Wealth and imagination

Whatever else it does, the fun-time Chelsea playground cultivates ultra-conservative versions of wealthy adult life in the young. Their money provides them with so many opportunities , and yet they seem incapable of imagining different ways of being.

I imagined that wealth and security would free people to be more creative and experiment with living in different ways.

Being rich means consuming and displaying items to demonstrate wealth. This is strictly gendered: clothes and manicures for women; cars and watches for men. Performative wealth is not just constricted to a shopping list that is not just conservative but gendered as well. Conforming to these patterns is seen as important for demonstrating that you belong.

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