Public Schools & The Enforcement of Civility

[roo_ster]

RevDisk:

I am on board with most of your post.

It is not the government's job to raise people's children.  It is the responsibility of the parent. 

Agreed.  To that point, I support vouchers as a means to wrest the power & money from gov't and allow those parents who care to give their kids a chance.  Those parents who don;t care, it doesn't matter what system of education/babysitting is implemented.

Beating the tar out of kids does not necessarily make them decent people.  If the only form of parental guidance a child experiences is "pain and suffering", I'd be very surprised if the kid didn't turn into a sociopath.  I know more than one childhood associate that did in fact end up that way. 

Corporal punishment ain't the issue.  Like anything else, the extremes are bad.  Parents need to be responsible and teach their kids to be decent human beings.  Every kid is different.  Some kids honestly could use a whack upside the head.  Others need things explained to them in logical terms.  Others need to be shown by example.  Again, there isn't any magic solution.

Honestly, I am less & less concerned with them being decent folks than them acting like decent folk.  They might be raging balls of anger inside, for all I care, if they act in a civil manner.  My view on this is similar to my view on bigotry: I care little what one thinks, as long as one treats others relatively decently.  I just don't have it in me to police or care what goes on in most folks' minds.

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

i don't subcribe to the idea of indiscriminate beatdowns.  b ut i know that a few strategic whuppings can generate desired behavioral change.  if in the situations vodka describe the cops started grabbing the lil sobs and tuning em up real good it would stop.  the reallity is a a couple kids are gonna die as a result. such is life.
i went to a school where parents could opt to allow corporal punishment.  they opted me in outa 4 kids in that school. i needed that threat to keep me in line. i got exactly one swat with a ruler across the back of my hand when i tested the system.  i did not need another.  i have 2 kids  one is not gonna need beatings the second has caught a couple already.  in 8 years child one has gotten one swat on three occasions.the last time was so far back she can't tell you when.  she doesn't for a second think she couldn't qualify for one again. i tell em both its my job to teach then how to act and that i will beat em if that is what it takes to teach em. i also say i would much prefer not to and that they can decide how its gonna be by how they behave. so far so good.
some teenage boys are a real challenge. they start to imagine they are tough.  getting overwhemed by a 1/2 blind fat old fart can be very educational for them and has shown great promise in the long term behavioral change area.i'd rather they learn that lesson from me in a nonlethal environment than the hard way on the street

[mtnbkr]

To be honest, I'm impressed with how often kids are polite and well behaved.  When I visit my daughter's elementary school, the kids are mostly polite and well behaved.  Once introduced to me, they refer to me as "Mr. Allen" or "sir".  Sure, some aren't as well behaved, but they're in the minority.  This is a poorer school fed by neighborhoods such as Georgetown South (if you live in Prince William County or surrounding areas, you know what I'm talking about).  Many of the teachers speak Spanish because so many of the students are ESL while their parents speak little or no English. 

A year or so ago, we were at Potomac Mills Mall in Woodbridge (locals will know what I'm talking about).  This was a very busy Friday night.  The place was packed and just walking down the mall was difficult.  Like morons, we stopped at Orange Julius and got the girls and SWMBO an drink each.  Abby, my oldest, was walking along, trying to drink hers when we passed a store catering to teens (H&M or some such).  Two teen girls, probably in the 13-15 range, cut in front of us. Remember, the place is packed, you're going to cut in front of someone in order to change directions or get into a store.  Not so close to be rude, but close enough that my daughter lost her composure and dropped her drink.  She immediately has a meltdown because she dropped her drink and she thinks she's in trouble for making a mess.  The girls immediately stop, come back to us, apologize for causing my daughter to drop her drink (not really their fault though) and offer to buy her another one.  I hadn't said anything and they had gotten away if they hadn't returned, so they did this out of their on volition.  I told them it wasn't their fault and they didn't need to buy my daughter another drink, but thanked them for their concern.

Sure, there was plenty of rude behavior going on as well, but if we pay attention, there are plenty of polite and well behaved kids that deserve mention.

