

Ask HN:  Is school essentially slavery? - amichail

Why does society tolerate this form of slavery?<p>Shouldn't students just learn on their own -- especially those who will pursue entrepreneurship?
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tshtf
In a world where there are an estimated 12 to 27 million actual slaves[1],
none of whom are free to leave their servitude under penalty of bodily harm or
death, I don't think it would be fair whatsoever to compare school (even
compulsory schooling of children) with slavery. Slavery is a completely brutal
and unacceptable institution, where one party has absolutely no rights.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery>

~~~
gdl
I disagree.

This is like the inevitable comparison between the US government stealing our
freedoms and China (or some other dictatorship). The argument isn't that they
are exactly the same thing - it is that one is edging closer to the other than
we would like, and we would like to draw attention to the bad similarities in
an attempt to fix them.

If we never compare the way things are to the worst ways we know, how can we
know if we're falling down that slippery slope until we get to the end and
it's too late? Maybe upon reflection we'll realize that we're already several
steps down a bad path, even if we're still far from "evil" territory.

------
jdietrich
"For most of your school life, it doesn't make that much difference what
subject you're taught. The real lesson is the method. The medium in school
truly is the message. And the medium is, above all, coercive. You're forced to
attend. The subjects are required. You have to do homework. You must observe
school rules. And throughout, you're bullied into docility and submissiveness.
Even modern liberal refinements don't really help. So you're called an
underachiever instead of a dummy. So they send you to a counselor instead of
beating you. It's still not your choice to be there. They may pad the
handcuffs--but the handcuffs stay on.

Which particular subject they happen to teach is far less important than the
fact that it is required. We don't learn that much subject matter in school
anyway in proportion to the huge part of our lives that we spend there. But
what we do learn very well, thanks to the method, is to accept choices that
have been made for us. Which rule they make you follow is less important than
the fact that there are rules. I hear about English teachers who won't allow
their students to begin a sentence with "and." Or about high schools where the
male students are not permitted to wear a T- shirt unless it has a pocket. I
no longer dismiss such rules as merely pointless. The very point to such rules
is their pointlessness."

[http://www.soilandhealth.org/03sov/0303critic/030301studenta...](http://www.soilandhealth.org/03sov/0303critic/030301studentasnigger.html)

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wallflower
"Inglis breaks down the purpose - the actual purpose - of modem schooling into
six basic functions, any one of which is enough to curl the hair of those
innocent enough to believe the three traditional goals listed earlier:

1) The adjustive or adaptive function. Schools are to establish fixed habits
of reaction to authority. This, of course, precludes critical judgment
completely. It also pretty much destroys the idea that useful or interesting
material should be taught, because you can't test for reflexive obedience
until you know whether you can make kids learn, and do, foolish and boring
things..."

More: <http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/>

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sjs382
Ask HN: Is this the worst Ask HN we've ever had?

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chc
If you're talking about children, they are too young to decide whether they
will "pursue entrepreneurship" and at what point in their lives. Depending on
their age, they are very likely too young to decide much of anything — this is
why they are in the custody of adults. School is preparation for whatever they
decide to do. It is also unreasonable to expect children to "just learn on
their own." If there were any indication that such a plan would work, we would
all lovingly embrace such a huge cost reduction. But in countries without a
primary education system, children just tend not to learn.

Higher education is not slavery because it's voluntary, which is the
antithesis of slavery.

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hardy263
The problem with thinking "students can learn on their own" is that there is
an autodidact culture here at HN, so that view is skewed a bit.

Most entrepreneurs have a different mindset from these people. They want to do
something big like make a revolutionary product or impact the world somehow.

Most of my peers don't want to learn on their own. They just want to get the
piece of paper that says "Bachelors of _________", get a well-paying job
(>60k), and live a life happily ever after. They don't care about making a
company, because being employed by someone else has far less risk than making
your own startup.

~~~
liuhenry
My thoughts exactly. I wonder if that's something that can be taught, though,
or at least encouraged/nurtured. How did we, as entrepreneurs, get to be this
way?

~~~
chc
"How did we, as X, get to be this way?" is a question the human race has been
pondering for millennia without really cracking the nut.

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staunch
Prison is a better analogy. It goes pretty far too, with some very important
differences of course.

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gentrysherrill
The Twain quote is the best in my opinion... those of us who are passionate
about learning will remove ourselves from the systems that impede us, or at
least endeavor to minimize their impact on our lives. School, at least in its
current implementation, is a supremely flawed model for many of the reasons
discussed in this thread and elsewhere. The solution is not to just do away
with it though - while for some of us this would be liberating, for a far
greater number of people it would be harmful. Anarchy, be it political,
economic, or educational, rarely generates cut and dry improvement.

As someone who has many issues with education, and has felt openly hostile
toward it previously, for me adopting a relaxed attitude about it was the most
important step. I realized I could go to classes, engage with professors and
other students, and do reasonably well in terms of marks without allowing
grades or assignments to impact my external intellectual curiosity. I've been
much happier, and much more productive both inside and outside of school,
since I let go of the frustration with "the system" and put the focus on
myself.

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mikecane
Slavery is what happens to you when you don't go to school.

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zokier
Closest to slaves are public school teachers who get relatively small pay for
their work, at least around these parts of world.

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meadhikari
A six year kid can not learn on his own and also most 20 years simply feel
difficult to learn on thier own.

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malandrew
it's more like a prison.

go read the first chapter of Paul Graham's "Hackers & Painters"
<http://www.paulgraham.com/hackpaint.html>

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zokier
Makes me wonder what kind of experiences spawn these kind of ideas.

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bigwally
"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education."

\-- Mark Twain

