#5SmartReads - November 12, 2020

On women, a COVID update, and your new favorite couple

"Other countries have social safety nets. The U.S. has women." (Culture Study)

“In the U.S., most of us aren’t taught to use our sociological imaginations. We’re not taught to think about social problems as structural problems. We’re not taught to see the forces that operate beyond our control – forces like capitalism, patriarchy, and white supremacy. And we’re not taught to see how those forces create many of the challenges we face in our lives and constrain our ability to make choices that could help us overcome those challenges.
Instead, we — especially women and people from other systematically marginalized groups — are taught to self-help-book our way out of structural problems. To believe that all our problems would go away if only we were to strictly follow some seventeen-step plan.”

This article broke my heart, had me nodding so hard that it felt like my head would fall off, and I wanted to quote every single word.

But I’ll spare you and encourage you to read it, share it, and di…