A no-win situation

Further to the previous posting, there's a story in the Times today of a mother who lost the plot and struck her child with a hairbrush. The boy, who is only 8, has now been taken into care. Without knowing the full details it's hard to be certain, but it sounds, well, mad.

And there does seem to be a bit of a dilemma for the mother here. If the boy doesn't get to school she's jailed for allowing him to truant. But if she uses physical force to make him go, she gets her child taken into care. I suppose there must be something short of hitting him that she could have tried, but at the end of the day it's still physical coercion.

On violence

There's a brilliant post at renegade parent on the subject of violence and children in which Lisa takes libertarians to task for advocating traditional approaches to child-rearing (enforced schooling, traditional subjects, corporal punishment and so on) which are, on the face of it, not exactly in accordance with libertarian ideals of self-ownership and non-initiation of violence.

I'm sympathetic to many of Lisa's points. For example, she says that children should follow their own interests and we have certainly found that putting educational materials in the way of the kids has been an easy way to get them to learn things - they simply pick them up and absorb them when they are ready, with Spanish, Geography and History proving very popular. I agree that children are not inherently stupid, untrustworthy or lazy - they are highly intelligent on the whole. I think they just don't know very much. (See the difference?).

It's also worth pointing out, however,  that just because someone advocates schools run along certain lines, doesn't mean that they support schooling per se. The decision to school children is effectively made for us by government when they tax us to support school-based education. Those who can afford to HE regardless (or are willing to make the personal financial sacrifice to do so, or who can bring themselves to live off benefits while doing so) are a minority. So if we are effectively forced into having schools, the question then becomes "how do we best get them to work", to which the answer might well be "traditional subjects, rote learning" and so on. I've written before about how coercion breeds coercion and this is another example of the same thing.

But Lisa's objection to corporal punishment is a mistake. There is nothing in libertarianism that says that harsh punishments are not permitted. Libertarians are against initiation of violence, but are quite comfortable with "giving as good as one gets", and then some.  Corporal punishment in fact is probably the most liberal approach to retributive justice there is. So when it comes to child rearing, I would have thought that "physical chastisement" is quite appropriate in certain circumstances. For example, when little Jonny bashes little Jane, and particularly if the social niceties of bashing have already been explained to little him, it would convey an important lesson about the real world. After all if we accept that children are intelligent human beings (which we do) then surely we have to accept that they have to take responsibility for their actions?

That said, use of corporal punishment for non-violent transgressions such as "answering back" is probably wrong. Once though, I applied my hand to bottom of one of the offspring for running across a road without looking. Did I do wrong? There's a question here of legitimate authority and its transgression that I need to get my head around. In the meantime, there's plenty to talk about.

Learn from the past

Bruno learns how aberrant bankers were dealt with in medieval Italy.

No post

Been on my sickbed since the end of last week. Still struggling now. Viruses. Yeuch.

Posting will be non-existent.

Nazis versus libertarians

There's an interesting post and a good comments thread over at Letters from a Tory. It will be of interest to my home educating readers.

Justin Webb on America

Justin Webb takes a lot of stick from the commenters at Biased BBC, who see him as the identikit BBC socialist propaganda-monger. I've never been entirely sure about this, particularly since he took up the post of America editor.

Listen to him being interviewed on Excess Baggage, where he was punting his new book about America under Obama. He makes a very eloquent defence of the undiscovered middle of America and repeats the observation that he made some time ago that America is a very gentle place, at least outside of a few city centres. He tells the story of Virgin, Utah where there is a city ordinance decreeing that everyone must own a gun, and states that he thinks that Virgin is likely to be a very ordered and decent place (or something to that effect - I forget his exact words).  In fact, throughout the interview he repeats the observation of the gentleness of American society. When you think about it, this is a remarkable thing for a BBC journalist to say - it is surely the antithesis of BBC-think to make a connection between gun ownership and peaceful coexistence, no matter whether you think he's right or not.

I can't help but wonder if Webb has gone to America and turned into a second amendment advocate - if so, he surely can't say so - it would surely be the end of his career - but he seems to feel able to point to places like Virgin and quietly point out that it's not quite like we have been lead to believe.

It's an interesting observation and a useful contribution to the debate on the shambles that is British society. Credit where credit's due.

Comments tracking

What do people use to track the comments they leave on other sites? Since the much-lamented demise of co.mments I haven't been able to find anything that has the same combination of ease of use and reliability.

There must be something out there.

Here's Hannan again

This time interviewed on Fox News in the US.

This seems like the first time anyone has put forward the free market solution to the banking crisis. That's a damning indictment of the Conservatives, and it's interesting to hear Hannan speak about the "two main parties" as if he were not a member of one of them.  This looks to me as if he is a Tory member in name only - his thinking is far more Whiggish or Libertarian and he confesses to being a Ron Paul fan too. How did someone like that ever get elected on a Conservative ticket?

Hannan's the man for all that

Everyone is posting this speech by Daniel Hannan - even the American blogs think it's great. Just in case one or two of you haven't seen it, it's well worth a look...

Update on Mar 26, 2009 by Bishop Hill

Hannan's speech has had half a million views on YouTube and still not a word of it in the British media. Funny that.

The welfare state and drugs

I was struck by this comment in a thread at Heresy Corner on the subject of the NHS.

Of the many conversations I had with [NHS] staff, one in particular sticks in the mind. I asked a porter how he saw the future, and he said the drug scene was going to change dramatically in a decade or so. For now the grannies are holding the fort, caring for the grandchildren while the generation in between gets wasted. 10-15 years from now, those grannies will be gone, and the wasted mums of today will be the grannies, but grannies incapable of holding anything.

