What next? Going to school with no shoes?

[Zech]

the poor here sound much like the poor there, big screen TV's, speakers that rattle the sidewalks,

Just to note that the big screen TV comment was made by another American. Some people feel that to be the case here but I'm not sure. I genuinely don't feel qualified to comment.

[chickenchargrill]

I'd just like to point out you can get all those gadgets and such super cheap, and *most* parents on benefits will go without basic things to provide that entertainment for their children or get them by other means. I don't mean steal by the way, but we've had a computer and laptop gifted to us, Nintendo DSs, a wii, not to mention the other stuff you'd find more acceptable to see a family on benefits with...
When we were on benefits and the weather was rubbish, it gave us an extra option of what we could do together as a family. I find it perfectly acceptable that people on benefits manage to get hold of those, because a lot of them can't just pop off to the countryside, or the seaside or whatever. Holidays are gained by having to buy the Sun every day to cut out the vouchers, or hunting online for cheap entry tickets so you can take them somewhere nice once in a blue moon. And generally, keeping your fingers crossed that the family tax credit reduction isn't too harsh, or hoping the private healthcare company doesn't decide you're not entitled to incapacity any more, even though you really do have something that prevents you from working (referring to several of my friends on that one) and knowing whoever is in charge would be entirely within their rights to just stop giving you money...

Just because *some* people on benefits behave like that should not lead to people generalising.

[The Riff-Raff Element]

I know people who depend on benefits against whom no-one could hold a candle when it comes to being excellent parents. Equally, I know (of) some absolutely lousy ones who shouldn't be allowed to keep a pet rock let alone a child.

To be honest, I'm not sure this is a money thing, though I suppose in wealtheir households it might be easier for kids to scavenge what they need because it is laying around, because I also know some very high income parents who are so pre-occupied with their own (sometimes very petty) concerns that they have little or no idea what is going on in their children's lives, including whether or not they are eating properly.

[oldjerry]

[quote="gregorach"]Did I stumble into the Dail Mail website by mistake?

I think you may well have done.I'm truly disillusioned.
Where's this presumption that just the poor are feckless? Nobody ever worked with someone who did sod all all day? Sure as hell I have.
And the crap Wealthy parents? Oh Yeah,they just send ther kids off to boarding school.

[MKG]

My mum was a postie. You want to try explaining to the entire nation why they're not getting their post until the middle of the afternoon? I grew up in the country, so lots of other kids parents worked in farming, and the cows aren't really open to negotiation as to when they need milking. And there's a lot of people who need to be at work in order for everyone else to get to work, and a lot of other jobs that require working shift patterns... Plenty of places need staff 24/7, or early deliveries, or whatever, and I don't think it's fair to blame the people who take those jobs for not being around when their kids are going to school - especially not when they'll end up on the sharp end of all this crap about how the unemployed are sub-human wasters who should all be lined up against a wall and shot if they don't. Damned if you do, damned if you don't... Sure,it would be great if everybody had the luxury of working typical office hours, but that's simply never going to happen.

Dunc, I wasn't having a go at you or your Mum. Or anyone else who happens to be in that situation. But you did say that the reason you didn't eat was because you couldn't be arsed to get out of bed. That's fine - your choice and you recognise it. What I WAS having a go at was the perception that the answer to all of this lies in schools. Schools, it is perceived, have the answer - feed the hungry kids (whose parents may or may not give a toss). As I've already stated, I simply do not believe that there is anyone in this country who cannot feed their kids. I strongly believe that feeding them in schools does nothing to alleviate the problem of uncaring crap for brains parents - in fact, it encourages it. Nor did I imply at any time that that the unemployed are sub-human wasters. Who said that all hungry children are the product of the unemployed?

Schools are about education. They are not, and never have been, the providers of corrective social services. Attack social problems at the root of those problems rather than passing them on to agencies with different agendas.

I wonder how far the idea would go of insisting that employers fed their early but hungry employees on the grounds that the workplace was where they were going to turn up next?

Mike

[oldjerry]

Absolutely spot on.On the one hand the State provides 'breakfast clubs' after school stuff etc so that apart from supervising dressing,tooth brushing and sleeping 5 days a week,parents have nothing to do,and then they suggest that people need parenting classes!
There again,principles don't pay the rent.Maybe if parenting was truly valued a parent would be paid a proper wage to do it.

[Green Aura]

While I agree that it is a parents' responsibility to feed their children, ranting about it not being the States responsibility won't get those kids whose parents can't/won't (for whatever reason) fed. Someone, somewhere has to do it and schools are best placed. Or should we just let them slowly starve. Take the kids off them? Yes, put them in old boarding houses in Margate to be groomed by paedophiles/dealers. Or just shove 'em up chimneys.

As for workplace canteens, they have proved extremely useful at times when the powers that be deemed it so.

[boboff]

Hoe Hum.

Can you really post a comment on here, an opinion without Dunc saying it's a generalisation?

I was interested to hear about the benefits in the States, it does sound even more generous than the UK!

Some facts Dunc.

