Are those nordic country as awesome as they seem? Seems like they're way ahead of the US in just about everything except militarily.
Finland's no joke militarily. Their armed forces are set up to directly fight the Soviets/Russians, who they fought to a standstill back in the 1930s. Their military produced this guy:
Simo Häyhä, nicknamed "White Death" by the Red Army, was a Finnish sniper. Using a modified Mosin–Nagant in the Winter War, he has the highest recorded number of confirmed sniper kills – 505 – in any major war.[2]
He also was shot in the head with an exploding bullet. He lived.
FINLAND BELONGS TO THE NORDS.
NOOOOOOOOORRRRRDS
Cantido on
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mrt144King of the NumbernamesRegistered Userregular
Damn you for forming a coherent and convincing argument in the face of self-pity and defeatist sentiments!!!
Edit: You are like always in jail spool. What's up with that?
Oh, you know, a little B&E, a little aggravated assault. A little not knowing when to STFU and walk away from an argument on the internet. Nothing undeserved.
Damn you for forming a coherent and convincing argument in the face of self-pity and defeatist sentiments!!!
Edit: You are like always in jail spool. What's up with that?
Oh, you know, a little B&E, a little aggravated assault. A little not knowing when to STFU and walk away from an argument on the internet. Nothing undeserved.
Yeah, I usually fail to notice the oncoming authority bus until I've smashed right the fuck into it.
I just stopped posting for a while, because I needed to stop caring what internet fictions thought of what I say on the internet.
Oh yeah! I read about that guy. To be honest, the US military isn't as great as it could be. Instead of using all that gigantic budget to equip soldiers with better training, intelligence, and equipment, it usually goes to multi-million dollar boondogles that the generals' old buddies companies have been contracted to make. That, and hiring fucking mercenaries.
The US military was built for the purpose of systematically disabling air defenses and blowing up targets of importance swiftly and decisively. To my knowledge it's probably better at that than any other military ever, the occupation thing? Not as much.
Although credit where credit is due, the military has made significant progress on the soldier safety front in the last 3 or 4 years (casualty rates notwithstanding), vehicles have been redesigned to resist IEDs, logistics for wounded is better than ever, etc.
To tie this to the thread, the military isn't doing a very good job keeping all these returning vets from being poor. You'd think with all the hero worship soldiers get in D.C. we'd have something for them to fucking do when they get home.
1.) Join the PTA. Talk to other parents. It's not that hard to get a read on the quality of teachers, if you do a little bit of networking.
2.) Ask for the teacher that the other parents say are the best. Most parents don't get involved this way, and schools are usually happen to fulfill those requests. That's doubly true if you are involved in other ways. If you don't like a teacher, ask to have your child moved to another classroom.
Sorry, but I call bullshit on the bolded portion above. Where on earth did you get the notion that schools are "usually happy" to assign a child to whatever teacher the parent requests? Or that it's some kind of quid pro quo for parents who are PTA members? Schools have to manage teacher assignments for a whole pool of students including special education, English language learners, students who just moved into the district, students who haven't said for sure they're returning next year, etc. Unless you're talking about a school district where there are ten kids and so everybody has plenty of time to play "parental request lottery".
This is not to say I agree with the idea of immediately treating a teacher as the enemy until proven otherwise; that's just silly goosery.
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Sorry, but I call bullshit on the bolded portion above. Where on earth did you get the notion that schools are "usually happy" to assign a child to whatever teacher the parent requests? Or that it's some kind of quid pro quo for parents who are PTA members? Schools have to manage teacher assignments for a whole pool of students including special education, English language learners, students who just moved into the district, students who haven't said for sure they're returning next year, etc. Unless you're talking about a school district where there are ten kids and so everybody has plenty of time to play "parental request lottery".
This is not to say I agree with the idea of immediately treating a teacher as the enemy until proven otherwise; that's just silly goosery.
