Only those who never knew it could be 'proud' of colonialism

A good opinion piece describing the feelings when someone from the colonized land hears about the colonizer boasting about their cultures & development over centuries. Although, the piece is about an British-Indian-African speaking against the British rule in African countries, this can be easily expanded to include America, & other European countries (Germany, France, Belgium, Spain etc.)

British boast that at one point in history their empire was so big that sun never set in that empire, & they are proud of the legacy of their empire. But those British also forget to mention what British did in those colonized lands, in Australia, SouthEast Asia, South Asia, Middle East, several African countries, & of course, even in US. British policies colonized, humiliated, & subjugated the native people of these lands. They looted & transferred billions of treasures (if we value those treasures in current money) to UK. Even after exiting their colonies, they still interfere with the domestic policies of their colonies, because they still think that these regions are their colonies.

Let's talk about Americans. They proudly say that America is the most powerful country in the world, they have the best "democracy" in the world, & other regions, & their residents, should learn from America that how a country & its people should live, so these people can also develop. Americans don't stop to think how did their country become so "powerful"? By constantly interfering with the domestic & foreign policies of those countries, & if someone doesn't listen to the dictated terms of America, then they are forced to change their thinking or get punished severely. This is what political scientists have named, "imperialism."

If we look this international, diplomatic relationship on a micro level, it's very similar to a school yard bully forcing another student to do what the bully wants him / her to do. If that another student refuses to do such act, he / she is severely punished. When this happens on the school grounds, all of us, including Americans, call it bullying & condemn it, wholeheartedly. But these same Americans conveniently forget what America does on the international level is exactly same; "do what I say or you won't like the consequences for disobeying."

After all, an Iraqi, a Panamanian, a Colombian, a Yemeni, an Afghani, & the list goes on & on, won't feel such affection for America. They have felt, & are still feeling & living, the death & destruction of what America did to them. They don't feel happy or proud that America is such a powerful country, because that power is achieved by spreading terror, violence, misery, suffering, death & destruction. All that knowledge, scientific or otherwise, is useless if it is not backed by work, which doesn't harm anyone else. All that philanthropic work of Americans around the world is no good if those same Americans' tax dollars & moral support is for that same American army, which spreads misery, death & destruction in the poor villages of Afghanistan, Iraq, & Yemen.

After all, as the author of this piece pointed out, all empires, old & new, are "motivated by greed & cultural disrespect," & when one country wants to forcibly rule another country, it will always spread more misery & destruction than create anything valuable.

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https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/only-those-who-never-knew-it-could-be-proud-of-colonialism-a6831196.html

Way back in 1973, when I was a postgraduate student at Oxford, I fell out with my new best friend, Samantha. She was the daughter of a South African businessman and I had been exiled from Uganda. Africa bonded us for a while, then things fell apart. She couldn’t understand why I went on and on about colonialism and its impact on the subjugated. And I couldn’t forgive her for not understanding. ...

A new survey found nearly 43% of Britons are proud of the British Empire. They hang on to these feelings because this nation has never gone through an honest assessment of that past. Though British rule did deliver some good, like all empires it was motivated by greed and cultural disrespect. The 18th-century historian Edward Gibbon observed, “The history of empires is the history of human misery.” They who have assiduously painted over dark episodes in British history should know that whitewash is unreliable and temporary. Truths will out.
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Ah, the many lessons we subjugated natives had to suffer through, amid the daily micro-humiliations of Western supremacy. The British banned home languages from playgrounds and spicy food in lunchboxes at our school; money spent on educating black children was a fraction of the funds made available for white kids in occupied lands. Just like in the UK, when the poor stole food, they were punished with extreme harshness. Resistance movements, like the Mau Mau in Kenya, had members tortured, imprisoned or killed.

Around 85 million Indian people died in famines between the years of 1760 and 1943, partly because of ruthless grain control policies. Churchill was unmoved when millions were perishing in Bengal. Indians, he thought, were “beastly people with a beastly religion.” They had no food because they bred like rabbits. There has not been a single deadly famine in India since independence. The Great Hedge of India (2001) by Roy Moxham described a vast hedge that was built by Victorian administrators so they could collect salt tax. Impoverished Indians were no longer able to afford this essential. Many suffered illnesses as a result or died.

What Rhodesians did to black people during this period remains hidden from British people. All they hear about is Mugabe, a monstrous product of colonialism, as was Idi Amin.

My last book, Exotic England, is both a critique of and a paean to my nation. I am here because they, imperialists, were there, in our lands. Though never equal, the relationship was not black and white. We learnt things, changed, fell in love sometimes. All of us have a responsibility to look honestly at this history, because so much of it lives on.

... Our education syllabus focuses on imperial vanities not realities. The media and arts do not yet reflect modern, global Britain.

So too, our foreign policies remain colonial. Blair was proud of the empire, so too Brown. The British still own the Chagos archipelago. In the Seventies, inhabitants were forcibly removed from the islands by our government and the largest atoll, Diego Garcia, turned into a US military base. A report quietly published last week suggests 98% of the dispossessed Chagossians want to go back. They do not matter. ...

That is not to mention the unconsciously colonialist British culture. A travel supplement on South Africa in a Sunday paper featured happy pictures almost all of European travellers and commentators, plus two local ladies selling fruit and a vineyard worker ... .

How British weapons may have been used during Israel's 2014 attack on Gaza

One of the major roots / causes of these "terrorism" related incidents, if not the sole reason, is this direct & indirect supply of arms & weapons, by developed countries (US, UK, France, Germany, Sweden, Canada, Russia & China) to developing & autocratically-ruled countries.

Now, this article has been published in a major newspaper from Britain & must be shared by thousands, thanks to social media, nowadays. Even if we assume that a Syrian or an Iraqi or an Afghani or a Yemeni or a Libyan or a Somalian or a Palestinian from Gaza or West Bank didn't have a clue about that rocket was made that killed all his family members, he may come to know about it through this article or through word of mouth or perhaps, even an "extremist" preacher, that that rocket, which wiped out my family & left me homeless was made in UK or US or Germany or France etc., then you can imagine how he would feel about that country.

As I have blogged previously that whenever this supply of arms & weapons around the world by developed countries would stop, the peace in the world would come about by itself. Spending billions of dollars on bombing campaigns in a far off land, against an enemy, which is radicalized due to these supply of weapons of death & destruction, is useless & completely fruitless.

The hypocrisy of European nations is laudable that they would arm Israel with their weapon technology on one hand, & then ban consumer products made in Occupied Territories under Israel.

Frankly, I think BDS movement (Boycotts, Divestment & Sanctions) is a useless move. What is a more effective move against Israel, against its illegal occupation? Banning a few consumer products & divesting out of a few investment portfolios or not supplying billion worth of arms & ammunition to Israel? Anyway, I digressed.

