Comments on: Dumbing down: role models and the dangers of easy affluence http://aphrabehn.wordpress.com/2006/12/17/dumbing-down-role-models-and-the-dangers-of-easy-affluence/ Ours IS to reason why... Wed, 06 Jan 2010 23:50:20 +0000 http://wordpress.com/ hourly 1 By: Aphra Behn http://aphrabehn.wordpress.com/2006/12/17/dumbing-down-role-models-and-the-dangers-of-easy-affluence/#comment-1116 Aphra Behn Tue, 19 Dec 2006 20:49:18 +0000 http://aphrabehn.wordpress.com/2006/12/17/dumbing-down-role-models-and-the-dangers-of-easy-affluence/#comment-1116 Thank you all for reading and for giving me much food for thought. Hello again Mr Librarian. :-) You ask "what are the benefits of being famous for being famous?" - I guess it is about recognition and acknowledgement. Hi Tammy, thanks for dropping by. You are so right in all that you say. There are only so many knowledge workers that we need, I guess. Then we hire students and even graduates and put them in call centres, pay them peanuts and give them scripts to read. That is soul-destroying work. You are also right about needing role models. That could divert us off onto all sorts of conversations about what we call positive discrimination in the UK, (I think in the US you call it quotas). Of course, the most accessible and believable role models for pretty and talentless girls are other pretty and talentless girls, so the celebrity culture breeds celebrity wannabes. Hi Archie. Welcome to my blog. I think you are right, that universal education is pointless if it doesn't lead anywhere. But I found myself wondering if part of the problem is that we don't have skilled artisan jobs any more because factory based manufacturing is so much cheaper. In the good-old-bad-old days there was a huge need for skilled artisans, to make shoes or clothes, to shoe horses, to make furniture, and so on. We do still need skilled tradesmen to build houses, plaster walls, and fix our boilers, but as the plumber said to me last night - the paperwork takes longer than the job. If you had spent five or seven years learning a trade you had your living in your hands, status in the community, and a degree of self-respect. you were also reasonably well off, as plumbers are today. Of course, the downside was that necessities were so expensive that no-one could afford luxuries, and that huge numbers of people, women in particular, had to go into domestic service. I dont want to romanticise the past, but surely what is missing is a sense of security within the world, and a sense of personal ability and self-respect, which a lot of people got because they had a trade even if thet did not have an education. Factory work was dangerous and exploititive, but if you were a cobbler, or a tanner, or a blacksmith, or a tailor, or a stonemason you had a portable skill, and a certain amount of independence compared with a factory worker or farm labourer for example. Anyway, thank you all for prompting me to think further on the subject, and thank you all for taking the time to say what you think. Alll the best Aphra Thank you all for reading and for giving me much food for thought.

Hello again Mr Librarian. :-) You ask “what are the benefits of being famous for being famous?” – I guess it is about recognition and acknowledgement.

Hi Tammy, thanks for dropping by. You are so right in all that you say. There are only so many knowledge workers that we need, I guess. Then we hire students and even graduates and put them in call centres, pay them peanuts and give them scripts to read. That is soul-destroying work. You are also right about needing role models. That could divert us off onto all sorts of conversations about what we call positive discrimination in the UK, (I think in the US you call it quotas). Of course, the most accessible and believable role models for pretty and talentless girls are other pretty and talentless girls, so the celebrity culture breeds celebrity wannabes.

Hi Archie. Welcome to my blog. I think you are right, that universal education is pointless if it doesn’t lead anywhere. But I found myself wondering if part of the problem is that we don’t have skilled artisan jobs any more because factory based manufacturing is so much cheaper.

In the good-old-bad-old days there was a huge need for skilled artisans, to make shoes or clothes, to shoe horses, to make furniture, and so on. We do still need skilled tradesmen to build houses, plaster walls, and fix our boilers, but as the plumber said to me last night – the paperwork takes longer than the job.

If you had spent five or seven years learning a trade you had your living in your hands, status in the community, and a degree of self-respect. you were also reasonably well off, as plumbers are today. Of course, the downside was that necessities were so expensive that no-one could afford luxuries, and that huge numbers of people, women in particular, had to go into domestic service.

I dont want to romanticise the past, but surely what is missing is a sense of security within the world, and a sense of personal ability and self-respect, which a lot of people got because they had a trade even if thet did not have an education. Factory work was dangerous and exploititive, but if you were a cobbler, or a tanner, or a blacksmith, or a tailor, or a stonemason you had a portable skill, and a certain amount of independence compared with a factory worker or farm labourer for example.

Anyway, thank you all for prompting me to think further on the subject, and thank you all for taking the time to say what you think.

