Anarchists = scum

[Biscuit]

I know that...but many of our younger posters won't remember Mr McGhee and may actually think it is you...though I doubt if many would think that I am a chimpanzee!

 

[Mr Banana]

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[Art Vs Science]

What actually is an anarchist? i mean, anarchy is a form of conforming in essence so becomes null in it's own definition

 

[Westdene Seagull]

That's right.

Our economy should be built entirely from 16 year old school leavers who have learnt a trade or other less meaningful careers. Why a portion of the population would want to better their career standards by gaining higher qualifications is beyond me, too! Let's just let those who can AFFORD an education go and get one. Afterall, they'll be the ruling class one day! Why rock the status quo?

Idiot.

But it's how high that portion is that's the problem - 50% is just plain daft. And given that nothing is paid up front and even until the graduate earns £21k then there is no block on the "poor" going IF they have the capability.

 

[Westdene Seagull]

I learnt so many skills at Uni that have made me much more employable and good at what I do. I was a late developer, I was in all the lower classes at school and only really found my feet in the last year of GCSE's and then A-Levels. Kicked on to a whole new level at University and I've now got a great job at a very succesful company. I would never have managed that without University and my course was probably one that some people would deem as dross (film and tv) but if you can engage in something that interests you it makes a massive difference and helps you pick up skills I'd never have developed otherwise and apply them to other things.

Care to list these allusive skills ? Only it's often an argument put forward for going to Uni but I've never seen them actually named. I would suggest most would be equally obtainable in work. I learnt more useful things working while at Polytechnic than I ever did studying.

 

[Chicken Run]

Leave it lads I think he's a lost cause!! Christ on a bike. Have you ever met anyone so childish!? Your profile says you're 41! Act like it. (Saying that his profile also says 'Chicken Run has not made any friends yet' )

There's only one grey matter dodger here Mr. Run and it isn't me!

OMG, says the pathetic little runt who checks out my profile and then suggests I'm somewhat inferior because I've made no friends on an internet site, as you said have you met anyone so childish

 

[beorhthelm]

I never understood Labours determination to try and get 50% of 18 year olds to Uni anyway,

social engineering, dear boy. tell 'em whats best for them.

I learnt so many skills at Uni that have made me much more employable and good at what I do. I was a late developer, I was in all the lower classes at school and only really found my feet in the last year of GCSE's and then A-Levels. Kicked on to a whole new level at University and I've now got a great job at a very succesful company.

i very much agree with this, but did you need to do a full 3 year Honours program to gain that extra skill and development? could you have acheived the benefits in 2 years? or even one? i certainly gained lot from my degree from Southbank (currently ranked worst), but i reckon the usful stuff could have been put into 2 year, maybe less. there was alot of padding and the dissertation is really just for kudos and of little practical worth (prepares acedemics for further studies and acedemic papers, not businessman and engineers for tangiable projects).

a better system, with different tiers for abilities and objectives, could be cheaper and therefore fully funded. like it used to be.

 

[Seasider78]

University should be on a supply and demand basis with courses in areas where there is a national skill shortage given grants to encourage sign up. This way the public purse pays for the public benefit. If someone wants to study a niche subject for their own personal gain then I see no problem with them paying for it.

 

[Publius Ovidius]

A degree like History requires A LOT of independent reading outside of lessons, but the reading they do outside of lessons will make it a full-time course.

Well I am doing an OU Degree involving heaps of reading which I fit around my full time job, living my life etc etc. So dont tell me you need 40 hours a week "reading time"

 

[Dandyman]

social engineering, dear boy. tell 'em whats best for them.



i very much agree with this, but did you need to do a full 3 year Honours program to gain that extra skill and development? could you have acheived the benefits in 2 years? or even one? i certainly gained lot from my degree from Southbank (currently ranked worst), but i reckon the usful stuff could have been put into 2 year, maybe less. there was alot of padding and the dissertation is really just for kudos and of little practical worth (prepares acedemics for further studies and acedemic papers, not businessman and engineers for tangiable projects).

a better system, with different tiers for abilities and objectives, could be cheaper and therefore fully funded. like it used to be.

