Another feel-good program that will backfire
Gateway Pundit has a post on the compulsory community service that Obama is asking of middle, high school and college students. The change.gov website states:
My guess is this crap will work as well as the self-esteem movement did in the 70's and 80's which is to say, it will probably backfire. In fact, according to psychologist Martin Seligman in a book I am currently reading, The Optimistic Child: A Proven Program to Safeguard Children Against Depression and Build Lifelong Resilience,
kids are more depressed today than ever due to fake self-esteem programs. One reason, according to Seligman is that our society has changed from an achieving society to a feel-good one. I would say that forcing kids to act like do-gooders will be just as fake as instilling self-esteem and result in resentment and irritation later in life.
And seriously, who wants their help? Bird Dog at Maggie's Farm blog asks a good question, "are people really so helpless in America that they need pimply high-schoolers or condescending do-gooder college kids - who know nothing at all about life - to "help" them?"
Why not teach people how to help themselves and achieve their own goals instead of sending a group of youth forced by government mandate to assist them in feeling like victims? Or why not at least make it voluntary as some have suggested in the comments. If education and helping others to help themselves is done voluntarily, it might be a good thing. But why the government coercion?
Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year.
My guess is this crap will work as well as the self-esteem movement did in the 70's and 80's which is to say, it will probably backfire. In fact, according to psychologist Martin Seligman in a book I am currently reading, The Optimistic Child: A Proven Program to Safeguard Children Against Depression and Build Lifelong Resilience,
kids are more depressed today than ever due to fake self-esteem programs. One reason, according to Seligman is that our society has changed from an achieving society to a feel-good one. I would say that forcing kids to act like do-gooders will be just as fake as instilling self-esteem and result in resentment and irritation later in life. And seriously, who wants their help? Bird Dog at Maggie's Farm blog asks a good question, "are people really so helpless in America that they need pimply high-schoolers or condescending do-gooder college kids - who know nothing at all about life - to "help" them?"
Why not teach people how to help themselves and achieve their own goals instead of sending a group of youth forced by government mandate to assist them in feeling like victims? Or why not at least make it voluntary as some have suggested in the comments. If education and helping others to help themselves is done voluntarily, it might be a good thing. But why the government coercion?
Labels: national socialist programs, politics
posted by Helen at 12:51 PM
53 Comments:
My daughter is in middle school and is traveling this weekend with her church youth group to minister and help at shelters. Are you saying that these kinds of community service activities are a waste of time or even counter productive?
I'm all for training and encouraging self sufficiency and achievement but what about those that fall down on the way? How do we recover those that are capable and cope with those that aren't?
An attitude of "Let them wallow in the mud if they can't dig themselves out" is intellectual elitism of the worst kind. I hope that's not what's being advocated here.
13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states (my emphasis):
1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
I don't mind offering incentives to promote volunteerism, but requiring such activity appears to be unconstitutional and my children will not take part in any forced community service project, ever.
I would say that forcing kids to act like do-gooders will be just as fake as instilling self-esteem and result in resentment and irritation later in life.
Wow, did I wake up in the twilight zone? This sounds like something I'd hear from the hens at the local playground who don't want to discipline their kids.
You "force" your kids to act a specific way so that they'll grow up acting that way. It's called "parenting" and there's not enough of it going on these days. My kids weren't born saying "please" and "thank you" and they sure as heck didn't think sharing toys was a good idea but I "forced" them to do it anyway. I also "force" them to act like do-gooders because that's what we are in our family. Unrepentant "do-gooders". There are worse things to be.
Does anyone know *how* this is to be enforced? Do kids who refuse get thrown in jail (seems unlikely)? Refused a diploma (for private school kids, too)? What?
-Mark Roulo
Two additions.
1) Yes, I know adding incentives to volunteer means that the individual is no longer "volunteering", but the comment is more focused on the legal/constitutional issue than the volunteering part.
2) My children will take part in community service projects and mission trips as sponsored by our church or other organizations. However, those activities will be truly voluntary in nature rather than forced upon them by an overbearing and intrusive government.
Agreed, except please don't refer to the students required to serve as a "Marxist group of youth." It will be compulsory, meaning required, meaning we don't necessarily believe in it. That statement makes it sound like my age group is Marxist which, I hope, is not true.
