Last edited by Oldfruit1 (2013-11-01 17:07:04)

Last edited by 4F Hepcat (2013-11-02 01:01:05)

I think, Hep, that it is worse than that - the universities have become, as you say, diploma factories but the main purpose of the institutions (as with any factory) has become just to make money to keep a going concern and jobs and pensions for the people who work there. And, as you say, they aren't even churning out people with qualifications that actually enable them to be of use or ornament. On top of that, the age of learning for its own sake became a dirty social and political concept under Thatcher and will remain a dirty social and political concept, in an age in which no one wants to join Luverley White and Klean - because everyone wants the dosh offered by Small, Brown & Smellie. Even the professions have gone the way of cash-trade under a corrosive, transatlantic influence.

well the benefits families which you mention I would describe as the underclass, below the working class, sometimes referred to in the UK as 'chavs'. Vicky pollard type characters who the rest of society collectively roll their eyes to.

I have to agree hepcat. the modern chav is VERY different from the old working class. I sometimes end up sitting next to these people in the bus, I was coming home yesterday from a north London department store and as the bus goes door to door to my house thought Id make use of it rather than take a car and struggle with parking and so on. I sat behind a mum and son, the mother was in her early 20s and they were both 'playing' like badly behaved juveniles in their seats laughing hysterically at other passengers and so on. something very very wrong with what's going on, I cant think what can be done about it to be honest.

Owen Jones seems like a clever young fellow, I stress the young bit as he seems quite immature. He is taken rather too seriously by the BBC and Telegraph who let him voice his opinions which are very much taken straight out of a university debating society, although after our above conversation at least he is interested in the world around him and didn't sign up to McKinsey or GS straight after college, hearts in the right place and has convictions and wants to make a difference. He is totally wrong as you say on the chav class, he sees things through the lens of class warfare when this issue isn't about that at all, in fact the old working classes won that war a long time ago as modern Britain caters to either them through huge state programs, or else to the super rich who get to pay no tax and enjoy great shopping all at the same time (the middle got in right between the eyes and still haven't quite worked out what the hell happened, but have been placated partially by running up their property prices in a perpetual bubble). his views are moulded by his rather short time spent on the planet (well I would say this being a wizened old fruit), coming from a working class background and making it to oxford followed by a stint working for monkey nuts as a researcher in parliament. what he also doesn't realise is oxford doesn't stand for anything anymore, as I said a prestige sausage factory for kids who can get As, MPs are a talking shop with no power in Britain to do anything at all, they are merely there to give the illusion that the public have any access to government and are usually bone idle former lawyers who are interested in feathering their own nests. I feel for OJ, as when he finally wakes up and smells the coffee he will realise the beliefs he has based his life on so far were illusory.

fruity

Last edited by Oldfruit1 (2013-11-03 08:05:38)

Jobs were plentiful when I started out. Qualifications were not essential, there was work for all. Education was free and many got grants to study. Improvements in standards of living were taken for granted.

That is all gone now.

As George Carlin points out  the game is rigged.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acLW1vFO-2Q

Education is one of the last expanding industries. In due course it will feel the squeeze too.