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Altered_Soul wrote:

Ketara wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Orkeosaurus wrote:

Ahtman wrote:

sebster wrote:

JEB_Stuart wrote:

Iron_Chaos_Brute wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Miguelsan wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Miguelsan wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Orkeosaurus wrote:We must fight THE POPULATION BOMB!

Agreed.

There should be mandatory sterilization of poor and indigent peoples.

Yeah I agree! Mandatory eugenics, first we start with the politicians

M.

I was thinking retroactive abortions for all lawyers...

No, no, no we need those to make sense out of the crap the other ones legislate.

M.

You know, the vast majority of politicians are lawyers by trade and/or training...

They are worse. They are failed lawyers.

Extreme quote pyramid!

Dude, it is amazing...and epic...but mostly epically amazing!

Watch that pyramid grow!

What pyramid?

I like to feel included in things!

You need to get out more!

Mainly, I like the logic that it is clearly kids on free lunches wgo get crap test scores. I'd love to see the data he's drawing that correlation from.

It doesn't matter, because this is all good for Jon Stewart.

I am ignoring the post above, because its not good for business.

The data is from the "making it up" file that all politician like to get their facts from (I got that from the file as well, although I'm no politician)
Grow pyramid grow! Until we are asked nicely to give up on it though.

Nurgleboy77 wrote:No government support will not make the child go hungry, it will make the parent have to supply food for it.

Have you ever dealt with the truly poor?
There is a point where you simply can't afford to make the investment in everything that you need. Where the choice between good food (or food at all), shelter and clothing becomes 2 of 3 or even 1 of three.
I deal with people on the edge of that every day. It doesn't take a lifetime of bad choices to reach that point either. Too many people are a pink slip away from that decision, and many others are a great deal closer to it than they think. Mortgage+debt servicing and taxes eats through the average reserve within about 3 months if that of the smart employees reserve, even shorter if they were already living paycheque to paycheque. Getting sick peels that reserve even quicker.
Once the reserve is gone even if they achieve subsequent employment in a lower paying job they are still going to have trouble paying everything. Helping feed the children for the poor, which includes the working poor, should be a no brainer.

Orkeosaurus wrote:I have a modest proposal you may be interested in, of how we may both stop world hunger in the future and relieve it today.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Proposal

In case anyone missed the reference.

No more pyramids, please. It starts to be a form of Spam.

Actually I did think before I typed. Personally I do not believe it is the role of the government to feed it's population. There are plenty of non government charities that help in this situation.

Quite frinkly if you cannot care for your childern then maybe you should think about letting a relative care for them. If no relative then maybe a non-relative should be considered.

The first thought should not be "I can't feed my kids, I know I'll have the government do it."

jbunny wrote:The first thought should not be "I can't feed my kids, I know I'll have the government do it."

That is almost never the first thought. You talk about these things like everything you know about these issues you learned from a political leaflet.

jbunny wrote:Actually I did think before I typed. Personally I do not believe it is the role of the government to feed it's population. There are plenty of non government charities that help in this situation.

Quite frinkly if you cannot care for your childern then maybe you should think about letting a relative care for them. If no relative then maybe a non-relative should be considered.

The first thought should not be "I can't feed my kids, I know I'll have the government do it."

How old are you?

Do you really think the first thought is I should get the government to feed my kids? It's the last thought for most first is self, then family and as desperation increases food banks and charities. Food stamps and welfare are the last stop in the cycle of despair, as even the last hopes are dashed against the rocks.
1. Those private charities are stretched to the breaking point in the current cycle.
2. The idea of breaking apart families is not one anyone who loves their kids will willingly consider until all other options have been lost. I have serious trouble believing that anyone who has kids could even suggest this to be a possibility.

jbunny wrote:Do you care to explain why he is wrong on so many levels so we can discuss. I at least explained why I thought he was right.