HMT,
Your daughter is doing the service voluntarily. I do not think that forcing kids by government mandate is the way to get people to want to help others. My concern is that the public schools will make this into some phony feel-good program that the kids will not really be involved in because they did not choose to help. I am with dogwood above, offering incentives to promote volunteering is okay but force is not, and that is what is being advocated here.
Will,
Point taken.
Dogwood beat me to the punch.
Q: On what basis does any government have to *compel* community service?
A: There isn't any, and sly tricks such as making it a part of the curriculum or requirement for graduation is a usurpation power grab.
The *only* quasi compulsory service that has any
Constitutional basis is militia service, which reflects the duty to pick up a rifle and help defend your immediate community when its under attack.
Even *that* has various exceptions for objections of conscience.
(Sidebar: I note several things that we can thank our Courts for. The first is the illicit transmogrification of our Constitutional militia duty to some alleged duty to join the standing army, which is a distinctly different body with a different purpose. For this, we can thank Lincoln, Wilson and FDR, if I recall my history correctly. The other is the removal of one's individual judgment on the morality of a specific war from the right of conscientious objection, requiring instead objection to all war under all circumstances.)
Dogwood,
I agree. REQUIRING community service is not the way to go. Having it as an option through schools... Maybe but I think I'd rather it be encouraged through private community organizatiosn or school "clubs".
hmt,
Big difference in how "I" force my kids to act and how the government forces my kids to act. The "twilight zone" will be when the kids are out doing "mandatory volunteering" because the Feds want them to.
Anyone else find it terribly ironic that the first black president of the United States is advocating legislation that would violate the Constitutional ban on slavery?
Too funny.
To anyone thinking this forced volunteering is a good thing, answer me two questions.
How is making volunteering a part of a required curriculum actually volunteering?
What makes your (the school boards) idea of what constitutes community service better than mine? And you know damned good and well that's what will happen.
Colleges already do this and, when completing my degree in the recent past, I told the enrollment person (politely) to piss that one off. I've done more community service in my life than most of their personnel put together and getting a bio degree don't require it. I won the argument.
On the plus side of the concept, the conservative section of society will simply exchange that servitude for their currently (actually) volunteer service and certainly get to listen to the liberal set whine great bouts of lamentation about all the new work they're being required to do.
dogwood -- Never thought of it that way. Thank you very much for the talking point.
TallTim,
Agree. My initial read took the comment as an attack against "do-good" service in general; which I, obviously, found confusing. Mandatory service would indeed be counter-productive. I seem to remember another ill conceived idea about mandatory military service in the not to distant past.
Effectively putting a gun to person's head, which is what happens when "the law" gets involved, and forcing that person to behave altruisticly to a third party only teaches that unfortunate creature just how subservient and helpless he/she is the face of overwhelming and coercive force.
Furthermore, the recipient of this altruistic behavior will probably want the situation to continue and will reciprocate in some way, not to the person actually help him/her, but rather to the government which forced the altruistic behavior. But it's OK because it's all in the interest of "improving" the slave's character.
And on a related note, one particularly cynical economist (Am I being redundant?) said that taxation was the process of putting a gun to taxpayers' heads and extorting money from them, then giving that money to the politicians' clients, to buy their votes. Same idea, just using money instead of slave labor.
(Don't mind me. I'm just having a bad week.)
HMT,
After re-reading my post, I admit that it could be confusing and look like I was attacking community service. I certainly am not. It is the government coercion I have a problem with. I also acknowledge that teens and others can make a difference in people's lives and do have something to offer --just not by force, because they have chosen to do so. I am also not comfortable with government schools dishing this out. It seems to me that this would be an indoctrination program into left-leaning modes of thought. Public schools often cannot help themselves in this way. It is better for churches, private organizations or even after-school volunteer clubs to try and recruit kids.
The government has no business, as shown by dogwood, of forcing anyone to perform community service, take a particular job or such. This is another step in the totalitarian goal of the left.
That being said, through school, church, Scouts, supporting sports programs and just generally helping out friends and neighbors, my kids and I do plenty of "community service." We don't need a bunch of liberal fascists telling us what counts and what doesn't. Because, the only things that will count are those that further their totalitarian goals.
Please go to the Change.Gov website and read it. Too much!
