The people who have everything also run everything.

(Sat 06-Jul-19 12:37:16) So would you do away with private education?
I have never been convinced that it is only, or especially, private education that gives some the golden ticket. The vast majority who are privately educated have wealth behind them. They do not have the scarcity problems of others. They can risk more and more easily make and save more and this must give them a great deal of confidence. On the other hand, those with negative wealth are more insecure and will make their decisions and possible not take simple risks based on their experience of this.

If you look at the cross-over of people who attended very good state schools, in a pleasant area where their parents and others had the disposable income to make life a easier, I would suggest there is little difference between them and the child whose parent scraped to send them to a local but not particularly sought after public school.

Lessismore
Many thanks for drawing my attention to this brilliant article.
I'm still lethargic getting over something very achy and groggy, so might not have discovered this had you not quoted it. I love analysis like this. It is very well written.

I was shocked to read how dire things are in terms of integration since I was in Grammar School in the 60s. I had hoped we were more integrated now. I might have agued that we are, drawing on the MPs that I can call to mind. However, the numbers do not lie. This report shows the situation. We are stuck in an ignorant rut of trying to create Politicians who can run the Country from people who are as removed from the lives of the average person as they were 50 years ago. The divide is an abyss.

Has anyone read "Poverty Safari" by Darren McGarvey? It is set in Glasgow where he grew up in very deprived circumstances. He decided to look at the reasons for poverty and the reasons why the Powers that Be and the Residents in the poor areas could not communicate. It is brilliant! Up to date and piercingly perceptive.

In the article we are discussing, Gary Younge says: "One of the reasons why British politics is so difficult to understand at present is that most of those critiquing it are so deeply embedded and implicated in the world they are critiquing, they just can’t see straight." In other words, our politics is difficult to understand because the people reviewing it are stuck inside it so tightly and anything they say reflects on they themselves, so they can't have an objective view. So as far as British Politics goes, we can't see the wood for the trees!

If you want to sound superior and put down the quotation which is so well selected for this discussion as a "catchy soundbite" that does not bear scrutiny or a fallacy that gives rise to itself, you clearly either have not read the article or have not understood it. Or perhaps you want to show off your bit of Latin? Another quotation from the article which can sweep that pompous idea out of court is: "Since the war Britain has come to think of itself as far more meritocratic. The current situation gives the lie to that illusion" with the accompanying statistics to prove it. Don't fall into the error of "sounding clever" (but showing yourself up for being stupid) by saying "lies lies and damned statistics" because these stats are so simple even an infant class can understand them!

The fact that the person who threw us into the crazy ill-prepared Brexit mess a few years ago "went to the same school and joined the same supper club at the same university as the person who will most likely be prime minister in a few weeks’ time." The person who will have to ultimately sort out the result, without much idea of how. Also " Nobody thinks that is an uncanny coincidence. It’s how Britain works. It’s also why it’s not working."

At my Grammar School in the 1960s I fell for the Britain as a Meritocracy idea. I am appalled at the dire failure of this today. Even though I taught in different universities and my late husband was a House Master in a Public School, I should know how the divide works. In the university which the ex Public school students attend, what I would call snobbery, but I suppose it is elitism certainly exists. The public school you attended gives you greater status accordingly. In the other University, the students are practically all doing a wage earning job as well as studying full-time and the debt which they will have when they leave weighs heavily upon them. It is frequently discussed and influences their choice of career. In the hierarchical university one hears nothing about this. At the week-ends the students row, sail, play tennis etc and are free to do as they please. You can tell the teaching style they received. They expect you to simply narrate the facts they need to spue out to pass the exams. There is no desire to discuss, to think about another point of view or - Heaven help us! to do a bit of research themselves!. When it comes to their piece of original research they are flummoxed unless they have found a student in a higher year with an idea to copy. In the poor kids' uni they are bubbling with discussion. They will argue about the research! Teaching them research methods and how to understand statistics is enormously rewarding. But when they graduate, that debt will be the rudder that steers them into the next port in their lives. Not aspirations, not desires to try something higher and better. Fettered with debt they are held in place.

It is true, until we can free our brightest and best to become the leaders in our Country, they will not emerge to do so because of the heavy weight of debt round their necks. We shall have the Borises and the Charterhouse boys, those whom mummy and daddy put through school and university without any encumbering debt so they were free to choose. Moreover, those who were taught from the cradle that they were the ruling class. With subtlety, politely, insidiously, with oodles of money, gently letting them know who were the "people like us" and the "people not like us". Thus confidence is born and that is all you need. Not a moment's self doubt to stop your path to the top. That is why the people who have everything also run everything.

Thanks, Tillybelle for that good analysis of the problem.

So many people in this thread have veered off into the defence of people who have 'striven' to achieve whatever they have achieved. They seem to be missing the point that the article is about people who have never 'striven' in their lives because they haven't needed to. They were born into wealth and privilege.