1. I believe in Benefits, when I worked with allot of Kurdish Refugees, those same Daily Mail oft quoted "immigrants who get all the benefits" I knew they got a Bed sit to share with 2 others, and about £4 a day in food vouchers. NOTHING else. They came to work for me, and they worked hard, and over 3 or 4 years saved and bought cars, found better living, began to have relationships etc The "safety blanket" worked, but only just.

2. When I was working hard 80 - 90 hours a week running a business, and investing in property, I put everything I had into it, we had no holidays, or nice things as I was investing in my families future, and was mortgaged up the hilt. My best mate, who when we met at 25 had the same as me, chose the council flat, to take many sick days, change jobs, play the system, he always had the best PC,Holidays, Flat Screen, Camera, Phone, Ipod etc etc. FACT Dunc, not a generalisation, ok you don't know him, but its still true. So now 15 years on he is in the same Flat, nothing saved for retirement, and I have a small holding and he has taken on all the flats gardens set up an Allotment group and gardens three of the allotments with another retired accountant friend of his.........It's amazing how stopping Drinking copious amounts of Cider have changed him!

So on the one hand I can see benefits as being too easily given to some, that some parents in some situations are poor parents, but also we all have a choice, and what ever choice you make they are personal and right for you. I wish you had the same open mind rather than this frankly tiresome chip on your shoulder where you feel the need to feel sorry for yourself and accuse all of things, which you later contradict ( first you were too lazy to get up, then it's your Mum having to deliver the post) You can defend your opinion by bandying about some rubbish about the Daily Mail, which is frankly very insulting, and then carry on the insult by condescending to explain that people work 24/7 in the economy? I think perhaps the Canabis has finally done it's Job! (Isn't your previously admitted habit one that does cause confusion and perhaps not just a little paranoia?)

I think the "nice" forum attitude to debate wears thin in the face of such continual hypocracy, cynical criticism of all who might have done better in life that you, and frankly confused posts.

Daily Mail..........My expletive in another expletive Sake

[gregorach]

I think you're reading a lot into my posts that simply isn't there boboff. Perhaps I'm not the only one with a chip on his shoulder? You're coming across as pretty embittered yourself.

[Green Aura]

Can we lay off the personal jibes please. They're not necessary nor, in this case, accurate.

[MKG]

While I agree that it is a parents' responsibility to feed their children, ranting about it not being the States responsibility won't get those kids whose parents can't/won't (for whatever reason) fed. Someone, somewhere has to do it and schools are best placed. Or should we just let them slowly starve. Take the kids off them? Yes, put them in old boarding houses in Margate to be groomed by paedophiles/dealers. Or just shove 'em up chimneys.

As for workplace canteens, they have proved extremely useful at times when the powers that be deemed it so.

I wish that it WAS a state responsibility. And yes, we are in the ridiculous situation of someone, somewhere, having to do it (again). I even don't mind such a service being run in schools. But not BY the school. Not financed from the school budget (a lot are). Not by coercing teachers and TAs into becoming amateur social workers. Schools have enough problems at the moment in vain attempts to up educational standards.

I like the idea of reinventing climbing boys, though. I have a list of names ...

Mike

[boboff]

Ok.

It's okay to point the finger and accuse someone of holding the same views as those expressed by the Mail, without the right of reply, although I have replied, so that's not actually true, anyway, like the Boddingtons, I am not bitter.

[gregorach]

It's okay to point the finger and accuse someone of holding the same views as those expressed by the Mail, without the right of reply, although I have replied, so that's not actually true, anyway, like the Boddingtons, I am not bitter.

And yet you've been constantly impugning my motivations, my reasoning, and my mental health, left, right and centre. Apparently you think it's perfectly alright to insist that any disagreement I have with you can only be the result of bitterness, jealousy, hypocrisy, laziness, entitlement, confusion, cynicism, closed-mindedness, self-pity, and paranoia (did I miss any?), but should I mention that I see some similarity between some of your views and those commonly expressed in the Mail, suddenly I've gone beyond the bounds of reasonable discourse? I'm the one who's being unacceptably insulting? Physician, heal thyself.

I also notice that certain other people who express views similar to mine, or who have even explicitly agreed with me on one or more points, somehow don't find themselves on the receiving end of your tirades... Did I run over your puppy or something?

[boboff]

Well I am sorry, I didn't mean any of those things you infered I had meant, I was simply commenting on the fact that you can sometimes take opinions and state they are generalisations, which by there very nature they are. The rest I will delete if you prefer.

The rest was a rant, as I too hate the rubbish in the Mail, and I do have some right wing opinions, but too tar me with the "yeah but some things you say the Mail says too" is simplistic.

Anyway, enough said.

[gregorach]

Well I am sorry, I didn't mean any of those things you infered I had meant, I was simply commenting on the fact that you can sometimes take opinions and state they are generalisations, which by there very nature they are. The rest I will delete if you prefer.

No, please leave your original comments as they are. The statements have already been made, and altering the record now won't change that. I would much rather that the conversation remain as it actually was, so that people can make up their own minds as to the rights and wrongs of it.