I used to cover schools as a reporter, and I have personal experience with several schools over several states and districts. School-to-school and district-to-district reassignment is a bitch - usually requires going in front of the board, but the ability to ask for a teacher is common. It's not really a difficult thing, and schools are usually happy to remove a student from a teacher's classroom instead of dealing with an angry parent for a year. It's the kind of thing that only sounds difficult if you have an outside perspective of schools.
Of course, part of the reason it's not difficult is that most parents don't bother. It's not so much a PTA member perk as it is that most parents do not know or bother to learn their school culture.
Oh yeah! I read about that guy. To be honest, the US military isn't as great as it could be. Instead of using all that gigantic budget to equip soldiers with better training, intelligence, and equipment, it usually goes to multi-million dollar boondogles that the generals' old buddies companies have been contracted to make. That, and hiring fucking mercenaries.
The US military was built for the purpose of systematically disabling air defenses and blowing up targets of importance swiftly and decisively. To my knowledge it's probably better at that than any other military ever, the occupation thing? Not as much.
Although credit where credit is due, the military has made significant progress on the soldier safety front in the last 3 or 4 years (casualty rates notwithstanding), vehicles have been redesigned to resist IEDs, logistics for wounded is better than ever, etc.
To tie this to the thread, the military isn't doing a very good job keeping all these returning vets from being poor. You'd think with all the hero worship soldiers get in D.C. we'd have something for them to fucking do when they get home.
Somebody here said it real good. Pubs like the idea of soldiers. People purging foreigners for the benefit of the U.S. As soon as it occurs that these soldiers are people with human needs that cost money, they don't care. I'm haunted by what's going to happen to these vets when the war winds down.
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mrt144King of the NumbernamesRegistered Userregular
Somebody here said it real good. Pubs like the idea of soldiers. People purging foreigners for the benefit of the U.S. As soon as it occurs that these soldiers are people with human needs that cost money, they don't care. I'm haunted by what's going to happen to these vets when the war winds down.
I used to cover schools as a reporter, and I have personal experience with several schools over several states and districts. School-to-school and district-to-district reassignment is a bitch - usually requires going in front of the board, but the ability to ask for a teacher is common. It's not really a difficult thing, and schools are usually happy to remove a student from a teacher's classroom instead of dealing with an angry parent for a year. It's the kind of thing that only sounds difficult if you have an outside perspective of schools.
Of course, part of the reason it's not difficult is that most parents don't bother. It's not so much a PTA member perk as it is that most parents do not know or bother to learn their school culture.
I'll raise your anecdata with being a parent who's had kids in multiple school districts, a parent who was a schoolteacher and a parent who was an administrator for a large urban school board in another state. I've got anecdotes from other parents and teachers in other states and relatives who are in various other positions in the school system, but I'll save those for the next round of betting.
"Schools are happy to" != "you can petition the school board", as you know. There is a difference between asking your school's principal to put your kid in a particular class and going to a school-board meeting, getting your request on the agenda, etc. and having the school board take action. Even if a school or a board wants to be nice and cooperative, you're going to get bogged down in procedure and rules - because there's going to have to be some way to manage the fact that everybody wants their kid in Mr. Fleebrizzer's class and there aren't enough seats for all of them. "Well Bobby's mom was angrier than your mom, so Bobby got what he wanted"? Probably not.
Additionally, "remove a student from a teacher's classroom" != "put a student in a teacher's classroom". Sure, if Bobby's mom says that Mrs. Dragoon is a terrible teacher for him and she wants him out, she may well be able to get the school to pull him out of that teacher's classroom. That's very different than Bobby's mom being able to pick and choose which teacher's classroom he gets into in the first place, or where they send him after Mrs. Dragoon. Because, you know, Mr. Fleebrizzer already has 32 kids in his class, so we're going to send Bobby to Ms. Mesopotamian, who isn't nearly as good but at least only has 29 kids already.
Should parents be more involved in schools? Sure, with the caveat that doesn't take into account that a lot of people have pretty full plates that don't make it easy to take time off for multiple school board meetings, and often not the skills or power to get any results from a school.
