Loyalty to the State

POSTED BY: canttakesky
UPDATED: Monday, March 31, 2008 03:34
VIEWED: 19263
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FINN MAC CUMHAL

Saturday, March 8, 2008 6:48 PM

Actually Serg quite clearly addressed these issues, though you chose to ignore it.

“I believe you are inappropriately framing this issue was one of property rights. The real issue is that children, by their very nature, are dependent and incapable of making decisions for themselves. The 'fight' is over who has the right to make decisions on their behalf. I believe that decision should be heavily weighted in favor of the biological parents, to the point that, unless outright abuse can be proven, there is no decision to be made. The parents win.”

Serg is right. You are inappropriately framing the issue as property rights. It has nothing to do with property, but with who will provide better care for the children. And I agree with Serge that a loving parent is far more likely to provide that care then a state that by necessity views these children as numbers to a bureaucratic mess. If you had questions about Serg’s point of view, you could have asked him to further clarify, instead you chose to generalize all fathers with demeaning and insulting stereotypes, which suggest to me that you come into the discussion with misunderstandings that have nothing to do with what Serg said.

Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.

Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.

-- Cicero

SIGNYM

Saturday, March 8, 2008 7:09 PM

SARGE: I believe that decision should be heavily weighted in favor of the biological parents, to the point that, unless outright abuse can be proven there is no decision to be made. The parents win.
SIGNY: I find no assurances that Sarge would tolerate any interference from "the outside" except in cases of outright physical abuse or neglect. And yet, as Frem well knows, there are myriad ways that a family can be abused besides being beaten, starved, or sexually assaulted.

How did I neglect Sarge's statement on this issue? AFA looking at family as property, I took my cues straight from Sarge's writing:

SARGE: Yup, and I win. My kids don't belong to the state, they "belong" to me. If you want to characterize that as inhumane or callous feel free. But if you come to take my kids from me, you'd better be well armed.
SIGNY: Sarge framed it in a "me and mine" way. I didn't put that in there, he did, and it seems to reflect a bias towards viewing family as "property".

The only place I mischaracterized Sarge's statement was that he DOES grant "mom" a say in the childs' future: He says I believe that decision should be heavily weighted in favor of the biological parents (plural).

However, what about adoptive parents?

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Let's party like it's 1929.

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Saturday, March 8, 2008 7:22 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
SARGE: I believe that decision should be heavily weighted in favor of the biological parents, to the point that, unless outright abuse can be proven there is no decision to be made. The parents win.

SIGNY: I find no assurances that Sarge would tolerate any interference from "the outside" except in cases of outright physical abuse or neglect. And yet, as Frem well knows, there are myriad ways that a family can be abused besides being beaten, starved, or sexually assaulted.

How did I neglect Sarge's statement on this issue?

Do I really need to point this out? I don’t know who you think you’re fooling, but YOU limited abuse to physical, not Serg.

Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.

Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.

-- Cicero

SIGNYM

Saturday, March 8, 2008 7:41 PM

Well, that's my interpretation. It's very very hard to "prove" abuse that's non-physical. Emotional abuse is gray area, and while I don't think Sarge would defend emotional abuse, he posits a system in which emotional abuse could be defended by the business end of a gun.

But maybe Sarge would like to explain his statements himself?

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Let's party like it's 1929.

SERGEANTX

Saturday, March 8, 2008 10:13 PM

Wow... don't think I've ever been quoted this much before.

Signy, you're doing quite a lot of "interpreting" here. You seem more intent on validating your own prejudices than in making a point. I used the language I did in part to poke a little fun at those very prejudices. And I don't so much mind the "property" argument as I do the stealth assumption that the very concept of property is evil.

Apparently, to you, it's a package deal. Anyone preferring a preference for parental rights over state interest is by nature a right wing Neanderthal. You've somehow jumped from an obviously tongue-in-cheek reference to being armed and decided I'm now a gun nut who believes that 'a man should rule his family with an iron fist'. Both of which are entirely laughable to anyone who knows me.

All I'm saying that I think it would be a mistake to shift the primary responsibility for the welfare of our children from the parents to the state. And if you give the state the ultimate say in what's good for the child by default, that's exactly what you're doing. In my opinion, strengthening a parents role in the equation is far more practical and more likely to promote the welfare of children on the whole.

SergeantX

"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock

SIGNYM

Saturday, March 8, 2008 10:39 PM

But I think you're caught in a false dilemma of states versus parents. There are other options and other actors to be considered like neighbors, extended family, and the children themselves. FWIW, if it came down to it, parents on most cases would do better for their children than "the state". But I think that families SHOULD be open to "outside interference".

