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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   3624 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 21, 2026

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But it's not like she was ground down by the experience of trying to improve the education her daughter was receiving. Instead, she basically just assumed that her daughter was being taught, took the school's word for it that they were doing a good job, and... That's it. No actual effort to bully the school into shape. If she had, she could have changed course for her daughter much more quickly.

Even given her ideology, it doesn't make sense. She should have been working to improve the school for the collective, instead of whatever it is she did.

She had periodic bursts of energy (which the schools absorbed with apathy and meaningless validation) but then seemed to give up/assume the best based on the grades she was getting. I can only assume she didn't want to look at it too close precisely because she talked herself unto a hill. Once things seemed to be working out she was happy enough.

She did try to bully the school into shape, she wouldn't call it "bullying", but this is pretty much what I imagine bullying a school into shape to sound like:

After lunch, I headed straight to the principal’s office to meet with her. Afterward, I sent a lengthy email about what I had witnessed and demanded the unsafe lunchroom conditions be addressed. In what had become a pattern when we raised concerns, it took several days before the principal responded and several more weeks of emails and calls before she announced a plan to address the lunchtime issues.

We had to stay and fight for the students who did not have options, and so we started to become a thorn in the principal’s side.

The article is full of the assumption that all these poor kids needed is a NYT writer savior telling the principal that maybe they shouldn't let kids act rowdy. As if it never occured to them.

All this to avoid accepting that, let alone admitting anything regarding genetics, some kids' early years and family environment set them up to fail and drag down others with them and that the damage caused to others by trying to act like they can be given the same chances is not worth it.

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