Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
while 85 percent of children born to upper-class families are raised by both of their birth parents, only 30 percent of those born to working-class families are.
Rob Henderson • Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
Something as simple as access can cause a massive increase in substance abuse.
Rob Henderson • Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
People are inclined to positively evaluate those who have suffered.20 Plainly, if people think you are a victim, they will be more likely to excuse your detestable behaviors.
Rob Henderson • Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
Ever since I left home, I’d been focused on trying to escape my past. I’d strived to be independent so that I wouldn’t have to rely on anyone. But now, what mattered most to me was to become someone who could be relied upon.
Rob Henderson • Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
Later, confirming my hunch that she was an eccentric woman, Mrs. Martínez bought a parrot, which she named Carlos but insisted I refer to as Mr. Carlos. Sometimes I would purposely call him Carlos just to upset Mrs. Martínez. I was scared of this bird but still had to feed him. And as long as I did my chores, Mrs. Martínez didn’t seem to care if I
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for every male foster kid like me who obtains a college degree, twenty are locked up.
Rob Henderson • Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
Successful people tell the world they got lucky but then tell their loved ones about the importance of hard work and sacrifice. Critics of successful people tell the world those successful people got lucky and then tell their loved ones about the importance of hard work and sacrifice.
Rob Henderson • Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
Many students would routinely claim that systemic forces were working against them, yet they seemed pleased to demonstrate how special they were for rising above those impediments. This spawned a potent blend of victimhood and superiority.
Rob Henderson • Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
For behaviors and habits to be stable and predictable, one’s environment needs to be stable and predictable.
Rob Henderson • Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
twentieth-century French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu stated that a “triadic structure” of schooling, language, and taste was necessary to be accepted among the upper class. Bourdieu described the mastery of this triad as “ease.” When you grow up in a social class, you come to embody it.