Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 12:46 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Margaret Sanger couldn't have said it better.

Posted by southernbelle (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 9 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Since there isn't another forum to say this, I'm going to use this one. I have to say,Farrar Faucetts family is showing so much more class than Micheal Jacksons. I can really appreciate a private funeral for a public fiqure like Farrah. Her family and friends shared her with her public all of her adult life. Leave them alone with their grief. I don't think the death of these people should be made into a side show just because you(the family and associates) want to capitalize on a famous persons death. That is sooo tacky!

Posted by rushinghjr (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 9:24 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Sounds good Southern!

Posted by Yeahuhuh (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 9:56 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Grumble, grumble Enkik. I think this was a nice little editorial.

There is nothing wrong with recognizing that social pressures are a primary determiner of how parents will parent properly -- and how children will be socialized at least in part by their community.

Of course it can sound bad to free thinkers or those who are "different" in their communities -- giving the locals so much sway.

Being a white guy who is NOT a political conservative, I launched my child rearing confident that the socialization of public schooling was a plus factor that would work for my kids. I never really worried that my core values would be rejected by my children if they were totally straight about what I believed and why. And I was there to ensure that the academic hurdles were being met.

In fact, sending my children to a private school I felt would actually open them to a more distorted social order, so I avoided it and was rewarded by the choice. I did that to help my children and to help the public schools which have been grievously damaged by "white flight".

It is not about the color that is left at the public schools but about the mix of optimisms that one gets in a school environment in which entire segments of society are unrepresented.

Public schools here are arguably worse now than a few years ago when I sent my kids. I do think bad parenting is at fault in the following ways.

Ignorant people who don't understand the world and don't teach their kids -- that's one problem. The other problem are the droves of white parents that consider it unthinkable to reclaim -- and build -- the public schools for all children. I consider the first group mostly ignorant and the second group to be a bit more cowardly. But I know it can be a hard decision, and I know my choice is not for everyone or for every time.

If people are simply ignorant -- they are not apprised of the facts -- then it is only so reasonable to expect excellence from them. If they make their decisions for selfish and fearful reasons they should hold themselves more responsible.

At any rate the group mentioned in this article should be encouraged and applauded, not ridiculed.

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 12:26 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Yh, how am I ridiculing anyone? Margaret Sanger's name has been plastered on black public schools all over this country. She is one of the great black liberators, on a par with Abraham Lincoln.

I agree with you. A bunch of white people in Natchez can get together and decide what's best for black kids since their own parents can't or won't do it.

We live in an historical era.

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 12:47 p.m. (Suggest removal)

"The result is a generation of poorly raised children attempting to raise the next generation without knowing the best way."

Thank heavens, someone in Natchez has figured out the best way to raise children. Is it better to raise them as Christians, Jews, Muslims, or Atheists? Is it better to inculcate them with ideas of individual rights, or collective rights? Is it better to raise them according to the values most prized by Europeans, Africans, or Asians? What is the best way to raise children? Can you teach someone to love and nurture?

The last time this sort of sentiment went around it kicked off with better family contests, moved on to involuntary sterilization, then settled on abortion and earned income tax credits. Now that abortion and earned income tax credits have failed, it's time to start over with better families. At least this time when we get to the involuntary sterilization stage we will have the real science of the Human Genome Project to provide objective evidence for the sterilizations and won't have to rely on the subjective opinions of concerned wealthy matrons serving on welfare boards.

Parents for Better Public schools should start some contests and give prizes at the county fair to the local families who best exemplify the ideal public school family, rewards for most improved family, and so on and so forth.

Posted by happyreader (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 1 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Is this group (Parents for Public Schools) funded by government dollars?

The really sad part is that the parents who most need advice on parenting are the ones who are least likely to attend any such meetings.

Posted by Yeahuhuh (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 1:10 p.m. (Suggest removal)

You must have lost your teeth to get your tongue so far over into your cheek, Enkik.

Isn't it ironic that white women ended up more eager than anyone to embrace the contraception options Sanger pushed?

I figure a bunch of any color of people can get together and decide what's best for any color of kids. But the people who through their taxes are going to pay for public education and pay as well for the eventual results of public education in others' kids should bother to give a flip -- and not pin their hopes on abandoning schools and maybe -- maybe -- getting a tax voucher to subsidize their effort.

We do live in an historic era. Maybe I just have too much faith in the eventual outcome. Like the Dalai Lama says -- among humans, things are actually much, much better than they once were. Civility is actually increasing!

