“When I taught from 2001-2016 at a high school for Modern Orthodox families, many of the students came from Kemp Mill.”
I was one of them! I lived around the corner from you and took your class in 2002-03. I’m afraid I don’t remember much, except that when we talked out of turn in class you’d tell us “there’s too much ambient noise.” I still have the books, though . . . I wonder how turn-of-the-century Ray Kurzweil holds up twenty-five years later.
Nice to hear from you, Benjy. Kurzweil was very insightful on where tech was headed, but his timeline was generally too aggressive. I think that Brin's book is still timely.
I think tight-knit communities are of extraordinary value, and I think Judaism (and other religions) can play an important part in fostering that sense of community. I'm not quite convinced that smartphones or social media are the enemy of community. I think that you can find community in digital worlds - just look at the way you have brought together a group of like-minded individuals around your Substack!
Columnist Jonah Goldberg tells the story of his time as an editor of his college's student newspaper. He helped introduce the newspaper's first computer, which eliminated the need for them to do layouts manually with X-acto knives and paste. Instead of all-hands-on-deck, late-night pizza sessions, student reporters could now stop by the office just long enough to drop off their pieces. Efficiency rose and community disappeared.
My husband recalls how the student newspaper which was his natural home through college, actually printed in the very building in which it was written, and working with the guy who oversaw that process lent the whole thing a cool blue-collar vibe that was welcome to these liberal artsy types.
Ha! I've been saying this for years. The real triumph of orthodoxy over conservatism is explained by the no-driving prohibition. It's a 'density' forcing function in suburbia, which makes community possible.
^^Probably the most important commandment that Orthodox Jews observe is not to drive on the Sabbath. To attend synagogue, they must walk. Because of that, they do not live spread out.
In contrast, Jews in the Conservative and Reform denominations drive on the Sabbath. There are Conservative rabbis who will tell you that allowing driving was the worst decision the Conservative movement ever made, because it led to the breakup of communities.^^
My groups were the first Boomers to enter school (born 12/46-12/47). I grew up near, and later lived in a small town of 350. Most of my classmates were from farms (who mostly attended one-room school houses for grades 1 & 2, before consolidation) or from the county seat of 2500 where some attended a Catholic grade school. By 3rd grade we were in one of rhose 3 grade schools. When when we left 8th grade everyone went to the local HS. There were 105 of us as freshman. The biggest class then and still today.
In the 50s TVs were still relatively few. So we played outside a lot, all day in the summer, with our peers. By the time we got to HS we all pretty much knew each other.
Just this past week one of those classmates texted me to report the passing of another of us. In passing, he noted that he still lives in the area and people still talk about how close our class was as a group. Totally true, but not so much today, even with smaller classes. We spent, comparatively, a huge amount of time together in groups large and small. Playing, arguing, fighting (fighting among boys was general acceptable so long as no permanent damage was done - despite years of playing "Cowboys and Injuns" and shooting BB guns and slingshots, any of us would have been horrified about using a weapon in a fight), dating, playing sports between us and against teams from other nearby communities.
I can't help but believe that our experience bonded us and was good for us. I wish my grandchildren had at least a similar experience. A couple do/did, the others not so mch.
The root of many of these problems is restrictive zoning leading to high housing prices making it necessary for both parents to work. When both parents are working, the kids, if any, are in day care or some after-school programs. They're not home intentionally acting with neighbor kids. And with no stay-at-home moms, there is no natural place for kids to gather anyway. Without children interacting across families, there is little interaction between the adults in the neighborhood, and one result is that most suburbanites don't even know their next-door neighbors, let alone the people down the street.
All sounds good but I'm confused about one small point that seems rather important. Where are these neighborhoods with lots of people of ages you'd expect them to have kids?
When we moved into our first house my wife was pregnant for the first US our two. Our street looped off another with maybe 30 houses. I can only think of 5 that had kids then or during our 6 years there. Our next door neighbors never had kids and a single man 2 houses the other direction never maried. Everyone else was older. I don't know that they all had grown kids but they wouldn't have had any at home. When we moved to our current home, 5 of the other 10 homes had kids, with one more a few years later. Now only one has kids with everyone else's grown and gone like ours. The rest of the neighborhood isn't much different. If we go back ~50 years ago when I was a kid it wasn't any different. As a kid I knew a much larger part of the neighborhood but the numbers weren't much different then either. So I ask, where are these neighborhoods where kids are in most of the houses? Seems to me 50-50 is high and in most cases 3/4 or more are people outside their time with minor children.
