The Price of Privilege

On the topic of white liberal bliss, one of the most fascinating books I've read in the past year is set, perhaps not coincidentially, right here in my (proverbial) backyard.

Last year, Kentfield psychologist Madeline Levine used anecdotes from her twenty-plus years of practice with Marin County as material for The Price of Privilege. It discusses how the parental pressure that accompanies growing up in upper-middle-class homes--where value as a person is perversely achievement-oriented--has driven many of her teen-aged patients to clinical anxiety, alcoholism, depression and other lovely conditions.

I was thinking about Levine's book last weekend, as I was having lunch out at High-Tech Burrito in Strawberry Village. I was sitting alone on a bench, noshing on the guac-laden creation of this better-than-mediocre-if-not-quite-the-Mission place, watching the kids and parents interact on a beautiful if slightly blustery Sunday afternoon. It was a suburban idyll, to be sure--Stanford sweatshirts, organic stuff, Land Rovers, sweatshop-conscious footwear.

Yet in my business, which consists of educating a great many of these kids, I've seen legions of tragedy. Stories that will wrench your soul, all of which take place in rather gilded surroundings. Levine is controversial, perhaps, but I think she's right.

We live in Marin. These are our children, after a fashion. So what are we going to do about it?

HTML Footnotes:
Madeline Levine: http://www.harpercollins.com/books/9780060595845/The_Price_of_Privilege/index.aspx
High Tech Burrito:http://www.hightechburrito.com/