Essentially, business deals trump everything. GDP & exports from death & destruction is far more valuable than the life of a human being in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Afghanistan, Yemen & Palestine (Gaza & West Bank). Life of a human being is also as much important in France, US, UK, & other developed countries, but whenever "terrorists" strike in these countries, we need to think why some people, albeit "extremists", took this step. What we, ourselves, are doing, which might or might not be, radicalizing & pushing a few twisted individuals to take this drastic step? Are we involved somehow in hurting someone in their own countries? Are we, directly or indirectly, killing innocent people? Are we turning people, who may have never thought of taking up arms against us, into so-called "terrorists"?

The answers are actually very simple, lie bare & in the open. Us people in the West just have to look & examine our own actions without any predetermined bias to find the real roots of the problem & then we can end this problem of "terrorism" very easily & cheaply; by stopping the supply of all arms & weapons by developed countries to developing countries.
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http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/britain-still-arming-israel-despite-fear-weapons-will-be-used-against-gaza-10357621.html

The Government has been accused of ignoring its own evidence that British weaponry may have been used by Israel in its assault on Gaza last year after fresh arms deals worth £4m were approved by Britain within weeks of the conflict.

Figures seen by The Independent reveal that the UK gave the go-ahead for dozens of military exports to Israel, including components for drones & air-to-surface missiles, in the immediate aftermath of Operation Protective Edge, which claimed more than 2,000 lives, including those of hundreds of Palestinian civilians.

Campaigners said the exports showed that the Government was conducting “business as usual” in its arms sales to Israel & turning a “blind eye” to the risk that UK-made weaponry could be used in any fresh clashes between the Israelis & the Palestinians.

Last year’s bombardment provoked calls for Britain to halt all arms exports to Israel after ministers admitted they had found 12 instances where weapons containing British components may have been used in the Occupied Territory by Israeli forces.

The refusal of the Government to suspend these licences caused a split in the Coalition & led to the resignation of Foreign Office minister Baroness Warsi, who said Britain’s stance during the air & sea assault had been “morally indefensible”. She said all arms sales should be stopped with immediate effect.

Ministers pledged last year to review all existing licences to Israel to assess the risk of British weaponry being used in the Occupied Territories & publish the results.

But new figures published ... in a report on arms exports show that Britain has in the meantime continued to sell weaponry worth millions to Israel, both directly & via third party countries including Germany, America & Italy.

Andrew Smith, spokesman for Campaign Against Arms Trade, said: “More than 2,000 people died in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, & yet in the months immediately following the conflict it was business as usual for the UK Government & the arms companies it supports.

“Even the government has admitted it’s highly likely that UK weapons were used against Gaza last year. Now it is turning a blind eye to its own evidence. These arms sales send a message that arms company profits & military contracts are more important than the human rights of Palestinians.”

In the three months between the end of hostilities in Gaza in August last year & the end of December, the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills (BIS) approved 32 military exports from Britain to Israel worth £3.97m. The first licence was granted on 1 September - just 6 days after the announcement of an Israeli ceasefire.

Some £2.5m of that total was for items going directly to Israel, including components for military radars, submarines & jet engines.

The remainder was for the incorporation of UK-made weaponry, including components for military pilots’ head-up displays & military combat vehicles, into products to then be re-exported to other destinations, including Thailand & United Arab Emirates.

The data, based on the Government’s own quarterly arms export statistics, also details 36 further licences granted for British components sent to destinations including Germany, Italy & United States for incorporation into weaponry which was then to be sold to Israel.

The material included parts for air-to-surface & surface-to-surface missiles, components for combat helicopters & tank turrets, & material used for the command & control of drones.

At least two of the 12 pre-existing arms licences which the Government now admits were for weaponry which may have been used in Gaza were sent to Israel via Germany & the US.

Campaigners argue that the latest exports contain similar material which could also be used by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) if hostilities recommence in the Occupied Territories.

The Independent revealed earlier this year that the Government also approved arms exports worth nearly £7m to Israel in the 6 months prior to Operation Protective Edge, which Tel Aviv said was necessary to halt rocket attacks from Gaza by Hamas fighters.

Ministers have previously defended Britain’s exports to Israel by saying the country has a right to self-defence & the UK only grants licences where it is satisfied material will not be used for “internal repression” or to “aggravate existing tensions or conflicts”.

But the report by CAAT, War on Want & the Palestine Solidarity Campaign alleges that Britain is flouting its own rules by continuing to allow the export of material which carries the risk of being used in any future Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

David Wearing, the author of the report & a researcher at London University, said: “Ministers’ claims that the UK enforces stringent controls on arms exports simply do not stand up to scrutiny.

“Aside from the question of how individual pieces of UK-made kit are used, the approval of £4 million of military exports in the wake of Operation Protective Edge demonstrates a strong preference to maintain business as usual irrespective of what message this sends to Israel about its behaviour.”

Critics of Britain’s arms exports control system argue there are now repeated examples of the use of British-made weaponry in the Occupied Territories over the last 13 years, including the deployment of armoured personnel carriers & the use of F-16 fighters & Apache helicopters containing UK components.

The IDF’s Hermes drone was also deployed last year over Gaza. A version of the drone, used to pinpoint targets, contains components made by British companies but it is claimed this version was not used in Gaza.
...

The Government said its review of arms export licences to Israel, ordered last year, was "due to complete shortly" & insisted its monitoring of the situation in the Occupied Territories was taken into consideration when granting licences.

A spokeswoman said: "We will only approve equipment which is for Israel’s legitimate self defence & where we are satisfied it would be consistent with our human rights commitments & other international obligations.”

Number of sexual assaults reported on children rises to 85 a day

Although, it is despicable wherever children are sexually abused in the world, but these kinds of stories don't make the headlines in the West. When something like these surfaces in the developing world, people are up in arms that children are not being protected by the law enforcement authorities & government.

Usually, the numbers of sexual assaults on children in those countries is quite small, compared to thousands upon thousands being abused in England or North America.
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http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/jun/17/police-record-85-sexual-assaults-children-day-nspcc

Police are recording 85 sexual assaults on children each day after an increase of more than a third in reports of abuse & exploitation, new figures have revealed.

A total of 31,238 allegations of sexual offences against children, including rape, assault & grooming offences, were made to forces in England & Wales in 2013/14, research by the NSPCC has found. The figures show an increase of 38% – more than a third – on the previous year.

The majority of the victims were aged between 12 & 16 but more than one in four – 8,282 – were younger than 11, the charity said. Of those, 2,895 are estimated to be aged 5 or under, including 94 babies.