He's wrong because his statistical argument is stupid. While I have no problem believing that the schools with the lowest parent/teacher night attendances test the worst, his assumption of that the correlation of the two grants a causative relationship is a grade school error. It's extremely likely that the lowest parent/teacher night attendances are going to be among poor schools, as their parents are the most likely to have both parents working (harder for someone to attend), the most likely to be shift workers (less likely to be free in the evening) and countless other factors. Poor schools also test the worst, as they have the least funding and the least educated parents. There are so many complex factors involved that to pick out parent teacher nights as a powerful factor is simply stupid.

More than that, his idea basically is to identify the kids with the worst parents and then remove government support from those kids. Think about that for a second, he wants to pick out the kids with the least parental support, and then give those specific kids even less help. This is a serious proposal from a guy in state level politics. It boggles the mind.


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Nurgleboy77 wrote:Am I a terrible person because I was nodding along with that whole video?

Not necessarily. You've likely got a poor understanding of poverty and child development, but they aren't hanging offences.


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Fifty wrote:Okay, so some kids with good parents turn bad, but it is about time parents are held to account for some of the failures they have committed whilst supposedly raising their children.

Sorry, I get worked up about this stuff.

Absolutely, and knowing so many stories from my own teacher friends I understand why you get so worked up. The problem with the proposed solution is that a parent isn't held accountable by holding a meal back from the kid. The only one punished by that is the kid.


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Nurgleboy77 wrote:No government support will not make the child go hungry, it will make the parent have to supply food for it.

That has simply no relation to how things actually work. If a parent is screwed up enough that they're happy to miss a parent teacher night even if it means their kid stops getting meals, it's ludicrously unlikely they'll then turn around and start providing homecooked meals. Or if the parent is poor its likely the meal will some basic fix that'll satisfy hunger but won't provide anything the kid actually needs to develop.

Nurgleboy77 wrote:No government support will not make the child go hungry, it will make the parent have to supply food for it.

That is so far from correct it should be funny. If a parent is so crap at your job as to not turn up to meetings, parents evenings, etc, then you can be sure they will let their child go hungry.

Re-read some of the horror stories I posted. If a parent will let their kids gak in the bath, do you think they care if it is hungry? If they are so strung out on drugs they let their 4 year old wander in the road and don't even react when I reunite them, will they care about feeding it? If the kid hasn't had clothes washed in months, will they bother feeding it? How would this work with the mother who was charging her 15 year old son rent?

efarrer wrote:truly poor?
There is a point where you simply can't afford to make the investment in everything that you need. Where the choice between good food (or food at all), shelter and clothing becomes 2 of 3 or even 1 of three.
I deal with people on the edge of that every day. It doesn't take a lifetime of bad choices to reach that point either. Too many people are a pink slip away from that decision, and many others are a great deal closer to it than they think. Mortgage+debt servicing and taxes eats through the average reserve within about 3 months if that of the smart employees reserve, even shorter if they were already living paycheque to paycheque. Getting sick peels that reserve even quicker.
Once the reserve is gone even if they achieve subsequent employment in a lower paying job they are still going to have trouble paying everything. Helping feed the children for the poor, which includes the working poor, should be a no brainer.

This is not an issue of the truly poor. The truly poor still turn up to parents evenings, and if they can't make it due to work commitments, they arrange another appointment. I know this, because I am the person they are mostly seeing. Hell, I've helped those people out as much as I am able to, by taking their kids on revision weekends that other families are paying for, and the like.

The issue here is with NOT the truly poor, it is the truly neglectful. These are the people who need dealing with, and it needs to be in ways that do not have consequences for their children.


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As an addendum - I grew up in a middle class world, attended a middle-class grammar school, went to a middle class university and then did another middle class job (civil service).

I am still regularly astounded by the things I see living in Hackney.

Some of you are still in middle-class worlds not realising how truly awful and selfish human beings can be, even towards their own children.

Now, middle-class people can be equally awful, but they do it in very different ways.

