

It Takes a School, Not Missiles - robg
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/13/opinion/13kristof.html?partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=all

======
mdemare
Doesn't anybody here remember what the Taliban in Afghanistan were like before
the U.S. drove them out? Well, here's a reminder: "Women seeking an education
were forced to attend underground schools such as the Golden Needle Sewing
School, where they and their teachers risked execution if caught."

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taliban_treatment_of_women>

I applaud what Mr. Mortenson has accomplished, but what he did (in Afghanistan
at least) only became possible after the U.S. army invaded Afghanistan and
fired all those expensive missiles.

~~~
omouse
I'm sick of this re-writing of history. There are other countries that helped
to remove the Taliban, among them are Canada and the U.K. Please give credit
where credit is due. A U.S. pilot even killed some Canadian soldiers! So to
say "the U.S. drove them out" and "the U.S. army invaded Afghanistan" is
insulting.

------
dominik
A good review; the better parts are where the columnist, Mr. Kristof,
describes the book and Mr. Mortenson rather than talking about his own
opinion.

Most interesting: "To get a school, villagers must provide the land and the
labor to assure a local “buy-in,” and so far the Taliban have not bothered his
schools. One anti-American mob rampaged through Baharak, Afghanistan,
attacking aid groups — but stopped at the school that local people had just
built with Mr. Mortenson. “This is our school,” the mob leaders decided, and
they left it intact."

"Mr. Mortenson has had setbacks, including being kidnapped for eight days in
Pakistan’s wild Waziristan region."

Strangely, the columnist adds in "It would be naïve to think that a few dozen
schools will turn the tide in Afghanistan or Pakistan," right after that,
undermining his own point... ?

~~~
maw
Why does it undermine anybody's point? In an area where millions of people
live, a few dozen schools is a small number, yet thousands of them may make a
positive difference.

------
DarkShikari
This reminds me of the film "Charlie Wilson's War" and the story of what
happened back in Afghanistan in the late 80s; after spending over a billion
dollars secretly providing rebels with weapons in order to defeat the Soviets,
we walk out without spending even a few million on rebuilding, and almost none
of the population learns that we were the ones who saved them--and instead
blame us for not helping, not being educated enough to know the truth.

And thus we created the enemy which we fight today.

~~~
jfarmer
Actually, what happened was that the Saudis stepped in and DID build the
schools, houses, and infrastructure.

And then we're shocked, SHOCKED! that the radical elements would win out over
the more moderate ones.

------
omouse
I don't know, considering how awful some of the schools here are, do we really
want to export them to other countries? It'd be nice if some countries took
some chances and innovated in regards to how schools, corporations, and other
social structures work instead of plainly copying the Western world.

 _edit: I agree that education is important and better than lobbing missiles
and bullets at someone but at the same time..._

~~~
LogicHoleFlaw
So many of the problems with education in the US are cultural that it's
depressing. When people don't _want_ to learn, there is very little you can do
to improve the situation. Especially in a compulsory system where students are
not free to leave and end up simply disrupting those students who truly want
to learn.

The thirst for knowledge in the third world and true desire to learn combats
the worst features of the Western education model.

~~~
omouse
To an extent it is a cultural problem, but on the other hand, why would you
_want_ to learn about something that's taught in a dry and boring way?

~~~
JabavuAdams
Because you're in the developing world, and you're desperate to become an
engineer / civil servant / whatever, so your kids don't have to drive taxis?

I'm all for studying what you're interested in, and in general, I don't do
things that I'm not at least marginally interested in, but let's not kid
ourselves. This is a luxury that many don't have.

------
pragmatic
Sigh.

So now we have to build millions of schools around the world so people will
love us.

Is this reddit, the "social" socialist propaganda site? What does this have to
do with hacker news?

~~~
JabavuAdams
No, we need to win the war against violent, Islamic extremism, and violent
religious fundamentalism, in general.

In that regard, schools and education are just another weapon in a combined
military / social arsenal. As it turns out, the schools are cheaper than the
missiles.

The point is, if we don't do this, we will _lose_.

~~~
xlnt
The reason that, for example, Palestinian textbooks contain maps omitting
Israel is that they don't _want_ to teach their children a fair and peaceful
message.

Schools are great when people are reasonably open to living peacefully but
can't work when people do not want peace and sabotage attempts at real
education. So, unfortunately, we're going to need a bunch of missiles.

I know it's hard to grasp, but there are people who do things like destroy
_greenhouses_ _of their own_ out of spite or hate. If you give them a a
voluntary choice, some people don't want peace; their agenda for how the world
should be comes first.

