Your Opinion on Socialism

[MillTownCath]

Hi guys! What’s your opinion on social democracy? On socialism in general? Also, what is the relationship between our faith and this ideology (opinions of theologians, popes, or apologists; statements from the catechism, papal encyclicals, etc.)?

This question is for Catholics and non-Catholics (for the non-Catholics, what do your leaders and teachings say?)

Thanks guys

Socialism is wrong, but so is completely unregulated capitalism. The Catechism warns against both.

 

[davidmlamb]

I will disagree that a student can learn math and science better in a government school then they can in homeschool. Test results support me.

If you limit those test results to the United States this may be true. But the fact is the vast majority of American parents are not equiped to teach advanced mathematics such as pre-calculus and calculus. They are not equipped to teach physics, or chemistry and neither are they equipped to teach micro biology and biology. World statistics are on my side. Foreign countries are producing America’s future scientist, physicist, chemist, engineers and even physicians.

The American education system has been dumbed down. Thirty years ago we did not need to home school our children because our public schools were superior and they produced NASA Engineers and Scientist. That generations work force is retiring now and being replaced with imports from other countries. This is a horrific tragedy and until we stop making the government out to be the enemy that some how replaces God the country we once knew will fall. The Bible and the Church teach us that governments were instituted by God and therefore anything good the government produces such as public institutions are gifts from God. When we reject them we reject what God has instituted for our own good (Romans 13:1-6)

But for the sake of argument, say you are right. I’d still be against government schools. For many reasons. A few:
-it seperates the family, making the child a ward of the state for most each day.

No it allows children to interact with other children and learn social skills that are needed to be successful in life. Sheltering children in the home all their lives turns the family unit into a cult. What you call “the state” is in reality people like you and me; teachers who have families themselves and who are dedicated to the vocation of teaching to which God has called them to do. The state does not replace God, it is an order God created and an extension of God’s grace for the social order and common good of society. Your characterization of the state is in grave error. You need to read CCC 1897-1912 and Romans chapter 13.

-children learn a lot of OTHER things beyond math and science in school, and there are more important things in life then getting high test scores.

There is a time and place for everything. A time to learn at home, and a time away from home to learn and interact with other people in public life. It is part of the common good. Children need the proper balance of family and religious life as well as public life. When you smother them with religion they are far more likely to run away from a religious and moral life.

Going to heaven being the chief one. If the government school was guaranteed to make my kid into the smartest rocket scientist ever but corrupt his morals,.

Public school never corrupted my morals or my childrens morals. Neither did they corrupt my parents morals. My Father grew up in a Catholic boarding school and my mother went to public school from K-12. Guess who turned out to abandon his faith and religious life? My Father! My father had been in Catholic school from K-12. He was an altar boy and lived under strict boarding school rules. But in 1964 when he was 25 he had a vesectomy, turned his back on the Church, left my mother. To this day my dad has never returned to the Church or God. My mother on the other hand remained a pious and religious woman and attends mass with me.

It is the duty of the parents to teach their children about faith and morals and it is the duty of the children to obey their parents as well as their teachers. The world is filled with corruption but sheltering children from the world by isolation will do more harm then good. Children have their parents and the Church. They learn right from wrong by the time they are 10 and are free will beings being able to choose either good or evil. When they choose the ladder we dicipline them and they have the sacrament of reconcilliation. This is the way I grew up as well as my parents and their parents. We do not need to turn our homes into cults. We just need stable homes balanced by faith, love and interaction in public life to develop social skills and friendship. Finally we ought to commit our children to consistent daily prayer. Then hope they choose the right path when they grow up.

Peace,

David

 

[davidmlamb]

I look dimly on the benefits of “allowing” more parents to work outside the home. I’d also say a parent who stays at home is still very much contributing to the economy. More importantly their contributing to the salvation of their children.

Pax.

Do you support Unions and collective bargaining as the only effective means to assure a just wage so that both parents don’t have to work in order to make ends meet? There was a time in America when most jobs were unionized, only one parent had to work and a person was able to draw a good pension from that job. Public schools worked very well back then in part because one parent could afford to stay home with the children and manage the home. A just wage is the ligitamate fruits of work and to undermine that is the root cause of many social disorders in our society

Peace,

David

 

[davidmlamb]

With a government hand-out, there is no such social contract and so the person take without giving back. That kills the pride of a man, and all sorts of social evils arise from men with no pride."