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Are those nordic country as awesome as they seem? Seems like they're way ahead of the US in just about everything except militarily.
In Scandinavia, there is very little poverty. Interestingly, there is also very little poverty among people of Scandinavian descent in the US.
Even more interesting, there used to be massive poverty in Scandinavia, which is why a huge number of them immigrated to the United States. Maybe their Scandinavianness isn't the issue. Good governance is.
Should parents be more involved in schools? Sure, with the caveat that doesn't take into account that a lot of people have pretty full plates that don't make it easy to take time off for multiple school board meetings, and often not the skills or power to get any results from a school.
I actually agree with all of the above. Schools differ massively, with something that is easy in one being a major hassle in another.
Where this conversation started, though, was with a poster who thought that it was right and proper to deal with his child's teacher in a hostile manner because of, effectively, his political principles. I was gently trying to suggest that maybe he would have less issues with his kid's school if he became more involved, investigated how they react to a more engaged parent and tried treating them more like professionals and fellow human beings and less like a servant class.
So, I admit I overshot with the generalities in a way I wouldn't have in the same discussion with another poster. I was trying to gently suggest that he was paying the equivalent of what one of my old employers called an "asshole tax" as a result of how he approached the situation.
Are those nordic country as awesome as they seem? Seems like they're way ahead of the US in just about everything except militarily.
In Scandinavia, there is very little poverty. Interestingly, there is also very little poverty among people of Scandinavian descent in the US.
Even more interesting, there used to be massive poverty in Scandinavia, which is why a huge number of them immigrated to the United States. Maybe their Scandinavianness isn't the issue. Good governance is.
Those two things are connected. The emigration was mostly from the agrarian underclass. They went to the midwest where they could make a living as independent farmers with bigger farms then their landlords back home could afford. They also sent word back and organised mass exoduses from the various villages, resulting whole communites transplanting to America.
Scandinavia could absorb the remaining poor easy and develope the natural resources they left behind into industry.
History of Economics and History of Technological development Represent.
Oh and in the early 1800s the scandinavian countries put what was at the time a massive investment into combating illiteracy. Creating schools and having wandering teachers to teach kids the 3 Rs(even poor kids of tenant farmers) free of charge(outside of regular taxes). This made the above possible, since they could learn to navigate their new homeland and stay in touch with the old.
The sky was full of stars, every star an exploding ship. One of ours.
I thought this was relavent to the discussion. Personally, I think the findings are somewhat surprising, since despite the increase in income inequality, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of actual class conflict happening. I guess OWS has been successful.
I thought this was relavent to the discussion. Personally, I think the findings are somewhat surprising, since despite the increase in income inequality, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of actual class conflict happening. I guess OWS has been successful.
I thought this was relavent to the discussion. Personally, I think the findings are somewhat surprising, since despite the increase in income inequality, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of actual class conflict happening. I guess OWS has been successful.
If by 'successful' you mean 'successfully highlighting a very real problem that exists in society', then I agree.
I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt that you aren't implying that the conflict is being manufactured by OWS. It's a very real thing and it's time that more attention was given to it. And, honestly, if it weren't for the pervasive idea that 'anyone can get rich, your time will come!' among many people of the poor and working class, I think the number would be even higher.
WATCH THIS SPACE.
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HacksawJ. Duggan Esq.Wrestler at LawRegistered Userregular
I thought this was relavent to the discussion. Personally, I think the findings are somewhat surprising, since despite the increase in income inequality, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of actual class conflict happening. I guess OWS has been successful.
If by 'successful' you mean 'successfully highlighting a very real problem that exists in society', then I agree.
I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt that you aren't implying that the conflict is being manufactured by OWS. It's a very real thing and it's time that more attention was given to it. And, honestly, if it weren't for the pervasive idea that 'anyone can get rich, your time will come!' among many people of the poor and working class, I think the number would be even higher.