Fifty wrote:
This is not an issue of the truly poor. The truly poor still turn up to parents evenings, and if they can't make it due to work commitments, they arrange another appointment. I know this, because I am the person they are mostly seeing. Hell, I've helped those people out as much as I am able to, by taking their kids on revision weekends that other families are paying for, and the like.

The issue here is with NOT the truly poor, it is the truly neglectful. These are the people who need dealing with, and it needs to be in ways that do not have consequences for their children.

The person in that video wasn't just talking about the neglectful, he was talking about the poor in general. He made a blanket series of statements to justify his desire to cut off funding for paying for student lunches for the poor. You can try to redirect it to say it was just for the neglectful but it wasn't. He was targeting the poor and his manner of the targeting the poor was to aim for the children.

Then he is on the wrong target and will achieve bad and wasteful results.

Kilkrazy wrote:Then he is on the wrong target and will achieve bad and wasteful results.

Only if his objective isn't to consolidate his political base and become Governor.

That would be bad and wasteful.

Kilkrazy wrote:That would be bad and wasteful.

Welcome to American politics!

Welcome to anyone's politics...

It's exactly the same in the UK or Japan, just organised differently with different people involved.

Kilkrazy wrote:Welcome to anyone's politics...

It's exactly the same in the UK or Japan, just organized differently with different people involved.

I know, I was just being silly.

I can't believe anyone would be silly in the OT forum.

I must say if a woman/couple can't afford to feed their kids without getting welfare than don't have any.

Sure it's a right to have kids but welfare isn't a right, it's a privilege. If a woman who makes $500k a year wants 4 kids good on her as I know my tax dollars won't go to feeding their ass. If a woman makes $12k a year as a waitress and wants 4 kids then I say "stop the train". Stop at 1 kid or don't have any and feed and clothe them herself, not expect the government to help her out.

Since it is the feckless and undeserving poor who are being characterised, what mechanism of testing and coercion do you think would achieve this goal.

(I assume you do not advocate the culling of children of honest poor people who by bad luck lose their jobs.)

Sebster@ Thank you for writting out a well thought out response on why you disagree with him. While I cannot fully disagree with your comments. I don't agree with everything.

I believe regardless of how much a parent works they will make time for the important things. As someone else said, most teachers are willing to make arrangements for a time that will work for all parties.

Atman@ I did not learn any of this from a leaflet. I learned it by talking to people I grw up with, or worked with. I knew lots of people that did everything in their power to cheat the system.

I will say this is not every poor person, just an extremely large portion of people I have first hand knowledge of.

I'd be all for some sort of financial aid for people who had the ability to feed and clothe their children BEFORE they got into a spot they were unable to BUT it should be temporary and it shouldn't entitle them to everything.

I got laid off my job a year ago. People living on welfare live better than I do and I live decent. I still am able to pay rent, eat, pay insurance on my car but that is all I have. I don't have health insurance so if I get sick or hurt the bill is all mine. I won't get larger UI payments if I decide to have a kid before I get another job.

The current welfare system in the US is a joke and a sham. Free money for doing nothing, increased as the number of kids goes up; free MA; heating assistance which means basically heat is paid for through the winter months; WIC (which is damn good as WIC now gives you access to name brand foods, not just generic crappy food it used to give).

I get none of that unless I apply for welfare and unlike the majority of welfare leechers in this country I have too much pride to expect the government to help me (and before anyone says anything UI is NOT welfare).

Jbunny is right. Leftists like to pretend the welfare system is good and perfect and that nobody is a welfare queen but that's only because it's their idea and they support it and they don't want to be known to support something that is a bs policy so they look past those things and say that it's only in peoples minds welfare trash live better than someone working 40 hours a week for minimum wage. A single mom of 5 kids has a better lifestyle than a single guy working housing or road construction 50 hours a week.

Fateweaver wrote:I must say if a woman/couple can't afford to feed their kids without getting welfare than don't have any

That's a nice sentiment, but what do we do with the children that have already been born? Kill them? Let them starve?

The issue becomes quite simple when you ignore the most important variable.