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 1:20 p.m. (Suggest removal)

That doesn't matter happyreader. The best way is known.

Who funds and trains this group? What are their goals? What have they done in the past? How successful were they?

William Raspberry says this group feels American communities cannot afford two school systems, one for the haves and one for the have nots. He says they made this statement in 1992.

So, Trinity, ACCS, TJ, and Catholic school parents, listen up here. Even though it costs the public schools twice to inadequately educate children what you pay to give your kids a good education, to this group you are the problem. You are the haves, and they are the have nots, though they have twice the money you do. Not only does this group not thank you for paying to educate the public school kids and then paying again to educate your own, you are bad.

No wonder Monica Carlson has at the top of her list "what is said here stays here".

Parents for Public Schools is a group that opposes choice in education, because they know the best way. All kids should graduate barely being able to read.

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 1:33 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Wrong again YH. Blacks get abortions at a rate 5 times higher than white women. 70% of all Planned Parenthood clinics are located in or near inner city neighborhoods. 19% of the population gets 40% of the abortions.

Posted by southernwoman (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 1:49 p.m. (Suggest removal)

EKK, are abortions done outside the PP clinics incuded in the statistics you quoted?

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 2:06 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Yes southernwoman.

Posted by Yeahuhuh (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 2:15 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Not wrong Enkik. I mentioned contraception and you morphed it into abortion. They are not the same thing. White women do get more abortions than blacks, despite the fact that any particular white woman would be less statistically likely. White women also otherwise contracept more effectively. I view this as socioeconomic -- it is not about race.

The fact that blacks are more predisposed to the more desperate methods of contraception should raise your empathy flag and launch you to compassion. IMHO.

If your aim was to save the babies it would seem you should care more about the schooling and socializing I am talking about so as to bring the poor or minorities into the mainstream. While your grand scheme for advancement may be an eventual solution, in the meantime someone has to do the best they can with the real situation.

Aside, what do you expect, a group that wishes to help women toward reproduction within their means should locate themselves in posh suburbs -- or it proves one of your conspiracies?

Public schools are here to stay. No matter what happens to you economically they are there for you. That is the way it was planned. If you have more money and want to, you can upgrade. But you have to keep the public system in place.

But then there are always those who would orchestrate a loud and musical tax whine in the well fed folks of this country. We can all be enticed to sing as if we were about to die from our duress. My opinion -- it ain't dignified.

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 2:33 p.m. (Suggest removal)

So, by socializing do you mean exposing black kids to white kids? Isn't that what was behind integration in the first place? Is the theory that white families are better and exposure to them will improve the black race?

Why should I feel empathy for people who indiscriminately fornicate? They did what they wanted to and had fun doing it. If you want contraception all you have to do is go down to the public health clinic and ask for it. You need to do that before Saturday night though.

Some more abortion facts. 1% of abortions are sought for cases of rape or incest, 6% for health reasons of the child or mother, and 93% for social reasons.

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 2:36 p.m. (Suggest removal)

A tax whine from the well-fed? Apparently you don't shop at WalMart- go there if you want to see examples of well-fed.

Posted by juju (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 2:45 p.m. (Suggest removal)

EnKiKur, TJ?? Huh? It's been closed for 30 years.

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 2:52 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Hehe... shows what I know doesn't it? They should reopen it though. We need more school choice, not less.

Posted by southernwoman (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 4:07 p.m. (Suggest removal)

EKK, you know that obesity is not a good sign of being WELL fed.

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 4:21 p.m. (Suggest removal)

It is a good sign of having enough money to eat the wrong food though. Vegetables are cheap compared to processed foods.

Of course, only the rich are able to practice free will. This has been denied to the downtrodden, who have no choice in life at all.

Posted by Yeahuhuh (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 4:37 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Answering your questions Enkik...

"So, by socializing do you mean exposing black kids to white kids? Isn't that what was behind integration in the first place? Is the theory that white families are better and exposure to them will improve the black race?"

By socializing I am meaning the process of socialization as in the "loftier" aims of it -- exposing one another to contrasting ideologies and lifeways. Loftier is a loaded word so let's just say for you that I mean expose one another to the values across a socioeconomic spectrum so folks can choose better what dey like. The theory is you take the socio-economically diverse and place them in contact with the other groups of society while you are doing a necessary task like educating -- then let the best ideology win. You can describe it as white families improving black families if you want to. I wouldn't -- sometimes it is the opposite.