I just mean successful in bring the issue to the public attention, and creating more of a perception that there is a class conflict.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I thought this was relavent to the discussion. Personally, I think the findings are somewhat surprising, since despite the increase in income inequality, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of actual class conflict happening. I guess OWS has been successful.
What would you define as "actual class conflict"?
Im not sure exactly, but I know I never get accosted coming out of Saks or feel uncomfortable wearing expensive things like Burberry coats/scarves.
I thought this was relavent to the discussion. Personally, I think the findings are somewhat surprising, since despite the increase in income inequality, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of actual class conflict happening. I guess OWS has been successful.
What would you define as "actual class conflict"?
Im not sure exactly, but I know I never get accosted coming out of Saks or feel uncomfortable wearing expensive things like Burberry coats/scarves.
Sounds like a problem we need to work on.
In seriousness, though, I wonder if we'll spend all that much time in the "accosting" stage before we move straight into violence. I think some people won't believe that a real class-based conflict is possible, or will affect them, until that happens.
I thought this was relavent to the discussion. Personally, I think the findings are somewhat surprising, since despite the increase in income inequality, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of actual class conflict happening. I guess OWS has been successful.
What would you define as "actual class conflict"?
Im not sure exactly, but I know I never get accosted coming out of Saks or feel uncomfortable wearing expensive things like Burberry coats/scarves.
Sounds like a problem we need to work on.
In seriousness, though, I wonder if we'll spend all that much time in the "accosting" stage before we move straight into violence. I think some people won't believe that a real class-based conflict is possible, or will affect them, until that happens.
I don't know that we need to think of class conflict in terms as extreme as all of that. But I do think we could make a fairly compelling case that a tiny percentage of powerful-but-unelected private citizens capable of influencing public policy that improves their own status quo (in a number of quantitative ways) while diminishing that of an overwhelming majority (again, in measurable way) does ring pretty true as a "conflict" between fairly discrete groups.
I don't know how "class conflict" or the more dramatic and bellicose "class warfare" has become pigeonholed as a cry of the radicals. Rational people can determine a problematic divide between an especially privileged percentage of the nation and the deleterious effects their success entails for most other people.
See, if you're just above dirt poor (and are therefore ineligible for food stamps), than you don't get them, which means that you'll go through your meager savings buying food, and a few months later you'll be dirt poor, and you'll qualify for food stamps.
Between this and politicians trying to reduce the amount or length of unemployment benefits, I really can't believe anyone who tries to tell me that the United States is not doing everything it can to create a destitute lower class.
See, if you're just above dirt poor (and are therefore ineligible for food stamps), than you don't get them, which means that you'll go through your meager savings buying food, and a few months later you'll be dirt poor, and you'll qualify for food stamps.
Between this and politicians trying to reduce the amount or length of unemployment benefits, I really can't believe anyone who tries to tell me that the United States is not doing everything it can to create a destitute lower class.
It's not malice, though. I get the attitude that drives this, because I lived nextdoor to a rather stereotypical welfare recipient with a bunch of screaming brats driving a nicer car than mine, and taking my tax money to pay for it (because money not spent on food can, of course, be spent on the car).
Then one day I woke up and realized that she probably wasn't paying any more for that car than I was, given maintenance on a newer car is much, much less and that she probably only owned the car on account of having had better credit than I did at one point. And that her current situation may well have been due to a change in life circumstances, such as a divorce.
But a lot of people just never get past the "usin' mah tax monies to buy their Nintendo boxes!" attitude.
I mean shit, if they have those assets that means that at some point they were probably making money, and paying taxes. So some of that money was theirs. Shit, people.
And yes, forcing people to liquidate assets to pay for food before they qualify for assistance is a real great way to help people out in the long term.
Then one day I woke up and realized that she probably wasn't paying any more for that car than I was, given maintenance on a newer car is much, much less and that she probably only owned the car on account of having had better credit than I did at one point. And that her current situation may well have been due to a change in life circumstances, such as a divorce.