Fateweaver wrote:I'd be all for some sort of financial aid for people who had the ability to feed and clothe their children BEFORE they got into a spot they were unable to BUT it should be temporary and it shouldn't entitle them to everything.

I got laid off my job a year ago. People living on welfare live better than I do and I live decent. I still am able to pay rent, eat, pay insurance on my car but that is all I have. I don't have health insurance so if I get sick or hurt the bill is all mine. I won't get larger UI payments if I decide to have a kid before I get another job.

The current welfare system in the US is a joke and a sham. Free money for doing nothing, increased as the number of kids goes up; free MA; heating assistance which means basically heat is paid for through the winter months; WIC (which is damn good as WIC now gives you access to name brand foods, not just generic crappy food it used to give).

I get none of that unless I apply for welfare and unlike the majority of welfare leechers in this country I have too much pride to expect the government to help me (and before anyone says anything UI is NOT welfare).

Jbunny is right. Leftists like to pretend the welfare system is good and perfect and that nobody is a welfare queen but that's only because it's their idea and they support it and they don't want to be known to support something that is a bs policy so they look past those things and say that it's only in peoples minds welfare trash live better than someone working 40 hours a week for minimum wage. A single mom of 5 kids has a better lifestyle than a single guy working housing or road construction 50 hours a week.

Yet you still have the money to go online and bitch about leftists.

And the funny thing, is your Ui is the result of the same leftists you hate, it's a social program that is designed to let someone who can't find work survive.

I see you whine and whine and whine about how bad things are because of everyone but you. It's the immigrants, it's this, it's that.

Put up or shut up. If it's not your fault your unemployed, whose is it?
Who is it that's stopping you from moving to a place where there is work?
Who is it that's stopping you from finding work?

jbunny wrote:
I believe regardless of how much a parent works they will make time for the important things.

Right, well, even if we assume that (and its an extremely poor assumption) you still cannot derive a point which renders the punishment of children as a positive action.


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Fateweaver wrote:
(and before anyone says anything UI is NOT welfare).

Yes it is. You've just constructed an emotional barrier which will allow you to accept one, while impugning the other.

Fateweaver wrote:
Jbunny is right. Leftists like to pretend the welfare system is good and perfect and that nobody is a welfare queen

No, if they're intelligent they simply recognize that welfare queens are not of sufficient significance to justify removing the program altogether.

The economy keeps me from finding work. Even gas stations in my area aren't hiring. Moving is not an option. It takes money to move and relocate.

UI is not social in the US. My old company pays extra tax to ensure that if they have to lay me off I'm taken care of. You don't pay for it, neither does dogma or Frazz or Shuma or any other poster on here. I know none of the dakkaites owns the company that laid me off so nobody on this site can claim "they are paying for me to survive".

Internet is free and or cheap. I can take my laptop anywhere and get free wireless. The internet is the one luxury I have at home.

Like I said I live decent but people who never make an effort to work live better. I HAVE to work to get UI payments. Welfare leechers DON'T. THAT is the difference between me and them.

To dogma: Perhaps you missed the point where if you had kids and were suddenly unable to provide for them you should get temporary assistance (and if you work somewhere that isn't a shithole and get laid off you are sort of covered by UI). If you have kids knowing you don't HAVE to work because you will get free assistance than you shouldn't have kids.

Welfare won't disappear though because the Liberals see nothing wrong with drug-addicted moms with 4 kids getting everything handed to them in life.

Yeah... I'm pretty torn on the whole welfare thing. Kids should never have to pay for the sins of the parents. Especially at the hands of the government that is charged with protecting its citizens. The problem is how do you have accountability and still accomplish that goal. If you try a carrot and stick approach in the cases that it's actually needed the parents probably get the carrot and the kids get the stick.