More than three-quarters of the reported abuse cases were against girls (24,457). Britain’s largest force, the Metropolitan police, recorded the highest number of sex crimes against children, with 3,523.

The data, obtained through freedom of information requests, reveals a significant year-on-year increase in the number of sex offences against children. In 2012-13, the same research showed that a total of 22,654 sexual crimes against children were recorded by 41 police forces. All 43 forces in England & Wales responded in the latest study.

The NSPCC said that until now the total had largely remained steady & the 38% rise was the biggest increase in 6 years of requesting the figures. Since 2008/09, the number has increased by almost 50%.

Last year the charity helped 2,400 young victims through its therapeutic recovery programme, but it says there are not enough services to support every child who has experienced abuse.

Jon Brown, senior policy officer for the NSPCC, said: “Our estimate is that there are 50,000 children in the country who need help & support for abuse who are not getting it.

“We need the government to step up & breach this gap. It cannot be right that so many children are going without support. We should be treating this as a public health problem given the damage done into adulthood to individuals who have been abused as children.”
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Police experts say the effect of the case has been to encourage more victims, both those reporting abuse in the past & ongoing abuse, to come forward because they are now more confident they will be believed.

But improved recording methods by police have also been cited as a possible reason for the increase.

Brown said it was not clear whether the increase in reports of abuse was due to an actual rise or increased confidence of victims coming forward.

He agreed with comments made last month by Simon Bailey, chief constable of Norfolk & the national police lead on child abuse, that there was a real increase in abuse taking place, much of it facilitated by the internet.

Responding to the new figures, Bailey said they still represented the tip of the iceberg.

“Many, many, more victims have found the confidence to report abuse, knowing they will be treated with sensitivity & respect, that we will listen to them & that we will take their allegations seriously,” he said.

“Increased reporting means we are dealing with unprecedented number of investigations but it is my belief that more abuse is being perpetrated. The internet has given people the ability to sit in their room & indulge fantasies in a way that simply was not available to them two decades ago.”

Last month Bailey revealed that the police are investigating more than 1,400 prominent men, including politicians, celebrities & those linked to institutions, over allegations that they have sexually abused children in the past. The investigations are being carried out by forces across the country & coordinated by a team running Operation Hydrant.
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Peter Wanless, the charity’s chief executive, said: “These figures are disturbing & clearly illustrate child sexual abuse is a continuing & widespread problem that needs urgent action. But we know this is still only a fraction of the true number of victims because some endure an agonising wait of many years before telling anyone – & others never reveal what has happened to them.”

How the 'poshness test' is denying working-class people top jobs

A few months ago, I blogged about how universities in US are laying out the red carpet for children of rich parents. That is skewing the education paradigm in favour of the rich. Well, this news from the UK is highlighting how the social favouritism for the rich doesn't stop at the school but continues on to working lives.

Now, this news may surprise that lot in the world, who think that there is merit & fairness in the Western world. In the Western world, most jobs, & definitely the good ones, are only available through the "power of Networking." Of course, employees of certain socio-economic background keep similar friends, & hence, when the boss says that a vacancy is coming up in a department (marketing, finance, human resources etc.), employees tell their friends (who are like them) about that vacancy.

Eventually, people of a certain socio-economic background end up in the same company. Promotions take place from that employee pool. And then, those people hire the same; other people in their own image. After all, it's just human psychology that we like other people who seem similar to us; in values, in finances, in habits, in education etc.

So, of course, the good jobs in the top firms will go to the people who are of a certain "posh" class. It doesn't matter what education or how good a person was in school, anymore; it all comes down to who you are friends with, nowadays. This is the case everywhere around the world.

At the end of the day, the so-called "modern" society is going back to the days of dark ages, when the few select elites of the society used to have everything in the society working for them; from politics to finances to education and work for their kids.
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http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/poshness-test-is-the-new-glass-ceiling-lack-of-wealthy-background-denies-working-class-people-top-10319541.html

Thousands of working-class people are being denied jobs at top firms, as they effectively need to pass a “poshness test” to join elite employers, according to the official body set up by the Government to promote social mobility.

Executives are more likely to judge potential recruits by how they speak than by how well they might do the job, research by Alan Milburn’s Social Mobility & Child Poverty Commission found.

Its review shows that more than two-thirds of the job vacancies in elite legal & City firms are filled by university graduates who have been through private or grammar schools. By comparison, nearly 90% of schoolchildren have a comprehensive education, compared to just 7% attending fee-paying schools & 4% going to selective grammar schools.

Discrimination comes about because the managers who conduct job interviews do not like working-class accents, the commission reported, but are impressed by young people who have travelled widely, which naturally favours those from well-off families.

One employer frankly admitted his firm’s recruitment practices were loaded against young working-class applicants. But, he asked: “How much mud do I have to sift through in that population to find that diamond?”

Even when a working-class youth is on first rung of the ladder, he or she is likely to be passed over for promotion because of “the tendency of more senior professionals to promote in their own image & thus ‘misrecognise’ merit,” the commission said.

“This research shows that young people with working-class backgrounds are being systematically locked out of top jobs,” said Mr. Milburn, the former Labour Cabinet minister who chairs the commission. “Elite firms seem to require applicants to pass a ‘poshness test’ to gain entry. Inevitably that ends up excluding youngsters who have the right sort of grades & abilities but whose parents do not have the right sort of bank balances.

“Thankfully, some of our country’s leading firms are making a big commitment to recruit the brightest & best, regardless of background. They should be applauded. But for the rest this is a ‘wake up & smell the coffee’ moment. “In some top law firms, trainees are more than 5 times likely to have attended a fee-paying school than the population as a whole. They are denying themselves talent, stymieing young people’s social mobility & fuelling the social divide that bedevils Britain. ”

The “poshness test” is one way in which Britain’s social divide is widening, despite the rise in the number of professional jobs, which is expected to increase by 2 million in the next 5 years.

Research has previously shown that graduates whose parents can support them while they do unpaid work have a marked advantage, because almost a third of graduates recruited for full-time jobs in the top firms have already worked for them, usually as unpaid interns. It has also been found that most major firms tend to recruit graduates from just 19 universities.

The commission, which advises the government on social mobility, has examined the recruiting history of 13 elite firms employing 45,000 of Britain’s highest paid professionals.

They concluded that the recruiting practices are now so skewed in favour of “poshness” that many of the firms’ own senior executives would have not been hired under the criteria now used.

Between 60% & 70% of job offers made by the leading accountancy firms are to graduates of the 24 leading universities that make up the Russell Group.
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But on a positive note, some firms have acknowledged that A-level results are not always a good indicator of performance, & have stopped taking them into account. In one firm that was studied, more than 10% of recruits would have failed if they had been judged on their school results.