Under America Serves it says, "When you choose to serve....." then later in the text it says, "by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service ..."
Choose to be Required to serve, I guess.
Is this the change I was waiting for?
Where is my copy of Orwell's 1984?
There is a huge difference between volunteering and being compelled by government fiat. Nobody likes to be 'voluntold'.
How will the federal government require this? What volunteer service will count? Who would judge what volunteer service is worthy to count for these required hours?
How would the federal government compel private schools or home schoolers to participate?
This is really just a new tax. On children's time instead of on parent's wallets.
Mary,
I'm guessing the feds will require local public schools to require community service of their students in order to receive federal educational funds.
I fully understand that the feds can and do attach strings to federal funding, but they can't use that funding to require others to violate the Constitution.
I for one will be looking for a public interest law firm to do some pro bono work if "required volunteerism" becomes law.
Mandatory volunteerism.... nice contradiction.
Volunteer (definition): To perform or offer to perform a service of one's own free will.
Dogwood - I'm guessing the feds will require local public schools to require community service of their students in order to receive federal educational funds.
So what will the schools do to enforce this? Withold diplomas? Will parents have an opt-out? If my child prefers to have a paying job to volunteering, what then?
If they wish to make this a class during the scheduled schoolday...what else gets cut? Considering the number of kids that graduate that can't read, I'd much prefer the schools work harder at the 3 R's.
I agree with the above posters who see this as an indoctrination tool into liberalism/socialism. This shouldn't be allowed to happen as a government mandate.
When I worked as an aide to the city council of a small Southern city, the council members several times volunteered have student interns work in our office. That translated into my being told to find them something to do and supervise them. I had everything from a 14 year old high school student with no real skills to a masters level business student with no real skills. My job was staffing committees, writing analyses, writing and designing newsletters... I had nothing for them to do. It was a waste of their time. I tried to find interesting and useful projects, and sent them around to get to know various parts of govt. But it would be a huge huge project to manage a massive influx of untrained teenagers going into the community, even bigger if you wanted a) them to learn something useful and b) actual valuable tasks completed.
I don't think it's a good idea philosophically. I know it will be a horrible mess in action. However, Michelle Obama worked with an arm of AmeriCorps for a while, and apparently intends to make youth service in the community her cause while in the White House. Maybe hubby is giving her a leg up on the task.
My homeschooled kids find plenty of opportunities to participate in community service activities without being compelled to by the government.
Of course we are not on the radar now, but I expect it won't be long before "they" find a way to weave that into homeschooling requirements either via the states or passing a federal homeschool law.
What I wonder is - will people be able to choose their own way to serve or will the Minster of Community Service decide what's best for us? I wonder how long it will be before service related to a church does not "count."
I have a friend that trained volunteers for a living, and she was dead-set against forcing people of any age to serve the community without compensation and against their will. She said that community service was a sentence imposed by the court for minor infractions, and while she believed in volunteering, she thought that it was something that should in fact be voluntary.
Voluntary service is a wonderful thing, but by making it compulsory you end up with a bunch of people that have to be there, not who want to be there. It was the problem with the draft in the 1960's and 1970's, and it's a problem today.
Marbel points out the other problem: lots of people of all ages serve their church communities and causes that would not be deemed "acceptable" by the Powers That Be. I fully expect that school kids will be so busy doing the compulsory activities mandated by the Volunteer Czar that they will have little time or desire to do things that they really want to do. That's slavery, which was abolished by the 13th Amendment. Not that the new regime cares about a minor detail like the Constitution...
This is why elections matter. Obama knows this would get struck down as a violation of the 13th amendment. So he will reconfigure the SCOTUS in the next 4-5 years and pass this in his 2nd term. Then it comes to the new left-wing radical SCOTUS in 2014 and they say "no 13A violations here, moving on"!!! You see how it works.
My son visits elderly people left along, mostly, and very lonely. He does this as part of his fraternity duties. Those he visits are very grateful and my son feels that he is doing something beyond just being out for himself. My daughter, when 13-15, went with me to a soup kitchen and helped out weekly. We felt good about it and those we helped appreciated our help.
Sounds to me a useful thing rather than training youngster to become hedge fund managers so early in life.