Anybody who is too terrified to do such a thing is perfectly free to scrape up the extra bucks and school their kids in a different way.

"Why should I feel empathy for people who indiscriminately fornicate?"

Well if it's an undesirable trait worth considering at all you can choose either empathy or enmity, whatever you are most comfortable with. Your empathy might widen itself when you think about it to the extent of thinking about the offspring, the aborted, the piles of tax money you will supply for them eventually, and all the misery associated therewith.

My take is that empathizing is not such a terrifying or expensive process, it is seldom fatal, it strengthens moral character rather then eroding it, and it gives insight to those who intend to influence a situation. Of course if it weren't for welfare and taxes, there would be precious little reason for many folks to think about anyone outside their small sphere.

As I see it, the problem with being nuts is that one starts talking about a group who is interested in making public schools better and one ends up talking endlessly about abortionist conspirators and eugenics -- when the ones we should care about would just like the best education they can afford.

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 4:56 p.m. (Suggest removal)

So if I empathize, go tsk tsk, isn't that awful!, and go out into the community and tell people how to conduct their lives they are going to do what I say? Is that how it works?

Perhaps your school experience was different than mine, but kids in school don't socialize across socio-economic barriers- they studiously avoid it. The girl in designer clothes with a lawyer dad is not going to sleep over at the home of the factory worker's daughter who wears hand-me downs and things from WalMart- not often anyway. The homecoming queen at North Natchez is not going to become queen of the pilgrimage.

The problem with social theory is that it works in the realm of imagination but not in the real world. Did integration improve the Natchez-Adams school system? The end of separate but equal became total control of a 40 million dollar budget by a minority that also comprises 90% of the school population, with terrible results.

So it must not have been the economic inequality of separate-but-equal that was causing problems for the black community, it must have been something else.

Thankfully this something else has now been identified due to the efforts of Parents for Public Schools- it's unloving, unskilled parenting. Problem solved.

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 5:14 p.m. (Suggest removal)

What we need is an evaluative board. Parents for Public Schools can run it. Ferret out those unloving, unskilled parents and take their kids and put them in a county run home staffed by loving, skilled minimum wage workers- hire some of the parents the kids were taken from, they probably need jobs anyway. Let these unloved, deprived children learn the right way to live from minimum wage caretakers under the supervision of a high wage social butterfly.

We should also try the kind of behavioral therapies used to train animals, maybe. Keep the kids on a very low calorie diet and when they produce the right answers and right behaviors, reward them with food. Heck, you can teach chickens to win at tic-tac-toe, kids should do much better.

There must be something we can do that will produce real results. Maybe have a big community hug and an Oprah marathon on some First Friday. And we can spend more money. That always gets good results. If we doubled the school budget we could get all kinds of experts, they would flock to Natchez.

Posted by jrn59 (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 6:07 p.m. (Suggest removal)

This message board belongs to EKK and yeahuhhuh.

Posted by happyreader (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 7:14 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Wow. Just... wow.

Posted by unclered (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 7:17 p.m. (Suggest removal)

For those who dismiss the idea that socioeconomic factors have a major influence on a child's educational achievement, then I ask the following question: Why did the Natchez public schools' test scores and educational quality drop only after the "haves", in a fit of racist hysteria, pulled their children out of the public schools? Well over half of the children in the Natchez-Adams School District come from families that live below the poverty level. To pretend this doesn't matter points to stupidity, bigotry and callousness.

Another thing thing that should stop is comparing public and private schools. Private schools are not tested and rated under federal laws such as the so-called No Child Left Behind Act. Private schools are not even held to the same curriculum standards. I know for a fact that a former ACCS basketball coach/"science" teacher (former head master's son), refused to teach several chapters in an earth science text because it taught evolution. He said, "We's is Christians and this is our school." Are children at that school receiving a quality education? Do private schools have large numbers of students with mental and physical disabilities that federal law mandates public schools to teach? Most private schools. especially around here, have no special education specialists, so students with special needs are sent to public schools. By the way, under No Child Left Behind, special education students have to take the same grade level tests as regular classroom students and their scores are used to rate the school (Levels 1-5).

Private schools, with their mostly white, middle to upper-class students and their pick and choose curriculum, do not present an accurate view of education in America.

I find it interesting that the conservatives that rail against public education and scapegoat the poor so much, consider themselves such fine Christians. Here is a news flash for all of you "Cains" out there: You are your brother's keeper.