“When I taught from 2001-2016 at a high school for Modern Orthodox families, many of the students came from Kemp Mill.”
I was one of them! I lived around the corner from you and took your class in 2002-03. I’m afraid I don’t remember much, except that when we talked out of turn in class you’d tell us “there’s too much ambient noise.” I still have the books, though . . . I wonder how turn-of-the-century Ray Kurzweil holds up twenty-five years later.
Nice to hear from you, Benjy. Kurzweil was very insightful on where tech was headed, but his timeline was generally too aggressive. I think that Brin's book is still timely.
I think tight-knit communities are of extraordinary value, and I think Judaism (and other religions) can play an important part in fostering that sense of community. I'm not quite convinced that smartphones or social media are the enemy of community. I think that you can find community in digital worlds - just look at the way you have brought together a group of like-minded individuals around your Substack!
Columnist Jonah Goldberg tells the story of his time as an editor of his college's student newspaper. He helped introduce the newspaper's first computer, which eliminated the need for them to do layouts manually with X-acto knives and paste. Instead of all-hands-on-deck, late-night pizza sessions, student reporters could now stop by the office just long enough to drop off their pieces. Efficiency rose and community disappeared.
My husband recalls how the student newspaper which was his natural home through college, actually printed in the very building in which it was written, and working with the guy who oversaw that process lent the whole thing a cool blue-collar vibe that was welcome to these liberal artsy types.
Ha! I've been saying this for years. The real triumph of orthodoxy over conservatism is explained by the no-driving prohibition. It's a 'density' forcing function in suburbia, which makes community possible.
^^Probably the most important commandment that Orthodox Jews observe is not to drive on the Sabbath. To attend synagogue, they must walk. Because of that, they do not live spread out.
In contrast, Jews in the Conservative and Reform denominations drive on the Sabbath. There are Conservative rabbis who will tell you that allowing driving was the worst decision the Conservative movement ever made, because it led to the breakup of communities.^^
My groups were the first Boomers to enter school (born 12/46-12/47). I grew up near, and later lived in a small town of 350. Most of my classmates were from farms (who mostly attended one-room school houses for grades 1 & 2, before consolidation) or from the county seat of 2500 where some attended a Catholic grade school. By 3rd grade we were in one of rhose 3 grade schools. When when we left 8th grade everyone went to the local HS. There were 105 of us as freshman. The biggest class then and still today.
In the 50s TVs were still relatively few. So we played outside a lot, all day in the summer, with our peers. By the time we got to HS we all pretty much knew each other.
Just this past week one of those classmates texted me to report the passing of another of us. In passing, he noted that he still lives in the area and people still talk about how close our class was as a group. Totally true, but not so much today, even with smaller classes. We spent, comparatively, a huge amount of time together in groups large and small. Playing, arguing, fighting (fighting among boys was general acceptable so long as no permanent damage was done - despite years of playing "Cowboys and Injuns" and shooting BB guns and slingshots, any of us would have been horrified about using a weapon in a fight), dating, playing sports between us and against teams from other nearby communities.
I can't help but believe that our experience bonded us and was good for us. I wish my grandchildren had at least a similar experience. A couple do/did, the others not so mch.
The root of many of these problems is restrictive zoning leading to high housing prices making it necessary for both parents to work. When both parents are working, the kids, if any, are in day care or some after-school programs. They're not home intentionally acting with neighbor kids. And with no stay-at-home moms, there is no natural place for kids to gather anyway. Without children interacting across families, there is little interaction between the adults in the neighborhood, and one result is that most suburbanites don't even know their next-door neighbors, let alone the people down the street.
All sounds good but I'm confused about one small point that seems rather important. Where are these neighborhoods with lots of people of ages you'd expect them to have kids?
When we moved into our first house my wife was pregnant for the first US our two. Our street looped off another with maybe 30 houses. I can only think of 5 that had kids then or during our 6 years there. Our next door neighbors never had kids and a single man 2 houses the other direction never maried. Everyone else was older. I don't know that they all had grown kids but they wouldn't have had any at home. When we moved to our current home, 5 of the other 10 homes had kids, with one more a few years later. Now only one has kids with everyone else's grown and gone like ours. The rest of the neighborhood isn't much different. If we go back ~50 years ago when I was a kid it wasn't any different. As a kid I knew a much larger part of the neighborhood but the numbers weren't much different then either. So I ask, where are these neighborhoods where kids are in most of the houses? Seems to me 50-50 is high and in most cases 3/4 or more are people outside their time with minor children.
The Lindsey link
https://brinklindsey.substack.com/p/tim-carney-on-americas-family-unfriendly