If that's a call for more, better quality and more respected vocational training then I agree.

On the other hand, the ConDems proposals will make British public higher education the most expensive in the world, so no real need to worry about too many plebs littering universities is there ?

 

[Buzzer]

What actually is an anarchist? i mean, anarchy is a form of conforming in essence so becomes null in it's own definition

Not so much an oxymoron as completely wrong. Anarchy is not about conforming or not conforming. It's about rejecting an ever more totalitarian state imposed authority over your life and claiming back your own personal liberty. I'm guessing you have a view that anarchy taken from a 70s punk rock lyric. That pseudo-nihilist Johnny Rotten wouldn't know what anarchy is if it bit him on the bum.

Society is afraid of anarchy and (true) anarchists because society's rulers don't want people to think for themselves, to act for themselves and take responsibility for their own actions. God forbid that we know ourselves best and what is best for us individually and for how we interact with other people.

Anarchists are not scum and the scum that are doing all this damage are not anarchists.

 

[Simster]

Not so much an oxymoron as completely wrong. Anarchy is not about conforming or not conforming. It's about rejecting an ever more totalitarian state imposed authority over your life and claiming back your own personal liberty. I'm guessing you have a view that anarchy taken from a 70s punk rock lyric. That pseudo-nihilist Johnny Rotten wouldn't know what anarchy is if it bit him on the bum.

Society is afraid of anarchy and (true) anarchists because society's rulers don't want people to think for themselves, to act for themselves and take responsibility for their own actions. God forbid that we know ourselves best and what is best for us individually and for how we interact with other people.

Anarchists are not scum and the scum that are doing all this damage are not anarchists.

This is spot on, Buzzer. Most people don't actually seem to know what anarchism is.

 

[Lord Bracknell]

the poster does not know the meaning of anarchist for sure. read some krishnamurti.

When I was a student, I shared a house with another student who, when he graduated, got a job as ... Krishnamurti's gardener.

 

[Jimbo.GRFC]

University should be on a supply and demand basis with courses in areas where there is a national skill shortage given grants to encourage sign up. This way the public purse pays for the public benefit. If someone wants to study a niche subject for their own personal gain then I see no problem with them paying for it.

Possibly the most sensible post on this thread, no actually it is the most sensible

 

[clapham_gull]

My nephew is at York taking a history degree and has to attend for 6 hours a week - how does that work?

I'm not sure you understand how higher education works.

I've just passed a Masters in Computer Science (not some Mickey Mouse nonsense either) but had about 6 hours of lectures a week.

But that says nothing of the nights I was up until 2 or 3 (with my day job the next day) doing reading / assignments etc.. and the last five months (at home) I spent every spare moment finishing off a 22,000 word essay, software project and demonstration website.

Now I fully understand the problem with paying for all this (although I should point out that I paid for my Masters myself) but, the simple argument that too many people are doing degrees because er.. too many people are doing degrees is bollocks.

I clearly recall when I did my first degree (almost 20 years ago), that the major concern in this country was take too few people were continuing their education.

Now people are doing that - apparently that's a problem too.

Seems that most the people barking that argument are the ones who never did it. As much as I feel sorry for people who are finding themselves in a minority....

 

[clapham_gull]

University should be on a supply and demand basis with courses in areas where there is a national skill shortage given grants to encourage sign up. This way the public purse pays for the public benefit. If someone wants to study a niche subject for their own personal gain then I see no problem with them paying for it.

Possibly the most sensible post on this thread, no actually it is the most sensible

Well - that's an argument but there is another one.

There isn't much money to made studying the history of art or sociology - but if you want market forces to dictate that those things should never be studied - we would be a much thicker nation for it.

After school (very much under the Tories) I found myself in situations where I discovered I knew f*ck all about history and have tried to make up for it ever since. Purely because the history taught was bollocks. The thought that history is now considered a "luxury" degree frightens the f*ck out of me and so it should you. Exactly the same with something like philosophy or even film studies.