He said when that happens, the NHS in Scotland will either break down or would be forced to prioritise in ways now unimaginable. The one thing, in fact, everyone I spoke to there seemed to agree on was that the future is going to be very bleak.

A fishing trip

BBC:

The Metropolitan Police has seized £35m during an operation targeting safety deposit boxes used by criminal gangs.

Officers also recovered guns, drugs, child pornography and even illegal elephant tusks when 3,500 deposit boxes at three London centres were raided.

If 3500 boxes were raided, it's fair to say that this was a fishing trip rather than a targeted search.  Ever woke up with a feeling that you were in a bad dream?

State provision and the database state

I think we are probably heading, as a society, for a pretty major decision about our relationship to the state.  As things stand, the database state is starting to be rolled out and there may still be an opportunity to roll it back. Don't believe me? take a look at this:

This 21st century school system, which is beginning to develop, will look and feel very different to the one we have been used to. It will be one in which, to achieve their core mission of excellent teaching and learning, schools look beyond traditional boundaries, are much more outward-facing, working in closer partnership with children, young people and parents; other schools, colleges, learning providers and universities; other children’s services; the third sector, the private sector and employers; and the local authority and its Children’s Trust partners.

Still with me? Read on...

[W]e will further incentivise co-location of wider children’s services on school sites. Better use of the opportunities provided by modern technology will enhance all of the dimensions of a world-class education system.

Do you see where this leads? In the not-so-very-distant future, you will pack little Jonny or little Jill off to school and you will be handing them over to a surrogate parent. Suddenly real parents will start to look rather peripheral to their children's upbringing. In this brave new world, every aspect of their lives will be interfered with by the school: they will be inspected by social services, they will be examined by doctors and nurses and dentists and opticians and child welfare officers and the NSPCC, every detail being written down and recorded on the database from where it can never be removed. Your children will grow up the state knowing everything about them. The school will become the foundation upon which the database state will be built.

This is why state provision of anything is dangerous. So terribly, terribly dangerous.

This is why we must privatise the schools.

The quotes are from here, which I found on a HomeEd Facebook site.

The government's bill of rights and responsibilities

So we find ourselves at the top of a slippery slope, with Jack Straw breathing down our necks and pushing us firmly in the small of the back. Today the government publishes its discussion paper on a proposed new bill of rights and responsibilities. And if any of you were not convinced by my arguments the other day about the danger posed to society by the government and its human rights agenda, take a look at this extract.

The Government wishes to explore whether a future Bill of Rights and Responsibilities ought to have more prominence to principles such as that underpinning Article 17 [of the ECHR, which prevents people using their convention rights to quash the rights of others]; and to the principles of fair balance and the doctrine of proportionality, both of which are inherent threads running throughout the Convention. Such expression would make these principles more transparent to all citizens, and, if enshrined in legislation, could help guide the courts when they come to balance individual rights against limitations necessary in the wider interests of the community.

Note how he neatly elides from a convention article protecting the rights of the individual from the illegitimate actions of other individuals, to a demand that the rights of the individual be subsumed beneath "the wider interests of the community". The idea that the societal interests should take precedence of individuals is of course a fundamental tenet of socialism, and one that has lead to such delights of history as the Killing Fields, the Cultural Revolution and Stalin's famines.

In my book, the wider interests of the community can frankly go and take a running jump. 

Straw's intentions are patently transparent. He intends incorporate socialism into the constitution. He intends to end individual freedom. His bill of rights is the communist manifesto dressed up to look like Magna Carta.

Far better we adopt mine.

Propaganda in schools

I wonder what the kids learned in school today?

According to one of my readers (to whom I'm grateful for the tip) some of them (and I'm relieved to say none of mine) have been learning about...the same thing they learn about all the rest of the time - yes folks you've guessed it - environmentalism.

There's a toe-tapping new musical for primary kids to put on for their parents - it's called Eddie the Penguin Saves The World and it's about (yes, you guessed right again) global warming! (Tada!)

(Actually that's a bit of a surprise - I could have sworn it was Al Gore that saved the world). Anyway, let's find out about Eddie...

Eddie the penguin discovers that the world he lives in is changing and that the ice is melting. He decides to take his family to find a new home at the North Pole, where he meets Peggy the polar bear and discovers that human beings are causing the ice to melt. Eddie goes on a mission to save the planet and let the world know how they can change things for the better.

This fantastic new musical from Niki Davies is a must for any school investigating ecological and environmental issues. Songs can be used in conjunction with the script or stand alone.

Science education has certainly moved on since my day.

At the bottom of this post you should be able to find a sample from the show, helpfully provided by the publishers, Out of the Ark Music. The jaunty number I've picked for your delight is "The Melting Song"

The icebergs where we like to play are melting, melting away

Drip, drop, drip, drop, drip, drop.

and although I haven't copied it over, you might also enjoy "The Recycling Song"

Don't put your cardboard in the trash

Put it in a box, you can do it in a flash

Those of you who want more can visit Out of the Ark yourselves and enjoy more samples from the show, including the smash hits "Trees" and "One World" together with the bonus tracks "Use it again" and "Turn off the tap".

I bet you can hardly wait.

The melting song

DK on Carswell

An important speech by Douglas Carswell, the Tory MP for Somewhereorother, is covered by DK (without swearing once!).

Once upon a time there was genuine scrutiny. Indeed, as some people may know, a war was once fought over the extent to which the House was able to vote to approve supply and Government moneys. However, this House has slowly but definitely lost its power to oversee how the Executive spend our money. The quango state, on which the PAC produces so many of its reports, is in effect beyond budgetary scrutiny. Retrospective audit on the PAC is pretty much all that is left.

Read the whole thing.