And you know what, she may have just been that horrible. She may have been a loathsome sponge that deserves all the poverty life has thrown at her. She may drown kittens for fun. She may have a poster of Hitler above her bed.
But tailoring the laws to punish that woman for being scum means that you have also punished those children. And you have punished the vastly larger number of people in her financial situation who have done nothing to deserve it. To make that woman suffer for being the lowest form of humanity, you have destroyed the lives of thousands of innocents. You have made sure that a lot of people who were struck low by life and needed a helping hand to rebuild won't get it.
Then one day I woke up and realized that she probably wasn't paying any more for that car than I was, given maintenance on a newer car is much, much less and that she probably only owned the car on account of having had better credit than I did at one point. And that her current situation may well have been due to a change in life circumstances, such as a divorce.
And you know what, she may have just been that horrible. She may have been a loathsome sponge that deserves all the poverty life has thrown at her. She may drown kittens for fun. She may have a poster of Hitler above her bed.
But tailoring the laws to punish that woman for being scum means that you have also punished those children. And you have punished the vastly larger number of people in her financial situation who have done nothing to deserve it. To make that woman suffer for being the lowest form of humanity, you have destroyed the lives of thousands of innocents. You have made sure that a lot of people who were struck low by life and needed a helping hand to rebuild won't get it.
Great job.
We love to think of the poor people in this country as having to be either something straight out of a Dickens novel or straight out of Cops, if they don't have the good taste to look like something out of a Dickens novel. The overwhelming dearth of compassion in the discourse on the poor is a lot more troubling to me than the idea that some slacker got some of my tax money. Fuck that guy. But someone who needed it got some too.
It's not so much class warfare as competition, and obviously those with the least just can't compete. But competition sounds fair.
The poor can compete just fine. It's just that none of us will like it if they decide to start playing.
Scary thing is that I consider you an optimist. Number of bodies you can bring means nothing any more.
Revolution has always been a three way game, but knock out the middle and then all bets are off.
Bah, number of bodies means plenty, as long as you aren't trying to take on the government head-on. Start killing everybody you see wearing Burberry, instead. You can at least make being rich a lot less fun, and force them to give up a lot more of that wealth for their own personal protection.
Still not sure the poor win in the long run, t hough.
I love this.
See, if you're just above dirt poor (and are therefore ineligible for food stamps), than you don't get them, which means that you'll go through your meager savings buying food, and a few months later you'll be dirt poor, and you'll qualify for food stamps.
Between this and politicians trying to reduce the amount or length of unemployment benefits, I really can't believe anyone who tries to tell me that the United States is not doing everything it can to create a destitute lower class.
It's not malice, though. I get the attitude that drives this, because I lived nextdoor to a rather stereotypical welfare recipient with a bunch of screaming brats driving a nicer car than mine, and taking my tax money to pay for it (because money not spent on food can, of course, be spent on the car).
Then one day I woke up and realized that she probably wasn't paying any more for that car than I was, given maintenance on a newer car is much, much less and that she probably only owned the car on account of having had better credit than I did at one point. And that her current situation may well have been due to a change in life circumstances, such as a divorce.
But a lot of people just never get past the "usin' mah tax monies to buy their Nintendo boxes!" attitude.
I mean shit, if they have those assets that means that at some point they were probably making money, and paying taxes. So some of that money was theirs. Shit, people.
And yes, forcing people to liquidate assets to pay for food before they qualify for assistance is a real great way to help people out in the long term.
It'd be nice to see an occasional story on the news about a welfare recipient who wasn't actively milking the system for all it was worth.
You don't and never will though, because it's not news. Welfare is supposed to be there to help people who are down on their luck, and unable to provide for themselves by other means.
So, until such a point in time that a person actually needs welfare to survive the only experience they have with the system is the news stories of the .05%(or less) of welfare recipients who break the system, and no information as to how rarely this actually happens.
When that's all the information you get, it's very easy to take that stance. I know I had the same opinion until I read one of the posters here detailing how difficult it was for him to gain government assistance after a stroke (I think it was Duck, but can't remember).