Alll the best

Aphra

]]> By: archiearchive http://aphrabehn.wordpress.com/2006/12/17/dumbing-down-role-models-and-the-dangers-of-easy-affluence/#comment-1065 archiearchive Mon, 18 Dec 2006 06:47:14 +0000 http://aphrabehn.wordpress.com/2006/12/17/dumbing-down-role-models-and-the-dangers-of-easy-affluence/#comment-1065 Education was wonderful if you were part of the 1-2% who took part in it. That left 98% of tyhe population to do the necessary drudge work. Growing the food to feed your thoughts, cleaning your house so you had an uncluttered space to think, making your clothes so you could show that you were of the educated class. Universal education has created a group (like 98%) of people who, because of their education, know that they will not make it to the heights. There is no Nobel for them, not even a PhD or a BA. Unlike their ancestors who knew nothing better, the modern generation of educated drop-outs know that there is something better than running the sewerage works, or driving a truck, or taking in ironing. They know there is something better and they know they will never have it. Why not go for cheap celebrity as a way of making quick money? It may be the only way out for a loser. Sorry for the cynicism but the current drift to the right in the Western World gets to me on occasion. Education was wonderful if you were part of the 1-2% who took part in it. That left 98% of tyhe population to do the necessary drudge work. Growing the food to feed your thoughts, cleaning your house so you had an uncluttered space to think, making your clothes so you could show that you were of the educated class.

Universal education has created a group (like 98%) of people who, because of their education, know that they will not make it to the heights. There is no Nobel for them, not even a PhD or a BA. Unlike their ancestors who knew nothing better, the modern generation of educated drop-outs know that there is something better than running the sewerage works, or driving a truck, or taking in ironing. They know there is something better and they know they will never have it.

Why not go for cheap celebrity as a way of making quick money? It may be the only way out for a loser.

Sorry for the cynicism but the current drift to the right in the Western World gets to me on occasion.

]]> By: tammy vitale http://aphrabehn.wordpress.com/2006/12/17/dumbing-down-role-models-and-the-dangers-of-easy-affluence/#comment-1061 tammy vitale Mon, 18 Dec 2006 00:13:27 +0000 http://aphrabehn.wordpress.com/2006/12/17/dumbing-down-role-models-and-the-dangers-of-easy-affluence/#comment-1061 love the post...and/but....education is not necessarily the answer anymore...it may have been when the elite boys where at it, but everyone has a chance at it and now all a 4 year undergrad will get you is in the door. It's no longer about grad school but which grad school and with whom you studied, etc. And then there's the on-going gal vs guy pay scale. And the good ole boy network (at least here in Ama where we still haven't elected a female President and heaven help us Hilary is all we've got - my hopes are on Obama). If you see no one that looks like you who's found a way out, you're liable to believe there isn't one. love the post…and/but….education is not necessarily the answer anymore…it may have been when the elite boys where at it, but everyone has a chance at it and now all a 4 year undergrad will get you is in the door. It’s no longer about grad school but which grad school and with whom you studied, etc. And then there’s the on-going gal vs guy pay scale. And the good ole boy network (at least here in Ama where we still haven’t elected a female President and heaven help us Hilary is all we’ve got – my hopes are on Obama). If you see no one that looks like you who’s found a way out, you’re liable to believe there isn’t one.

]]> By: Singing Librarian http://aphrabehn.wordpress.com/2006/12/17/dumbing-down-role-models-and-the-dangers-of-easy-affluence/#comment-1060 Singing Librarian Sun, 17 Dec 2006 17:06:34 +0000 http://aphrabehn.wordpress.com/2006/12/17/dumbing-down-role-models-and-the-dangers-of-easy-affluence/#comment-1060 You cannot imagine how pleased I am that I missed that Celebrity Mastermind. I even feel as though I should be making those annoying quote marks in the air as I type both the word Celebrity and the word Mastermind there. I feel nervous just imagining the general knowledge round. People are definitely fatter and lazier. I don't know about hell in a handcart just yet, but it is distressing. Aside from money, what are the benefits of being famous for being famous? Surely there aren't any. If you become famous for sleeping with a celebrity, how long can it be before the 'my dirty night of passion with...' stories are about you? Nobody seems to want to think any more. It's too much like hard work. You cannot imagine how pleased I am that I missed that Celebrity Mastermind. I even feel as though I should be making those annoying quote marks in the air as I type both the word Celebrity and the word Mastermind there. I feel nervous just imagining the general knowledge round.

People are definitely fatter and lazier. I don’t know about hell in a handcart just yet, but it is distressing. Aside from money, what are the benefits of being famous for being famous? Surely there aren’t any. If you become famous for sleeping with a celebrity, how long can it be before the ‘my dirty night of passion with…’ stories are about you?

Nobody seems to want to think any more. It’s too much like hard work.

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