What is a government hand-out? When our homes and lives are in danger and we call the police who come out and rescue us is this a government handout? When our house has a fire and we call the fire department who quickly rushes out to put out the fire is this a government handout? When we drive to work on the interstate highways or take road trips for vacations using them is this a government handout? When we are educated by public institutions are these government handouts? How about Medicare and Social Security? Are these government handouts? Or are these public benefits we pay into? And if we make a distinction between a government handout and public benefits are government handouts always bad? Does a government handout or a public benefit mean that the state is providing and not God? Or is the state an entity created by God as a means of providing for us? What does the Church teach us about these things?

Peace,
David

 

[Gift_from_God]

Possibly the greatest thing government has ever done…for government. Not quite so great for the citizens.

There would be massive amounts of illiterate people had it not been for public education.

There are many, many good reasons the number of parents homeschooling their children continues to grow.

Homeschooling is not that common

Public education “teaches” children to wait in line,

Wait in line? You mean as in wait in line for your turn like in the cafeteria? What’s wrong with that?

do busy work

Do work? Doing hard work is part of life

move around when the bell rings

When the bell rings, that generally means class has ended and you have to leave that class, or class is about to start again, so you need to go to that class

raise their hand to be called on

Is that wrong?

not think about science in math class or math in science class

I think that’s a proper thing to do. Set your mind to one subject at a time seems pretty normal

and not to ask questions that don’t have answers in the answer key. That sounds pretty harsh.
This is the wrong thing to do?

That’s because the system is pretty harsh. The goal isn’t intelligent, thinking citizens. The desired product is obedient, dumbed down serfs.

I’m an honours student at a university and was offered multiple scholarship for good grades. I highly doubt I’d be considered an obedient, dumbed down serf

 

[sharptiger999]

Jesus is an advocate of socialism in the bible. But I do not like socialism. I am a very free market libertarian thinker.

 

[melbanglican]

Why all the attack on public schools? Public schools work well in other industrialized countries and are producing well educated kids in math and science. In Japan for instance, a high school graduate has one year of calculus, physics, and chemistry when they graduate and they can speak at least 2 languages fluently. This is also the case in every asian country as well as Germany, Sweden and Norway. Canada also has a superior public education system. In Britain not only is their education system superior but they will subsidize a Catholic or Anglican education if that is where you want to send your child. Why can’t we invest in our public education system like this?

David

As in the Britain, so also in Australia.

On the wider topic, where do the Christian Socialists fit into the scheme of things?

thecsm.org.uk/

Peace be with you.

 

[Dan_Daly]

There would be massive amounts of illiterate people had it not been for public education.

In the American colonies at the time of the American Revolution there weren’t public schools, and there was near 100% literacy among the populace. Quite a bit higher that now.

 

[Dan_Daly]

Do you support Unions and collective bargaining as the only effective means to assure a just wage so that both parents don’t have to work in order to make ends meet? There was a time in America when most jobs were unionized, only one parent had to work and a person was able to draw a good pension from that job. Public schools worked very well back then in part because one parent could afford to stay home with the children and manage the home. A just wage is the ligitamate fruits of work and to undermine that is the root cause of many social disorders in our society

Peace,

David

I dispute the notion that in most American families, both parents “have” to work as things currently stand. I know many co-workers who I know make the same or more money who tell me their spouse has to work to make ends meet, while mine stays at home. We have a very skewed idea of needs vs wants in our society. In large part, a wife works outside the home in large part to earn the money to fund daycare. If the wife stayed home…no need to fund daycare.

But even looking at perceived versus actual need, so many families feel the “need” for the wife to work, precisely because so many women work. If mothers stayed home, that would be a great many people taken out of the pool of available employees. The fact that those people are in the pool now depresses wages and increases unemployment.

Pax.

 

[Dan_Daly]

Why can’t a parent teach their children calculus, algebra, physics or biology? If you are able to read, you can figure it out. School Teachers are not all knowing geniuses, and normal parents are not dupes.

Public schooling is getting worse, but it was a bad system from the start- by design. Perhaps we produced the men who put us on the moon, because public schools had not been in effect long enough to have done as much damage. It’s a cumulative effect. If you go to a dumbed down school, and then become a teacher, and teach new children at the dumbed down school (as a dumbed down teacher) they will do even more poorly and learn even less. The problem grows with each generation.

Social skills are very important. A setting where everyone is the same age, is not the best for socialization. A child can’t learn to be an adult from a roomful of other children. I will say socialization with other children is important as well, and is something that can and does happen quite naturally as part of homeschooling. Actually, it’s easier because you can go out and do things as a family and with other families, because you have more time because your children aren’t tied up in school all day for 180 days a year.

