Split Thread Does compulsory schooling equate to slavery? (Split from: "Liberal Fallacies" thread)

[A'isha]

More argumentum ad copypastum, and again with quotes with don't do a single thing to support your argument.

I mean, Albert Einstein went to school in 1880's Bavaria. Bismarck was still in charge when Einstein went to school!

Why on Earth do you think that has any bearing on education on 21st Century America?!

EDIT: It is a nice textbook example of the Appeal to Authority fallacy, though. "Look, Albert Einstein says schools suck! Albert Einstein!"

 

[Malcolm Kirkpatrick]

A system in which human beings are bought, sold, traded ...

That does not work. Robinson Crusoe could have enslaved Friday. Africans became slaves as soon as their captors shackeled them. Those who died on the walk from the point of capture to the first slave marked died slaves. A child could be born on the plantation to slave parents and spend his/her entire life as the property of the owner of that plantation and still be a slave. Commerce in slaves, though a common consequence of property rights to humans is not a defining characteristic. Compulsion is the defining characteristic.

Not everything that is compulsory is slavery. Were the vast majority of the American soldiers who served in Vietnam and World War II slaves?

WWII, yes. Vietnam? Before Nixon, yes. After the shift to a volunteer force, I'm not sure. "Vast majority" depends on the ratio of lifers, and new volunteers to draftees left over from the earlier policy.

 

[Malcolm Kirkpatrick]

More argumentum ad copypastum, and again with quotes with don't do a single thing to support your argument.
I mean, Albert Einstein went to school in 1880's Bavaria. Bismarck was still in charge when Einstein went to school!
Why on Earth do you think that has any bearing on education on 21st Century America?!
EDIT: It is a nice textbook example of the Appeal to Authority fallacy, though. "Look, Albert Einstein says schools suck! Albert Einstein!"

Einstein makes an argument. Which Ant attempts to rebut with "He's old."

 

[A'isha]

Robinson Crusoe could have enslaved Friday.

Um...Robinson Crusoe was a fictional character from a novel.

WWII, yes. Vietnam? Before Nixon, yes. After the shift to a volunteer force, I'm not sure.

So, just to make sure, you're asserting that drafted American military personnel, whether during wartime or not, were slaves?

 

[A'isha]

Einstein makes an argument. Which Ant attempts to rebut with "He's old."

No, I'm saying "what Einstein said about his schooling in 1880's Germany is about as inapplicable and irrelevant to schooling in 2010's America as it's possible to get, and the only reason you keep cutting and pasting those quotes is because you're trying to piggyback on Einstein's reputation as a famous physicist to bolster your inane argument".

Just so we're clear.

 

[bruto]

Most property does not. Slaves do. How do you define "tax"? It's not much of a stretch from a reasonable definition of "tax" to the conclusion that slaves are taxed 100% of their income.

By your definition above, if I knocked you down and stole your wallet it would be a tax too.

 

[A'isha]

By your definition above, if I knocked you down and stole your wallet it would be a tax too.

Slaveowners in the antebellum south were actually government tax collectors, too. Who knew?

 

[Border Reiver]

What's your definition of slavery? Is school attendance compulsory or not?

You've got a perfectly serviceable definition in my previous post. Slavery is the ownership of human beings as property.

School attendance is not slavery unless you define children as property.

 

[RandFan]

You've got a perfectly serviceable definition in my previous post. Slavery is the ownership of human beings as property.

School attendance is not slavery unless you define children as property.

Malcolm doesn't believe that children are slaves of their parents. The children work for love. So if the children are home schooled rather than forced to go to school, is that slavery?

And what about the benefits of school? How many slaves are forced to better themselves so that they can have greater freedom in the future and not be a slave to poverty?

Malcolm won't acknowledge those premises.

 

[Kid Eager]

Malcolm doesn't believe that children are slaves of their parents. The children work for love. So if the children are home schooled rather than forced to go to school, is that slavery?

And what about the benefits of school? How many slaves are forced to better themselves so that they can have greater freedom in the future and not be a slave to poverty?

Malcolm won't acknowledge those premises.

Hmmm... so if I'm correctly reading the logic so far, home schooling is slavery, because the "slaves" never get off the "plantation"?

Interesting thread - I might visit again in 3 months and see what other wisdom has emerged.

 

[bruto]

I find the arguments about compulsory schooling somewhat confusing, because the opposition to compulsory schooling seems, at least, to be in favor of home, private and parochial schooling, all of which are available alternatives within the structure of compulsory education (at least they are where I live). Is the argument here against public education only, or against mandatory education of any kind?

 

[RandFan]

I find the arguments about compulsory schooling somewhat confusing, because the opposition to compulsory schooling seems, at least, to be in favor of home, private and parochial schooling, all of which are available alternatives within the structure of compulsory education (at least they are where I live). Is the argument here against public education only, or against mandatory education of any kind?

