Eton going Epicurean?

Posted by on

Eton College is adding gratitude, kindness and empathy coaching to its curriculum to build its pupils’ “character”. Following a review into what values Eton should be promoting, boys at the £40,700-a-year school are being taught to take a moment each day to acknowledge how others have helped them and what they have to be grateful for.

What kept them?  My own experience of Old Etonians was at university, where a certain sub-set of them (not all!) proved to be rude, obnoxious and entitled.  Yes, they were in addition rich and titled.  What a shame the school hadn’t introduced them to the thought of Epicurus (or anyone else, if it comes to that) long ago.

This cannot stand!

Posted by on

Lawmakers in Alabama have passed a bill that virtually bans abortion. The legislation, to be signed by the state’s Republican governor, outlaws abortion except in cases where the pregnancy poses a “serious health risk to the mother”, the “unborn child has a lethal anomaly”, or the pregnancy is ectopic (in an abnormal place or position). . A Democrat amendment to allow exceptions for victims of rape or incest was rejected. Doctors who perform abortions could be jailed for life. The state’s Republicans have said they hope to use the bill to challenge Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that gave women the right to abortion. Several states have recently passed laws severely restricting access to abortions. Last week, Georgia banned abortions once a foetal heartbeat can be detected, which is often as early as six weeks.  Extremists expect the issue to reach the Supreme Court and have  abortion banned nationwide. Missouri has  now followed Alabama and Georgia.

It’s always the men, isn’t it?  The ultimate case of male chauvinism. Men don’t have babies and don’t have to look after them 24/7.  They  pay no heed to the intelligence and instincts of women or their personal situations, and think it appropriate to dictate to them on an excruciatingly personal matter such as giving birth, often without the loving support of a spouse.  Miserable marriages, rape, incest, flimsy means of support?  Never mind, men know best and have biblical quotes to support them. They should get out of the private lives of women they’ve  never met and don’t give a damn about!  There are already too many unhappy, struggling  people in this world – to bring more into the world by force of law is both un- Epicurean, counters pragmatic common sense, and is arguably a modern sin.

I hope this will bring out the women in force at election time to finally despatch the mis-named “good ‘ole boys” from power for good.

 

Assaults on teachers

Posted by on

Nearly 25% of UK teachers say they are physically attacked by pupils at least once a week, a study by the NASUWT union has found.  The report found that 89% have suffered physical or verbal abuse in the past year, and 49% say that at their school it is considered part of the job. The NASUWT also warned that pupils as young as 11 are harassing teachers by taking “upskirting” pictures; and that teachers are being subjected to “aggressive contact” from parents, as a result of schools giving out their email addresses.  (The Week, 27 April 2019)

Years ago, as an employer in a small business, I was invited by the head teacher at the secondary school next door to our factory ( in a poor, mainly black, neighborhood) to talk to the older, teenage children about employment and what to expect when they started work.  It seemed like a good idea at the time, but it turned out a disaster, which I have never forgotten. The kids, all about 16,  were out of control, talking over me, fighting, throwing things at one another, and muttering racial epithets at me before I had finished my first sentence.  The teacher was unable to quieten the main disrupters at the back of the classroom, and, poor man, seemed to have no means of instilling discipline.  He was essentially a “babysitter”, some of whose charges were brawnier  and more street-wise than he was.  Two or three kids, at the front of the class, listened and asked questions, but I could see that they were the object of derision as far as the bullies at the back were concerned.

One can’t generalise from one South London school or from a brief  experience, but one thing seemed certain at the time – the attitude of indifference and disrespect was brought from mainly single- parent homes and manifested itself in the classroom.  And nothing seems to have changed in nearly fifty years.  This can’t be addressed by reparations for slavery. That I felt humiliated while trying to offer well-meant advice didn’t matter; I wasn’t physically assaulted.   But what to do about the bullying and indifference to schooling and authority is/was a different matter.  In this case Epicurean courtesy and respect did not work.  What will?  You can lead a horse to water……….

Reparations for slavery

Posted by on

Letter to The Times

The proposal by Cambridge University to devote resources neither to teaching nor to research, but to virtue signalling over slavery is not only questionable for a charity, but also an endorsement of notions of hereditary guilt. Leaving aside the prevalence of coercive labour systems across much of the world, including Africa, throughout much of history, and the major role of African polities in the enslavement and sale of people, there is a preference for beating up on the past rather than addressing slavery in the world today. Public slavery in the shape of those oppressed under totalitarian rule, for example in North Korea, is particularly serious.

With the Left unable to use the Holocaust as a key signifier in historical consciousness, it has focused on the slave trade as an alternative and equivalent – inaccurately so, for the purpose of slavery was not to kill slaves.

Reparation for a distant and very widespread practice is absurd, both practically and philosophically. That the idea is gaining traction is an instance of the strange politics of these times.  (Jeremy Black, professor of history, Exeter University, pub. in The Week. 10 May 2019)

While I sympathise with the African American community in the  United States, I think reparations, as an idea, are inappropriate and would achieve nothing.  If you distribute a couple of thousand dollars, say, to every African American, as with most human beings , it would be a case of “come today, gone tomorrow”,  Money by itself cannot erase an historical problem or a folk memory. The best things you can do is to give minorities a good education, a good start in life , and finally prepare them for challenging and well- paid jobs in the modern economy, on the basis of racial equality.  (Problem – far too few youngsters of all backgrounds are getting a good education, except for a minority of well- to- do families).  The second thing I would do is to radically reduce the incidence of black incarceration, but this requires reform of the policing and legal system.  First, though, reform education, give it more resources and attract good teachers .

Sex and the Catholic church

Posted by on

In the early church nearly all Christian priests were married.  Popes tried to ban marriage and co- habitation,  but to little effect.  Pope Gregory the Great (590-604) said that all sexual desire is sinful in itself (meaning that sexual desire is intrinsically evil?), but right up to the 800’s the majority of priests were nonetheless married.

In 836, at the Council of Aix-la-Chapelle it was openly admitted that abortions and infanticide took place in convents and monasteries to cover up activities of uncelibate clerics.  As a result a very intelligent Saint, called St. Ulrich, a holy bishop, argued from scripture and common sense that the only way to purify the church from the worst excesses of celibacy was to permit priests to marry (Bravo!  he’s my favourite saint!).

The debate continued until in 1074 Pope Gregory VII proclaimed that  anyone to be ordained must first pledge celibacy: “priests [must] first escape from the clutches of their wives”.  It was at the 1st and 2nd Lateran Councils in 1123 and 1139 that clerical marriages were declared invalid, Pope Innocent II
(appropriate name) finally confirming the decision in 1139.

Pope Pelagius II let the cat out of the bag.  His policy was not to bother married priests as long as they did not hand over church property to wives or children.  In other words, it :was all about money and preventing priests from passing land and houses on ( legally) to their offspring.  Celibacy was never scriptural, and was never mentioned by Jesus or his disciples.   So why not scrap it now and at least give no excuse for priests to abuse their parishioners?  Seems a no-brainer.

Incidentally, as late as the 15 th  Century it is estimated  that 50% of priests were married and that this was  accepted by the people.  So what’s the big problem with priestly marriage?