The old “if you love them too much they’ll rebel” argument. Say I’m going to move to a new house, and I pack up my wife’s fine china. It’s precious. It’s fragile. It might break. Even if I pack it gently in packing paper, label the box fragile, and am extremely careful with it during the move…it STILL might break. So since it might break anyway, should I simply pack it any old which way? Of course not. A child’s soul is infinitely more precious then a piece of the finest china. I am called to protect it and love it the best I can. It still might turn away from God at some point, that doesn’t mean I protect it any the less.

I have not said I’m agains the state. I’m against the state acting in an uncharitable way or exceeding its authority (which would also be uncharitable). That is in line with Church teaching. A blank check to government and a belief that any institution which comes from it is good, is not in line with Church teaching.

I am glad you made it through school with your morals intact. God is merciful and loving. Not everyone placed in an occasion of sin falls. Many who fall repent. Not everyone in the village when the hurricane hits dies. That doesn’t mean I should send my kids to the beach right before landfall.

I am not a big fan of Catholic schools either, so you will not hear a defense of them from me. In many cases, Catholic schools are more damaging to a child’s faith then government schools. I went to both growing up, and the Catholic schools I attended were worse. In the words of Archbishop Fulton Sheen:

If you want your children to fight for their faith, send them to public school. If you want them to lose their faith, send them to Catholic school.’"

The problem with the Archbishop’s advice is that the fight in public schools is one where the deck is stacked against the child, so I’d add another line- if you want your children to live the faith, homeschool them.

Pax and God Bless.

 

[minkymurph]

But even looking at perceived versus actual need, so many families feel the “need” for the wife to work, precisely because so many women work. If mothers stayed home, that would be a great many people taken out of the pool of available employees. The fact that those people are in the pool now depresses wages and increases unemployment.

Pax.

Hitler tried that policy; created a massive labor shortage and wrecked the economy of the country.

In addition, work isn’t just about earning money. However, if your a ‘a woman’s place is in the home’ kind of guy, there’s not much point in discussion. As they say in part of the world, ‘you can’t preach to the converted.’

 

[minkymurph]

I dispute the notion that in most American families, both parents “have” to work as things currently stand. I know many co-workers who I know make the same or more money who tell me their spouse has to work to make ends meet, while mine stays at home. We have a very skewed idea of needs vs wants in our society. In large part, a wife works outside the home in large part to earn the money to fund daycare. If the wife stayed home…no need to fund daycare.

But even looking at perceived versus actual need, so many families feel the “need” for the wife to work, precisely because so many women work. If mothers stayed home, that would be a great many people taken out of the pool of available employees. The fact that those people are in the pool now depresses wages and increases unemployment.

Pax.

On the other side of the coin, were Margaret Thatcher was concerned you may have a point. I wish she had have stayed at home and looked after her kids, and I would say so a lot of other people who lost their homes as a direct consequence of her economic policy would feel the same.

 

[exnihilo]

I dispute the notion that in most American families, both parents “have” to work as things currently stand. I know many co-workers who I know make the same or more money who tell me their spouse has to work to make ends meet, while mine stays at home. We have a very skewed idea of needs vs wants in our society. In large part, a wife works outside the home in large part to earn the money to fund daycare. If the wife stayed home…no need to fund daycare.

But even looking at perceived versus actual need, so many families feel the “need” for the wife to work, precisely because so many women work. If mothers stayed home, that would be a great many people taken out of the pool of available employees. The fact that those people are in the pool now depresses wages and increases unemployment.

The average American is chasing unfulfilling wants that they are convinced are needs. Material things have always been a distraction to the true needs of mankind. Materialism ultimately destroys a civilization.

Women always worked. They cared for the children, which is their natural calling. And they also helped in the family business. Men used to work their own farm or trade. Women would assist in that work. A farm wife was as much a worker as the man.

With industrialization and corporations this changed. Men suddenly went off to work in a factory or office for someone else. The family no longer was part of the business. The father no longer taught his kids how to earn a living. The wife and children did not help and there was no business for the family to inherit.

Modern women have proclaimed they want to be part of the soul mortifying work that men were doing. The government thought this was a great idea because now they had taxable income whereas before they had unmeasured work. Most of the gains in women employment were sucked up by the state. This new arrangement has also destroyed the family which is great for the state as it benefits from atomized individuals who are easy to rule. The state wants obedient students who become obedient workers to tax and who are obedient to ridiculous infringements on their freedom.

