Samuel Abrams, director of the National Center for the Study of Privatization in Education, is a hardy soul. He agreed to debate Bob Bowdon, film-maker, pundit, and hater of all things public, in a debate sponsored by the libertarian publication Reason. The debate took place in July but it remains relevant.
Sam taught for many years in the New York City public schools, then wrote his academic thesis on the Edison Project, which grew into a book about for-profit education ventures called Education and the Commercial Mindset, published by Harvard University Press. The book is thoughtful, well-documented, and scholarly.
Bob Bowdon is a film-maker who made a name for himself as someone who despises public schools, teachers, and unions. He is a libertarian, and the crowd was with him from the start. Abrams was brave to go before a pro-choice crowd, and he won some of them over to the idea that there is actually something called the common good.
Bowdon, needless to say, is unfamiliar with the research about vouchers, and is unaware of research from Ohio, Indiana, Louisiana, and D.C. showing that students who take vouchers lose ground as compared to their peers who stay in public schools.
Haven’t read this yet, but if the argument were between a moron and an ideologue, I’d go with the moron every time. I began a review of a book on how Wall St. has infiltrated our government since WWI with, “Ideology as the unquestioned voice of certainty is the biggest enemy we face as a civil society.” Now I will read it with my predetermined conclusion in mind.
It’s a very bad idea to debate ideologues and other people for whom facts don’t matter.
“reason” is not even in their vocabulary.
There’s a poem somewhere in that comment! Since I’m not a poet, the only thing I can come up with is:
There once was an ideologue in Nantucket… 😊
My saying: never get into a wrestling match with a pig. You get dirty, and it annoys the pig.
But I congratulate Sam for standing up to this dummy.
We were obviously raised in different parts of the south. I learned: Never try to teach a pig how to talk, it frustrates you and annoys the pig. Yours belies a Texas penchant toward violence, mine a Louisiana proclivity for the arts. 😜
GregB,
Actually, the saying goes “never get into a pissing contest with a skunk. You can’t win.”
I don’t think I’ll mess with this Texan.
Actually, the pig likes it. If it annoyed the pig, that would be a bonus.
“Mud wrestling with pigs”
To wrestle with a pig
Requires you to dig
And wallow in the muck
Until you’re really stuck
Two thumbs up!
Don’t you mean hooves?
Since the audience was comprised of a high number of libertarians, Abrams made a significant impact on a group that was mostly opposed to his position. Reason and facts beat the unreasonable.
School choice has had disastrous effects on kids in my city. Now they are all on public transportation for two hours a day, for no reason.
For me, reading Bowdon’s discussion of the supposed public school “systemic” problems and failures is akin to what happens to the Martians in “Mars Attack” hearing Slim Whitman sing “Indian Love Song”:
I enjoyed the debate. I knew before it started, that neither individual would sway any meaningful number of the audience. School choice/vouchers are like the Rorschact test. You see what you want to see.
I remember Bowdon interviewing Parent Trigger architect and Parent Revolution founder Ben Austin back in 2010.
Ben told this bogus story about how unionized public school teachers retaliate against the children of parents — and against the parents themselves of course — who want to covert their school to a privately-managed charter that would be staffed without a union contract.
The teachers would first identify which children had pro-charter parents and then implement a nefarious, coordinated action plan.
These evil teacher union members would then somehow force these certain students into defecating and urinating on themselves — while the other students escaped this torture — in the process, sending this message to those pro-charter parents that …
This is what happens to the kids of any o’ you parents who dare to even THINK of being pro-charter.
At this moment of vulnerability, those parents were then coerced by the unionized teachers into rescinding their signatures from a petition which they had earlier signed, a petition which would have converted the school into a privately-managed charter school.
(unionized teacher twirls his black moustache, then whips a black cape around to partially cover his face)
Oh wait, here it is:
(NOTE the sinister, tinkling piano music score added for effect)
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
(00:41 – 02:06)
TRANSCRIPT: (00:41 – 02:06)
AUSTIN: “Instead of being embraced and applauded for getting involve in the education of their own children, (THE PRO-PARENT-TRIGGER PARENTS) were intimidated … uhhh … and abused and harassed… uhhmm … and… uhmmm … we quiclkly found out that there were few… moral boundaries that the other side was unwilling to cross.
“One story in particular that was… uhmmm… jaw-dropping.. was that… uhmm… we found out pretty quickly that parents… whose… who—uhh… children whose parents signed the petitions… uhhm… were not allowed to go to the bathroom, and… when the children peed in their pants, they were sent to the… Nurse’s Office… uhh… and… that is where the parents… uhmm… parents got called in to bring in clean underwear… uhh… and that’s where the parents got hit up to give their … uhhh… to rescind their… signatures.”
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
This wacko story made it into the fictional corporate ed. reform propaganda movie WON’T BACK DOWN, with the added effect of the child being locked in a closet.
( … Hmmm … wasn’t there a scandal this week about a charter school principal arrested for locking a child in a closet? Oh, and hasn’t Success Academy gotten into trouble for forcing kids to urinate and defecate on themselves….” Just sayin.’ ).
In WON’T BACK DOWN, the teacher tells the parent, “I wouldn’t have done this (to the parent’s daughter) if YOU hadn’t been doing what YOU were doing.” (The parent was circulating a petition to convert the school to a privately-managed charter with non-union teachers.)
Watch the video ABOVE. Ben is clearly lying his head off, as you can tell from the obvious “tells” he engages in — pausing repeatedly; looking down and up to search for the lies; fumbling his words.
What’s funny is that Bowdon — as with anyone watching this — eagerly wants to know what happened to these child-torturing teachers — were they ever puniished?! — but Ben just basically blows off the question and changes the topic…
… BECAUSE NONE OF THIS EVER FREAKIN’ HAPPENED!!!!
Bowdon doesn’t pursue this line of questioning … again … BECAUSE NONE OF THIS EVER FREAKIN’ HAPPENED!!!!
Instead, Ben proceeds to assure Bowdon (and everyone else watching) that, in telling this bizarre fabrication, his “goal is not to ‘teacher-bash’ or to ‘union-bash.’* ”
Really, Ben? Am we hearing you right?
You just publicly accused dozens of teachers / teacher union members at McKinley Elementary in Compton of countless acts of grotesque, premeditated child abuse, and engaging in an organized conspiracy that led to untold numbers of children being tortured into defecating and urinating on themselves — all to pursue the union’s anti-charter school agenda….
But oh no, you’re not “teacher bashing”, or “union bashing.”????!!!!
Sweet Jesus!
Seriously, if this grim fairy tale had actually happened, the corporate ed. reform crowd would have featured this in every website they controlled, and whenever they got the chance … all to prove how horrible traditional public schools are, and horrible unionized teachers and their unions are. There would have been criminal prosecutions, lawsuits, etc.
It would be cited OVER AND OVER as if it was the corporate ed. reform equivalent of the 9-11 attacks.
In actuality, it never happened, so you never heard of it.