Dr. Louise Ashley, of Royal Holloway, University of London, who led the research, urged firms to recruit from a wider range of applicants, & make sure that those from “diverse” backgrounds were not at a disadvantage. “Selection processes which advantage students from more privileged backgrounds remain firmly in place,” she said.

How a corporate cult captures & destroys our best graduates

Although, this opinion piece by George Monbiot is good, & I would love to agree with it completely but it has a few major flaws.

Yes, students are one of the most idealistic people of any nation. They see the problem from an innocent point of view &, without any conflicts of interests or any politics, they try to find the best resolution to the problem. But with the same vein, they try to resolve every problem in a very straight-forward way, without thinking how the systems are structured or controlled or influenced. Merely protesting against the government on the streets won't help much if your demographics is not influential enough in the hallowed halls of the political powerhouses. For instance, we can see what did Egyptian youths & students achieve after protesting for weeks on end. Or students protesting against rising tuition fees around the world have not been able to convince post-secondary institutions to lower tuition fees.

So, at the same time, it is very true that students want to see the world develop in the noblest of forms; without any discriminations & prejudices. But at the same time, they also want to achieve success in their careers & life. They all want to climb high in the corporate world based on their merits & hard work. They all want to work for large, international, world-renowned companies.

The primary reason for this is how the labour market works. If these graduates get in a large, international, world-renowned company at the beginning of their careers, they can build their careers from that point, onwards & upwards. Other companies will look at their resumes & CVs & will be immediately impressed with their work experience, which they achieved at the large company. Those graduates may even build strong & influential networks by working in large multinational companies. For example, a graduate working in McKinsey or Bain or Boston Consulting Group or Deloitte or KPMG or General Electric or Phillips or Honda or Toyota or Google or Facebook etc will be able to transfer between different companies, in the same industry or even in different industries, very easily, due to how his/her work experiences will be looked upon by his future employers. A management consultant from McKinsey gets the doors flung open for him/her at other management consulting firms or even at non-consulting firms, like Google or General Electric.

Besides, the work experiences being favourably looked upon & networks being built, the salaries at these firms are good, too. But, I will not discuss the finance part of the argument, since, not every graduate chases the biggest pay packet. For many, salary comes second to experience.

Working for non-profits may elate a graduate for a short while, but, unless, they are willing to spend their whole life in the same company or stay within the non-profit sector, their experiences will most likely be considered not as important as a graduate's who has worked in a major consultancy firm. Is it unfair? Definitely. Should this be changed? Definitely. But who is willing to change it? There are not enough principals of the consultancy firms in this world who will look at a resume or CV of a person working at a non-profit agency & be immediately impressed.

Heck, even in personal lives, telling someone that one is working at such & such multinational consultancy firm or tech firm or other international company not only seem impressive but helps a lot in other ways. For instance, in Asian, South Asian, South American, & African societies, the measure of success of one's life is how big & well-known the employer of that person is. It doesn't even matter if that particular person is a janitor in that company. Parents & family members proudly boast that their family member is an employee of such a well-known international company. They don't care if that company is making weapons of mass destruction or destroying the environment or even killing the very soul of the society.

So, I agree with the argument that smart students should not be courted by large firms right before their graduations; when they may have not seen the world enough to make the right decision to choose the right career path for themselves. I also agree with the argument that students who want to work in such places where they can achieve their ideals, whatever they might be. But I disagree with the point that universities are failing in their duty of care by letting their graduates go for work for major "soulless" companies. Regardless of how much or how little universities market these companies to their intelligent students, those students will chase the large multinational companies because they know they will be able to travel the world, receive large pay packets, & most important of all, gain the work experience which will propel their careers in the stratosphere (assuming they don't screw up somewhere to derail their careers).

Everyone wants to go for the highest purposes of humankind but when push comes to shove, those noble ideas & meanings are pushed aside. It's not the fault of the universities or the companies or the young graduates, but the structure of the whole labour market is to blame. It rewards networks, not merits. It rewards experience gained at a multinational company, not the experience gained at a non-profit agency. It casts aside those who want to pursue highest purposes of humankind for the ones who are selfishly chasing money & careers.
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http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jun/03/city-corporates-destroy-best-minds

To seek enlightenment, intellectual or spiritual; to do good; to love & be loved; to create & to teach: these are the highest purposes of humankind. If there is meaning in life, it lies here.

Those who graduate from the leading universities have more opportunity than most to find such purpose. So why do so many end up in pointless & destructive jobs? Finance, management consultancy, advertising, public relations, lobbying: these & other useless occupations consume thousands of the brightest students. To take such jobs at graduation ... is to amputate life close to its base.

I watched it happen to my peers. People who had spent the preceding years laying out exultant visions of a better world, of the grand creative projects they planned, of adventure & discovery, were suddenly sucked into the mouths of corporations dangling money like angler fish.

At first they said they would do it for a year or two, “until I pay off my debts”. Soon afterwards they added: “and my mortgage”. Then it became, “I just want to make enough not to worry any more”. A few years later, “I’m doing it for my family”. Now, in middle age, they reply, “What, that? That was just a student fantasy.”

Why did they not escape, when they perceived that they were being dragged away from their dreams? I have come to see the obscene hours some new recruits must work – sometimes 15 or 16 a day – as a form of reorientation, of brainwashing. You are deprived of the time, sleep & energy you need to see past the place into which you have been plunged. You lose your bearings, your attachments to the world you inhabited before, & become immersed in the culture that surrounds you. Two years of this & many are lost for life.

Employment by the City has declined since the financial crash. Among the universities I surveyed with the excellent researcher John Sheil, the proportion of graduates taking jobs in finance & management consultancy ranges from 5% at Edinburgh to 13% at Oxford, 16% at Cambridge, 28% at the London School of Economics & 60% at the London Business School. But to judge by the number of applications & the rigour of the selection process, these businesses still harvest many of the smartest graduates.

Recruitment begins with lovebombing of the kind that cults use. They sponsor sports teams & debating societies, throw parties, offer meals & drinks, send handwritten letters, use student ambassadors to offer friendship & support. They persuade undergraduates that even if they don’t see themselves as consultants or bankers (few do), these jobs are stepping stones to the careers they really want. They make the initial application easy, & respond immediately & enthusiastically to signs of interest. They offer security & recognition when people are most uncertain & fearful about their future. And there’s the flash of the king’s shilling: the paid internships, the golden hellos, the promise of stupendous salaries within a couple of years. Entrapment is a refined science.