Modern work destroys the family which is essential for creating truly caring people who will look out for what society truly needs.

 

[minkymurph]

Modern work destroys the family which is essential for creating truly caring people who will look out for what society truly needs.

I would agree that modern work destroys the family. You can’t say it’s a very natural thing for a man, or woman for that matter, to spend hours away from each other and their kids, providing the government with finance via tax. Industrialization drastically changed the economic and political landscape in Europe.

However, the world is as the world is. We no longer live in agricultural communities were families functioned as an economic unit. When we did the world was a very different place. Irrespective of how we ideally would like it to be, we can’t change it. We can’t make the world the way we want it to be because it would make our lives as Christians easier if it was. We have to live in the world as it is. That’s the reality. Meaning, whether we like it or not modern work is a feature of contemporary society, and we are faced with the challenge of promoting family life and what society truly needs in the world as it is and not how we’d like it to be.

 

[minkymurph]

Modern women have proclaimed they want to be part of the soul mortifying work that men were doing.

They have? This is news to me.

 

[minkymurph]

Why can’t a parent teach their children calculus, algebra, physics or biology? If you are able to read, you can figure it out. School Teachers are not all knowing geniuses, and normal parents are not dupes.

True. However, I was in teacher training for two years and I wouldn’t attempt to teach my children calculus, algebra or physics beyond a certain level because they are not my area of expertise. Biology perhaps. If you don’t really understand something yourself it’s difficult to teach it to someone else.

Social skills are very important. A setting where everyone is the same age, is not the best for socialization. A child can’t learn to be an adult from a roomful of other children. I will say socialization with other children is important as well, and is something that can and does happen quite naturally as part of homeschooling. Actually, it’s easier because you can go out and do things as a family and with other families, because you have more time because your children aren’t tied up in school all day for 180 days a year.

It’s true that schools aren’t a very natural environment for learning. However, in children don’t just learn from people their own age. They mix with younger children, older children and other adults and learn from them. They may learn something you wish they hadn’t, but learning to deal with that with adult support is an important life skill and prepares them for dealing with it when parents aren’t around.

The problem with the Archbishop’s advice is that the fight in public schools is one where the deck is stacked against the child, so I’d add another line- if you want your children to live the faith, homeschool them.

In fairness it’s very difficult for me to talk about the benefits of homeschooling because I have no experience of it. It just doesn’t happen here. The only people who homeschool in my part of the world are people who are wealthy, have a child with severe learning difficulties and employ someone to teach them at home for the purpose of enabling them to eventually attend a school. Outside of that it just doesn’t happen.

 

[davidmlamb]

Why can’t a parent teach their children calculus, algebra, physics or biology? If you are able to read, you can figure it out.

OH REALLY?..okay good luck with that! How many parents do you currently know who have picked up a physics and calculus book, read it, and then could teach differential and intergral calculus and classical physics?

School Teachers are not all knowing geniuses, and normal parents are not dupes.Pax and God Bless.

Teachers have been educated. They’ve gone through the tough work it takes to not only learn the material, but to solve difficult problems and teach others to do the same. If learning and teaching math and science was so easy everyone would do it. The average parent is just not equipped to do this, they must be trained for years and go through blood, sweat, and tears. How do I know? Because I did it and it was a long and difficult road and many did not make it.

Public schooling is getting worse, but it was a bad system from the start- by design. Perhaps we produced the men who put us on the moon, because public schools had not been in effect long enough to have done as much damage. It’s a cumulative effect.

Let me know when the Beka Home Schooling ciriculum starts producing NASA Engineers that send men to Mars.

If you go to a dumbed down school, and then become a teacher, and teach new children at the dumbed down school (as a dumbed down teacher) they will do even more poorly and learn even less. The problem grows with each generation.

Only each AMERICAN generation but the opposite is happening everywhere else in the industrialized world. You have yet to address this. Foreign public schools are producing most of the worlds scientist and engineers and American firms such as Intel, Apple, General Motors and Motorolla are hiring them while American public schools are producing Walmart Associates.

Peace,
David

 

[exnihilo]

However, the world is as the world is. We no longer live in agricultural communities were families functioned as an economic unit. When we did the world was a very different place. Irrespective of how we ideally would like it to be, we can’t change it. We can’t make the world the way we want it to be because it would make our lives as Christians easier if it was. We have to live in the world as it is. That’s the reality. Meaning, whether we like it or not modern work is a feature of contemporary society, and we are faced with the challenge of promoting family life and what society truly needs in the world as it is and not how we’d like it to be.