Fred,
I don't think anyone disputes that it's a nice thing to do, but no one should be forced by the government to do it. And frankly, I see nothing wrong with being a hedge fund manager, if that is what one wants to be. That is supposed to be the great thing about this country, we are supposed to be free to make choices about what we do--regardless of whether our fellow citizens think it's a good idea or not.
Sounds to me a useful thing rather than training youngster to become hedge fund managers so early in life.
Parents teaching children to serve others is a very useful thing. However, the government forcing children to do so is unconstitutional.
I'm willing to bet that my two children will spend more time over the next 12 years serving others than any 10 kids parented by liberals who think compulsory service is a good idea.
I fully support this line of action as a path toward a Republican landslide in 2012.
Obama did very well with the youth vote. Can you think of anything more compelling to college students than having someone way "You know that bulls*** work you're being forced to do? I'll make it so you don't have to do any more."
Similarly, this would either eat into actual education time (if we can remember what that is anymore) in middle and high schools or it would eat into after school activities or it would be a time suck for parents.
Can you imagine Ohio parents discovering that their child either quit the football team or work on that community service project until 8 at night twice a night for the rest of the semester?
We know what increases self esteem: Learning and earning. Learning new material, new ways of doing things, new skills, it all contributes.
So does earning things, money, rewards, good grades, etc. Being given things does nothing for self-esteem. A trophy for everyone has no meaning and is the kind of thing that Marti Seligman is talking about.
Want your kid to have better self esteem? Insist that they earn it.
Trey
Not to worry, folks, but I'm sure that your children can participate in the "Re-elect Barack Obama in 2016" election campaign.
And before someone "corrects" me, yes, I'm aware of the 22nd amendment. Are you aware of the whispering going on that maybe we should repeal said amendment?
I didn't graduate high school due to there being a mandatory "work education" requirement outside of school hours, where you either got credit for having a P/T job or you could work for free on one of many projects. I viewed it as slavery and rebelled. I got my GED just fine and have had a successful career with plenty of work, depsite my having "failed" the requirement.
Perhaps this is the solution to repairing the road infrastructure. Much like how the Nazi's built the Autobahn.
Let's not call this community service. Let's use it's real name: People's Revolutional Labor Battalions.
Er..."revolutionARY".
Did anyone even bother to GO to the website being cited. I followed the links that were posted at Gateway and it indeed lead me to the page that said that service would be required.
But then I actually went to the website www.change.gov, clinked on ameriserve, and what was on the ameriserve page WAS NOT what was seen on Gateway.
According to THIS page, service would NOT be required, but encouraged and that college students would be rewarded with a tax break for college tuition for their service.
I know nothing about computers, but the Gateway link smells like BS. A very well put together hoax/smear attempt. I can't believe people actually go ballistic over this crap without checking it out first.
Sci is right. I read the only paragraph on the site and it states:
"The Obama Administration will call on Americans to serve in order to meet the nation’s challenges. President-Elect Obama will expand national service programs like AmeriCorps and Peace Corps and will create a new Classroom Corps to help teachers in underserved schools, as well as a new Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, and Veterans Corps. Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by setting a goal that all middle school and high school students do 50 hours of community service a year and by developing a plan so that all college students who conduct 100 hours of community service receive a universal and fully refundable tax credit ensuring that the first $4,000 of their college education is completely free. Obama will encourage retiring Americans to serve by improving programs available for individuals over age 55, while at the same time promoting youth programs such as Youth Build and Head Start."
It don't see where mandatory community service is required. They are setting a goal for 50 hours of community service per year per student. A goal isn't a mandate.
Change.gov was... changed. Earlier today it said:
by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year.
Now it says it's a goal. It's also recently added the $ incentive.
Joanne Jacobs has the original text too.
"A very well put together hoax/smear attempt. I can't believe people actually go ballistic over this crap without checking it out first."
As you can see from the above posts, you are wrong sci. No hoax, no smear. And nobody went ballastic at all. I thought you guys were the ones who said dissent is patriotic.
Or are questions to much to ask?
Trey
The InstaHusband has the scoop.
The Google cache page with "required" is here.
@helen: "My guess is this crap will work as well as the self-esteem movement did in the 70's and 80's"
I thought the self-esteem movement was immensely successful at increasing narcissism and mediocrity.
