Ben, speaking of knowing what you're talking about...apparently, you didn't bother to read the REAL interview with Professor Adam Swift, regarding children who get bedtime stories.

In short, he was quoted out of context. But...Keith Farrell pretty much lied, in the Federalist Papers, when he wrote that Swift claimed the following:

"Parents should not seek to give their children a head start on reading or language comprehension, because other parents may not be doing the same."

Here's the Australian interview with Swift:

https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/philosopherszone/new-family-values/6437058

You have to allow parents to engage in bedtime stories activities, in fact we encourage them because those are the kinds of interactions between parents and children that do indeed foster and produce these [desired] familial relationship goods.’

Swift makes it clear that although both elite schooling and bedtime stories might both skew the family game, restricting the former would not interfere with the creation of the special loving bond that families give rise to. Taking the books away is another story.

‘We could prevent elite private schooling without any real hit to healthy family relationships, whereas if we say that you can’t read bedtime stories to your kids because it’s not fair that some kids get them and others don’t, then that would be too big a hit at the core of family life.’

So should parents snuggling up for one last story before lights out be even a little concerned about the advantage they might be conferring?

‘I don’t think parents reading their children bedtime stories should constantly have in their minds the way that they are unfairly disadvantaging other people’s children, but I think they should have that thought occasionally,’ quips Swift.

In the end Swift agrees that all activities will cause some sort of imbalance—from joining faith communities to playing Saturday cricket—and it’s for this reason that a theory of familial goods needs to be established if the family is to be defended against cries of unfairness.

‘We should accept that lots of stuff that goes on in healthy families—and that our theory defends—will confer unfair advantage,’ he says...

Regardless of the context, I think I understand what Swift is saying, but he kind of loses me at "unfair advantage."

Some parents enrolled their kids in SAT prep courses. I did not. Did those kids have an unfair advantage? Did they have any advantage? Since I didn't see the courses as being cost-effective, I didn't care.

You are right I didn't look too deep into that, Lenona. I just took the thing you said could never happen, put it into a search engine, and handed you the top response. I didn't have the energy to put more effort into it and that seems to work over 95% of the time.

Here's the Australian interview with Swift ~ Lenona at August 8, 2021 12:35 PM

Interesting navel gazing, Lenona. However, it strikes me as a little too much economic resentment and class envy with Swift's advocation of eliminating inheritance and private schools (count the number of times the author uses "private" modified by "elite" when referring to schools).

Seeing that Swift is British, this does not surprise me. Class, not race, is the great divide in British society.

One can argue that anything one does gives one an "advantage" over others. If you get out of bed in the morning, that is unfair to those too hungover to get up. If you study for exams, that is unfair to those who do not study. This framework leads to Harrison Bergeron. We already see this in the elimination of valedictorians and SAT scores and the attack on magnet schools. It is participation trophies given out to all. insane

Look, bedtime stories are tradition in my family, and have been for, like, ever. Far be it from me to discontinue tradition!

In fact, reading to my granddaughter, whether tradition or not, is enjoyable beyond measure, and I have no intention of stopping. Reading is inherent in my DNA.