We have but one life. However much money we make, we cannot buy it back. As far as self-direction, autonomy & social utility are concerned, many of those who enter these industries & never re-emerge might as well have locked themselves in a cell at graduation. They lost it all with one false step, taken at a unique moment of freedom.

John Sheil & I sent questions to 8 of the universities with the highest average graduate salaries: Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial, the LSE, the London Business School, Warwick, Sheffield & Edinburgh. We asked whether they seek to counter these lavish recruitment drives & defend students from the love blitz. With one remarkable exception, their responses ranged from feeble to dismal. Most offered no evidence of any prior interest in these questions. Where we expected deep deliberation to have taken place, we found instead an intellectual vacuum.

They cited their duty of impartiality, which, they believe, prevents them from seeking to influence students’ choices, & explained that there were plenty of other careers on offer. But they appear to have confused impartiality with passivity. Passivity in the face of unequal forces is anything but impartial. Impartiality demands an active attempt to create balance, to resist power, to tell the dark side of the celestial tale being pummelled into the minds of undergraduates by the richest City cults.

Oxford University asked us, “isn’t it preferable that [the City] recruits bright, critical thinkers & socially engaged graduates who are smart enough to hold their employers to account when possible?”. Oh blimey. This is a version of the most desperate excuse my college friends attempted: “I’ll reform them from within.” This magical thinking betrays a profound misconception about the nature & purpose of such employers.

They respond to profit, the regulatory environment, the demands of shareholders, not to the consciences of their staff. We all know how they treat whistleblowers. Why should “bright, critical thinkers & socially engaged graduates” be dispatched on this kamikaze mission? I believe these universities are failing in their duty of care.

The hero of this story is Gordon Chesterman, head of the careers service at Cambridge, & the only person we spoke to who appears to have given some thought to these questions. He told me his service tries to counter the influence of the richest employers.

It sends out regular emails telling students “if you don’t want to become a banker, you’re not a failure”, & runs an event called “But I don’t want to work in the City”. It imposes a fee on rich recruiters & uses the money to pay the train fares of nonprofits. He expressed anger about being forced by the government to provide data on graduate starting salaries.

“I think it’s a very blunt & inappropriate means [of comparison], that rings alarm bells in my mind.”

Elsewhere, at this vulnerable, mutable, pivotal moment, undergraduates must rely on their own wavering resolve to resist peer pressure, the herd instinct, the allure of money, flattery, prestige & security.

Students, rebel against these soul-suckers! Follow your dreams, however hard it may be, however uncertain success might seem.


A fully referenced version of this article can be found at Monbiot.com

3,000 children enslaved in Britain after being trafficked from Vietnam

After I keep hearing news of how adults & youths, of both genders, were keep getting enslaved in war torn countries, where there is no law & order, I came upon this article & thought to put some perspective to this news of slavery ... in a developed Western country. Now, this article is highlighting the problem of slavery in UK, but US & Australia have a similar problem.

These 3,000 children are enslaved in UK. They are being sexually & physically abused & put in domestic labour as a slave. The authorities, as usual, keep saying that they are trying to end it but losing the war against slavery. The reality of 21st century is that the slavery has actually increased in this century.

Slavery is wrong, regardless of whoever or wherever it happens. But, considering, there are almost 10,000 to 13,000 slaves in Britain, then how can the Western developed countries expect people in war torn countries to prosecute people in slave trade (criminal gangs & organizations) & protect people from being enslaved. It's very easy to blame others for their practices & ideologies before judging oneself where he/she is standing.

Furthermore, we need to keep in mind that these criminal gangs are only suppliers of slaves. Supply cannot exist without demand. That means then that people in the West, regardless of their race, education, national origins, ethnicity, religion, are open to knowingly taking in a slave, as long as it benefits them, somehow. Slavery exists because the general public demands it. Now, it might be a small section of the general public who is demanding it, but they definitely are the customers. The public supports slavery by either directly buying the slaves (usually rich elites) or indirectly asking for quality products at the lowest prices possible, which is possible only by businesses paying no or extremely low wages (recall my blog on Thailand's fishing, & Australian & Spanish agricultural industries employing slaves).

Since, we also know that criminal gangs would not be involved into this business without making a good return on their investments, they charge high prices for these slaves. So, their customers must be well-heeled to be paying such high prices for these slaves, which, in turn, means that they themselves are earning handsomely. So, the "respected" rich elites of our society don't hesitate from slavery. Hey, I thought, that happened in 1800s in the Western countries. So, after all, it seems like that the society hasn't developed, at all.
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http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/may/23/vietnam-children-trafficking-nail-bar-cannabis

Hien was 10 when he arrived in Britain. He did not know where he was or where he had been. He knew only that he was here to work. Since he emerged from the back of a lorry after crossing from Calais 7 years ago, his experience has been one of exploitation & misery. He has been a domestic slave, been trafficked into cannabis factories, been abused & beaten & was eventually prosecuted & sent to prison. It has been a life of terror, isolation & pain.

... . He is one of an estimated 3,000 Vietnamese children in forced labour in the UK, used for financial gain by criminal gangs running cannabis factories, nail bars, garment factories, brothels & private homes. Charged up to £25,000 for their passage to the UK, these children collectively owe their traffickers almost £75m.

While there is growing awareness of the use of trafficked Vietnamese people in the booming domestic cannabis trade, child trafficking experts are now warning that the British authorities are unable to keep up with the speed at which UK-based Vietnamese gangs are recruiting & exploiting children for use in other criminal enterprises such as gun-smuggling, crystal meth production & prostitution rings.

“By our calculations there are around 3,000 Vietnamese children in the UK who are being used for profit by criminal gangs,” says Philip Ishola, former head of the UK’s Counter Human Trafficking Bureau.

“The police & the authorities are now aware that trafficked children are being forced to work in cannabis farms but this is really only the tip of the iceberg. Often the same child will be exploited not just in a cannabis farm but also in myriad different ways. This is happening right under our noses & not enough is being done to stop it.”

Police admit that they are struggling with the speed at which Vietnamese criminal gangs are diversifying & expanding their activities across the England & into Scotland & Northern Ireland. “Right now we are just fighting in the trenches, fighting in the nail bars,” said detective inspector Steven Cartwright, who heads Police Scotland’s human trafficking unit. “It is vital that we that we understand new methods being deployed by the gangs because we need to stop demand at one end or limit their ability to make money at the other.”

Hien’s journey to the UK started when he was taken from his village at the age of 5 by someone who claimed to be his uncle. As an orphan, he had no option but to do as he was told. He spent 5 years travelling overland, completely unaware which countries he was going through, from Vietnam before being smuggled across the Channel & taken to a house in London. Here he spent the next 3 years trapped in domestic servitude, cooking & cleaning for groups of Vietnamese people who would come in & out of the property where he was held.

