Thursday, October 12, 2006
Two lords a leapin' (with insanity)
Following on from Lord Phillips media exposure, clearly Lord Bruce-Lockhart is feeling left out.
Nonetheless this former Conservative leader (see they're not all restricted to Labour) of Kent County Council manages to get a Times front page (here) with the claim that racial quotas are needed in schools. I've always been against quotas of any kind, but racial ones are (for me) particularly repulsive and in my view do nothing at all to enhance anything.
From the article he claims it is: "... unacceptable that non-white pupils should form 90 per cent of the population of one school, when white pupils formed 90 per cent of a neighbouring school down the road". No what is unacceptable is that the state is always telling people where to send their children. If the free choice of those parents is to send their children to those respective schools then there is absolutely nothing wrong with it.
Even Trevor Phillips, chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality (a commission whose work in my opinion is done and could now be abolished) speaks out against Lord Bruce-Lockhart: "“I’m open to discussion, but I would not have said this is the first place we need to go,”" Similarly the Muslim Council of Britain with Tahir Alam weighs in against: "“You cannot tell a parent that they cannot send their child to the school of their choice because it has met its racial quota. The right of parents to send their children to the school they want is a fundamental right in this country,”" I'm not sure he's correct about it legally and fully being a fundamental right, but he seems to have the right idea.
There's more all about segregation and telling us what a bad thing that is, but is it really? If you have a fair society, with equality of opportunity then if people choose to divide themselves along ethnic or religious lines then provided they do not enforce those divisions on others, who cares? For example, if say I was Jewish and wished to live in Golders Green in London where I believe a lot of Jews live then what would be wrong with that? Nothing in my opinion; on the other hand, if for example, I was living in a Catholic area and a non-Catholic wanted to move next door to me, it would be wrong to use force, or "zoning" or segregationalist arguments to try and prevent them. Of course there would be nothing wrong with me deciding to move out myself if I didn't like the new neighbours.
Surely you are more likely to create problems if you force people who for whatever reason do not wish to live near each other into close proximity? Look at the former Yugoslavia where the groups where all forced together and all seemed well, but as soon as the overall oppression was lifted they all started fighting each other. If people naturally segregate themselves then it is best to leave things like that, and provided equality of opportunity is available to all then they will probably naturally integrate to varying extents. If you force people together then they will hate it, but seeing as they can't see or do much about the invisible state "hand" forcing them, will probably end up blaming and taking it out on each other.
Nonetheless this former Conservative leader (see they're not all restricted to Labour) of Kent County Council manages to get a Times front page (here) with the claim that racial quotas are needed in schools. I've always been against quotas of any kind, but racial ones are (for me) particularly repulsive and in my view do nothing at all to enhance anything.
From the article he claims it is: "... unacceptable that non-white pupils should form 90 per cent of the population of one school, when white pupils formed 90 per cent of a neighbouring school down the road". No what is unacceptable is that the state is always telling people where to send their children. If the free choice of those parents is to send their children to those respective schools then there is absolutely nothing wrong with it.
Even Trevor Phillips, chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality (a commission whose work in my opinion is done and could now be abolished) speaks out against Lord Bruce-Lockhart: "“I’m open to discussion, but I would not have said this is the first place we need to go,”" Similarly the Muslim Council of Britain with Tahir Alam weighs in against: "“You cannot tell a parent that they cannot send their child to the school of their choice because it has met its racial quota. The right of parents to send their children to the school they want is a fundamental right in this country,”" I'm not sure he's correct about it legally and fully being a fundamental right, but he seems to have the right idea.
There's more all about segregation and telling us what a bad thing that is, but is it really? If you have a fair society, with equality of opportunity then if people choose to divide themselves along ethnic or religious lines then provided they do not enforce those divisions on others, who cares? For example, if say I was Jewish and wished to live in Golders Green in London where I believe a lot of Jews live then what would be wrong with that? Nothing in my opinion; on the other hand, if for example, I was living in a Catholic area and a non-Catholic wanted to move next door to me, it would be wrong to use force, or "zoning" or segregationalist arguments to try and prevent them. Of course there would be nothing wrong with me deciding to move out myself if I didn't like the new neighbours.
Surely you are more likely to create problems if you force people who for whatever reason do not wish to live near each other into close proximity? Look at the former Yugoslavia where the groups where all forced together and all seemed well, but as soon as the overall oppression was lifted they all started fighting each other. If people naturally segregate themselves then it is best to leave things like that, and provided equality of opportunity is available to all then they will probably naturally integrate to varying extents. If you force people together then they will hate it, but seeing as they can't see or do much about the invisible state "hand" forcing them, will probably end up blaming and taking it out on each other.
