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watching these riots on the TV, all i can think is "what sniveling little wankers!" a $14,000 annual tuition? that's peanuts compared to tuitions here. these spoiled little eurocrat elites obviously don't know how good they have it. and as the u.s. government finally has to wake to the same reality of austerity measures, there will be riots in the streets here as well.

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Whoa steady on there Dod! University over here is expensive and for many poorer families this will mean the end of the road as far as Uni is concerned. The thing is that Tony Blair was the one to introduce fee's, but seeing as how he was 'Labour' the protests were minimal.
Now we have a Tory Govt again and the fee's are going up (not in Scotland) the popular perception is that of the ruling elite ensuring only the well off can send their offspring to Uni. Which it is but Tony Blair started it.

Now this is going slightly off topic but in High School a person passes an exam if they score 40% (out of a possible 100%). This means that more people pass their exams and at a higher grade than their actual intelligence would suggest them capable of and thus get to go to Uni.

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Originally Posted by David Macleod:
Whoa steady on there Dod! University over here is expensive and for many poorer families this will mean the end of the road as far as Uni is concerned. The thing is that Tony Blair was the one to introduce fee's, but seeing as how he was 'Labour' the protests were minimal.
Now we have a Tory Govt again and the fee's are going up (not in Scotland) the popular perception is that of the ruling elite ensuring only the well off can send their offspring to Uni. Which it is but Tony Blair started it.

Now this is going slightly off topic but in High School a person passes an exam if they score 40% (out of a possible 100%). This means that more people pass their exams and at a higher grade than their actual intelligence would suggest them capable of and thus get to go to Uni.

so are you telling me that college is part of the public school system there. is it a right there to pay amazingly low tuition rates subsidized by the government? or will people have to do what people over here have had to do to get through college? i.e. take out student loans, work your way through school, scrimp and starve your way by, then start out somewhere at entry level, and work your way up. and if that is a right, what good is a college degree if everyone has a college degree? i mean i'm not in favor of the price of tuition (which here can be like $30,000 a year) but i also don't think that this is some right owed to college students, and i also don't think they realize how good they have it.

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Originally Posted by David Macleod:

Now this is going slightly off topic but in High School a person passes an exam if they score 40% (out of a possible 100%). This means that more people pass their exams and at a higher grade than their actual intelligence would suggest them capable of and thus get to go to Uni.

i just caught this bit. i know, they're doing the same thing here in the states too. i hate this ninny society we're raising. there are no winners anymore, there are no losers, there are no consequences for ones actions, because everyone is special and nobody's feelings should get hurt.

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Grr I started writing a reply and then lost it with a rather reckless use of the backspace button.

Anyhoo, students over here do have to get student loans as well as buying their course books, which means that the average student has 10s of £1000s of debt when they leave uni.

Education is a right not a privilege and the hiking up of student fees is more to do with ensuring that the poor stay poor and less educated and thus less likely to better themselves career wise - which is what the Torys are all about - keeping the poor poor and helping the rich get richer.

However there are a great many students who study the most rediculous courses that are of no practical use in the real world. Which makes me question the validity of a degree - all many of them prove is that a person can learn/remember a lot of **** about nothing of any real value and pass an exam, which means less every year, before signing on the dole and not paying back the money we gave them.

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Originally Posted by David Macleod:

Education is a right not a privilege and the hiking up of student fees is more to do with ensuring that the poor stay poor and less educated and thus less likely to better themselves career wise - which is what the Torys are all about - keeping the poor poor and helping the rich get richer.

i would agree that a primary education is a right, but are you saying that you feel a college education is a right as well? if so, it would be far simpler to incorporate universities into the existing public education system. and i see a paradox here mortimer. if all these poor people have been going to college, why are there still so many poor people? surely the lower class has shrunken dramatically in the UK.

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mort, i believe this measure is progressive, meaning the cost of one's tuition increases, the wealthier one is.

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I can understand how tuition hikes can anger many in the UK.  I dont understand how poking Camilla whatshername with a stick, and attacking Prince Charles will solve anything?  Sometimes I think people (in every nation) will riot simply because they want to cause as much damage and havoc as possible.

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Indeed Dennis. Some people seem to look for any excuse to riot and cause destruction to other people's property.

I can see why you would see a paradox here Dod but the number of poor students compared to middle and upper class ones is a very small percentage compared to those who don't go on to further education. This is largely because we are failing so many students at High School level. Insufficient funding, inner city schools where the students have the teachers living in a constant state of fear etc. Now ideally these young people would want to better themselves but what we have is the equivalent of your slack jawed yokels - downtrodden masses who see no future for themselves beyond the council estate and the dole queue.

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Originally Posted by David Macleod:
Indeed Dennis. Some people seem to look for any excuse to riot and cause destruction to other people's property.

I can see why you would see a paradox here Dod but the number of poor students compared to middle and upper class ones is a very small percentage compared to those who don't go on to further education. This is largely because we are failing so many students at High School level. Insufficient funding, inner city schools where the students have the teachers living in a constant state of fear etc. Now ideally these young people would want to better themselves but what we have is the equivalent of your slack jawed yokels - downtrodden masses who see no future for themselves beyond the council estate and the dole queue.

i think a lot of these protesters were probably the same lot that we see rioting at every G20 summit.

as for the last bit, i'm in complete agreement. it's the same way here. my only contention is that more government programs aren't the answer to raising people out of poverty. we (the west) have been doing this for how many decades now? and at every turn, we've decided the answer was to expand existing programs, and create even more of them, yet the poverty rate hasn't gone down. in fact, if the uk is anything like the us, its only gotten worse. we've taken the idea of social safety nets way too far, and applied it to way too many people. so now it's come down the this generation to either turn back the progressive tide which threatens to drown us, or to kick the can over to the next generation, and MAYBE, not have to live long enough to see the suffering we've caused to our kids and grandkids.

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I don't know how much of a problem you have with the 'professional unemployed' in the U.S but here we have people who spend their lives on benefits and have all the nice things in life that hard working people have to save for.  Then there are people who should be getting benefits but can't because they don't fall inside the Govt's criteria. The whole thing is fraked beyond belief and needs to be sorted but it's pretty much mission impossible.

With people living longer we're paying out more in state pensions and so by the time I retire (if I ever get the chance lol) state pensions will prolly be a thing of the past. So I will have been paying for something that I will never receive. Then there's the NHS....

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Originally Posted by David Macleod:
I don't know how much of a problem you have with the 'professional unemployed' in the U.S but here we have people who spend their lives on benefits and have all the nice things in life that hard working people have to save for.

yeah, we just started that with this recession, as congress and the president have seen fit to keep extending unemployment benies. but get this. over here they're heralding what an economic boom unemployment benefits are, and how they're the most effective means of stimulating the economy. nancy pelosi has said so herself. but this obviously leads to the question, well why does anyone work at all? if it's such a benefit to the economy, then why isn't  everyone on unemployment benefits?