It's also interesting that some seem to approve of this. It feels almost like deference to our 'betters'.

I've also noticed in many other discussions that there is a strand of disapproval of people who have been born into reasonably privileged families and have espoused left wing ideals. Almost as though they were class traitors for not being right wing. They're not acting as 'privileged' people should act.

It's all a bit odd...

I haven’t noticed that at all ( posters thinking others are class traitors) where are the threads on this??

Communism doesn’t work well ( there are always those at the top and near the top who still manage to drive around in expensive cars, best seats at the ballet etc!)

So why whinge about Capitalism, however imperfect, it’s still the better option.

I have read The Poverty Safari Tillybelle and completely agree with you. I find on these political posts, people are not really interested in the evidence, but are keen to state their entrenched views (right and left) without regard for facts which do not support them. Waste of time discussing IMO.

Lazigirl. Oh how I sympathise with your views!

We are not discussing a binary system here....the hammer and sickle versus the likes of BJ. The original article is very interesting.

I have only read about 4 pages in this thread, so apologies if this has been discussed. I read many references to people working hard to overcome growing up in poor circumstances, working hard at school, attending evening classes, studying at the OU etc and forging a good life for themselves. There has also been criticism of those who doss around and simply can't be bothered to improve themselves.

I worry about those who simply cannot do anything to change the hand they've been dealt. Putting it bluntly, they don't have the intellect. They are poor in spirit and have no model by which to improve their status in the communities in which they live. They weren't high flyers at school, because for many different reasons they could not achieve academically. We can't say they're poorly educated, because they don't have the capacity to take advantage of the higher levels of education available. They simply don't have the ability.

Their aspirations are low because they know they're bottom of the heap. They are the ones who need help and support to at least have a decent life. In some respects life dealt them a blow by not making them clever and those who forged a good life because they had the wherewithal to achieve, owe it to them to help them rise above poverty levels of existence.

What exactly is " clever"

Waste of time discussing IMO.

Please do go on discussing, Lazigirl. Reading nothing but entrenched views makes one lose the will to live...

But many people who get places at Oxford or Cambridge do so because they have been taught privately in classes of 12 rather than 30 as in some state schools. They aren't necessarily top brains but have been tutored and conditioned to perform well in the selection process.

They cream of the rest of us because we all let them, get away with it..... read ‘ The Ragged Trousered Philanthropist’...
It’s the book that made me an atheist , and a cynic. I thank every day for its publication .... I was only 14... but I ‘got it’ from that day onward ! Wake up Britain ... before they take it all!

Lessismore I understand 'clever' to mean having a sharp intelligence and the ability to learn and apply knowledge.

Having the ability to study to a higher level, I think being 'clever' also implies a sense of original and critical thought; the ability to study the work of others, to identify and question concepts and conduct empirical research.

I am putting on my tin hat, whilst pointing out the obvious.

The world is made up of:-
Doctors, Lawyers, Teachers, MPs, Civil Servants, Waiters, Builders, Plumbers, Electricians, Shop owners/workers, Chefs, Bankers, Cleaners, Gardeners, Rubbish Collectors, Police, Fire Brigade, Bankers, Estate Agents, Sports men & women, Entertainers and Homemakers.

All worthy occupations, different pay grades, different level of education needed for different occupations.

We cannot all be Bankers, we cannot all be cleaners the world needs all occupations to function.

Which goes back to my argument that being born clever gives you an unfair advantage over those with less intelligence.

Well said GG13! Two of the biggest mistakes made in the last 50 years firstly abolition of grammar schools which was the way out for so many poor people and secondly the obsession with sending 50% of school leavers to university.

The last stunt led to so many ill-suited to academic education thinking that they would sail through life with a degree in an obscure subject. It also devalued all the trades and apprenticeships which was the previous route to bettering yourself.

Ginny42 I hadn't seen your post before I posted. I guess it comes down to you are clever or not -" you can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink"

I totally disagree.
With all due respect, of course.

some of us though have had to deal with major problems in the family that have held us back.
I know of a few at least where circumstances have curtailed goals and ambitions because tragic family events have meant teens looking after parents and siblings.

Also once you become disabled and ill in this country you really get to experience the inequality.

As well as hard work, good connections you do need some luck too.

I take " clever" to mean a person who comes to my house and fixes a shower.

way out for so many poor people ..???

I would like to stay and discuss, but I'm in the middle of putting silicone around the edge of my kitchen floor because I'm too poor to pay anyone to do it for me.

Not because I'm thick; because I was quite lazy at school, and nobody cared that I'm actually quite sharp.
I didn't go to college because my mum was widowed and we needed my wages.

Now I'm a single parent because my daughter died.

Excuse me - diy time!

to better oneself.....what a ghastly concept. One is already more than enough.

Of course one is ..... as your username suggests .....perhaps substitute ‘better one’s circumstances’. My phrasing maybe nit picked but better minds will argue the actual points in the post.

Roll on those better minds G.