Posted by jrn59 (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 7:25 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Any one can attend private school, you just have to pay the tuition. There are mixed races in Woodville Christian and Centreville Academy and these kids (who want an education) seem to be doing just fine! Hats off to all GOOD teachers in whatever school you teach!

Posted by Lilsister (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 7:48 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Hi Gang.
I am back and this certainly is a subject that is dear to my heart. A few days ago, my husband and I visited a former co-worker and friend in a neighboring county. She is a principal at one of the schools. She was as happy to see us as we were to see her. I commented to her that she had a new glow, and she appeares to be quite happy. She replied, " I am at home, and I know most of parents and grandparents. "
It sadden me to know that we have lost some great individuals, who could have helped turn our school system around.
If you are from Natchez, It seems like a dark cloud hangs over you head. Instead we hire these individuals that we know very little about, and we entrust our most precious possessions to them. These individuals stay a year or two and move on to other systems, therefore, we don't have any stability in most of our schools. In addition, we don't get property taxes from most of them because they are not property owners.
Yes, it does take the enire village to raise our children, and until we in Natchez learn that when we have ineffective schools, run down neighborhoods,and poor parenting skills we all suffer.

Posted by Lilsister (anonymous) on June 30, 2009 at 7:53 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Corrections:
Cloud hangs over your head, and entire village

Thanks!

Posted by EnKiKur (Marty Ellerbe) on June 30, 2009 at 11:44 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Hey there LilSister, glad to see you back. I know you, and other people like you have the needed answers, you just don't have the needed support. Maybe ya'll should infiltrate this group and learn their techniques and then run them out of town. Advocating against choice in education is only going to make things worse, cause more resistance and more bad feelings.

unclered, black literacy rates have fallen dramatically (along with white literacy rates) since 1900, with a marked change for the worse after 1940.

Why did this happen? It happened mainly because of forced public schooling that was trying to do a lot of things besided teach kids to read and write and add and subtract.

Perhaps the most effective way to improve literacy rates among the poor of all races is to make it illegal for anyone to teach them to read and write.

Posted by unclered (anonymous) on July 1, 2009 at 8:53 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Enk: As usual, your conspiracy theories have no basis in fact. In 1900, the majority of the American population was illiterate, unless you consider signing your name with an "X" as literacy. Your phobia that public funded schools allowing even the poor to receive to attend school are part of an Orwellian conspiracy for world domination is based only on your dementia and delusions. It would make a great Dan Brown novel if you could create a larger role for the Catholic Church.

But then again, you are the person who once equated the selling of treasury bonds to the African slave trade. Go back down to your bunker and try to relax.

Posted by rushinghjr (anonymous) on July 1, 2009 at 10:28 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Same old Bull! Some people need to face "reality"! They know who they are and just can't see it? Sounds like part of the Owhampy tribe and they are on the wrong side again!

Posted by Yeahuhuh (anonymous) on July 1, 2009 at 11:44 a.m. (Suggest removal)

unclered is right Enkik. Your conspiracy theories are getting in the way of your vision.

Rushingjr is still stuck on a one-liner cutesy reply asserting he is right and everyone who disagrees is part of the wrong tribe. Social conservatism at it's best. Cute but not much substance.

I guess this thread is dead. Everyone who hates public schooling might just hold their breath till it goes away, and will your money to someone you love in case you go before it does.

Posted by rushinghjr (anonymous) on July 2, 2009 at 1:01 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Yes, I know I'm right!

Posted by unclered (anonymous) on July 2, 2009 at 3:34 p.m. (Suggest removal)

rushingjr: you're a moron.

Posted by rushinghjr (anonymous) on July 3, 2009 at 1:05 a.m. (Suggest removal)

UN/ you are a born again NUT and the entire County knows it! Every time I see your name, I get an email, sometimes several, advising me of your Mental Status! Now we know!

Posted by juju (anonymous) on July 3, 2009 at 4:12 p.m. (Suggest removal)

unclered, I don't think you have your facts right. Private schools DO have the same national standardized tests that public has, ACT, SAT, etc. Now the state curriculum tests and No Child Left Behind requirements aren't required I don't think unless they're trying for state and federal monies and status, and parochial schools such as Cathedral and Trinity,I believe, follow these guidelines. These days most private schools do. The first schools in America were private and we are fortunate to have free, accomodating public schools now too. We are lucky that they are not like foreign schools where if you do not keep your grades and progress checks up, the government pulls you out and finds other things for you like work or the military. Private schools should lessen public classroom size and free up more money!