SOCIAL REFORM

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SOCIAL REFORM

Postby cactuspete » Sun Sep 13, 2020 4:11 pm

Privately I've been involved in a few discussions with other members of this board and some of what we've talked about could fit here. Feel free to join in!

IDEA ONE: Citizenship should not be automatically conferred on all residents. It must be earned. Further, there should be three tiers of citizenship:
1) TIER ONE - Entitles the individual to one vote in local, statewide, and national elections. To earn this right one must either successfully complete four years of military service, four years of service in the CCC, or earn a bachelor's degree at an accredited university within the USA.
2) TIER TWO - To advance to the second tier an individual must complete a master's degree at an accredited university within the USA or successfully pay taxes for ten years. Only those who earn Tier One status can advance to Tier Two. (Entitles the individual to two votes.)
3) TIER THREE - To advance to the third tier an individual must complete a doctorate or successfully pay taxes for an additional ten years. Only those who earn Tier Two status can advance to Tier Three. (Entitles the individual to three votes.)

For this to work the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) would need to be reactivated. Also it should be noted that citizenship could not be earned until on or after an individual's twenty-second birthday. There are lots of details we've discussed, but I'll just add one more. In order for the university degrees to have any value, major reform of the university system would be necessary. There could be no frivolous courses of study or any courses focused on advocacy for a cause or any other garbage courses. Reforming the universities would be a lot of work, but it's an important part of social reform. On top of that our legal system would need a major overhaul for an meaningful change to be achieved.
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Re: SOCIAL REFORM

Postby CrustyOldFart » Tue Sep 15, 2020 8:02 pm

The CCC or Civilian Conservation Corps operated for a decade back before WWII. I know they did a lot of good work as far as building roads and trails and fixing up parks and that sort of thing. Are you suggesting that our country should bring it back? And then as far as your citizenship idea goes, I could see half of the country not qualifying. I also see how it could result in voters who aren't stupid. As for your idea about reforming our educational system, I think everyone is for that!
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Re: SOCIAL REFORM

Postby MojaveMike » Wed Sep 16, 2020 6:58 am

One of the observations made during discussions was that keeping young people occupied with either military, CCC, or college until they're twenty-two ensures that they'll reach a reasonable level of responsibility before they can vote. Face it, a high school diploma is a joke more now than ever. Public schools have dumbed things down so far that kids graduating from high school nowadays know next to nothing. Also by requiring that citizenship be earned, that means that those without citizenship have fewer legal rights which means they can't cause as many problems for those of us responsible enough to have earned citizenship. The current state of affairs would have been avoided had a system like this been in place beginning decades ago!
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Re: SOCIAL REFORM

Postby sierra_jim » Thu Sep 17, 2020 6:28 am

I really like the idea of bringing back the CCC. If citizenship cannot be earned until the age of twenty-two, what is the legal status of non-citizens?
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Re: SOCIAL REFORM

Postby cactuspete » Thu Sep 17, 2020 7:08 am

There are three main categories of non-citizens:
1) Residents - People born in the USA or who legally migrate to the USA.
2) Temporary Residents - Those who have arranged to work in the USA for a short time.
3) Visitors - Those vacationing in the USA.
Residents have fewer rights than citizens. For instance, they can be held without bail for an indefinite amount of time.
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Re: SOCIAL REFORM

Postby BoraxBill » Thu Sep 17, 2020 3:57 pm

cactuspete: This might not be a popular idea, but it's actually brilliant. One of the biggest problems in our country is that too many people get things without earning them. Having all the privileges of citizenship just because you're born in a country is complete BS. It's also true that no one should have those privileges just because one or both of their parents are citizens. For that matter, being adopted by a citizen and marrying a citizen should not confer the rights to citizenship. The idea that citizenship must be earned is an important foundational idea which the founding fathers did not consider. However, it made no sense from their perspective at the time in history. Now it makes complete sense and I also like the idea of tiers of citizenship. Brilliant!
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Re: SOCIAL REFORM

Postby cactuspete » Fri Sep 18, 2020 7:07 am

Moving on.... There were five big ideas that we discussed. Some we discussed more thoroughly than others.

