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I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

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Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#341

Post by socalgal2 »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #222
brundolf wrote: post #196

Many people, especially in our subculture, tend to feel like if they can't solve an entire problem forever, if they can't Change The World, what they're doing is futile and pointless But most people can't change the world. Most individuals shouldn't have the power to change the world. What we can do is be a force for good in the lives that are proximal to us. If we can make a few people's lives better, we should rest…

One of my favorite quotes: > "I was in the Air Force a while, and they had what they call 'policing the area,' and I think that’s a pretty good thing to go by. If everyone just takes care of their own area, then we won’t have any problems. Be here. Be present. Wherever you are, be there. And look around you, and see what needs to be changed." -Willie Nelson

Isn't this also the tragedy of the commons problem though? It only takes a few bad actors to not take care of their own area and over time, those that are doing extra to make up for them eventually feel like they're being taken advantage of.

I feel like in Japan it works because the culture adds enough social pressure that those not doing their part fall in line - or something. I don't think most western culture has that social pressure any more nor do I expect it can by added back

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#342

Post by throw3436 »

xarope wrote: post #333
pfannkuchen wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The idea that lunches can be freshly made, on site, out of healthy ingredients and children Excellent garden path sentence.

A friend who's a pre-school teacher has this excellent t-shirt (I LMAO the first time I saw it): let's eat, kids. let's eat kids. punctuation saves lives. https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/B1pppR4gVKL._CLa%7C2140%...

made my day! thanks for sharing =D

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#343

Post by mtnGoat »

As someone who experienced this first hand growing up. I consider how someone feels about free school lunch, a basic test of their humanity.

If you think kids should go hungry or be embarrassed at school because of their parents finances… we can’t be friends, nor acquaintances. IMHO, you are subhuman at that point and not worth my time.

My dad believed that because he paid taxes he shouldn’t have to pay the school to feed me. I begged, borrowed, and stole spare change to pay. He’d chip in once in a while, but once you are so far in debt they won’t feed you anymore (at least they didn’t at the time). I remember going to the lost and found every day to check the pockets of the clothes in there. I learned how to pick the locks on the gym lockers and would steal money from other kids pockets. I sometimes left school so I could go steal lunch from a grocery store near by. I got caught once, but after the lady knew what was up, she conveniently was always looking away from me during mid day of I came in. From the bottom of my heart I hope she receives every possible blessing in this life.

No child should have to do that. Ever! Happy to pay taxes to and live in a state that has solved this problem!

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#344

Post by verisimi »

kerkeslager wrote: post #290
camdenreslink wrote: post #259

New York State just passed universal free lunch and breakfast for public school students. Of all the things that we spend our tax dollars on, this feels like a no brainer. Making sure children are fed should be at the top of the list.

Stuff like this seems like such a dividing line to me. Like, in theory when people believe things that are morally wrong, I want to reach out to them with compassion and respect and try to gently persuade them to my side because we're all, in theory, on the same side. But if you don't want kids to be fed, I really am not sure we're actually on the same side any more and I really am not sure what to do with that.

I'll play devil's advocate, and you tell me the immorality of the position.

Say you have no children. Is it an acceptable position to hold that 'those people who have children should also be the ones to look after them'? Shouldn't you have considered these sorts of expenses and being able to meet them, rather than expecting to receive handouts?

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#345

Post by socalgal2 »

kerkeslager wrote: post #290
camdenreslink wrote: post #259

New York State just passed universal free lunch and breakfast for public school students. Of all the things that we spend our tax dollars on, this feels like a no brainer. Making sure children are fed should be at the top of the list.

Stuff like this seems like such a dividing line to me. Like, in theory when people believe things that are morally wrong, I want to reach out to them with compassion and respect and try to gently persuade them to my side because we're all, in theory, on the same side. But if you don't want kids to be fed, I really am not sure we're actually on the same side any more and I really am not sure what to do with that.

You can want kids to be fed and fully believe that the government giving out free meal to all kids will eventually lead to kids not being feed. I can think of lots of arguments

Budgets might be cut directly, so can not feed some percent, budgets might be cut indirectly (less tax revenue). Giving out free food might make people feel entitled and less likely to learn to be self sufficient. The "give a man a fish he eats for day, teach him to fish he eats for a lifetime", type of thinking. Some people might believe it encourages parents to be irresponsible. Back to budgets, it might remove money from other school needs. I guess the thinking would be, schools should teach, food is not their responsibility. If it comes their responsibility then they'll do less teaching which is back to not helping make their students able to ultimately fend for themselves but instead makes them dependent.

I'm not saying I buy those arguments but I can see them as valid arguments.

Helping directly is not always helpful. There's plenty of examples of that. Whether that's true in this case I don't know.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#346

Post by yojo »

verisimi wrote: post #344
kerkeslager wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stuff like this seems like such a dividing line to me. Like, in theory when people believe things that are morally wrong, I want to reach out to them with compassion and respect and try to gently persuade them to my side because we're all, in theory, on the same side. But if you don't want kids to be fed, I really am not sure we're actually on the same side any more and I really am not sure what to do with that.

I'll play devil's advocate, and you tell me the immorality of the position. Say you have no children. Is it an acceptable position to hold that 'those people who have children should also be the ones to look after them'? Shouldn't you have considered these sorts of expenses and being able to meet them, rather than expecting to receive handouts?