I agree that welfare is a busted system that is prone to abuse. However, there are people out there who genuinely work hard and need it. The failure of the economy has made that abudantly clear if you look around at what used to be the middle class. Too many people bust their humps all their lives and due to circumstances beyond their control (illness, layoffs, etc) get put behind the 8-ball. How do you help them while not subsidizing the freeloaders? If any of us internet gurus figure it out, I think the Nobel Committee in the area of Economics would be interested to hear it.

dogma wrote:

jbunny wrote:
I believe regardless of how much a parent works they will make time for the important things.

Right, well, even if we assume that (and its an extremely poor assumption) you still cannot derive a point which renders the punishment of children as a positive action.


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Fateweaver wrote:
(and before anyone says anything UI is NOT welfare).

Yes it is. You've just constructed an emotional barrier which will allow you to accept one, while impugning the other.

Fateweaver wrote:
Jbunny is right. Leftists like to pretend the welfare system is good and perfect and that nobody is a welfare queen

No, if they're intelligent they simply recognize that welfare queens are not of sufficient significance to justify removing the program altogether.

Show me how UI is welfare. One is paid for by the Federal government TOTALLY. One is paid for by taxes on employers over a certain size. Your Federal taxes you pay Dogma do not cover my UI payments but they do cover the payments made to Welfare recipients. It's not an emotional barrier. Leftist and humanitarians saying that welfare living is a crappy lifestyle are constructing emotional barriers to hide the fact that people living on welfare have it better than most workers working blue collar jobs.

Fateweaver wrote:
UI is not social in the US. My old company pays extra tax to ensure that if they have to lay me off I'm taken care of. You don't pay for it, neither does dogma or Frazz or Shuma or any other poster on here. I know none of the dakkaites owns the company that laid me off so nobody on this site can claim "they are paying for me to survive".

Its still social. Companies are composed of people, and taxes that they pay towards social programs are socialist.

Fateweaver wrote:
To dogma: Perhaps you missed the point where if you had kids and were suddenly unable to provide for them you should get temporary assistance (and if you work somewhere that isn't a shithole and get laid off you are sort of covered by UI). If you have kids knowing you don't HAVE to work because you will get free assistance than you shouldn't have kids.

And if you do have kids? What do we do with them? You haven't responded to my criticism, you're simply pretending to moral superiority in order to console an opinion which you probably know to be foolish.

Fateweaver wrote:
Welfare won't disappear though because the Liberals see nothing wrong with drug-addicted moms with 4 kids getting everything handed to them in life.

No, that has nothing to do with it. Its simply an acceptable negative. Needs of the many trumping the excesses of the few.


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Fateweaver wrote:
Show me how UI is welfare. One is paid for by the Federal government TOTALLY. One is paid for by taxes on employers over a certain size. Your Federal taxes you pay Dogma do not cover my UI payments but they do cover the payments made to Welfare recipients. It's not an emotional barrier.

Yes it is. What you're describing is a socialist program. You simply don't want it to be true. Unfortunately truth does not turn on desire.

Fateweaver wrote:
Leftist and humanitarians saying that welfare living is a crappy lifestyle are constructing emotional barriers to hide the fact that people living on welfare have it better than most workers working blue collar jobs.

Welfare is a crappy lifestyle. Working blue collar jobs is also, often, a crappy lifestyle. You might not believe it, but I've worked quite a few blue collar jobs. They suck, and I would never want to do it again. That said, the relevant statistics disagree with you sentiment. Your particular case does not overrule they're authority.

dogma wrote: Needs of the many trumping the excesses of the few.

Do we really know which is the "many" and which is the "few" though? I've always wondering how many of the welfare horror stories are true. Is the abuse widespread or limited? I don't honestly know.

Gornall wrote:
Do we really know which is the "many" and which is the "few" though? I've always wondering how many of the welfare horror stories are true. Is the abuse widespread or limited? I don't honestly know.

Well, its relatively easy to dig up statistics regarding the duration of welfare payments to segments of the population. I'll have to go hunting through JSTOR, but if I recall correctly the percentage of constant recipients is somewhere around twenty. Certainly not laudable, but low enough that any major reform must go through an arduous cost benefit analysis.