IDEA TWO: Educational Reform. The entire system needs to be reformed, but most urgently in need of reform would be colleges and universities. Our institutions of higher learning have strayed away from academic rigor and have become ideological hothouses advocating for social causes and special interest groups. Along the way success in these institutions has been based less on merit and more on advancing undeserving members of various ethnic groups. It's widely known that unprepared minority students are often admitted to universities while high scoring whites and Asians are turned away. That not only undermines the credibility of our colleges and universities, it's also blatantly discriminatory, unfair, and unethical.

While the hard sciences have been less affected by these issues, even when it comes to hard sciences we see a lowering of the bar. To add insult to injury, even students majoring in science or engineering are required to take ideological indoctrination classes where they are forced to listen to mindless dribble about microaggressions, fake racism, or make-believe genders. All of this ideological nonsense must be expunged from colleges and universities in order for them to regain credibility.

Dumbing down the curriculum is a huge issue and standards need to be raised. Students should be allowed to fail and very little energy should be wasted propping up unsuccessful students. They should be channeled in other directions with alternative educational pathways. There was a lot more to this idea, but this will give the reader an idea of the gist of what we mean by Educational Reform.
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Re: SOCIAL REFORM

Postby MojaveMike » Sat Sep 19, 2020 6:46 am

As I said up above, a high school diploma is a joke now more than ever and that's for a number of reasons, but primarily the dumbing down of what is taught is the problem. Allowing students to graduate from high school without a reasonable understanding of algebra, geometry, and trig is ridiculous. Add onto that lack of knowledge in history, science, and geography, as well as poor reading skills and very poor critical thinking, problem solving, and logic skills and the result is that most high school graduates simply put in their time and barely learned a thing. The solution is to raise standards and stop pushing dumbed down classes in things like consumer skills, "life" skills, and other sorry excuses for classes which are anything but challenging. Kids who can't succeed in normal high school classes should be put into an entirely different program and when they complete that program they should not be given a high school diploma. Instead they get some kind of certificate of completion of whatever you want to call the program.

Also we need what I would call an ideology free system that focuses on science, logic, and academic skills and does not push an ideological system of thought. I don't even like the term human values since that term gets twisted to mean all sorts of things. The core social (or universal) values to be taught are individual responsibility, efficiency, intellectual integrity, being considerate, nonviolence, respect for the property of others, and justice based on merit. No one should be made to feel that they need to make up for the deficiencies of irresponsible people or that it's okay for irresponsible people to break the law or that it's okay to create artificial and arbitrary expectations which others must adhere to.

The single biggest problem at the university level is the practice of including unqualified individuals simply because of their racial background. The second biggest problem is substituting advocacy of causes for academics. People of all racial backgrounds do not need to be represented anywhere. Those who are most qualified should be admitted and allowed to succeed or fail. A merit-based system is the fairest and most just system and all the sorry excuses in the world don't change that core value.
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Re: SOCIAL REFORM

Postby wildrose » Sat Sep 19, 2020 7:06 pm

There are two major problems with our educational system:
1) Ideological Indoctrination - Liberal politics is worked into most curricular materials. We need to emphasize productive values like the ones MojaveMike listed: "individual responsibility, efficiency, intellectual integrity, being considerate, nonviolence, respect for the property of others, and justice based on merit." Liberal values are almost the opposite: irresponsibility, unnecessary red tape, dumbing down content, rudeness and belligerence, calling a riot a peaceful protest, no respect for private property, and a justice system based on taking from the productive and giving to deadbeats. It's counter-productive to push liberal values!
2) Unreasonable Expectations - A student with a 90 IQ cannot do the same work as a student with a 110 IQ. College is for people with above average IQs. I can't even begin to count the number of people I know with college degrees who have below average IQs. In order for those people to have gotten through college the curriculum had to be dumbed down, thereby reducing the value of a college degree for all those who legitimately made it through college based on their own merit. In other words, college is not for everyone. There are other routes to a successful career and public education should not pretend that everyone has the potential of being a successful college student.
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Re: SOCIAL REFORM

Postby MojaveMike » Sun Sep 20, 2020 11:28 am

A comprehensive and rigorous test should be required before a high school diploma is given. It's a basic quality control measure. Don't give things to those who do not deserve them. That's what is required to become a merit-based society. This test could also be used to determine whether or not the individual qualifies for college or the military.
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