I am so sick of hearing people suddenly so deeply concerned about the socialization of America’s schoolchildren.

They’re fine with shooter drills, LGBT students bullied into suicide, punishing girls for wearing tank tops—since when do they give a shit about socialization?

American middle & high school is so intensely horrible socially that it’s a constant scar on almost every adult going right now, & no one has ever cared except to say “toughen up” to tormented children, but NOW the long-term social well-being of our children is just so important?

School funds being diverted from educational tools to sports, creating a social hierarchy rife with abuse in which some students get so much more than others, is so common it’s never even mentioned, but yeah we must risk our kids’ death to get them some of that good socialization

These people put armed cops in our schools. They fight like dogs against free lunches & for isolating students with lunch debt, even withholding diplomas. They scream every time teachers want enough money to afford pencils.

They don’t care about socialization one bit.

The problem is so many sensible people hear some new conservative excuse for doing the cruel & the reckless & jump to debate them on that topic as though they’re arguing in good faith. They never are.

They want schools open so they can pretend it’s all fixed & maintain power.

Secondarily, yes, they want the economy to wake up again.

But I’m not even sure they directly care about that. If they did, they’d wear masks. Those in power aren’t hurting for money, but the economy has to be back by November.

Those not in power?

They want to pretend.

Closed schools, bare grocery shelves, & masks make it impossible to believe everything’s fine & you made a good choice in 2016.

Since they can’t actually fix it (that would require admitting mistakes) the only option is to force everyone else to pretend there’s nothing to fix.