IMO: This is the result of an ad hoc attempt at rescuing an absurd claim. Who knows? Malcolm has painted himself in a corner. Parents can control the lives of their children but if they force their children into public education then THAT'S slavery. I suspect Malcolm doesn't want to address home schooling because that will require even more special pleading.

That said, it doesn't matter. Either parents should be responsible for preparing their children to survive on their own in the future or they shouldn't. If parents should bear the responsibility for their dependents (uh... duh) then educating children so that they will have a greater chance at not being a slave to poverty isn't slavery.

Uh... duh!

Don't expect a clear and unequivocal answer from Malcolm. It's a logical dilemma that he cannot reconcile.

 

[Malcolm Kirkpatrick]

So, just to make sure, you're asserting that drafted American military personnel, whether during wartime or not, were slaves?

Yes. Compulsory, unpaid labor is slavery. That's a definition, not a moral judgment. Conscription is also a tax (i.e., a State-mandated surrender of the resource of the individual's time). In societies without enough liquid wealth to use a system of taxation and labor markets to supply soldiers, conscription may be the most viable option. As with other forms of slavery, costs exceed benefits as the level of durable wealth per capita rises.

 

[RandFan]

So, just to make sure, you're asserting that drafted American military personnel, whether during wartime or not, were slaves?

Yes. Compulsory, unpaid labor is slavery.

Wait, soldiers who fought in Vietnam were paid,

 

[Malcolm Kirkpatrick]

I find the arguments about compulsory schooling somewhat confusing, because the opposition to compulsory schooling seems, at least, to be in favor of home, private and parochial schooling, all of which are available alternatives within the structure of compulsory education (at least they are where I live). Is the argument here against public education only, or against mandatory education of any kind?

In abstract, our discussion concerns the incentive structures that various legal regimes create for various partitions of the population.

The current legal/institutional environment features child labor laws, minimum wage laws, compulsory attendance statutes, tax support of school, government-mandated curricula, and (in many States) policies that restrict parents' options for the use of the taxpayers' sub-adult schooling subsidy to schools operated by dues-paying members of the NEA/AFT/AFSCME cartel. The current legal/institutional environment creates incentive structures for children, parents, and system insiders that differ systematically from the incentive structures that different legal/institutional environments would (do, to some extent) create. From the average taxpayer's point of view, the differences favor greater parent control in early years and greater student control in later years.

 

[Border Reiver]

Yes. Compulsory, unpaid labor is slavery. That's a definition, not a moral judgment.

And that definition is wrong - otherwise making your children do dishes or other chores is slavery. Slavery is the abiltiy to own and to treat a human being as property.

And to follow on, conscripts get paid.

 

[Upchurch]

Yes. Compulsory, unpaid labor is slavery. That's a definition, not a moral judgment.

Fortunately, children do not go "unpaid" when getting an education, wouldn't you agree?

Or do you find an education to be of no value?

 

[A'isha]

Fortunately, children do not go "unpaid" when getting an education, wouldn't you agree?

Or do you find an education to be of no value?

He's probably going to say something about how it doesn't actually have any value because it's solely for the benefit of the "dues-paying members of the NEA/AFT/AFSCME cartel" and thus does nothing for the kids themselves.

"Slaves who stayed on the plantation ate better than runaways", after all.

 

[iknownothing]

Why not? Compulsory, unpaid labor is slavery (definition). Currently, in the USA, State laws compel attendance at school. Children labor, unpaid, as windowdressing in the massive make-work program for dues-paying members of the zNEA/AFT/AFSCME cartel trhat people call "the public school system".

End of story.

Depending on your definition of slavery there is quite a bit more involved than compulsory, unpaid labor. None of which applies to children in a school.

For that matter, while school is compulsory, isn't unpaid labor. The only product that comes out of school is an educated mind, which is owned by the student, not the school.

At best, maybe you could argue for indentured servitude, since the compulsory part ends at age 16 or so. But again, the work done by the indentured servant, in this case, benefits the student. So it's the student working as an indentured servant for the benefit of...his older self, who will be in need of that diploma years later?

 

[A'isha]

But again, the work done by the indentured servant, in this case, benefits the student. So it's the student working as an indentured servant for the benefit of...his older self, who will be in need of that diploma years later?

As Malcolm's own words in the quote you replied to show, he doesn't seem to actually think that.

He seems to think that the students in school derive no benefit for themselves whatsoever, and are merely "windowdressing in the massive make-work program for dues-paying members of the NEA/AFT/AFSCME cartel", who are the ones actually benefiting from the student's unpaid compulsory labor.