Human Terrain & Anthropology (merged thread)

[Norfolk]

I understand your points in re undergrad education being to open up opportunities...But those opportunities aren't opening. At all.

And, to be blunt...20-40 years ago, when (I'm guessing), most of those speaking here were actually of traditional college age, maybe you could reasonably speak of a college's purpose being to "educate" in some broad sense.

I don't remember any time in the past 10 years in which that was any more than lip-service.

Yes, I'm a bit more...embittered because of my disabilities. I grant that. College was supposed to be the great, if not equalizer, then at least it was supposed to give me a fighting chance to compete on remotely the same playing field.

I know [] I'm not entitled to anything, thanks. It's actually insulting to hear someone say that, because I didn't slack off during college. I didn't have a social life; I didn't go to a single party at all during my time in college. Insofar as I could focus, I was focused to near-obsession on grades. Exactly, I thought, like I was supposed to be.

Yes, I screwed up. Repeatedly. I haven't denied that in this thread, notice.

But I'm not just hearing this from me, I'm hearing the same general complaint from my peers: That going to college screwed us over.

For most of my peers, our working lives haven't even begun. To begin them, most had to take out loans nearly equal to what Steve's generation (guessing at your age, you're about 55-60, Steve?) would have had to take out to buy their first home.

You get equity in a house, at least; not really in a degree. Degree is more like a car, in my estimation - it loses value as soon as you get it.

So, yeah. There are a lot of us who are bitter, disaffected, and grumpy.

Because it's the rare 18-19 year old who goes to college completely because they want to - in a large part, it's because our parents (your generation, speaking broadly) expected it, demanded it of us. Because we were led to believe that it'd be the essential key to becoming independent - not that it'd be the only thing required, but that it'd be an essential component. Not just for a few years, not as a fad...But for our entire lives. Yeah, in case someone forgot, we've had the life-or-death necessity of college preached to us since almost as soon as we could talk.

So we did. We went. To a greater or lesser extent, depending on the person, we worked. Because at the end of all of this, we expected a payoff. That if nothing else, we'd at least get a chance to prove ourselves.

That hasn't happened, and now we're deemed spoiled brats for pointing out the contradiction between what we were led to expect and what the reality has turned out to be?

Norfolk,

...Universal conscription would not work. Not only do you have to deal with the substantial problem of what to do with those (like me) who, through no fault of our own, will never be physically qualified for military service (unless you'd like to say that not only am I lazy and spoiled, but that retinopathy of prematurity and cerebral palsy are my fault?), but you have to deal with the, ahem, complete and total hypocrisy of the fact that the generation that burned their draft cards now wants to have the younger generations get drafted.

And that's just to start.

Yes, Penta, as both marc and I have observed, higher education is in great part sold on a false promise that it is a ticket to upward mobility, and parents and children are subjected to it constantly. I finished my M.A. in 2004, and absolutely nothing has come out of it employment-wise; I've simply had to make do working at factory jobs that haven't surpassed $13.25/hr, with long hours and minimal benefits, so I have experienced no shortage of grief and frustration in my own case.

Most of my university friends have been little better off (one did exceptionally well - as a tax lawyer); a few were still working the jobs they had in high school (working for a moving company), despite the fact that one had a BA and the other both a BA and an MA. Go figure. And there's been no shortage of bitterness in some of the phone calls exchanged, despite us having more degrees than you could shake a stick at. But in time I have learned the utter futility of resentment, and simply to carry on. And this is what our grandparents and prior generations had to deal with; life's not fair, and it only aggravates the situation to dwell on that. Move on as best one can, because nothing good will come of the alternative. That's how they survived in the old days.

Now, as to conscription, hehe.: Both Penta and marc are quite correct that Universal Conscription, if strictly Military, cannot work. I do not conceive of universal conscription as a cure-all, just as a treatment, so to speak, and as marc pointed out, National Service can take many forms - Germany is the most comprehensive example of this. But universal conscription for military service is the backbone of any such program; bear in mind however, that even in the late 19th Century, the British Army performed a survey that found only 60% of the male population of military age to be medically fit for military service. Given trends observed by military doctors since WWII, that figure is probably down to about 40% now (at best). As such, those inducted for National Service would have better than even chances of ending up working in a hospital ward, public works, or an administrative post rather than the military.

However, there are problems with National Service in general, and Universal (Military) Conscription in particular. The first is that many people, not least voters, will not like the idea of public service "imposed" upon them. They don't seem to mind the benefits of public institutions, and the rights and freedoms that those institutions preserve and promote; but many people also consider that they have a right to avoid, limit, or flout the public duties and responsibilities that they themselves must bear as part of their share in preserving and promoting those rights and freedoms. Freedom ain't free; someone, somewhere, someday, somehow, must pay the price, and it's only fair that all citizens do so. It's also only practical that they do so, for the sake of the common good, rather than the entire burden being off-loaded onto the backs of a few.

What I am describing is piety, the old Roman word for the assumption and carrying out of duties and responsibilities that are not freely chosen, but are demanded by the common good. They can be shirked, avoided, denied, but they cannot be be justly abrogated. The present ethos of our society, so self-consciensously celebrated and pursued (and passed on to the offspring) by elements of a certain generation born after WWII, is by contrast one of impiety, the shirking of just but unwanted duties for the pursuit of selfishness. The political opposition, practically speaking, to consciption or any form of National Service is at present, overwhelming. But as time goes on, that may change.

The second problem with National Service is that perhaps 60% or more of the young male population will not be handed over to the tender care of the Military. In some cases, such as in serious physical or psychological disability, that is an irreducible reality and obviously such people would perform National Service in another capacity, although that still may be as a civilian employee of the military or of the defence department. Where it becomes somewhat problematic is in the cases of the majority of the 60% who are not seriously disabled, but are still not medically fit for military service - and the best place for these is in some sort of Public Works system - not unlike the German Labour Services - to let the young males still work off their aggression under supervision.

I can offer no clear solutions, but I do propose some partial remedies, and National Service together with Universal Conscription is about the best that I can come up with that also provides a long track record of achievement (good and bad) that can be looked at and thoroughly considered.