| Re: "Humans 'very likely' making earth warmer" is wrong
On Thu, 08 Feb 2007 15:31:04 GMT, "no spam" <no@spam.net> wrote:
....
>
>Poverty is almost always a result of bad choices. People choose to not work
>in school. People choose to have kids when they know they can't afford
>them. People choose to drop out of school. People choose to sell drugs to
>make a fast buck. People choose to screw up their lives why should I be
>FORCED to pay to "fix" their problems?
>
When I was a kid I attended PS 3 in the Bronx (NYC). In the middle of
second grade my parents scraped together enough money to move us to
Queens, and a better school district. They evaluated me and were going
to place me in the "slow" classes because I was already way behind
reading level. My parents talked them into putting me in the regular
classes and within a few months I was ahead of reading level and going
into the "gifted" classes.
My parents attended an open school night and the principal asked them
just what was going on in that school in the Bronx that I kid like me
was behind reading level. I don't know that they could answer the
question.
That was over 40 years ago. I suspect my life would be very different
if I wasn't lucky enough to get out of PS 3. Your argument that
poverty is almost always a result of bad choices is simplistic. It
takes a very special person to climb out of a crappy environment. It
happens, but lots of good people get stuck.
I don't know the answer. We have a system that benefited enormously
from having a virgin continent to harvest, yet we have staggering
poverty and really awesomely bad schools. They're worse now than my
experience so long ago.
Providing money for doing nothing doesn't seem to work. Letting people
starve or be homeless isn't something I can stand either. I'll just
repeat that I don't know the answer.
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