Education vs Health Care
So, one of my proteges has a sort of conservative/Republican values set. I debate with her on time to times on things. Well, debate isn't always the word, because usually just regurgitates what Fox "News" pipes into her brain, and then I apply my grandpa's version of the Socratic method to it and interject some of my own commentary.
Anyway, one of our recent exchanges led me think along these lines, which are interesting to me:
Liberal: Alright, maybe we can reveal something by trading places. I'll take an opposite approach and you can tell me what's wrong with it. IE, you can be me for a while.
Conservative: Fine.
Liberal: Ok, starting. What's with all this "federally funded, compulsory elementary and high school education" we've got going on?! Why do I have to pay my precious, precious tax dollars for that?
Conservative: Insensitive scum! We must of course think of the children!
Liberal: But _I'm_ a single male. I don't have any children. Why should I have to pay for other people's welfare? Isn't that...SOCIALISM?! ::minor piano chords::
Conservative: Education is a god-given right for all of Jesus' precious little bundles of joy.
Liberal: Supposing I believe in separation of church and state or don't believe in any deities, can you give me a non-religious reason?
Conservative: Hmm... Well, an educated society is practical for all its members, not just the ones who have children of their own. You would suffer in a myriad of ways if every single cashier in every store could barely add up your bill, nobody could read or write. Education is at the core of any economy above the barest subsistance farming economies.
Liberal: Perhaps, but why do we have to go giving even more power to corrupt, inept Big Government Beuracracies. We could just let the Free Market handle education. Send the kids back to the coal mines to EARN their educations! They'll learn valuable, real-world lessons about Geology...and Economics!
Conservative: They can go to the coal mines once they turn 18, if they can't make an honest living for themselves. But everyone deserves a chance to become something more, and education is one of the best ways to make the American Dream come true. We can't trust McDonald's or Microsoft to educate our children- it has to be a neutral party. We can't outsource American education to India!
Liberal: You're also forgetting the parts about how education is at the cornerstone of rational, informed choices necessary for citizens to participate in fair elections, mathematics and scientific literacy are at the core of technological advances, and literacy is at the core of a free press.
Conservative: Eh, free press is overrated, Fox tells us what we need to know. But you're right- America wouldn't be the best country in the whole wide world if we weren't the best at everything thanks to education.
Liberal: Uh...well... about that... I don't think we're even top 10 anymore in math or science right now but I agree with the sentiment of what you just said. But my question is this: if we both accept that education is a fundamental fabric of our society, critical to civic participation and economic excellence to the point where it transcends just the responsibilities of parents paying for only their own children- then how is health care really any different? What point is there in educating a person's mind, just to let their body wither from pnemonia or influence or measels or polio? Given that disease can spread and kill, don't we have just as much collective social interest in universal health care? Why educate 40 million people in our public schools and grant-funded universities just to let them go uninsured and risk losing our investment to injuries or disease that are relatively easy to treat?
Conservative: Because that's SOCIALISM!!! ::dun dun dunnnnnn piano chords::
Anyway, when I started thinking of the one against the other, the parallels really became obvious. We accept compulsory public education- almost every country in the world does, for those who can even remotely afford it. We see forcing children into a life of coal mining as countrary to everything we stand for. But we don't seem to care about creating a lower caste of near indentured servants in thrall to crushing health care debts. And the thing about health care is, a lot of the expensive endgames are preventable upstream by routine preventative maintenance. We don't have the moral hardness to turn away, or goodness forbid, euthanize incredibly expensive Emergency Room visits, but we think nothing of poo-pooing preventative shots, vitamins and checkups that could prevent many of those ER visits as being immorrally soft- or even more foolishly, too expensive.
I hope some common sense can win the day in this health care debate and at the very least mandate universal health care for the same children we mandate universal education for.
Anyway, one of our recent exchanges led me think along these lines, which are interesting to me:
Liberal: Alright, maybe we can reveal something by trading places. I'll take an opposite approach and you can tell me what's wrong with it. IE, you can be me for a while.
Conservative: Fine.
Liberal: Ok, starting. What's with all this "federally funded, compulsory elementary and high school education" we've got going on?! Why do I have to pay my precious, precious tax dollars for that?
Conservative: Insensitive scum! We must of course think of the children!
Liberal: But _I'm_ a single male. I don't have any children. Why should I have to pay for other people's welfare? Isn't that...SOCIALISM?! ::minor piano chords::
Conservative: Education is a god-given right for all of Jesus' precious little bundles of joy.
Liberal: Supposing I believe in separation of church and state or don't believe in any deities, can you give me a non-religious reason?
Conservative: Hmm... Well, an educated society is practical for all its members, not just the ones who have children of their own. You would suffer in a myriad of ways if every single cashier in every store could barely add up your bill, nobody could read or write. Education is at the core of any economy above the barest subsistance farming economies.
Liberal: Perhaps, but why do we have to go giving even more power to corrupt, inept Big Government Beuracracies. We could just let the Free Market handle education. Send the kids back to the coal mines to EARN their educations! They'll learn valuable, real-world lessons about Geology...and Economics!
Conservative: They can go to the coal mines once they turn 18, if they can't make an honest living for themselves. But everyone deserves a chance to become something more, and education is one of the best ways to make the American Dream come true. We can't trust McDonald's or Microsoft to educate our children- it has to be a neutral party. We can't outsource American education to India!
Liberal: You're also forgetting the parts about how education is at the cornerstone of rational, informed choices necessary for citizens to participate in fair elections, mathematics and scientific literacy are at the core of technological advances, and literacy is at the core of a free press.
Conservative: Eh, free press is overrated, Fox tells us what we need to know. But you're right- America wouldn't be the best country in the whole wide world if we weren't the best at everything thanks to education.
Liberal: Uh...well... about that... I don't think we're even top 10 anymore in math or science right now but I agree with the sentiment of what you just said. But my question is this: if we both accept that education is a fundamental fabric of our society, critical to civic participation and economic excellence to the point where it transcends just the responsibilities of parents paying for only their own children- then how is health care really any different? What point is there in educating a person's mind, just to let their body wither from pnemonia or influence or measels or polio? Given that disease can spread and kill, don't we have just as much collective social interest in universal health care? Why educate 40 million people in our public schools and grant-funded universities just to let them go uninsured and risk losing our investment to injuries or disease that are relatively easy to treat?
Conservative: Because that's SOCIALISM!!! ::dun dun dunnnnnn piano chords::
Anyway, when I started thinking of the one against the other, the parallels really became obvious. We accept compulsory public education- almost every country in the world does, for those who can even remotely afford it. We see forcing children into a life of coal mining as countrary to everything we stand for. But we don't seem to care about creating a lower caste of near indentured servants in thrall to crushing health care debts. And the thing about health care is, a lot of the expensive endgames are preventable upstream by routine preventative maintenance. We don't have the moral hardness to turn away, or goodness forbid, euthanize incredibly expensive Emergency Room visits, but we think nothing of poo-pooing preventative shots, vitamins and checkups that could prevent many of those ER visits as being immorrally soft- or even more foolishly, too expensive.
I hope some common sense can win the day in this health care debate and at the very least mandate universal health care for the same children we mandate universal education for.