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A carregar... Tightrope: Americans Reaching for Hope (2020)por Nicholas D. Kristof, Sheryl WuDunn
   Ainda não há conversas na Discussão sobre este livro.  mikeolson2000 | Dec 27, 2023 |    ) steve02476 | Jan 3, 2023 | In the past few years, books have appeared about America’s working poor and just plain poor, not to mention America’s drift to the right and our current populist phenomenon, some better than others. Kristof and WuDunn’s book is among the best on these topics for a couple of reasons. The authors offer personal stories of Nicholas’ boyhood friends, boys and girls with whom he rode the bus to school and played with. These are real people who once had futures, who the author knew as nice people, some brighter than others, people like you probably grew up with, if you lived in a small town, or in the middle class part of town, if you came from a working class family. In other words, these are ordinary Americans, and they ran into a buzzsaw by virtue of birth, or job loss, or illness and lack of medical care, or bad care, and a myriad of others problems. They might look like deadbeats to some, people who made their problems; in reality, they are like us, you, me, the Kristofs, and bad decisions and an equal dose of circumstances crushed them. Then the authors use these stories of what happened to these people, many of whom are either now dead or destitute, to explain what’s happening in America’s communities, how dysfunctional family lives, drugs, violence, excess incarceration levels, job losses, and unwanted pregnancies account not just for the plight in his hometown of Yamhill, Oregon, but of that in small towns and inner cities across America. These authors examine how millions of Americans devolved into the situations devouring them, both through their own means the compounding effect of lack of meaningful, consistent, research-based solutions to the overarching factors affecting them. What’s more, they explore programs, although small, that are working to turn around lives, and based on this, offer a number of suggestions that could break the current cycle of despair and early dead. That’s where the hope comes in, that there are ways, many proven, that can lift many people up. The challenge, however, and it’s a huge one, is getting Americans to recognize we face a collective problem. This isn’t, as too many of us believe, simply an issue of personal responsibility. The authors acknowledge that personal responsibility plays a role here. However, they argue very effectively, based on research and in dollars and lives to be saved, that there’s a collective, national responsibility, too. If we would heed even a bit of what they have to say, if our leaders, both in government and business, would listen, if we could embrace the idea of shared responsibility, then we as individuals and as a country would ultimately be better off. It boils down to: are we better than this, better than the way we now are ignoring the issue of poverty in America, or blaming it solely on the poor? The solution rests with us. (  ) write-review | Nov 4, 2021 | In the past few years, books have appeared about America’s working poor and just plain poor, not to mention America’s drift to the right and our current populist phenomenon, some better than others. Kristof and WuDunn’s book is among the best on these topics for a couple of reasons. The authors offer personal stories of Nicholas’ boyhood friends, boys and girls with whom he rode the bus to school and played with. These are real people who once had futures, who the author knew as nice people, some brighter than others, people like you probably grew up with, if you lived in a small town, or in the middle class part of town, if you came from a working class family. In other words, these are ordinary Americans, and they ran into a buzzsaw by virtue of birth, or job loss, or illness and lack of medical care, or bad care, and a myriad of others problems. They might look like deadbeats to some, people who made their problems; in reality, they are like us, you, me, the Kristofs, and bad decisions and an equal dose of circumstances crushed them. Then the authors use these stories of what happened to these people, many of whom are either now dead or destitute, to explain what’s happening in America’s communities, how dysfunctional family lives, drugs, violence, excess incarceration levels, job losses, and unwanted pregnancies account not just for the plight in his hometown of Yamhill, Oregon, but of that in small towns and inner cities across America. These authors examine how millions of Americans devolved into the situations devouring them, both through their own means the compounding effect of lack of meaningful, consistent, research-based solutions to the overarching factors affecting them. What’s more, they explore programs, although small, that are working to turn around lives, and based on this, offer a number of suggestions that could break the current cycle of despair and early dead. That’s where the hope comes in, that there are ways, many proven, that can lift many people up. The challenge, however, and it’s a huge one, is getting Americans to recognize we face a collective problem. This isn’t, as too many of us believe, simply an issue of personal responsibility. The authors acknowledge that personal responsibility plays a role here. However, they argue very effectively, based on research and in dollars and lives to be saved, that there’s a collective, national responsibility, too. If we would heed even a bit of what they have to say, if our leaders, both in government and business, would listen, if we could embrace the idea of shared responsibility, then we as individuals and as a country would ultimately be better off. It boils down to: are we better than this, better than the way we now are ignoring the issue of poverty in America, or blaming it solely on the poor? The solution rests with us. ( ) write-review | Nov 4, 2021 | “They say I have a problem with control?” Ethan seethed to us. “Look dude, I have ten guns, and I can’t control myself ?” p 200 Author Nicholas Kristof grew up in rural Yamhill, Oregon. Previous generations had bought land, built houses and small farms, and found jobs that could support a family. They seemed to be reaching the American dream of upward mobility for the next generation. But of the kids that Nicholas rode the school bus with every day to school, a large number of them had early deaths – what Kristoff calls ‘deaths by despair’ – drug overdoses and addictions, prison sentences, early pregnancies and broken families. In this book he and his wife, coauthor Sheryl WuDunn, explore these individuals’ stories and how their families fell from the American dream. Good paying jobs disappeared from the area, and as they did, social services and education declined. As a result, when kids made a bad choice, there were none of the traditional safety nets available that in wealthier areas lend a hand and let them turn their lives around. Well written and researched, this tells a compelling story. I would recommend this to anyone wanting to understand the anger and disenfranchisement felt by many Americans today. ( ) streamsong | Sep 9, 2021 |