Chris

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

i work with kids in juvenile drug court.  they give me great hope. once they break in they go to great lengths to do well. positive peer pressure works. they still have some rough edges but they REALLY  want to do well once you convince em that its possible. they move me to tears regularly. and the lil sob's really like that. they are also of the opinion that a shot in the teeth can serve to help used at the right time.

[Tallpine]

When I was down in Texas a couple years ago, I was amazed at how polite everyone was and especially the kids, even compared to laid back Montana.

When my dad and I were headed into the ice cream shop, a couple early teen girls held the door for us even though we were at least 15 feet behind them.

I guess that it's a "Southern Culture" thing 

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

When I was down in Texas a couple years ago, I was amazed at how polite everyone was and especially the kids, even compared to laid back Montana.

When my dad and I were headed into the ice cream shop, a couple early teen girls held the door for us even though we were at least 15 feet behind them.

I guess that it's a "Southern Culture" thing 

we have a neighbor from nyc who hated it here till she saw how polite the kids were. now she loves it

[HankB]

Beating me for the length of my finger nails or failing to say "Sir" (mind you, I am a pathologically polite person)?  Not while I am breathing.  If anyone committed assault against me for any of the above mentioned activities, I would defend myself as I saw appropriate to the situation.  Which is to say, with overwhelming brutality. 

Minors are entitled to self-defense, just like anyone else.  Regardless of the fact that folks often forget or deliberately ignore this.

I tend to agree . . . one time in 8th grade, a week or two before graduation, a teacher was going to paddle a kid for some petty perceived offense . . . I forget exactly what, but it was probably something like combing his hair in class, which reminds me of another story . . .

But I digress.

Paddlings were virtually unheard of in my elementary school, but for some reason the teacher decided to paddle the kid in front of the class . . . but before beginning he'd have some of the other students "advise" the offender, thinking that since the kid "wasn't listening to him, maybe he'd listen to his peers."

When he came to me and the teacher demanded I advise my classmate, the advice I gave him was "Mark, the teacher is twice your size and still isn't man enough to hit you with his hand. I suggest you go into the cloakroom and get yourself a baseball bat to even up the odds. If he still hits you with the paddle first, we'll all be witnesses that you were defending yourself against an assault by a bigger & stronger bully when you smack him upside the head with the bat."

Teacher didn't like that at all . . . he huffed, puffed, scolded, threatened, and blustered, and . . . ultimately, he didn't hit the kid.

Now, sometimes little kids need a little corporal punishment to get their attention (I am NOT talking about crossing the line into beatings that leave welts and bruises - I think we'd all agree that's abuse!!!) and it should come from the parents. Now, once my age was into double digits, any teacher that laid a hand/paddle/ruler on me would have gotten a . . . very physical . . . response. No illusions that I would have won the fight . . . but there most certainly would have been a fight.

In high school, now, the one case where a teacher got physical with a student ended up with the teacher finding out what soccer felt like . . . from the viewpoint of the ball.

[RevDisk]

It is very easy to be "moral" when "being moral" is enforced by gov't violence, as it it currently is WRT slavery in both our countries.  Personally, I think it cheapens any claims contemporaries have to moral stature due to current lack of a slavery institution.

Treating humans as property and depriving them of fundamental rights without cause is wrong.  Regardless of who is doing so.  One doesn't need to be a moral titan to understand this principle. 

Paddlings were virtually unheard of in my elementary school, but for some reason the teacher decided to paddle the kid in front of the class . . . but before beginning he'd have some of the other students "advise" the offender, thinking that since the kid "wasn't listening to him, maybe he'd listen to his peers."

When he came to me and the teacher demanded I advise my classmate, the advice I gave him was "Mark, the teacher is twice your size and still isn't man enough to hit you with his hand. I suggest you go into the cloakroom and get yourself a baseball bat to even up the odds. If he still hits you with the paddle first, we'll all be witnesses that you were defending yourself against an assault by a bigger & stronger bully when you smack him upside the head with the bat."