I realized reading that post that the fraction of a percent of people cheating the system are a very minor part of the expenditure Also that making it more difficult to gain assistance isn't hurting the ones who get it but don't need it, but it's killing the people who actually need assistance but can't get it.
Scary thing is that I consider you an optimist. Number of bodies you can bring means nothing any more.
Number of bodies doesn't mean anything when it is the First World fighting against the Third World. A modern army can fight a billion people on somebody's else's turf and win.
But what happens when the fighting is internal, and it's the First World economy that's crashing because people are afraid to go outside? I wonder how long any nation can maintain a modern, super expensive military when the populace is hiding in their basements instead of working and paying taxes?
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THIS.
FINLAND BELONGS TO THE NORDS.
NOOOOOOOOORRRRRDS
Not that, this.
Damn you for forming a coherent and convincing argument in the face of self-pity and defeatist sentiments!!!
Edit: You are like always in jail spool. What's up with that?
Oh, you know, a little B&E, a little aggravated assault. A little not knowing when to STFU and walk away from an argument on the internet. Nothing undeserved.
Yeah, I usually fail to notice the oncoming authority bus until I've smashed right the fuck into it.
I just stopped posting for a while, because I needed to stop caring what internet fictions thought of what I say on the internet.
Edit: Also ... Damn! Bitches be poor and shit!!!
The US military was built for the purpose of systematically disabling air defenses and blowing up targets of importance swiftly and decisively. To my knowledge it's probably better at that than any other military ever, the occupation thing? Not as much.
Although credit where credit is due, the military has made significant progress on the soldier safety front in the last 3 or 4 years (casualty rates notwithstanding), vehicles have been redesigned to resist IEDs, logistics for wounded is better than ever, etc.
To tie this to the thread, the military isn't doing a very good job keeping all these returning vets from being poor. You'd think with all the hero worship soldiers get in D.C. we'd have something for them to fucking do when they get home.
Sorry, but I call bullshit on the bolded portion above. Where on earth did you get the notion that schools are "usually happy" to assign a child to whatever teacher the parent requests? Or that it's some kind of quid pro quo for parents who are PTA members? Schools have to manage teacher assignments for a whole pool of students including special education, English language learners, students who just moved into the district, students who haven't said for sure they're returning next year, etc. Unless you're talking about a school district where there are ten kids and so everybody has plenty of time to play "parental request lottery".
This is not to say I agree with the idea of immediately treating a teacher as the enemy until proven otherwise; that's just silly goosery.
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I used to cover schools as a reporter, and I have personal experience with several schools over several states and districts. School-to-school and district-to-district reassignment is a bitch - usually requires going in front of the board, but the ability to ask for a teacher is common. It's not really a difficult thing, and schools are usually happy to remove a student from a teacher's classroom instead of dealing with an angry parent for a year. It's the kind of thing that only sounds difficult if you have an outside perspective of schools.
Of course, part of the reason it's not difficult is that most parents don't bother. It's not so much a PTA member perk as it is that most parents do not know or bother to learn their school culture.
Somebody here said it real good. Pubs like the idea of soldiers. People purging foreigners for the benefit of the U.S. As soon as it occurs that these soldiers are people with human needs that cost money, they don't care. I'm haunted by what's going to happen to these vets when the war winds down.
Murderball leagues will skyrocket.
Rigorous Scholarship
I'll raise your anecdata with being a parent who's had kids in multiple school districts, a parent who was a schoolteacher and a parent who was an administrator for a large urban school board in another state. I've got anecdotes from other parents and teachers in other states and relatives who are in various other positions in the school system, but I'll save those for the next round of betting.
"Schools are happy to" != "you can petition the school board", as you know. There is a difference between asking your school's principal to put your kid in a particular class and going to a school-board meeting, getting your request on the agenda, etc. and having the school board take action. Even if a school or a board wants to be nice and cooperative, you're going to get bogged down in procedure and rules - because there's going to have to be some way to manage the fact that everybody wants their kid in Mr. Fleebrizzer's class and there aren't enough seats for all of them. "Well Bobby's mom was angrier than your mom, so Bobby got what he wanted"? Probably not.