If there is a business demand for particular degrees than it should be the concern of business to subsidise it. If there is a shortage in Engineers than the engineering industry should be doing something about it.

You both appear to be of a far left persuasion and believe it is the purely the responsibility of the state.

Personally (through very personal experience) the "production line" of GCSEs > A Levels > Degree needs to broken away from. We should make it much easier in this country to allow people to work and educate themselves.

University doesn't really prepare yourself for work unless you are doing something very vocational like Law. However, work prepares you very nicely for education. In response to Granny Weatherwax above, I found it much easier when I was older too. Nothing to do with my brain being bigger - but the routine of work (getting up early, working late, meeting deadlines etc..) is a useful bedrock on which to educate yourself.

It's easy to criticise younger students who haven't had a daily routine drummed into them after many years.

 

[Turkey]

Care to list these allusive skills ? Only it's often an argument put forward for going to Uni but I've never seen them actually named. I would suggest most would be equally obtainable in work. I learnt more useful things working while at Polytechnic than I ever did studying.

I feel like all I'm going to do is provide a list of things that will get picked apart by people who like to argue, and kinda regret posting in this thread now! I tend to avoid the political threads normally! Certainly research and the presentation of that research within an essay. There were a lot of organisational skills and pressure skills when having to do something there and then. For example, I produced an hour long live TV show, which involved all of the prepartion work, the contacts, dealing with people who are useless and don't do what they're supposed to do, making sure everything runs to schedule in both prep and then during the show itself. I also learn't a number of IT skills that have come in useful (mail merges, use of excel/access etc). It may well be possible to learn such skills in other ways but I certainly felt I encounter situations now where I can deal with something straight away with confidence that I'd have struggled with if I hadn't previously had those experiences. I wouldn't have got into my job without a degree to begin with, and I often have situation where old hands here ask me to do something and when they check up on me are quite suprised by the approach I've taken which works so much more efficiently than the way they had done it previously. There's no doubt in my mind that University helped me massivly in this respect.

 

[clapham_gull]

I feel like all I'm going to do is provide a list of things that will get picked apart by people who like to argue, and kinda regret posting in this thread now! I tend to avoid the political threads normally! Certainly research and the presentation of that research within an essay. There were a lot of organisational skills and pressure skills when having to do something there and then. For example, I produced an hour long live TV show, which involved all of the prepartion work, the contacts, dealing with people who are useless and don't do what they're supposed to do, making sure everything runs to schedule in both prep and then during the show itself. I also learn't a number of IT skills that have come in useful (mail merges, use of excel/access etc). It may well be possible to learn such skills in other ways but I certainly felt I encounter situations now where I can deal with something straight away with confidence that I'd have struggled with if I hadn't previously had those experiences. I wouldn't have got into my job without a degree to begin with, and I often have situation where old hands here ask me to do something and when they check up on me are quite suprised by the approach I've taken which works so much more efficiently than the way they had done it previously. There's no doubt in my mind that University helped me massivly in this respect.

If you can take the opportunity to train yourself again after you have worked for a few years. You will wonder what the fuss what about last time you did it !

 

[Turkey]

i very much agree with this, but did you need to do a full 3 year Honours program to gain that extra skill and development? could you have acheived the benefits in 2 years? or even one? i certainly gained lot from my degree from Southbank (currently ranked worst), but i reckon the usful stuff could have been put into 2 year, maybe less. there was alot of padding and the dissertation is really just for kudos and of little practical worth (prepares acedemics for further studies and acedemic papers, not businessman and engineers for tangiable projects).

a better system, with different tiers for abilities and objectives, could be cheaper and therefore fully funded. like it used to be.

For me personally, I certainly needed the 3 years. I learnt new things from many of the assignments and also improved my delivery as each assignment passed. Cramming it all into one or two years would have been too much. I think that's probably very much down to the individual person and the individual course though.

 

[Turkey]

If you can take the opportunity to train yourself again after you have worked for a few years. You will wonder what the fuss what about last time you did it !

Maybe one day! I do agree with your post about work preparing you for education as my Mum took a degree at around the age of 40 and did really well.