School Choice For Meeee, but not for Theeee!

[mikeymikec]

Honest to Christ, regardless of your political leaning, if you're posting random YouTube videos to support/make your argument, you've already lost. I'm not clicking on that link or any other YouTube link that doesn't contain footballs in groins or cats being derps.

s0me0ne is turning a bit 0roo0roo'y this days methinks!

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Anyone else have the feeling this is OPs home life

 

[pmv]

I disagree. If she publicly advocated for better 'non privileged' schools while privately working against those institutions in some way, she'd be a hypocrite. Or if she publicly advocated that 'privileged' schools are no better than 'non privileged' schools then sent her kids to 'privileged' schools, she'd be a hypocrite. Or if she advocated for the abolition of 'privileged' schools while sending her kids to them, then she'd be a hypocrite. Jeremy Corbyn opposes selective education, and Theresa May tried to call him out on his kid going to a grammar school, but it turns out that his wife wanted to send their kid there and they ended up actually getting divorced over the issue.

Her (Warren) sending her kids to 'privileged' schools does not exacerbate the problem.

Admittedly I don't know much about her positions, but I'm about a third of the way through this page on her site:

A Great Public School Education for Every Student | Elizabeth Warren

I believe in America’s public schools. It’s time to give our schools the support they need to ensure that every student has access to a meaningful, high-quality public education.

elizabethwarren.com

and I haven't seen anything that smacks of hypocrisy re sending her kids to a 'privileged' school. She wants to improve 'non-privileged' schools, good for her.

PS: I'm using 'privileged' / 'non-privileged' labels because especially in the UK the labels are really confusing like 'public' and 'private' school being the same thing, and I have no idea if Americans have similarly weird labels.

Was that Corbyn who had that marital dispute over the issue? I thought it was Michael Meacher?

With Corbyn something that always bugged me was the insane politics of his brother - what is it with elite privately-educated families that they go to opposite extremes? As with the Mitfords or the Hitchens, so the Corbyns. It makes me less inclined to trust any of them. I'm not entirely sure you can ultimately trust any 'leftists' who came from the kind of background that involved going to a private school. Like Chris Hitchens they can always revert to their roots.

I really don't feel any personal antagonism to Warren, but I still say it's a kind of hypocrisy and thus a political vulnerability. it's like being in favour of racial equality and integration, while seeking out a school that excludes black people to send your own children to. (While saying you want better standards for the schools that the black children go to)

There are privately-educated political figures, even some who sent their own children to such places, that I nevertheless have some respect for. It's still not a good look, though, and hard to defend when right-wingers point it out (such pointing out is always done in bad-faith, of course, as with the OP).

 

[mikeymikec]

Was that Corbyn who had that marital dispute over the issue? I thought it was Michael Meacher?

With Corbyn something that always bugged me was the insane politics of his brother - what is it with elite privately-educated families that they go to opposite extremes? As with the Mitfords or the Hitchens, so the Corbyns. It makes me less inclined to trust any of them. I'm not entirely sure you can ultimately trust any 'leftists' who came from the kind of background that involved going to a private school. Like Chris Hitchens they can always revert to their roots.

I really don't feel any personal antagonism to Warren, but I still say it's a kind of hypocrisy and thus a political vulnerability. it's like being in favour of racial equality and integration, while seeking out a school that excludes black people to send your own children to. (While saying you want better standards for the schools that the black children go to)

There are privately-educated political figures, even some who sent their own children to such places, that I nevertheless have some respect for. It's still not a good look, though, and hard to defend when right-wingers point it out (such pointing out is always done in bad-faith, of course, as with the OP).

Definitely Corbyn: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremy_Corbyn#Personal_life
I remember when it came up in Parliament, I was tutting largely because TM was using it to deflect a criticism of her policies, I didn't know about the divorce/circumstances at the time.

If you can come up with an argument about how her (Warren) sending her kids to a privileged school is to the fairly direct detriment of the less fortunate (like your black kids argument, but relevant 😉 ), I'd be interested to hear it. I do think "it's not a good look" is a bit of a touchy-feely argument though.

At the end of the day, the UK lacks powerful leftists, so beggars can't be choosers IMO 🙂 I think it's important to decide on what basis you don't trust someone though, because not approving of their circumstances in growing up (which they had little control over) is a hop, skip and a jump from disapproving of sexual orientation, race etc. If they prove themselves to be a hypocrite, that's a different story.

