buybuydandavis comments on Don't rely on the system to guarantee you life satisfaction - Less Wrong

16 Post author: JonahSinick 18 February 2014 05:48AM

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Comment author: buybuydandavis 18 February 2014 09:12:25PM 2 points [-]

Yes, it's peculiar that most people think Lord of the Flies model used in mass schooling is the appropriate model for the socialization of children.

Comment author: Nornagest 18 February 2014 09:42:27PM *  2 points [-]

It's particularly apropos that Lord of the Flies is common required reading in American high schools.

Comment author: taelor 19 February 2014 01:57:29AM 7 points [-]

Paul Graham on the subject:

If you leave a bunch of eleven-year-olds to their own devices, what you get is Lord of the Flies. Like a lot of American kids, I read this book in school. Presumably it was not a coincidence. Presumably someone wanted to point out to us that we were savages, and that we had made ourselves a cruel and stupid world. This was too subtle for me. While the book seemed entirely believable, I didn't get the additional message. I wish they had just told us outright that we were savages and our world was stupid.

Comment author: peterward 21 February 2014 08:45:29PM -1 points [-]

Were it not the case the teachers are often the biggest bullies. On the contrary, IMO, it is the excessively authoritarian, prison-like model school follows that generates bullies.

Comment author: buybuydandavis 21 February 2014 10:25:43PM 2 points [-]

Prison is the better model for the whole institution, while Lord of the Flies is the model of the schoolyard.

I think there's a good correlation between people who think a pile of children makes for good socialization and people who ignore the overarching prison model of the institution as a whole.

But I really don't think it's the interaction with the Prison Guards that predominantly makes for bullying - it's the interactions in the prison yard.

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