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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

#351

Post by oulipo »

mtnGoat wrote: post #343

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…

"My dad believed that because he paid taxes he shouldn’t have to pay the school to feed me."

I understand this is not what is meant here... but in a sense he's right. In a normal society where everyone pay taxes and they are well spent, it should be indeed the Government that's in charge of feeding kids at school

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

#352

Post by ViscountPenguin »

analog31 wrote: post #321
ThomW wrote: post #314

It absolutely floors me that children are forced by law to attend school and they don't automatically get a hot meal. That's irresponsible.

A weird aspect of my childhood: I brought a sandwich to lunch every day when I was in school. At first, my mom made it, but very quickly it became my own job, not that it was particularly difficult. The school had subsidized lunches and milk. I always brought a nickel for milk. The teacher collected everybody's lunch money at the start of the day. That way, it was utterly opaque who was getting it for free. A simple…

Here in Australia packed lunches are the standard, but something like a Japanese or Russian school lunch seems obviously superior in my mind.

At the very least I wish my school had let kids use the microwave, cold leftovers get a bit disappointing over time.

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

#353

Post by mlyle »

mtnGoat wrote: post #343

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…

I don't know what the correct answer is.

The tricky thing is, if you let anyone just choose not to pay, there will be plenty of people who are capable of paying who don't bother. In your case, it sounds like your dad was maybe capable of paying but wanted to freeload.

So as long as you're going to charge for lunches, you need to have some kind of enforcement mechanism. Embarrassing the kid ideally would not be part of it.

California pays for it all, but California is a pretty rich state. And if you're a poorer state, you have the choice between eliminating this problem, or addressing many other types of educational need.

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

#354

Post by ksp-atlas »

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%...

Shows up as a plain black shirt on my end

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

#355

Post by gosub100 »

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…

> the cultural emphasis placed on individualism.

That's just a roundabout way to spell diversity, isn't it?

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

#356

Post by mtnGoat »

mlyle wrote: post #353
mtnGoat wrote: post #343

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…

I don't know what the correct answer is. The tricky thing is, if you let anyone just choose not to pay, there will be plenty of people who are capable of paying who don't bother. In your case, it sounds like your dad was maybe capable of paying but wanted to freeload. So as long as you're going to charge for lunches, you need to have some kind of enforcement mechanism. Embarrassing the kid ideally would not be part o…

Just roll it into property taxes and call it a day. This is not a political issue in my mind, but a basic humanity issue. A child with hunger pangs isn’t focused on learning, if you can’t cover the basic need, the rest is a waste. The haves, selfishly don’t want to help subsidize the have nots. Which I get, BUT these are kids, we as adults should leave them out of it, sack up, and deal with it.

You are correct, my dad was a civil engineer, he very much could afford it. I guess he thought high end alcohol and golf were better expenditures. I found it interesting that the article mentions a lot of the debt isn’t from the lowest income brackets.

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

#357

Post by hiddencost »

mlyle wrote: post #353
mtnGoat wrote: post #343

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…

I don't know what the correct answer is. The tricky thing is, if you let anyone just choose not to pay, there will be plenty of people who are capable of paying who don't bother. In your case, it sounds like your dad was maybe capable of paying but wanted to freeload. So as long as you're going to charge for lunches, you need to have some kind of enforcement mechanism. Embarrassing the kid ideally would not be part o…

This is why we have taxes. Because we can assess how much each person can afford to pay, and then make collective decisions that can't be made by inefficient free market mechanisms.

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

#358

Post by aembleton »

mtnGoat wrote: post #343

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…

Couldn't you have taken a packed lunch in? Make a sandwich and take it with you.

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

#359

Post by mtnGoat »

oulipo wrote: post #351
mtnGoat wrote: post #343

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…

"My dad believed that because he paid taxes he shouldn’t have to pay the school to feed me." I understand this is not what is meant here... but in a sense he's right. In a normal society where everyone pay taxes and they are well spent, it should be indeed the Government that's in charge of feeding kids at school

Absolutely, and more states are starting to realize this. Covering basic needs for the most vulnerable is a cornerstone of community and a sign of success.

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

#360

Post by mtnGoat »

aembleton wrote: post #358
mtnGoat wrote: post #343

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…

Couldn't you have taken a packed lunch in? Make a sandwich and take it with you.

I could have, and did on occasion, but that would have required my dad to go buy lunch food and keep it on hand. But he didn’t need to do that… the school needed to feed us!

I did learn around 7th grade that I could steal his cigarettes and sell them. I guess he did pay for more lunches than I realized, now that I wrote this.

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