I consider myself to be a lefty and becoming increasingly lefty with experience, and while I'd *love* for there to be near-equality in all educational establishments and public sectors in terms of high standards of service provision, as long as we have capitalism there will always be a better service for those who can pay for it. IMO an evolving civilised society makes it difficult to be exceptionally rich (decent employment laws, decent minimum wage, high taxes for the rich) while making giving the less fortunate as many advantages as possible to minimise the amount of people who have to live paycheck-to-paycheck.

 

[pmv]

Definitely Corbyn: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremy_Corbyn#Personal_life
I remember when it came up in Parliament, I was tutting largely because TM was using it to deflect a criticism of her policies, I didn't know about the divorce/circumstances at the time.

If you can come up with an argument about how her (Warren) sending her kids to a privileged school is to the fairly direct detriment of the less fortunate (like your black kids argument, but relevant 😉 ), I'd be interested to hear it. I do think "it's not a good look" is a bit of a touchy-feely argument though. It's "not a good look" for conservatives to be progressive, back science, abandon bigotry etc if they want to appeal to their fans.

At the end of the day, the UK lacks powerful leftists, so beggars can't be choosers IMO 🙂 I think it's important to decide on what basis you don't trust someone though, because not approving of their circumstances in growing up (which they had little control over) is a hop, skip and a jump from disapproving of sexual orientation, race etc. If they prove themselves to be a hypocrite, that's a different story.

I consider myself to be a lefty and becoming increasingly lefty with experience, and while I'd *love* for there to be near-equality in all educational establishments and public sectors in terms of high standards of service provision, as long as we have capitalism there will always be a better service for those who can pay for it. IMO an evolving civilised society makes it difficult to be exceptionally rich (decent employment laws, decent minimum wage, high taxes for the rich) while making giving the less fortunate as many advantages as possible to minimise the amount of people who have to live paycheck-to-paycheck.

Well I think the argument is much the same as with race. If you are from the wealthier classes, your children are likely to go on to a career of bossing around the children of the less-well-off, so it's probably a good thing that they should integrate with, and get to know, those they are going to be bossing, early on. People who grow up in an elite cultural bubble can lack any real grasp of the lives of those they later get to rule over. Class integration is as important as the racial or religious kind.

There's also the fact that if the more-powerful better-off parents all opt out and send their own children to elite schools, there's that much less pressure for the state school system to improve or be properly funded.

And schooling is a different kind of product to other things the wealthy can buy. It's a vital part of how class reproduces itself from one generation to the next. Much of what is sold by private schools is not the quality of the teaching, but the exclusivity, the not having to mix with the oiks, plus the social-networking opportunities and the self-confidence it gives its products. A private education system is more damaging than even private health-care co-existing with a socialised one (because not everyone _needs_ healthcare, the lucky can go through most of life without really needing it, but everyone needs education).

Finally, there's a correlation between poverty and behavioural problems. So you end up with the less-well-off-but-capable children having to deal, in under-resourced schools, with all the most disruptive and damaged children as classmates, while the more powerful get to buy their way into ghettos of good-behaviour.

 

[Zorba]

I am inclined to think it _is_ hypocritical. Elite liberal hypocrisy about this issue has irritated me my whole life ('irritated' being probably about the right word, neither stronger-nor-weaker than that).

It's not a good look to want racial integration while participating in, and seeking to benefit from, economic segregation. Private schools are an instrument of class-apartheid.

I quite liked Warren, as a candidate, but certainly her sending her children to private schools is a mark against her. Though as far as I can tell it's something she has in common with pretty much all top US politicians of either party, so I don't see how it can be a deal-breaker. Charter schools remain a bad idea, just as Academies are here (they seem to be pretty much the same concept).

If Warren is a hypocrite about it, then she's a hypocrite about it, that doesn't change the truth-or-falsity of what she says. That's the thing about hypocrisy - it doesn't say anything about the rights-and-wrongs of the actual topic.

Edit - I didn't watch the video, can't be arsed with Youtube videos, I'm just guessing as to what the point being made in it is.

The problem is fixing and integrating schools is a massive collective problem and no one wants to do it on their own. Further, going it alone won't fix anything. Charter and magnet schools just make the situation worse, though.

I don't see how you get rid of private schools, but in general I think school choice is bad policy overall. Bussing and forced integration is the only way to really fix the problem, however.

 

[Lanyap]

Warren lied, people cried.
Trump lied, people died.

 

[cytg111]

...

Is that right?