The world is the way it is because of a series of choices. Those choices brought us great material wealth. But we could in a sense go backwards a bit. In so doing we would lose some of the material wealth but gain family, internal peace, and other benefits. Our society is defined by the sum total of decisions from the people. It changed to how it is because of decisions and it can change still.

I dont agree that we *have *to live in the world as it is. Our needs are very few and easily satisfied. We chose to live in the world as it is. I dont advocate a complete rejection of the world as it is. I do advocate rejecting much of it. And if enough do we can redefine contemporary society. If we just accept the world then there will be no change, positive or negative. Since the world is not perfect we are obliged to seek change, hopefully for the better.

They have? This is news to me.

Certainly at universities and in the popular media. Obviously this does not mean all. But the general spirit of the times certainly has.

 

[minkymurph]

The world is the way it is because of a series of choices. Those choices brought us great material wealth. But we could in a sense go backwards a bit. In so doing we would lose some of the material wealth but gain family, internal peace, and other benefits. Our society is defined by the sum total of decisions from the people. It changed to how it is because of decisions and it can change still.

To an extent the world is the way it is because of the choices people make. However, it’s also defined by things that are beyond our control, and not having the option of being able to choose.

I dont agree that we *have *to live in the world as it is. Our needs are very few and easily satisfied. We chose to live in the world as it is. I dont advocate a complete rejection of the world as it is. I do advocate rejecting much of it. And if enough do we can redefine contemporary society. If we just accept the world then there will be no change, positive or negative. Since the world is not perfect we are obliged to seek change, hopefully for the better.

The truth is I’m a bit of cynic, and I grew out of trying to change the world a long time ago. There are things it is not within our power to change which limits our choices.

I often think of the ‘Wisdom’ prayer.

’God grant me the courage to change the things I can change, the grace to accept the things I cannot change, and the wisdom to know the difference.

Certainly at universities and in the popular media. Obviously this does not mean all. But the general spirit of the times certainly has.

I don’t think I should get into this here because it would perhaps be going way off the topic of the thread. Suffice to say, your post suggested that women want to work and want to do the same jobs as men are responsible for the destruction of family life, and family life would be much better if women stayed at home. You also used the term ‘modern women,’ and your post suggests your using it in a derogatory sense - that women who want to work outside the home or take up employment in a male dominated field are lesser wives and mothers, because they should be staying at home doing housework and looking after the kids and leaving the jobs for the men. You can understand some people would have a problem with that suggestion. However, perhaps I’m reading something into your post you did not intend.

The days when women stayed at home, looked after the kids and had the man’s dinner on the table will never come back. Women now work and work in previously male dominated fields. That’s not going to change irrespective of how much should. We could dispute whether women should be working from now until the cows come. The fact remains that highly educated, intelligent women earning good salaries are not going to go back to being housewives because a minority of men think family life would be better if they did. As you say, the fact that the government likes it because they can tax them is another strong indication it won’t change. Apportioning blame on women who want to work for family breakdown won’t change anything either. Men, or women for that matter who don’t like that, are just going to have to get over it. Individual couples can live this way if they choose, and they have the luxury of being able to afford it because the man gets paid a decent wage. However, it’s not for them to say others should do the same.

 

[Dan_Daly]

The average American is chasing unfulfilling wants that they are convinced are needs. Material things have always been a distraction to the true needs of mankind. Materialism ultimately destroys a civilization.

Women always worked. They cared for the children, which is their natural calling. And they also helped in the family business. Men used to work their own farm or trade. Women would assist in that work. A farm wife was as much a worker as the man.

With industrialization and corporations this changed. Men suddenly went off to work in a factory or office for someone else. The family no longer was part of the business. The father no longer taught his kids how to earn a living. The wife and children did not help and there was no business for the family to inherit.

Modern women have proclaimed they want to be part of the soul mortifying work that men were doing. The government thought this was a great idea because now they had taxable income whereas before they had unmeasured work. Most of the gains in women employment were sucked up by the state. This new arrangement has also destroyed the family which is great for the state as it benefits from atomized individuals who are easy to rule. The state wants obedient students who become obedient workers to tax and who are obedient to ridiculous infringements on their freedom.

Modern work destroys the family which is essential for creating truly caring people who will look out for what society truly needs.

Very well said! Pax.