Brickbat: Leave Them Kids Alone

The United Kingdom's Labour Party has committed itself to abolishing private schools if it wins the next election. A measure approved at the party's latest annual conference says "the ongoing existence of private schools is incompatible with Labour's pledge to promote social justice." The measure promised to confiscate private schools' property, land and other assets and redistribute them "democratically and fairly across the country's educational institutions."

Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

The measure promised to confiscate private schools' property, land and other assets and redistribute them "democratically and fairly across the country's educational institutions."

Hopefully without lining anyone up against a wall.

[AlmightyJB]

As long as no one has any different ideas, they should be ok. Double Plus Good think only.

[Cyto]

Good snark... that's some quality Orwellian thinking right there!

Steal their property and distribute it fairly and democratically. Sheesh! And right there in the party platform?!?

What the hell happened to the west? At least over here in the USA we have distance. But in Europe? Their experience with communism is much closer and more palpable. You'd think they'd have had a belly full of that form of evil.

[$park¥ is the Worst]

They want socialism, they just didn’t want to be forced to take socialism with somebody else in charge.

[Brandybuck]

England used to be bona fide Socialist. In the full Marxist sense. They just about imploded into an economic blackhole before the ruling Labour Party allowed for some concessions. Even then it was an economic basket case. Which gave just enough wiggle room for the Thatcher revolution when they nominally got some capitalism back into the system.

Watch British news from the 60s and 70s and the top story was always about nationalisation or similar. It's why Rolls Royce and Jaguar were state owned companies. It's why city councils have extraordinary powers. It's why today they can outright ban knives and no one even blinks.

The only reason it never went full bore is because England is still classist to its core, with the aristocracy still owning most of the land and the House of Lords having a big veto over land confiscation.

[Inigo Montoya]

Sounds like the contest for Upper Class Twit of the Year has been replaced by Lower Class Twit of the Year, and lots of party candidates are in a tight race for the title.

[Ben of Houston]

It's odd that a major political platform is literally taking its policy positions from Voldemort.

[MatthewSlyfield]

Why do you think that's odd?

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Wat does Voldemort have to do with private schools or socialism?

[Mickey Rat]

In the end, the Labour Party are just common thieves.

[geo1113]

Social justice is not justice.

[Longtobefree]

Not particularly social, either - - - - - -

[Longtobefree]

Too lazy to check out the initial source; are they sure it is the British Labor party, and not the USA Democrats?

[Zeb]

Yes, American democrats are not, in fact, the source of all evil in the world. The UK labor party is doing just fine on its own as far as being insane goes.

[Brandybuck]

Last I checked, US Democrats only want to severely curtain private schools. They don't want to get rid of them otherwise the children of Democrat politicians would have to go to public school. So they have to give concessions to Sudbury and the like.

And they've never actually advocated the confiscation of private school properties. They can't do that with our Constitution. And they certainly can't do it at the Federal level.

[CDRSchafer]

Public school teachers and honchos like sending their precious offspring to public schools too.

[Jerry B.]

Can we ship Bill de Blasio over there? Sounds like he'd fit right in with the Labour Party. And maybe we could tempt all the other Progressives who love "Social Justice" to go with him.

[Conchfritters]

In a clear hint that taxes may have to rise, the shadow minister said the measure would only be beneficial if the government could rake in some of the money better-off people would have spent on educating their children.

Of course - these fuckers love raising taxes as much as they love shitty public schools. Actually, the two go hand in hand.

[Cyto]

That's a great pickup....

Look, we've confiscated your private school. We're conscripting all of the teachers into public service at public schools. And we are going to be taking your private tuition anyway.....because we can.

[Brandybuck]

Since private schools are CHEAPER to run than public schools, it seems that the Labour Party can't even do math.

[Robert]

No, I read it as their being perfectly able to do the math. They're counting on both the tax money those people are already paying and at least a cut of their tuition money too, to spend on other things. They just figure on cramming those extra students into the existing classrooms; if they could figure a way to deprive specifically those children of any schooling, they would. That is, kick them out of the private school, keep taking the money they would've paid in tuition, and just let them forage or whatever.

[Rich]

"the ongoing existence of private schools is incompatible with Labour's pledge to promote social justice."

"whatever TF *that* is."

[Jerryskids]

Social justice is the sort of justice meted out by socialists. Namely, Stalin. Bernie Sanders would be hounded out of the Labour Party as a right-wing reactionary, but they're described as "center-left" in the UK. I shudder to think what a left-wing extremist looks like over there.

[Quo Usque Tandem]

“whatever TF *that* is.”

It evolves, and is relevant to the time and issues of the day.

Much like "living constitutionalists"

[Dan S.]

In the old Britain, private schools were confusingly called "public schools", to distinguish them from private tutors. What they called actual public schools, I don't know.

[Inigo Montoya]

I believe they were called local schools. The idea being that the state-run school in your area would serve the kids living there, as opposed to a public school such as Eton or Rugby, which would take in boarding students from across the land. FWIW, I’m pretty sure those public schools have a history of giving out scholarships to a small number of academically gifted kids whose families would never be able to afford sending them there otherwise. Still, there is no question that those public schools serve the children of the rich elite and are feeder schools for top universities, much the same as schools like Philips, Andover, or Choate do in the US.

[Quo Usque Tandem]

Thanks, I've always wondered the same a Dan but was too otherwise occupied [aka "lazy"] to look it up myself.

[Brandybuck]

Q: "Are you a homosexual?"
A: "No, but I did attend Eton"

[Quo Usque Tandem]

England has a clear precedent for doing this.

See confiscation of monasteries and all property of the Roman Catholic Church under Henry VIII.

[Mickey Rat]

They also had a tradition of executing people who objected in horrific ways.

It was also a light cover for solving Henry's debt problem due to his prolific spending on his cronies and wars.

[Brandybuck]

England has weird politics. Their Liberal Party is conservative. And the Labour Party isn't just about labour unions. It's about a fully socialist party, from the old school labour movement. Remember, England used to be Socialist, in the socialist meaning of the term (collective ownership of the means of production).

[Quo Usque Tandem]

Until they ran out of other peoples money; but that won't stop them from incessantly trying until everyone is poor and doesn't even have a knife to whittle with.

[CDRSchafer]

Over Barack Obama's dead body will Sidwell Friends become public.

[Agammamon]

Public schools, Oliver. They call them public schools over there.

[TangoDelta]

"democratically and fairly"

So have the wolves already voted on what they're going to do with the lamb's property?

[Agammamon]

What are you talking about Comrade? All that is belongs to the glorious People's Farm. They merely voted on how to redirect the usage of the People's property.

[John]

How possible? well Social justice is not justice.Latest Song and Video Songs

[Halykan]

How possible, indeed, noble spambot. What would we do without your hard hitting insights?

[rothayato]

I believe they were called local schools. The idea being that the state-run school in your area would serve the kids living there, as opposed to a public school such as Eton or Rugby, which would take in boarding students from across the land - https://rottenhayato.com . FWIW, I’m pretty sure those public schools have a history of giving out scholarships to a small number of academically gifted kids whose families would never be able to afford sending them there otherwise.