 

[mikeymikec]

Well I think the argument is much the same as with race. If you are from the wealthier classes, your children are likely to go on to a career of bossing around the children of the less-well-off, so it's probably a good thing that they should integrate with, and get to know, those they are going to be bossing, early on. People who grow up in an elite cultural bubble can lack any real grasp of the lives of those they later get to rule over. Class integration is as important as the racial or religious kind.

The logic of this argument strikes me very much as "if everyone stops sending their kids to privileged schools, then the problem will disappear"... yeah, ain't gonna happen.

There's also the fact that if the more-powerful better-off parents all opt out and send their own children to elite schools, there's that much less pressure for the state school system to improve or be properly funded.

Finally, there's a correlation between poverty and behavioural problems. So you end up with the less-well-off-but-capable children having to deal, in under-resourced schools, with all the most disruptive and damaged children as classmates, while the more powerful get to buy their way into ghettos of good-behaviour.

I agree with this, but my previous response in this post also applies. IMO if you get enough genuine lefties in power, the system will change for the better. This is a much more likely outcome than arguing if one (or a handful of) lefty doesn't send their kids to private school that it's somehow going to make a meaningful difference to anything. Those kids might not even end up in positions of influence.

Coming back to a point I previously made, I think you're setting up lefty politicians for failure by asking them to be a paragon of your values in every respect.

And schooling is a different kind of product to other things the wealthy can buy. It's a vital part of how class reproduces itself from one generation to the next. Much of what is sold by private schools is not the quality of the teaching, but the exclusivity, the not having to mix with the oiks, plus the social-networking opportunities and the self-confidence it gives its products. A private education system is more damaging than even private health-care co-existing with a socialised one (because not everyone _needs_ healthcare, the lucky can go through most of life without really needing it, but everyone needs education).

I wouldn't know, I've never experienced a private education in any respect, so I don't have a comment to make here.

 

[kage69]

"Bootstraps" Republicans get all manner of assistance and funding from state and feds for their private businesses, while decrying soshulism. No big deal there, nothing wrong with taking advantage of a system while advocating for it's change.

A democrat effectively does the same thing and the clown brigade loses their shit.

Great thread n0b0dy, what topic of fail will you be boofing next?

 

[pmv]

"Bootstraps" Republicans get all manner of assistance and funding from state and feds for their private businesses, while decrying soshulism. No big deal there, nothing wrong with taking advantage of a system while advocating for it's change.

A democrat effectively does the same thing and the clown brigade loses their shit.

Great thread n0b0dy, what topic of fail will you be boofing next?

Yeah, but, the 'left' imposes higher standards on its own. As with the Al Franken business, it might be regrettable, but it's just how it is. The right are endlessly forgiving of themselves, but I don't think that's a model to follow. Particularly the US right, I would say, perhaps because of that Christian Evangelical selective emphasis on 'forgiveness'. They love a repentant sinner who claims to have 'seen the light'.

 

[woolfe9998]

Warren's "big lie" is apparently saying that her children went to public school, while the truth is that one of the two went to public school K-12, while the other went to public school K-5, and private school 6-12.

This from an asshole who never criticized Donald Trump for lying in the past 5 years. It's a politifact "half truth" vs. 10's of thousands of lies.

OP is worse than stupid. He is getting boringly predictable.

Yawn.

 

[pmv]

The logic of this argument strikes me very much as "if everyone stops sending their kids to privileged schools, then the problem will disappear"... yeah, ain't gonna happen.





I agree with this, but my previous response in this post also applies. IMO if you get enough genuine lefties in power, the system will change for the better. This is a much more likely outcome than arguing if one (or a handful of) lefty doesn't send their kids to private school that it's somehow going to make a meaningful difference to anything. Those kids might not even end up in positions of influence.

Coming back to a point I previously made, I think you're setting up lefty politicians for failure by asking them to be a paragon of your values in every respect.



I wouldn't know, I've never experienced a private education in any respect, so I don't have a comment to make here.

I don't really have a political program about this, I don't actually know how one changes it, it's simply a personal reaction - I often find the privately-educated annoying and, when they are 'lefties', I often don't fully trust them. Too often they will 'do a Hitchens' and return to their roots, politically. Those who send their own children to private schools _really_ annoy me with their hypocrisy - that's a 'red line', for me. This is a UK thing, I really don't know that it translates to US politicians, the context there is quite alien.

Edit - one reason why the US seems hard to make sense of is that it seems as if to be a national politician there you pretty much have to be quite wealthy and part of the 'elite'. The political system seems to require it. Ergo, they all send their children to elite schools, so that's just 'normal' for the entire political class.

