People frequently make statements that, while technically true, lack the necessary surrounding context. Without this context, the claims can be, at the very least, misrepresented and, at worst, deceptive. Claiming context, however, maybe the responsibility of the the audience.
Consider an example.
During my highschool years, my family took advantage of me by giving me the responsibility of caring for a toddler and an enfant. I couldn’t broaden my experiences by participating in extracircullar activities or sports in highschool. I couldn’t earn my own money working at a fastfood restaurant. My family pocketed thousand of daycare dollars while I suffered a loss.
Now put context around the scenario to see if, as a member of a family, this claim is true.
- Consider a farm family in the 1940s. People are still recovering from the great depression when thousands of farms were lost in bank repossesions. All the adults are preoccupied with the crops and livestock and feeding everyone in the household. Teenage boys sometimes leave school after eigth grade to work fulltime besides their fathers. Female family member from the old country may make the journey to help in domestic chores as an opportunity to make a new life in the US.
- Consider a family in the 1970s. The women’s movement has championed women’s work outside the home. The parents have the financial capacity to put all their children through college. The also have the connections to mentor the kids about career choices and chanel their aspirations to people within their preferred industry. The children secure well paying jobs early in life.
- Consider a famliy with a teenage foster child and three very young birth-children. The foster child is treated well in the household but at age eighteen is told to make it in the world by their own gumpshin.
I think most would say that the duties of the individual in the form of babysitting was matched by the duties given to her by the family in the first two scenarios. In the last scenario perhaps not so much. The point is that when a claim of retribution is made against a group, it is not possible to give an assessment until 1. the group is named 2. the context of the activity is described 3. a weighting of the benefits of being a member of the group is determined. Even then, it is often necessary to have a sense of a baseline of what social arrangements were typically acceptable for similar sets of people.
From here forward demand to know context. There is no way to assess a story without it.
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