Additionally, "remove a student from a teacher's classroom" != "put a student in a teacher's classroom". Sure, if Bobby's mom says that Mrs. Dragoon is a terrible teacher for him and she wants him out, she may well be able to get the school to pull him out of that teacher's classroom. That's very different than Bobby's mom being able to pick and choose which teacher's classroom he gets into in the first place, or where they send him after Mrs. Dragoon. Because, you know, Mr. Fleebrizzer already has 32 kids in his class, so we're going to send Bobby to Ms. Mesopotamian, who isn't nearly as good but at least only has 29 kids already.
Should parents be more involved in schools? Sure, with the caveat that doesn't take into account that a lot of people have pretty full plates that don't make it easy to take time off for multiple school board meetings, and often not the skills or power to get any results from a school.
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Even more interesting, there used to be massive poverty in Scandinavia, which is why a huge number of them immigrated to the United States. Maybe their Scandinavianness isn't the issue. Good governance is.
I actually agree with all of the above. Schools differ massively, with something that is easy in one being a major hassle in another.
Where this conversation started, though, was with a poster who thought that it was right and proper to deal with his child's teacher in a hostile manner because of, effectively, his political principles. I was gently trying to suggest that maybe he would have less issues with his kid's school if he became more involved, investigated how they react to a more engaged parent and tried treating them more like professionals and fellow human beings and less like a servant class.
So, I admit I overshot with the generalities in a way I wouldn't have in the same discussion with another poster. I was trying to gently suggest that he was paying the equivalent of what one of my old employers called an "asshole tax" as a result of how he approached the situation.
Those two things are connected. The emigration was mostly from the agrarian underclass. They went to the midwest where they could make a living as independent farmers with bigger farms then their landlords back home could afford. They also sent word back and organised mass exoduses from the various villages, resulting whole communites transplanting to America.
Scandinavia could absorb the remaining poor easy and develope the natural resources they left behind into industry.
History of Economics and History of Technological development Represent.
Oh and in the early 1800s the scandinavian countries put what was at the time a massive investment into combating illiteracy. Creating schools and having wandering teachers to teach kids the 3 Rs(even poor kids of tenant farmers) free of charge(outside of regular taxes). This made the above possible, since they could learn to navigate their new homeland and stay in touch with the old.
--LeVar Burton
I thought this was relavent to the discussion. Personally, I think the findings are somewhat surprising, since despite the increase in income inequality, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of actual class conflict happening. I guess OWS has been successful.
What would you define as "actual class conflict"?
If by 'successful' you mean 'successfully highlighting a very real problem that exists in society', then I agree.
I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt that you aren't implying that the conflict is being manufactured by OWS. It's a very real thing and it's time that more attention was given to it. And, honestly, if it weren't for the pervasive idea that 'anyone can get rich, your time will come!' among many people of the poor and working class, I think the number would be even higher.
As someone of Scandinavian descent living in the US, I can confirm this.
I just mean successful in bring the issue to the public attention, and creating more of a perception that there is a class conflict.
Im not sure exactly, but I know I never get accosted coming out of Saks or feel uncomfortable wearing expensive things like Burberry coats/scarves.
Sounds like a problem we need to work on.
In seriousness, though, I wonder if we'll spend all that much time in the "accosting" stage before we move straight into violence. I think some people won't believe that a real class-based conflict is possible, or will affect them, until that happens.
I don't know that we need to think of class conflict in terms as extreme as all of that. But I do think we could make a fairly compelling case that a tiny percentage of powerful-but-unelected private citizens capable of influencing public policy that improves their own status quo (in a number of quantitative ways) while diminishing that of an overwhelming majority (again, in measurable way) does ring pretty true as a "conflict" between fairly discrete groups.