Poor and working-class Americans start out with countless disadvantages, and the social safety net that ought to help them recover from missteps has been systematically slashed by 50 years of mean-spirited social policy — even as corporations and the wealthy have enjoyed steadily growing government subsidies and a steadily more permissive regulatory environment. ... The intended audience for “Tightrope” isn’t clear. The authors inform us that their main goal is to “tell stories” rather than explore “policy alternatives,” because only storytelling is likely to convince conservatives that the woes of the working class can’t just be chalked up to personal irresponsibility. On these points, conservatives are unlikely to be persuaded, and liberals are unlikely to require persuasion. Historically, economic crisis breeds fear and vulnerability to manipulation by authoritarians among groups perceiving a loss of power; racism is indeed rife in a country built on white supremacy. But “Tightrope” catches what many analyses miss about struggling communities across color lines: an undercurrent of self-hatred, in which people blame themselves for bad outcomes and are loath to ask for a “handout.” ... “Tightrope” thus concludes that America’s true exceptionalism is our lack of concern for one another. ... “Tightrope”’s greatest strength is its exaltation of the common person’s voice, bearing expert witness to troubles that selfish power has wrought. Tightrope is a convincing argument that it's not too late to change the course of the nation. "We remain optimistic about what is possible," Kristof and WuDunn write. It's also an agonizing account of how apathy and cruelty have turned America into a nightmare for many of its less fortunate citizens. ... It's difficult to read, and it was surely difficult to write, but it feels — now more than ever — deeply necessary. Husband and wife journalists Kristof and WuDunn (A Path Appears) turn a compassionate lens on the failed state of working-class American communities in this stark, fluidly written portrait.... Kristof and WuDunn avoid pity while creating empathy for their subjects, and effectively advocate for a “morality of grace” to which readers should hold policy makers accountable. This essential, clear-eyed account provides worthy solutions to some of America’s most complex socioeconomic problems. Pulitzer Prize winners Kristof and WuDunn (A Path Appears: Transforming Lives, Creating Opportunity, 2014, etc.) zero in on working-class woes and how to ease them. With an earnest blend of shoe-leather reporting and advocacy for social justice, the married journalists send a clear message to anyone who wants to see working-class Americans prosper: Stop blaming them for making “bad choices” and for failing to “pull themselves up by the bootstraps.” While acknowledging the need for personal responsibility—and for aid from private charities—the authors make a forceful case that the penalties for missteps fall unequally on the rich and poor in spheres that include education, health care, employment, and the judicial system.... An ardent and timely case for taking a multipronged approach to ending working-class America’s long decline. PrémiosDistinctionsNotable Lists
Politics.
Sociology.
Nonfiction.
HTML:The Pulitzer Prize-winning authors of the acclaimed, best-selling Half the Sky now issue a plea??deeply personal and told through the lives of real Americans??to address the crisis in working-class America, while focusing on solutions to mend a half century of governmental failure. With stark poignancy and political dispassion, Tightrope draws us deep into an "other America." The authors tell this story, in part, through the lives of some of the children with whom Kristof grew up, in rural Yamhill, Oregon, an area that prospered for much of the twentieth century but has been devastated in the last few decades as blue-collar jobs disappeared. About one-quarter of the children on Kristof's old school bus died in adulthood from drugs, alcohol, suicide, or reckless accidents. And while these particular stories unfolded in one corner of the country, they are representative of many places the authors write about, ranging from the Dakotas and Oklahoma to New York and Virginia. But here too are stories about resurgence, among them: Annette Dove, who has devoted her life to helping the teenagers of Pine Bluff, Arkansas, as they navigate the chaotic reality of growing up poor; Daniel McDowell, of Baltimore, whose tale of opioid addiction and recovery suggests that there are viable ways to solve our nation's drug epidemic. These accounts provide a picture of working-class families needlessly but profoundly damaged as a result of decades of policy mistakes. With their superb, nuanced reportage, Kristof and WuDunn have given us a book that is both riveting and impossible to i Não foram encontradas descrições de bibliotecas. |
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 Google Books — A carregar...GénerosSistema Decimal de Melvil (DDC)306.0973Social sciences Social Sciences; Sociology and anthropology Culture and Institutions Biography And History North America United StatesClassificação da Biblioteca do Congresso dos EUA (LCC)AvaliaçãoMédia: (4.17)
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It's certainly a book of the moment -- many of the issues underlying the racial divide in America also separate us by economic class. It ends, hopefully, with specific prescriptions to address the problems kids face when born into poverty.
I liked "Educated" and "Hillbilly Elegy," but they felt a little bit like cultural safaris to me -- like, let's go look at the poor folks! Kristof writes about the people he grew up around with genuine love and respect. He recognizes their strengths and dignity, despite any failures and without boasting of successes.
I like that attitude. I believe the coast-versus-heartland divide is manufactured. The people I know in both places are interesting.
The book's not light summer reading, but it goes pretty quick. I recommend it. (