Ah, one other reason paddling died is because some teachers enjoyed it significantly more than they should have, if you get my drift.  Hence the other reason why I'd really prefer a stranger not be given any authority to assault children.  There's unfortunately not insignificant odds that said stranger might be getting off on it.

[Tallpine]

Funny thing when I was going to school in AZ in the sixties ...

About half the teachers were truly exceptional, and the other half probably shouldn't have been allowed to be anywhere near children.

 

[MicroBalrog]

How very Progressive of you, to claim for yourself the moral stature countless others labored after for centuries.

Everything we do can be claimed in a measure to be the product of the work of others. Which means only that we're in possession of a valuable product of the hard work of others. It's still valuable.

I have been raised on the notion that slavery is wrong. Joe E. Slaveowner wasn't. So Joe. E.Slaveowner saw it fit to rape his slavegirls (which at least some slaveowners did), whip them (which even the most decent slaveowners did), and so forth.

The fact Joe Slaveowner's parents raised him a slave-whipping bastard doesn't excuse him, just that it doesn't excuse his spiritual descendant, Joe the Gang Member, that his parents raised him to be a liquor-store robber. It merely means my parents raised me better than either of them. So did yours.

It is very easy to be "moral" when "being moral" is enforced by gov't violence, as it it currently is WRT slavery in both our countries.  Personally, I think it cheapens any claims contemporaries have to moral stature due to current lack of a slavery institution.

So it was 'easy' for Northerners to be moral because the North had no slavery institution?

Is it 'easy' for you to be moral about murder only because murder is illegal? Am I to assume you think we would both revert to cannibalism if that were made legal? What kind of argument is that?

Also, very few folks actually provided the support you think was so prevalent, unless one subscribes to the "any economic activity anywhere effects commerce" argument as found in Raich.  (Which would net most northern and southern abolitionists as economic actors and thus supporters of slavery.)  Faulty history and logic, Professor Zinn.

Read up on poor whites and their support for slavery.

Then, there is the easily-punctured "poke any any aspect," which only requires one example to refute...

Please. Do you deny, for example, that the lifestyle and culture of the Southern elite was defined by the fact they were a leisure class, said leisure being provided by the forced labor of others?

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

in what way do you imagine this differs from liife in the north?  your reading reveal to you that general/president grant was a slave owner.

[MicroBalrog]

in what way do you imagine this differs from liife in the north?  your reading reveal to you that general/president grant was a slave owner.

Consult Margaret Ossovskaya's "The Knight and the Bourgeois", Warsaw, 1973 (I'm sure there's an English edition). Though the Northern elites benefitted from slavery indirectly (cotton, etc.), the lifestyle of the Northern elite was shaped by the fact they were businessmen, rather than feudals (a grand difference!). This created a giant disparity in commercial behavior between the North and South, and among other things explains why the Southerners were less active in the settlement of the West (if I recall correctly, and I haven't re-read it recently, this is described in great detail in Frederick Nolan's "The Wild West: History, Myth, and the Making of America", and in Thomas Sowell's "Markets and Minorities", who explains in great detail how slavery affected negatively the economic life of the South).

your reading reveal to you that general/president grant was a slave owner.

General Grant owned a single slave within his lifetime, and he set him free within a year of receiving him from his father.

[Zardozimo Oprah Bannedalas]

The cost of freedom. Some will play games with girls and go about the barn doing mischief. Some will, Heaven forbid, play Bandy or build swings and swing upon them.
We should beat them like we would a fencepost.

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

Consult Margaret Ossovskaya's "The Knight and the Bourgeois", Warsaw, 1973 (I'm sure there's an English edition). Though the Northern elites benefitted from slavery indirectly (cotton, etc.), the lifestyle of the Northern elite was shaped by the fact they were businessmen, rather than feudals (a grand difference!). This created a giant disparity in commercial behavior between the North and South, and among other things explains why the Southerners were less active in the settlement of the West (if I recall correctly, and I haven't re-read it recently, this is described in great detail in Frederick Nolan's "The Wild West: History, Myth, and the Making of America", and in Thomas Sowell's "Markets and Minorities", who explains in great detail how slavery affected negatively the economic life of the South).