Back on point, I think this is my biggest problem with the left. They always chide the right for preaching what the right believes to be good values, yet the left tries to legislate what they believe to be good values. Why can't they understand that 1. just because you think someone else's ideas are wrong doesn't mean you should stop them from saying it (fairness doctrine for example) and 2. just because you think your ideas are good (community service for example) doesn't mean you should force others to do it.
Trust wrote: "They always chide the right for preaching what the right believes to be good values, yet the left tries to legislate what they believe to be good values."
And you know, I share many of their values, I am just not a damn fool about how to achieve them!
Almost non of us on the right support bigotry, but we know that affirmative action has been a set up for minority folks who are put in jobs and programs they are not qualified for. Almost everyone in America wants peace, but we know that peace comes from strength, not fear of war. Poverty sucks, but government largess creates MORE of it. Home ownership is fantastic, but putting someone in a home they cannot afford created the economic mess we are in.
And when we point out the futility of their approach, we are called racists, war mongers, and insensitive rich people.
I agree with most of the liberal values, most of us do, but they are trying to implement them in ways that have never worked because they are not psychologically realistic or effective.
Trey
a) Is the 10th Amendment a cheap joke?
b) If there is desire to do this, why not implement it through existing organizations, e.g. Scouts and 4H, and at the state level?
c) [Godwin's Law violation goes here]
Trey - Good point. Affirmative action is bigotry. It is a program legalizing bias by race and gender. That is bigotry pure and simple.
The change at change.gov serves as a reminder of the frequent changes in Obama's campaign website. And, we're supposed to trust this guy? Is this what he means by "change?"
Yes Dadvocate, that is what he means by change. You are not to question his historic statements, but if you do, he will alter them to try to make you look like the bad guy and shift focus. Most politicians try, but this one is our focus at the moment. The man is not to be trusted. Take the case of his grandmother.
Dadvocate, I am sure that you agree with me that increasing minority college graduation rates would be good for America. But the liberals go about it all the wrong way!
The real work needs to be done at the cultural level. Increasing minority parental involvement in schools, reducing teen pregnancy rates, reducing single parent households, increasing the value of education in the culture, all these things would really help.
But they are hard work and involve personal and cultural responsibility, and that has somehow become anathema to the left.
So while I agree with most of Senator Obama's goals, his plans to accomplish them make me think he is a fool.
Trey
I'd agree, but I'd go a little farther than you might, Dr. Helen: government mandated, i.e., coerced, "volunteering" is evil.
Charity work should be completely voluntary; it should be done when and if you have the time and money, and when and if you have an issue or problem you want to do something about.
I think that to understand the call to mandatory community service, we have to put it in context of the modern culture and the ideas driving the call to service: generally, altruism.
Here is an excerpt (see http://tinyurl.com/68uw8f) from a good article on the ideas behind modern education:
“ 'Social justice,' in its broadest definition, is the extension of the principles of 'justice' into every aspect of human existence. Depending on its implementation, such an idea could possibly have merit. But in all of its various American implementations and offshoots in America today, it is nothing more than a justification for Marxist and radical-left designs.
When it is applied to American education, social justice pedagogy (the method of teaching social justice) has come to mean a way of thinking and teaching intended to undermine both authority and objective reasoning and bring about an underclass-inspired political upheaval. The movement’s philosophical foundations are derived from the writings of the Brazilian Marxist educator Paolo Freire. Its American version was influenced greatly by Columbia University education professor Maxine Greene. The pedagogy’s best known popularizer is William Ayers, Greene’s protégé and former member of the violent 1960s Weatherman radical group, who is now a University of Illinois professor and an associate of presidential candidate Barack Obama.
Like Ayers himself, social justice in education is no longer relegated to fringe status. A brief look at the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Education indicates that social justice pedagogy is, or might soon become, the dominant philosophy among the faculty. "
I earned my teaching credentials from the University of Houston in the 90's, so I know what the author above says is true. Plus I have a degree in philosophy, and have done some research on modern education.
Obama's campaign's push for mandatory service is more than a push to 'take care of people.' He wants to build a individual-killing, spirit-suffocating net just as the Marxist of Russia and China did.
BTW, to those who said some people should 'do their research' because Obama's site did not say community service would be required: Do your research.
From what I have seen and read, the wording on Obama's site was changed. Change, after all, is his mantra. And yes he can...
Thanks a lot!
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