence is just an excuse to dismiss good advice/ideas.
I agree that the Olympics is an elitist sham.