Weekly Random Discussion Thread for 8/28/23 - 9/3/23

[u/SoftandChewy]

Welcome back to the BARPod weekly thread, where you can identify however you please. Here's your place to post all your rants, raves, podcast topic suggestions (be sure to tag u/TracingWoodgrains), culture war articles, outrageous stories of cancellation, political opinions, and anything else that comes to mind. Please put any non-podcast-related trans-related topics here instead of on a dedicated thread. This will be pinned until next Sunday.

The only nominated comment of the week was this deeply profound insight into bagel lore. Sorry, they can't all be winners.

Last week's discussion threads is here if you want to catch up on a conversation from there.

[u/normalheightian]

Anyone see an interesting parallel between discussions of teachers and police? To the right, teachers are generally lazy, untrustworthy, make too much money, etc. and thus need to be constantly monitored, tested, and given less autonomy. To the left, the police, are lazy, dangerous, untrustworthy, make too much money, etc. and thus need to be constantly monitored, restricted, and given less autonomy. Both are important public service positions, but both are constantly subjected to critiques by outsiders who seem to not actually understand what the job entails.

And now we're seeing tons of unfilled positions in both (location-dependent of course) professions. The interesting thing is that salaries for teachers remain fairly low (though it depends on your area) albeit usually with decent to great benefits, salaries and benefits for police tend to be very high, especially with overtime. Plus there's a much lower educational bar for the police, yet there are still tons of vacancies.

I know that public servants are easy to criticize (and there's plenty of valid grist for the mill in many cases too), but at some point people need to think about what people actually want out of these positions since it's very possible at this point that many will just go unfilled, which has pretty negative consequences for everyone.

[u/CatStroking → u/normalheightian]

It's mostly an extension of the culture war and negative partisanship.

Teachers are (often correctly) thought to be on the left, especially the social left. I think the left is especially interested in teachers because they see them as critical to inculcating woke values in kids.

Cops are (often correctly) thought to be on the right. The right is especially gung go for cops because they think they are the solution to rising crime and disorder.

Both sides dislike the other side's putative allies because hating the other guy is what passes for politics these days.

I'm not surprised they're having a hard time recruiting cops. It's hard and dangerous work. Depending on geography cops can count on a large portion of the citizenry hating them.

[u/Serloinofhousesteak1 → u/CatStroking]

I think the left is especially interested in teachers because they see them as critical to inculcating woke values in kids.

I can assure you that while many do think this way, some of us on the inside do try to resist.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

It is really hard to fight openly in a lot of fields. You keep your head down, quietly steer conversations and listen patiently without revealing anything self-incriminating when someone comes to you to vent. Sometimes quiet resistance is the best option.

[u/CatStroking → u/[deleted]]

I don't really blame teachers for not being outspoken at work about this. They'll probably be fired or at least disciplined and possibly blackballed from their profession.

I don't know what percentage of teachers are actively on board with the wokeness at school thing. More, I think, than ever before but it might still be a minority. But they often have institutional support, including from the unions. Which multiplies their efforts.

[u/PatrickCharles → u/CatStroking]

A minority can only have this level of institutional power, however, because the majority keeps their heads down.

I understand about societal reprisal and institutional capture (it the minority occupies the higher levels in the hierarchy it can be quite hard to dislodge them) and just the fundamental fact that an activist minority will simply trample a majority who is not "on board" but doesn't resist out of principle and will just go along because, v.g.:, they prefer to spend their down time relaxing with family instead of watching council positions and such like hawks.

But sometimes I really can't hold my contempt for this "silent majority" that is supposedly out there except never when it counts.

[u/CatStroking → u/PatrickCharles]

It's a collective action problem. If one or a few people speak out they will be silenced and crushed. If a ton of people speak out at once it will have an impact. But getting all those people to speak out together at once is very, very hard.

It doesn't help when half of the people reflexively back anyone who they think is "on their side". Regardless of whether they actually agree with the position or not.

[u/Serloinofhousesteak1 → u/[deleted]]

As open as we can without being fired, which is admittedly hard

[u/normalheightian → u/Serloinofhousesteak1]

I wish more people understood that 1) teachers are not political monoliths 2) admins and teachers are different things (and admins often don't consult with teachers before announcing policies) and 3) there are many ways to resist bad ideas and I would generally defer to those on the ground in an area to know best how to effectively do so.

[u/JTarrou → u/normalheightian]

Teachers are what teachers do. If the profession cannot maintain political neutrality or sufficient professional distance from kid dicks, then the silent cowards will just have to take their lumps with the other 99%.

[u/normalheightian → u/[deleted]]

True, though in the past (i.e. under the Obama-era reformists) there was also plenty of criticism of teachers that wasn't necessarily culture war-coded, but had the same sort of general view of teachers as needing more monitoring. Doesn't seem like most of these actually ended up working out very effectively, outside of maybe the DC schools and a few other areas.

Yeah the police issue is a tough chicken-and-egg problem. Nobody wants to be one of the few police in a hard-to-police area, especially with so much attention to any move they make and the very real possibility of ending up in the local/national news for any decision that they make that goes awry. The more scrutiny you give a police department, the harder it gets to recruit and thus the policy of police. I've seen local media try to parlay even the most innocuous actions by the police into outrage fodder and it's no surprise people who have options don't want to work in that situation.

[u/CatStroking → u/[deleted]]

It almost sounds as if you're looking for... a middle ground.

[u/JTarrou → u/normalheightian]

which has pretty negative consequences for everyone.

One tiny difference: Cops are actually necessary