Equality Is Not An American Value

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-25-2007
Equality Is Not An American Value
88
Wed, 10-29-2008 - 5:27pm

Dennis Prager told a group of conservatives and

Sopal

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iVillage Member
Registered: 04-02-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:31pm

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-25-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:32pm

Are you on your school's Site Council?

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-25-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:34pm
So really, its all about
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-02-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:37pm
Do you mean PTA yes.
iVillage Member
Registered: 10-23-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:37pm

Well, OK, I suppose....but you were responding to the OP which was discussing noted right-wing radio personality Dennis Prager saying "equality is a European value, not an American value."

The Declaration of Independence, for crying out loud, says it is "self-evident" that "all men are created equal." And just as Thomas Jefferson wasn't nearly dumb enough to have meant, by that comment, that he believed all people are created exactly the same, with no differences in ability or anything else, nor should WE be distracted by red herrings about how "socialists" want to "give everybody the same stuff, regardless of effort" or similar ridiculous flights of hyperbole.

Your reply to the OP was to fall back on a well-worn old saying ("this is America, work hard and you will do well"). I certainly think there are many, MANY different ways besides to measure "doing well" besides the pecuniary...but usually, when people talk about "doing well" in relation to the whole "bootstrap" or "entrepreneur" notion of what it means to work hard here in America, they're saying that you can keep score by how much money someone has: those who have "worked hard" will "do well," those who HAVEN'T worked hard? Not so much. I find this statement ridiculous on its face: there are plenty of people working short hoes in the strawberry fields of the San Joaquin valley who get up at dawn or before on a daily basis and perform work that most of us would consider very hard indeed....and, if that's what they do every day, two things are certain: one, their days will be FILLED, start to finish, with very hard work, and two, they will never, EVER "do well" in the financial sense of the word. Likewise, Paris Hilton, whatever she may DECIDE to do with her life, knew from the earliest moment she understood what money was, that she would never be FORCED to work at all (let alone "work hard") in her entire lifetime, in order to "do well" in the financial sense of the word: in fact, a lot better than most people will ever even come close to. For no work whatsoever.

I'm glad that you don't find the pursuit of the almighty dollar the best possible way of judging whether someone is doing - or has done - "well." But if one measures one's having "done well" by how many close friendships one has, or whether one has been a nurturing parent, or created things of beauty, then why bring it up in the context of a discussion about what the government is or is not theoretically doing with social programs and/or tax money to assist certain groups of people? If money isn't particularly relevant to whether someone "does well," what do things like that matter?





Konichiwa, Bitches!
McCain LOST???

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-25-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:40pm

What a dandy place.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-02-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:43pm

I disagree they did an underhanded thing.

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-09-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:50pm
Ah.....so it's all about money, the great GREEN God. Did it ever occur to you that you cannot take it with you? And that perhaps there's a more powerful God out there who cares more about how you respect your fellow man, rich or poor, than about how much wealth you accumulate?



I live in the real world, sweetie.


Did you not achieve some financial gain upon moving to NoVa ?

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-23-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:52pm

You "should have been consulted?"

Not really. Actually, you may very well have been consulted, obliquely, through an announcement that you might not have seen, or a PTA meeting or something. But even if the principal made this decision completely on his/her own - or perhaps in consultation with a group of teachers or something, with no parental involvement whatsoever - what makes you think that just because your taxes go partially to fund the school that you therefore get veto power over decisions by the principal? Or the right to ignore rules set up by either the school or the district?

Do you ignore traffic rules you disagree with? Have you ever done so in front of a police officer? How'd that work out? What about federal taxes? Are you against the war in Iraq? Probably not, but I sure am....should I "be consulted" over my Congressperson's decision to vote for the AUMF, back in 2002? What would/should - in your opinion - happen to me if I decided to try to figure out how much of my taxes, approximately, go to funding the war...and just don't pay them? I'll leave that one as a rhetorical question.

In the most macro sense of the word, you DO have "input," just not directly, as it appears you would like - and possibly believe you deserve. Think of it this way: you are less like that principal's direct supervisor, or the owner of the business for which he works as a manager, than you are like a shareholder (and not a major one, at that) in a company for which the principal works. You can't call up the mid-level managers at, say, GE, if you own a few shares of stock in that company, and complain about the decisions they're making. Those people don't answer to you. The COMPANY does, ultimately, answer to you - but it also answers to a lot of other people, too, many of whom may very well not feel the same way you do. They may even feel the exact opposite from you. I can tell you that, were you in my kids' school, that would very much be the case. Why should the principal "consult" you - or pay attention to your wishes - more than mine?

Beyond that, though, like any decent-sized organization, public OR private, the larger issue is that the people in those areas are empowered to make decisions commensurate with their relative level of responsibility and authority within the organization, and within the general mandate and guidelines of the organization itself. They answer primarily to those above them, who set their job parameters, and those people answer to the people above THEM. Eventually, in the case of public schools, you get to a level where people ARE directly accountable - through elections - to the public. But I'm sorry, you - as a taxpayer - have no real-world right to expect to be "consulted" about such things any more than any other parent does....and typically only then, if the school or the principal decide to throw the question open to the community served to ALLOW them to make the decision on a "majority rules" basis. But one of the principal's, er, principal mandates from HIS superiors is to do what HE thinks is in the best interest of the students in his school, not to blow with the wind of each and every parent who walks through his door or rings his telephone extension.







Edited 10/30/2008 9:59 pm ET by mccaint

Konichiwa, Bitches!
McCain LOST???

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-23-2008
Thu, 10-30-2008 - 9:55pm

"I can ignore the rule because I give the PTA money."

Wow. We've entered the "agree to disagree" zone.





Konichiwa, Bitches!
McCain LOST???

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