 

[ch33zw1z]

Warren's "big lie" is apparently saying that her children went to public school, while the truth is that one of the two went to public school K-12, while the other went to public school K-5, and private school 6-12.

This from an asshole who never criticized Donald Trump for lying in the past 5 years. It's a politifact "half truth" vs. 10's of thousands of lies.

OP is worse than stupid. He is getting boringly predictable.

Yawn.

Lol, she's still doing better than many other politicians, even from the qonservatives

Not to dive to far into it. Neither of my kids are in district, and I'm happy for that. Not all districts are created equal, we tried ours for 8 years before it really went sour.

 

[woolfe9998]

Lol, she's still doing better than many other politicians, even from the qonservatives

Not to dive to far into it. Neither of my kids are in district, and I'm happy for that. Not all districts are created equal, we tried ours for 8 years before it really went sour.

I couldn't care less where individuals decide to send their children to school. As parents, most of us will want the best education we can afford. If the public schools in a given area are subpar, however, we ought to look at improving them rather than going with "school choice."

I certainly don't want my tax dollars subsidizing people getting a religious education, which is what is happening in most cases in states that have school choice. It is clearly a violation of the Establishment Clause.

Most people don't realize this, but it's a good thing we had public education in this country starting in the mid 19th century. If we had "school choice" instead, various blocs of immigrants would likely have sent their children to schools structured around their own ethnic groups. German parents would have sent their kids to German schools, teaching in German. Etc etc.

Instead, we had everyone going to the same public schools because that is what poor immigrants could afford. The result was generational assimilation to an "American" culture, or what we call the "melting pot."

Given the cross-cultural animus, even amongst various white European cultures in those days, we would have had terrible trouble forming an integrated society without public education. Blacks, unfortunately, had to wait on that, due to Jim Crow laws.

 

[pmv]

I couldn't care less where individuals decide to send their children to school. As parents, most of us will want the best education we can afford. If the public schools in a given area are subpar, however, we ought to look at improving them rather than going with "school choice."

I certainly don't want my tax dollars subsidizing people getting a religious education, which is what is happening in most cases in states that have school choice. It is clearly a violation of the Establishment Clause.

Most people don't realize this, but it's a good thing we had public education in this country starting in the mid 19th century. If we had "school choice" instead, various blocs of immigrants would likely have sent their children to schools structured around their own ethnic groups. German parents would have sent their kids to German schools, teaching in German. Etc etc.

Instead, we had everyone going to the same public schools because that is what poor immigrants could afford. The result was generational assimilation to an "American" culture, or what we call the "melting pot."

Given the cross-cultural animus, even amongst various white European cultures in those days, we would have had terrible trouble forming an integrated society without public education. Blacks, unfortunately, had to wait on that, due to Jim Crow laws.

Though I think you make an absolutely valid point that I certainly can't disagree with, I do think it's interesting that you see a danger of divisiveness and lack-of-integration primarily in terms of ethnicity or race. That is an important issue, over here as well (if not to the same degree as the early US), but to me it seems equally important that there should be mixing and integration between economic classes (which as well as correlating and overlapping with those ethnic divides can also ihave a cultural dimension all of its own - e.g. that site "stuff white people like" that briefly wound a lot of poeple up (does it still exist?) struck me (and a lot of British people, I think) as being more accurately called "stuff upper-middle-class people like").

 

[woolfe9998]

Though I think you make an absolutely valid point that I certainly can't disagree with, I do think it's interesting that you see a danger of divisiveness and lack-of-integration primarily in terms of ethnicity or race. That is an important issue, over here as well (if not to the same degree as the early US), but to me it seems equally important that there should be mixing and integration between economic classes (which as well as correlating and overlapping with those ethnic divides can also ihave a cultural dimension all of its own - e.g. that site "stuff white people like" that briefly wound a lot of poeple up (does it still exist?) struck me (and a lot of British people, I think) as being more accurately called "stuff upper-middle-class people like").

In the early days of public education, the vast majority of families were poor by today's standards. School choice was flat out a bad idea then, because we needed ethnic integration and it would have prevented that.

Today, I suppose school choice could increase integration amongst socio-economic classes, but I can't support it unless there is a rule that private schools taking public funds cannot have mandatory religion classes. Taxpayers absolutely must not be funding people's religious education.