The men in the house beat him & forced him to drink alcohol until he was sick. Other things happened to him that he still cannot talk about. He was never allowed out of the house & was told that if he tried to escape, the police would arrest him & take him to prison.

During his time in that house, Hien says, many other Vietnamese children were brought in. They told him that they were here to work & to pay off debts for their families back home. They would stay for a few days & then be taken away, & Hien never saw them again. He became homeless after his “uncle” abandoned him. He slept in parks & ate out of bins. He was eventually picked up by a Vietnamese couple, who offered him a place to stay but then forced him to work in cannabis farms in flats in first Manchester & then Scotland.

In his testimony to police, he says he still does not understand exactly what the plants were, although he understands now that they are worth a lot of money. He looked after the plants, using pesticides that made him ill, & only left the flat when he helped transport the leaves to be dried elsewhere. He was locked in, threatened, beaten & completely isolated from the outside world.

“I was never paid any money for working there,” he says. “I did not stay there for money but because I was afraid & I hoped the whole thing would end soon.”

When the police came, they found Hien alone with the plants. He told his story to the police, but was still sent to young offenders’ institution in Scotland, where he spent 10 months on remand, charged with cannabis cultivation. He was released only after the intervention of a crown prosecutor led to him being identified as a victim of trafficking.

Vietnamese children such as Hien are easy pickings for the increasingly sophisticated trafficking gangs operating between the UK & Vietnam. Children make up nearly a quarter of the estimated 13,000 people trafficked into the UK every year, & Vietnamese children are the largest group of children trafficked to the UK. The United Nations Office on Drugs & Crime estimates that 30 Vietnamese children arrive illegally in the UK every month, on well-established smuggling routes.

“Children are an increasingly valuable assets to criminal gangs because they are easy to get hold of, easily intimidated & exploited, & easy to keep isolated & unaware of what is really happening around them, which makes it far less likely for them to be able to disclose anything of use to the police,” says Ishola.

When it comes to Vietnamese children, he says, the culture of seeing a child as the “golden egg”, who will be sent to work abroad & provide for their families still prevails. This attitude is exploited by gangs, who deceive families into believing that there is legitimate work in Britain for their children.

“During their journey to the UK, the traffickers keep charging the children more & more money, & by the time they arrive, the pressure to pay back this enormous debt is a key factor in their vulnerability to ending up trapped in forced labour,” he says. “Upon arrival the children are faced with a highly organised system of criminal activity, with methods of control ranging from extreme physical brutality to debt bondage. Before they even arrive, that trap is set for them.”

Members of the Vietnamese diaspora in London told the Observer that they had seen an explosion in child trafficking by criminal gangs operating on the peripheries of their communities in recent years. “Some of these children & victims have told me that it cost them £25,000 to get to the UK,” said one Vietnamese community leader in London, who did not want to be named. “They come with a debt & they are not allowed to leave until the debt is paid. That is slavery & exploitation.”

Like Hien, many of the children end up working on cannabis farms. The link between child trafficking & the UK’s domestic cannabis industry has been increasing, with Vietnamese children the main group at risk. According to a 2014 report by the NGO AntiSlavery International, almost all potential victims of trafficking linked to cannabis are Vietnamese, & more than 80% are children.

Many of these children are subsequently prosecuted by the UK justice system, despite many being identified as potential victims of trafficking. This has led to Vietnamese children becoming the second-largest ethnic group held in youth detention centres across the UK.

Vietnamese gangs have historically dominated the UK’s £1bn cannabis trade & have been instrumental in the proportion of domestically grown cannabis in Britain rising from 15% in 2005 to about 90% now. While the trade remains enormously profitable – the number of Vietnamese cannabis factories in the UK has grown by 150% in the past 2 years – their grip has been weakened thanks to increased law enforcement & under competition from British growers. Now they are finding new & more efficient ways of doing business.

“In terms of law enforcement, I think we’re about 2 years behind the curve,” says Daniel Silverstone, a criminologist at London Metropolitan University who has written extensively on Vietnamese gangs in the UK.

“Traffickers have changed their modus operandi in recent years in direct response to the attention & interventions of law enforcement. A few years ago it was almost exclusively cannabis farms, but their business interests have now become much more diverse. So we’re seeing an expansion into Scotland & Northern Ireland, the use of nail bars for forced labour & money laundering, & moves into drugs like crystal meth.” This means that children, who are an integral part of the gangs’ business operations, are also now being moved into other areas of exploitation. “As their grip on the domestic cannabis trade slips a little, they are looking to maximise their profits from these children in whatever way they can,” he adds.

The Metropolitan police say that there is now much more awareness of the complexity of tackling the UK’s child trafficking problem but that the closed nature of the Vietnamese community has made things difficult. “What has persistently been a challenge for us is making inroads into this community,” says Phil Brewer, who heads its new human trafficking & kidnap unit. “We usually only find out about a child when we make a raid & find someone in a cannabis factory or nail bar, but often this person has been through multiple forms of exploitation before we reach them.”

Parosha Chandran, a leading human rights barrister & UN expert on trafficking, has represented Vietnamese children charged with cannabis cultivation who have gone through many different trafficking situations before being moved into cannabis farms.

“Trafficked Vietnamese children have rarely faced just one type of forced labour,” she says. “I’ve come across cases where young people have been subjected to a spectrum of exploitative practices. In one of my cases, for example, the child was forced to look after people’s homes & care for their children, when he was just a child himself, then he was taken to work cleaning a nail bar, then moved to another place where he was forced to sew labels on to clothing – & all of this happened before he even arrived in the cannabis factory.”

In March the UK passed its first Modern Slavery Bill, designed to increase the prosecution of traffickers & give better protection to victims of modern slavery in the UK. However, Chandran says that Vietnamese children continue to be prosecuted for cannabis cultivation while their traffickers remain free.

“The Modern Slavery Act’s central focus on prosecution is misguided & its provisions fail to fully protect the rights of trafficked children,” she says. “We as a democratic country need to find durable solutions to ensure these children remain protected from harm for the rest of their lives.”

...

Methods used to lure children from Vietnam to the UK are also becoming increasingly sophisticated, including use of social media. “Vietnamese children are brought to the UK, taken in by Vietnamese adults & put to domestic work,” says Swat Pandi, from the NSPCC’s child trafficking advice centre. “The child feels indebted to the adults for food & shelter & is told they need to return the favour by looking after cannabis plants. These children suffer high levels of neglect, emotional abuse &, in the absence of any protective factors, are highly vulnerable to physical & sexual abuse.”