You are not denying food to the parents, you are denying food to the children. They did not choose to be born, and they certainly didn’t choose the fiscal responsibility of their parents.

Maybe there is room in there to shame the parents or give them a slap on the wrist, but the kids are blameless and denying them food makes you probably a monster.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#347

Post by walthamstow »

kerkeslager wrote: post #290
camdenreslink wrote: post #259

New York State just passed universal free lunch and breakfast for public school students. Of all the things that we spend our tax dollars on, this feels like a no brainer. Making sure children are fed should be at the top of the list.

Stuff like this seems like such a dividing line to me. Like, in theory when people believe things that are morally wrong, I want to reach out to them with compassion and respect and try to gently persuade them to my side because we're all, in theory, on the same side. But if you don't want kids to be fed, I really am not sure we're actually on the same side any more and I really am not sure what to do with that.

Even outside of morality it's a straightforward issue. Investments in children benefit the whole economy and society, for decades. If a person can't see that then they could be immoral but they might just be stupid.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#348

Post by ViscountPenguin »

I-M-S wrote: post #266
mylesp wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A solution that I have seen implemented and discussed is a flat, very low fare. High enough to keep people off public transit that are disrespectful of it, but low enough to allow almost anyone to take it thus increasing ridership. An added bonus is when using a transit card to tap on and off, the statistics of ridership are still readily available for governments to better plan infrastructure. If you pick a low enou…

Even a very low fare still needs a huge and costly infrastructure around to enforce it

Here in Queensland we just paid $400 million for a ticketing system that is now used entirely for 50c tickets. The marketing line is that the fee is necessary for analytics, but the cynic in me says that it's probably a combination of secret contract negotiations with a pay-per-tap component, and sunk cost fallacy.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#349

Post by ReptileMan »

sitkack wrote: post #188
mjevans wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect the only real benefit is a change in behavior of some passengers. They _paid_ for a thing and therefore feel more respectful towards it. Which would be related to the other symptomatic reasons such a barrier might be sought. As a society my country (USA) sadly has low respect for the commons generally. There's a lack of investment (not none, but not enough), a sense of 'me-ism' entitlement in the population…

Disrespect of the commons has been a 50 year effort on the right to normalize ripping off the government to make it nonfunctional and illegitimate. We are to celebrate those who get out of paying taxes by any means and looking the other way when others take from the commons.

At some point we have to face the truth that the only well organized and ran country in the world is Singapore. European governments had barely any right influence and they manage to evolve their own disfunction quite well. It seems that for some reasons the states after WWII just lost their capacity to build things. If you watch Oppenheimer - one of the things in the background is how staggeringly competent were the administrative guys. There is no such things now. Any government project both big and small is expected to be cost overrun, delayed and if ever finished is a cointoss if it will make things better or worse. It is a global malaise.

Re: I decided to pay off a school’s lunch debt

#350

Post by atoav »

x-complexity wrote: post #287
iandanforth wrote: post #232

On the off chance you're interested in school lunches I highly recommend watching videos of Japanese school lunches on YouTube. There's a bunch out there now and if you were raised in the American system it will probably blow your mind. The idea that lunches can be freshly made, on site, out of healthy ingredients and children are active participants in serving and cleaning up is just crazy. When I encountered it for…

> The idea that lunches can be freshly made, on site, out of healthy ingredients and children are active participants in serving and cleaning up is just crazy. > When I encountered it for the first time I felt like a big part of my childhood had been sold to the lowest bidder. ....I share the sentiment, but I also see the chasm between the requirements to get to what's desired, & what's actually given to meet those r…

> To have this program exist requires children that can be trusted to not waste the food that they're given, to behave, & to learn about preparing their own meals. > > It's a bootstrapping problem, trust problem, & expectations problem, all at once.

In Austrian civil service I worked with kids who had special needs and were predominantly from poor social backgrounds. I made homework with them, drove them to school and back from day care in a bus, and I prepared food with them, had them deal with the dirty dishes, etc.

Most of the kids totally crazy behavior immidiately made sense once you met the parents. In fact there were only two kids where this wasn't the case and the first had PTSD of a life-changing magnitude (fled the Syrian war) and the other had good parents but a mental condition (I suspect severe ADHD).

Most of those kids would have been classified by the general public as hopeless cases.

I cooked with them, did the dishes, baked, regularily. Even kids that get beaten at home or were riddled with war trauma are surprisingly reliable if you just give them a task they understand. And turns out tasks they do every day are easy to understand after a week.

If those kids could make it, I am not the least worried about kids in better circumstances. Will it always be 100% perfect when kids do it? Will every kid be at it with full effort every day? Will a new kid grok it instantly? No. But that is okay. What is the worst that can happen? They go without food as a consequence? Other Kids show them how?

You're making it sound as if preparing food together is some unnatural herculian challenge while preparing food together was probably the most common act humanity has ever shared doing throughout its history.

No it must not be everyone. Prepare food? Get food. Pretty simple. Waste food? That was yours. And the other kids also don't like to see that.

The rason for having a society is to deal with those kind of differences. If you teach kids how to get structure into their lives and how to eat healthy the wasted food will easily be saved in future costs in the health and social systems.

Also: my kids could do this, US kids can't. What does thst mean for the US economy 4 decades down the line in comparison? You really think the US can afford to "educate" kids that way?

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