General Grant owned a single slave within his lifetime, and he set him free within a year of receiving him from his father.

ahhhh i see!  heres a clue  in grants time a wifes property was her husbands  grants wife owned slaves

http://www.granthomepage.com/introbinson.htm
in his wifes memoirs if we are to believe her they were freed by the emancipation proclamation

in the north the industrialists treated the freemen worse than slaves  they were cheaper and plenty to be had

as an example they killed hundreds of workers at the iron furnaces in the winter. furnaces were in the open you shoveled em full of coal stripped to the waist then froze for an hour till the next time you stoked. if you imagine the brits gave up slavery for moral reasons you are mistaken. they gave it up cause it was cheaper to exploit the "freeman" than to use slaves. use em and if they live discard em when you don't need em

[MicroBalrog]

in the north the industrialists treated the freemen worse than slaves  they were cheaper and plenty to be had

In some industries, yes. On the other hand, there's plenty of primary sources to show for that life (for example) for seamstresses in the North was pretty good by the time's standards. There was also social mobility and very simple physical mobility (many workers left to go West) that kept conditions in the North better (not very good, but better) than, say, conditions for workers in England.

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

care to share a source? i hope they are better than your source on grant.   and saying things for seamstresses here was good for the times isn't saying much when you consider how they were treated in , just for an example, england.

[MicroBalrog]

care to share a source? i hope they are better than your source on grant.   and saying things for seamstresses here was good for the times isn't saying much when you consider how they were treated in , just for an example, england.

Actually, I'm not SURE that in Illinois a wife's property was her husband's. But moreover, I never said Grant was exactly a perfect idol of glory and freedom.

I hope you don't mind if I take a day or two to find the source. It was a large collection of contemporary sources and I don't have it with me.

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

you gotta love the irony of lincoln freeing grants slaves  while grant was a yankee general

[roo_ster]

you gotta love the irony of lincoln freeing grants slaves  while grant was a yankee general

Yes, that is irony writ large, with a cherry on top.

But, I wonder if it exceeds the sheer concentrated 180-proof irony of:
A man who fought for the Union, had an arm blown off in battle, survived to get captured by the Confederates, survived Andersonville, and then goes home back to the North and...two or three generations later his descendant joins up the ascendant KKK, funny costumes & all.  Hey, it was all the rage!  (Get it?)

Or so my maternal grandmother said of her father years before she died.

A pillar of the community, though.  What with being on the school board, running a local business, and with a reputation for generosity to the poor that I learned of when an elderly lady discovered I was his (middle) namesake. 

She & her daughter told me as much about the man in an hour as my mother & grandmother combined did in years.  Mostly, it was different stuff, though, regarding his very personal philanthropy and generosity over decades, to many different people.  If I would have run him down in front of my mother, she might have disowned me.  I got the feeling that if I would have run him down in front of this elderly lady, I would have had a fight on my hands.

Kinda puts the kibosh on any simplistic moral calculus and any moral preening I might do because I surely would never join such an organization as my GGF did.  Frankly, I can't think of anyone not related to me who would take up for me the way that lady did for my GG father.

[MicroBalrog]

The Yankees weren't necessarily nice guys. In fact, had the South not been associated with such a completely evil thing as slavery, we'd not be holding Lincoln up as such a big hero today.

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

who is this we you speak of?

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

i helped clean up a parsonage after the preacher passed away  amongst the things we found was one of those white costumes with the hood. man was a pillar of the community.  i felt bad for his son and grandsons   they took it hard

[Jocassee]

At this point I'm just curious about "bandy."

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

Frankly, I can't think of anyone not related to me who would take up for me the way that lady did for my GG father.

heck george wallace used to get the black vote, and that was before he had the change of heart.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/wallace/filmmore/reference/interview/chestnut06.html