Despite the government’s pledge to end modern slavery & the UK’s first modern slavery bill, passed in March, Chitty says she has seen no change in the numbers of Vietnamese children coming through her charity’s services. “It’s very much business as usual,” she says. “We still have a problem with immediate safeguarding & appropriate placements for trafficked children. And young people are still being criminalised by the courts.”

Even when a child has been taken out of trafficking & come under the care of a local authority, he or she is likely to return to the control of the traffickers. In 2013, a report by independent thinktank the Centre for Social Justice concluded that 60% of trafficked children in local authority care go missing, nearly a third of them within a week of arrival. Most are never found again. There are increasing reports of children being retrafficked from foster homes or when they have been given asylum status.

“I don’t think we understand the entire enterprise,” says detective inspector Cartwright. “Despite our best intentions I think we’re not offering them anything that would persuade them to stay. Many will get retrafficked because we didn’t offer them a better alternative to what the traffickers are providing.”

Hien is trying to rebuild his life after being given asylum in Scotland, but is struggling to find peace after years of trauma. “I still worry that the traffickers may find me & come to my house. But I know this time that I will ask for help,” he says. “I think they have justice here but I wish they hadn’t kept me in prison for so long. By telling my story, I want people to understand what I have experienced here.”

Tenant evictions reach six-year high amid rising rents & benefit cuts in UK

This is what's happening with English residents & citizens in their own country, in UK, that not only government has cut down on the social benefit payments the public used to receive, but they are also now evicting tenants who can't pay rents, due to a hardship has fallen upon them.

Developing countries don't have the social safety net which can help residents & citizens when they fall upon hard circumstances, but it seems like that developed countries are going the same way.

If you are thinking it's just the story of one country, UK, then you are sorely mistaken. Although, you should realize that London is considered one of the financial hubs of the world, right beside New York. The cruel irony is that the number of homeless people in New York City has also doubled in the past decade (2004 - 2014).

I believe it's safe to assume that a homeless Briton looks no different from a homeless American or a homeless Pakistani or a homeless Syrian or a homeless Nigerian or a homeless Iraqi or a homeless Somali. I think you get the picture.

Who do we blame for this rising inequality in this "modern" world of 21st century? Governments, economy, financial systems, businesses, elites, corruption, immigrants, terrorism etc.?
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http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/may/14/tenant-evictions-reach-six-year-high-rising-rents-benefit-cuts

The number of tenants evicted from their homes is at a six-year high, according to new figures, as rising rents & cuts to benefits make tenancies increasingly unaffordable.

County court bailiffs in England & Wales evicted more than 11,000 families in the first 3 months of 2015, an increase of 8% on the same period last year & 51% higher than 5 years ago.

The increase in the number of tenants losing their homes means 2015 is on course to break last year’s record levels. Nearly 42,000 families were evicted from rental accommodation in 2014, the highest number since records began in 2000.

Rental prices have soared in many UK cities but wages failing to keep pace with rising costs & caps to benefits have left many poorer tenants unable to make payments.

Separate figures also ... showed almost 59,000 households have had their benefits capped in the past 2 years. Nearly half of those families were in London, where the average monthly rent for a two-bedroom home is £2,216.

Housing charities said the figures were a glaring reminder that many tenants were struggling to maintain a roof over their heads, & they called on the ... government to do more to tackle a housing crisis in the UK.

The latest repossession statistics, published by the Ministry of Justice, reveal the highest number of evictions in a single quarter since 2009, when comparable records began, with nearly 126 families forced out every day.

Between January & March, 11,307 tenants & their families were evicted by bailiffs, compared with a figure of 10,380 between October & December last year, & 10,482 in the first quarter of 2014.

The record figure comes as the number of landlord repossession claims ... also rose. Claims were up 10% on the last quarter, but at 42,226 they remained below a six-year high of 47,208 in the first quarter of 2014.

Claims by both private & social landlords were up, the figures showed, although most of the rise was explained by claims by the latter. Social landlords were behind nearly 5 times as many attempts to recover properties than private landlords, the figures showed. These landlords are typically housing associations providing homes at lower rents than the market rate, often to tenants who receive housing benefit.

In the first 3 months of the year, 64% of possession claims were made by social landlords. These 27,204 court actions came alongside 5,551 made by private landlords & 9,741 accelerated claims, which could have been by either social or private landlords.

In May 2014, when the threat of evictions reached its highest level for a decade, the National Housing Federation, which represents housing associations across England, told the Guardian the bedroom tax was causing problems for social landlords. The policy cuts the amount of housing benefit paid to social housing tenants whose homes are deemed too large for their requirements. Benefit sanctions were also thought to be causing problems.

But many housing associations, particularly in London & the south-east, have turned out tenants as they have sought to redevelop generations-old estates to take advantage of the big rise in property values. This has in turn led to an increase in the number of grassroots campaigns to oppose evictions, such as the Focus E15 mothers.

The MoJ figures came on the same day as the Department for Work & Pensions revealed that 58,690 households across the UK had their benefits capped to a maximum of £26,000 a year since April 2013. Londoners were the worst affected, with 26,636 families facing a cut in benefits over the period to February 2015, followed by 5,953 in the rest of the south-east.

DWP proposals to meet the Conservatives’ pledge to cut £12bn from the welfare budget, in documents leaked to the Guardian last week, included barring under-25s from claiming housing benefit, increasing the bedroom tax on certain categories of tenants, limiting welfare payments by family size & freezing welfare benefits at current levels.

Responding to the eviction statistics, Campbell Robb, chief executive of Shelter, said: “Today’s figures are a glaring reminder that sky-high housing costs & welfare cuts are leaving thousands of people battling to keep a roof over their heads.

“Every day at Shelter we see the devastating impact of a housing market at boiling point, with the cost of renting so high that many families are living in fear that just one thing like losing their job or becoming ill could leave them with the bailiffs knocking at the door.

“The new government must make sure people aren’t left to fall through the cracks & hurtling towards homelessness by preserving, if not strengthening, the frayed housing safety net to protect ordinary families desperately struggling to make ends meet.”

Betsy Dillner, director of the campaign group Generation Rent, said: “These record eviction figures & signs that they are accelerating are a stark reminder of the housing crisis that the government must urgently start taking seriously now they’re back in power.

“Whether it’s an inability to pay expensive rents or a landlord’s desire to take back their property, the fact that more than 40,000 families were forced out of their homes last year is a symptom of the government’s failure to create a sustainable housing market.”

The housing minister, Brandon Lewis, defended the government’s performance, pointing out that mortgage repossessions had fallen drastically, keeping owner-occupiers in their “hard-earned homes”.