I don't know how "class conflict" or the more dramatic and bellicose "class warfare" has become pigeonholed as a cry of the radicals. Rational people can determine a problematic divide between an especially privileged percentage of the nation and the deleterious effects their success entails for most other people.
I love this.
See, if you're just above dirt poor (and are therefore ineligible for food stamps), than you don't get them, which means that you'll go through your meager savings buying food, and a few months later you'll be dirt poor, and you'll qualify for food stamps.
Between this and politicians trying to reduce the amount or length of unemployment benefits, I really can't believe anyone who tries to tell me that the United States is not doing everything it can to create a destitute lower class.
It's not so much class warfare as competition, and obviously those with the least just can't compete. But competition sounds fair.
I want to be that awesome and rich when I'm that old.
You can be really, really honest when you're that rich and that old.
The poor can compete just fine. It's just that none of us will like it if they decide to start playing.
It's not malice, though. I get the attitude that drives this, because I lived nextdoor to a rather stereotypical welfare recipient with a bunch of screaming brats driving a nicer car than mine, and taking my tax money to pay for it (because money not spent on food can, of course, be spent on the car).
Then one day I woke up and realized that she probably wasn't paying any more for that car than I was, given maintenance on a newer car is much, much less and that she probably only owned the car on account of having had better credit than I did at one point. And that her current situation may well have been due to a change in life circumstances, such as a divorce.
But a lot of people just never get past the "usin' mah tax monies to buy their Nintendo boxes!" attitude.
I mean shit, if they have those assets that means that at some point they were probably making money, and paying taxes. So some of that money was theirs. Shit, people.
And yes, forcing people to liquidate assets to pay for food before they qualify for assistance is a real great way to help people out in the long term.
And you know what, she may have just been that horrible. She may have been a loathsome sponge that deserves all the poverty life has thrown at her. She may drown kittens for fun. She may have a poster of Hitler above her bed.
But tailoring the laws to punish that woman for being scum means that you have also punished those children. And you have punished the vastly larger number of people in her financial situation who have done nothing to deserve it. To make that woman suffer for being the lowest form of humanity, you have destroyed the lives of thousands of innocents. You have made sure that a lot of people who were struck low by life and needed a helping hand to rebuild won't get it.
Great job.
Revolution has always been a three way game, but knock out the middle and then all bets are off.
We love to think of the poor people in this country as having to be either something straight out of a Dickens novel or straight out of Cops, if they don't have the good taste to look like something out of a Dickens novel. The overwhelming dearth of compassion in the discourse on the poor is a lot more troubling to me than the idea that some slacker got some of my tax money. Fuck that guy. But someone who needed it got some too.
Bah, number of bodies means plenty, as long as you aren't trying to take on the government head-on. Start killing everybody you see wearing Burberry, instead. You can at least make being rich a lot less fun, and force them to give up a lot more of that wealth for their own personal protection.
Still not sure the poor win in the long run, t hough.
You don't and never will though, because it's not news. Welfare is supposed to be there to help people who are down on their luck, and unable to provide for themselves by other means.
So, until such a point in time that a person actually needs welfare to survive the only experience they have with the system is the news stories of the .05%(or less) of welfare recipients who break the system, and no information as to how rarely this actually happens.
When that's all the information you get, it's very easy to take that stance. I know I had the same opinion until I read one of the posters here detailing how difficult it was for him to gain government assistance after a stroke (I think it was Duck, but can't remember).
I realized reading that post that the fraction of a percent of people cheating the system are a very minor part of the expenditure Also that making it more difficult to gain assistance isn't hurting the ones who get it but don't need it, but it's killing the people who actually need assistance but can't get it.
Number of bodies doesn't mean anything when it is the First World fighting against the Third World. A modern army can fight a billion people on somebody's else's turf and win.
But what happens when the fighting is internal, and it's the First World economy that's crashing because people are afraid to go outside? I wonder how long any nation can maintain a modern, super expensive military when the populace is hiding in their basements instead of working and paying taxes?