AFA property being an evil concept... it can be. If property rights trump everything else that's an evil paradigm.

---------------------------------
Let's party like it's 1929.

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Saturday, March 8, 2008 11:28 PM

It's not a false dilemma. It is the issue in the thread. The question in this thread is parental rights vs the right of the state.

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
AFA property being an evil concept... it can be. If property rights trump everything else that's an evil paradigm.

Now that’s a false dilemma. No one here has argued that property rights necessarily trumps everything else. In fact, you’re the only one here really arguing property rights at all.

Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.

Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.

-- Cicero

SIGNYM

Sunday, March 9, 2008 12:28 AM

Umm... Finn, you DO know the meaning of false dilemma, right? It is a dilemma posed as if the two options are the only ones possible.

Now, I realize that "states rights v parents rights" is the heart of the original post. But I think that question is improperly framed.

---------------------------------
Let's party like it's 1929.

SERGEANTX

Sunday, March 9, 2008 4:29 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
But I think you're caught in a false dilemma of states versus parents. There are other options and other actors to be considered like neighbors, extended family, and the children themselves...

Not so much. Because mostly I agree with you. I'm just saying that first priority should be the judgment of the parents, backed up by family, friends and community in that order. I'm not saying that there is no point where community interest overrides parental rights. Just that we'd be doing children a great disservice to dilute the role of parents in the equation.

SergeantX

"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock

FREMDFIRMA

Sunday, March 9, 2008 5:02 AM

Thanks for the clarification, Sarge, that's what I thought you meant but I did not wanna assume.

What it boils down to is who gets the benefit of the doubt, who's decision it should default to, and since the family, barring an abusive environment, is a positive force and beneficial to a childs mental health - versus the State, which is ruinous to it...

Without some damned compelling evidence, I do believe that ought to be a parental decision, and the State can go to hell, it's not really any of their business, whatsoever - because it is a social, rather than legal issue at the heart of it, somewhere the State has utterly no business interfering to begin with.

Now I do believe any child old enough to comprehend what they are being asked, SHOULD be asked, at least get their input on the process - but while parents individually may or may not see children as less than "people", the State ALWAYS does, it's one of my pet peeves, as you well know.

Thing is, anyone.. anyone at all, who can read, write, and do simple math can teach another to do so, and from THAT point, education... or at least good education, is just offering a gently guiding hand in using those initial skills to obtain and process more information.

The idea of credentials for this is moronic, once those basics are taught, the person doing 95% of the work is the kid in question, and they'll either do it or they won't, you cannot force-feed info into someones head, no matter how much DARPA would love that to be true - the true gift of an educator is to make them WANT to, and it's something no set of offically-approved credentials can measure, all that measures is your ability to confine your own thinking to what the State thinks it should be, how well you obey, jump through the hoops, and how much shit you'll take in begging the States approval to do something.

Those credentials mean jack shit to me, whether a teacher truly has the gift or not does - and it's a rare few who do that this process does not weed out, as it is obviously designed to do.

In all honesty what we have in the public school systems today, folks, it ain't education, it's indoctrination.

Consider this - the teacher picks some book and foists it on a child to read, or offers a set of equally repulsive and boring works to "choose" from like a magicians force.

Ok, look, my niece is fifteen, the suggested books would bore a ten year old and were intended for a readership of 8-11, and this is a girl who just polished off Harry Harrisons Stainless Steel Rat series with glee... I cannot see them holding her interest, can you ?

So, having foisted the book, which must be read under threat of a bad grade... and yes, I am well aware that some schools deliberately select works of outright political propaganda at BOTH ends of the political spectrum as a method of manipulation, considering it wasn't "liberal" lies that lead me to self-educate about history.

And then, the child isn't allowed to offer their OWN perception of the work, nope, they have to then cram whatever their own perception is into a narrow "accepted" window and swallow however the school thinks they SHOULD percieve the work, or suffer the consequences of a bad grade.

I can think of no better way to discourage a child from reading, then to force them to read something and then demand that they percieve it as the school desires.

The core of education is to question, to imagine, and to understand, that is NOT what public schools are offering in this day and age.

Nope, it's sit down, shut up and OBEY.

Imagination and individuality are discouraged, if not outright punished, and the social model offered by schools as part of the learning experience exists in only one other place in our country... the penal system.

Pecking orders, social cliques, single-figure authoritarianism, uniform policy, zero-tolerance, constant searches and suspicion, snitches, and now even obnoxious gaurds and metal detectors.

I really would prefer not to subject any child to that environment by choice, to be honest.

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