And unfortunately, in the US, it is religious conservatives who are pushing school choice precisely because they want their children to get a religious education at taxpayer expense. IIRC, in the state of Louisiana, something like 85% of public funding going to private schools is going to religious schools.

I can sympathize with poor people, including poor blacks, who want school choice because their public schools are in bad condition. However, until we eliminate the subsidy of religion from school choice, their only option is to advocate better public schools.

 

[pmv]

In the early days of public education, the vast majority of families were poor by today's standards. School choice was flat out a bad idea then, because we needed ethnic integration and it would have prevented that.

Today, I suppose school choice could increase integration amongst socio-economic classes, but I can't support it unless there is a rule that private schools taking public funds cannot have mandatory religion classes. Taxpayers absolutely must not be funding people's religious education.

I'm arguing exactly the opposite - "school choice" tends to reduce integration among socio-economic classes. That's a big reason for being against it. The wealthier classes tend to not want their offspring to have to mix with the lower-orders.

 

[woolfe9998]

I'm arguing exactly the opposite - "school choice" tends to reduce integration among socio-economic classes. That's a big reason for being against it. The wealthier classes tend to not want their offspring to have to mix with the lower-orders.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but in theory, doesn't school choice mean that poor kids get money to potentially go to the same private schools as rich kids? The rich may not like it, but if school choice is in place, there isn't much they can do about it.

 

[pmv]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but in theory, doesn't school choice mean that poor kids get money to potentially go to the same private schools as rich kids? The rich may not like it, but if school choice is in place, there isn't much they can do about it.

I'm thinking largely of how it works _here_. I have to admit I'm hazy what the idea means there. Here it means you don't have to go to your local school, you can pick one you like out of your area. Thus there is competition for places in the schools percieved as 'good' and they get to pick-and-choose who they take, which tends to mean taking largely middle-class students. You seem to be talking about a 'voucher' system, as beloved of libertarians, is that correct? That's a different issue, I guess, and I would agree with your objection to it.

 

[woolfe9998]

I'm thinking largely of how it works _here_. I have to admit I'm hazy what the idea means there. Here it means you don't have to go to your local school, you can pick one you like out of your area. Thus there is competition for places in the schools percieved as 'good' and they get to pick-and-choose who they take, which tends to mean taking largely middle-class students. You seem to be talking about a 'voucher' system, as beloved of libertarians, is that correct? That's a different issue, I guess, and I would agree with your objection to it.

Yeah, we are talking completely different things. Here, "school choice" means you can either go to public school, or else the state gives you money to subsidize private school education.

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

Again, explain to me what makes Warren a liar and a hypocrite here.

Do you sincerely need people to spoon feed you to that degree? Doing one thing and saying another is literally the definition of hypocrisy.

Honest to Christ, regardless of your political leaning, if you're posting random YouTube videos to support/make your argument, you've already lost. I'm not clicking on that link or any other YouTube link that doesn't contain footballs in groins or cats being derps.

Right, because our mainstream news media has the highest of reputations lol. Not at all resulting in lawsuits for slander where they pay out millions, talk show hosts spewing tons of misinformation... no no no, not any concerns there.

 

[interchange]

Do you sincerely need people to spoon feed you to that degree? Doing one thing and saying another is literally

Is Warren using vouchers, etc. to send her kids to private school? Being for or against school choice programming has nothing to do with whether or not a person uses their own personal money to pay for a private education. I'm not aware of anyone out there which is advocating that people with personal means to pay fully for their kids' education on their terms should be disallowed from doing so (assuming such education meets a minimum standard).

 

[fskimospy]

Is Warren using vouchers, etc. to send her kids to private school? Being for or against school choice programming has nothing to do with whether or not a person uses their own personal money to pay for a private education. I'm not aware of anyone out there which is advocating that people with personal means to pay fully for their kids' education on their terms should be disallowed from doing so (assuming such education meets a minimum standard).

Exactly, this is not complicated. Warren opposes charter schools (mistakenly, IMO) but she has never advocated for banning private schools in any way, shape, or form.

His argument is apparently if you have a position on how if we shouldn’t have private schools funded by public money you can’t want to have private schools funded by private money. This position is...confusing.

 

[MrSquished]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but in theory, doesn't school choice mean that poor kids get money to potentially go to the same private schools as rich kids? The rich may not like it, but if school choice is in place, there isn't much they can do about it.

A voucher can help if there is a good enough school that it can pay for, along with transportation to get there. More well off families can add to the voucher and do so. That leaves a lot of people out in the cold