He said: “Mortgage repossessions continue to fall at 56% lower than this time last year, & the lowest annual figure since the series began in 1987. Meanwhile, numbers of county court mortgage possession claims continue to fall to the lowest quarterly number since records began. This is thanks to our work to tackle the deficit & keep interest rates low, helping more families to stay in their hard earned homes.

“There are strong protections in place to guard families against the threat of homelessness. We increased spending to prevent homelessness, with over £500m made available to help the most vulnerable in society & ensure we don’t return to the bad old days when homelessness in England was nearly double what it is today.”

Sats stress is crushing children's love of learning

A great opinion piece on how current education system in UK (but I can expand it to pretty much all education systems around the world, except maybe a few ones, which don't conform to what's being said here) are not igniting the flame of life-long learning & curiosity in children in school & instead, making them hate schools & learning in general by forcing them to do things in school, which is killing their curiosity & love of learning.

I see this everyday around me. People who were very smart & intelligent in school life (elementary, secondary, post-secondary etc.), & are still intelligent in their work lives, eschew even basic reading. Some still are curious & love to read but they are mostly reading fiction novels of romance & thrill. These are majority of our populace. Heck, these people don't even like to watch documentaries, to expand their learning & mental horizons.

So where's the disconnect that such intelligence in school life stays behind in their school lives?

Problem is the current modern education system. They are trying to make children rote learners or mere tools for teachers & the education boards to show that their students are successful in schooling system, & hence, those education boards & teachers are meeting their periodic targets.

Kids to adults in the education system come to learn that if you want a good job, assuming it is being awarded on merit & not on networks, then you need as high marks as there can be, & based on current education system, those marks can be achieved through rote memorization, regurgitation, & essentially, doing what the teacher / professor is telling me to do in class & in exam.

But that's not how learning & school used to be. Learning & education system built by such great teachers / philosophers as Socrates, Plato, & Aristotle were not based on strict tracking & meeting targets but essentially based on absorbing the knowledge for life. Their idea of learning was for learning is for life. They created curiosity in their students. They wanted their students to not study just enough to get a great mark in the next exam, but to think and learn about themselves, their society, & their world around them; however small it might be, whatever it might be.

That's why, in today's "modern" world, lots & lots of people are "educated" but they have not learnt anything. They are considered "educated" based on the number of degrees they have earned, which they got by regurgitating the materials on exam papers. They never actually gained the powerful idea of how to be curious & actually read & watch & travel to learn. Most people's lives don't revolve around learning about themselves, their society, & their world around them, but what can I learn now, which will help me make some money. Well, that course of "learning" has got us where the world is today; everyone is at someone's proverbial throat, because people have lost humanity & selfishness is enjoying its day out.
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http://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/2015/may/16/secret-teacher-sats-stress-childrens-love-of-learning

It’s funny really, we’ve all been there. We all remember sitting on the carpet with our legs crossed, listening wide-eyed to our teachers reading a book to us in class. That’s what many of us recall about primary school – how fun it was & how free we were to explore our ideas.

In many ways, that’s the point; to immerse our children in a world where learning is fun, to open up their imaginations & encourage them to be inquisitive in a safe space. As Socrates said, education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel. As a primary teacher, that’s a good guiding mantra. Let children discover, their eyes light up & sparks ignite.

Unfortunately, in the wake of their Sats preparation, my year 6 class – & I’m sure every year 6 child across the land – would probably say this isn’t so. Flame lighting has been swapped for vessel filling. Yes, they’ve been learning & yes, they have made “progress” (lots of it for some). We know this because we’ve measured their strict diet of test, drill, repeat twice every half term for the entire year.

The issue here is whether it was worth it, because in so many respects the drive for floor targets & pupil premium percentage increases have robbed students of their primary school experience. The regime is focused on spelling & grammar, reading comprehensions & mental maths – combined with extra practice tests, interventions & booster clubs fitted in anywhere between dusk & dawn. Children can hardly remember what an art book looks like, or what a decent PE lesson feels like, or what a music lesson sounds like. They’re so confined to their desks that the process of developing the whole child has gone out of the window & their actual interests & other skills no longer have a place in school life.

Little Ricky, for example, loves geography. He’s fascinated by the world around him & can’t wait to get the atlases out on the search for capital cities, rivers, mountain chains & forests. This is where he comes alive & feels worthwhile. Excitement fills his wings & he’s ready to fly anywhere in the world – until he is pulled out for his maths booster. Yes, he needs extra support in adding fractions & rotating around a point, but seeing his shoulders drop & his smile fade is heartbreaking & frustrating. Nobody is denying he needs his maths – he has to be ready for secondary school & his future – but it’s just as important that he gets time & space to be him. He needs to connect with what he wants to learn because that’s where he switches on. That’s what he’s good at; that’s where we get him.

It’s at this point we need to wonder who we’re doing this for. Is it really for him? Because it feels like we’re missing who he really is, who they all are. What sparks their flame gets dampened. If your dyslexic child flourishes through art, tough. If the quiet, timid child at the back of your classroom comes out of their shell through drama, forget it. If the young carer, who comes in late because they’ve been changing their parent’s bed, feels they can express themselves through a map, no chance. Get down & give me the area of a quadrilateral.

Already so many children are being turned off school. It’s not just my Victorias & Emilys, who read every night & write stories for fun. It’s not just these children who are going home & telling mum it’s all getting too much. At least these children can complain – my Jaleels & my Delanes don’t know how to, their protest is not so eloquent. They share their thoughts through their poor punctuality & lack of focus. They are sick more, turn up less & don’t want to be there because it’s easier not to try than fail to get the results they “need”. A regime of test & repetition, rote & regurgitation is putting them off. They’re bored. They’ve had enough. They are saturated.

Apart from lesson objectives, all these children are really being taught is that school is a chore & a burden. Because of their Sats, these children are anxious & unhappy, rather than excited or inspired. They are only 11 years old & already asking for extra papers to take home so they can cram over the weekend. Some have trouble sleeping & can’t eat, while others stop attending school altogether. This is all before they have even started secondary education.

Of course, their levels will be great; we make sure of that – we have no choice. But what are they really learning? They are learning that education isn’t stimulating & nobody is listening to their needs. The kindling of their educational flames is fast being extinguished by tracking & targets.

We need to ask ourselves what we want for our children. Do we want them to learn that their passions, interests & dreams don’t count? Do we want them to learn that bottom lines & level 4s are more important than their self-confidence & talents? Or do we want them to know that we hear what they have to say? That the question is more important than the answer? That learning is a lifelong journey that should inspire?

As teachers, it’s our job to ensure that the flame of learning gets kindled & burns brightly for all, whatever their capacity, interests or age. But we need to think really carefully about what we put children through, because there’s no way we can engage them through more years of study if they’ve already run out of appetite.