You know, it's funny, one of the memes strong enough to change some dangerous
people enough to be safe is Christianity, but the idea of converting Muslims
to Christianity is met with extremely loud screeching about how we shouldn't
do that and they should be allowed to believe the (uncivilized) things they
believe now. If we can't convert them to peaceful Western values then it's
going to be missiles.

~~~
cia_plant
_If we can't convert them to peaceful Western values then it's going to be
missiles._

Doesn't this seem self-contradictory to you? What, exactly, is "peaceful"
about a value system that advocates aggressive, ideologically motivated war?

~~~
xlnt
I was referring to missiles used in self-defense.

------
mtw
it reminds me of the movie idiocracy. explosions and violence make more
impression on short-term than litterature or culture

~~~
rbanffy
Children should be required to watch "Idiocracy" in the classroom...

------
breck
"Three Cups of Tea" is a terrific book. I highly recommend it.

------
PieSquared
_"So I have this fantasy: Suppose that the United States focused less on
blowing things up in Pakistan’s tribal areas and more on working through local
aid groups to build schools, simultaneously cutting tariffs on Pakistani and
Afghan manufactured exports."_

What a fantasy. I wish. But what's easier: bombing and shooting or educating?
(Same goes for most other non-violent measures that could have been taken.
They're harder.)

~~~
Retric
If they cost less money why are they harder? Do you think it’s a question of
funding or a question of scale?

~~~
rbanffy
It's slightly depressing to imagine that if our defense contractors could make
more money building schools than weapons, we would not be having this
discussion.

------
mynameishere
Cripe. I have this vision of my property taxes going up 100-fold as I pay to
educate every single child in the world. The NEA will be thrilled. Really,
it's not the USA's responsibility to buy schools for non-Americans. Shit, it's
not the USA's responsibility to buy schools _anywhere_.

Any genuinely effective techniques can be covered under this heading:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_operations>

~~~
JabavuAdams
This is a strawman argument. Your tax dollars are paying for the military
anyway. The article claims they can build 20 schools for the cost of one
cruise missile.

In the long-run, we can't win the GWOT through military force alone. Even
relatively hawkish people like Richard Clarke recognize this.

~~~
mynameishere
Oh, man, schools and cruise missiles aren't fungible. Heck, no government
program has ever replaced any other government program. We'll see those cruise
missiles targeting the schools before that happens.

------
rokhayakebe
This is the kind of article I need to read in the morning. It gives a sense of
purpose. We are seeing a shift in our collective consciousness. The system we
are part of is not the best. In fact it is arguably the worst system since the
caveman era. We are the first generation that truly believes we can, need and
will improve our world without hurting anyone.

~~~
wheels
Then I might suggest subscribing to the New York Times. Can the rest of us
keep our Hacker News feed?

~~~
rms
>Can the rest of us keep our Hacker News feed?

The Hacker News RSS feed is in the same place it has always been.

~~~
wheels
Uhm, the point was that this isn't hacker news.

~~~
rms
I understood your point. I disagree with you because this isn't Hacker News
_for you_. The main Hacker News page is never going to be 30 perfect stories
for every single hacker in the world because it isn't a customized page so it
can't be perfectly individualized. Hackers like different stories. More than
50 people liked this. Hacking doesn't have to be in python. The hacking Mr.
Mortenson is doing is incredibly noble.

Why do you find this story to be so objectionable?

From the guidelines:

>Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're
evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters,
or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-
topic.

~~~
davidw
> I understood your point. I disagree with you because this isn't Hacker News
> for you

If it gets bad enough, then eventually people will start moving on to
something better, that is actually about hacker news, and not the political
article du jour. This article and discussion were both extremely off topic.
And it's not just any off topic, it's politics, which brings out the lowest
common denominator in most forums it's introduced in. I mean, how can people
vote up stuff like "The system we are part of is not the best. In fact it is
arguably the worst system since the caveman era." ? Apologies to rokhayakebe,
but that's not serious, interesting discussion, it's hyperbole typical of
thousands of other internet forums. I would prefer to try and keep HN from
becoming just like all those other forums, although perhaps it's a vain hope.

~~~
edw519
I agree with you, davidw.

Except we're beginning to have a new problem here at hn.

The only thing worse than threads about politics, religion, drugs, or popular
culture are the comments about how they're not "hacker news".

We're starting to sound like a committee that gets together and spends most of
our time writing the agenda.

~~~
davidw
Saying "these discussions are even worse than the ones they seek to avoid" is
an easy out though, unless there's some other way to express our
dissatisfaction with said politics articles (down arrow, or whatever else).
Furthermore, they serve to pass on information to new members of the
community.

~~~
edw519
Fair enough.

------
arthurk
Is there a way to see this article without registering?

~~~
jcl
They don't require registration for users referred from Google:

[http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22It+Takes+a+Schoo...](http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22It+Takes+a+School%2C+Not+Missiles%22&btnG=Google+Search)

------
mattmaroon
What if you have a school and missiles?

------
jpcx01
actually, it takes both

