I’m going viral on the other app because I posted “acab includes teachers” i’m facing a lot of verbal abuse & mockery from people that haven’t read a word of school abolition theory or even watched a video or read a zine or article
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Every time I start to loosen my generally critical attitude towards the philosophy and rhetoric of modern anarchists one of you just goes and posts about bathtub insulin or bedtime abolition and I get sent back to my original stance at the speed of light. Deeply unserious.
It's the idea that once society collapses and the non-capitalist utopia arrives people with Diabetes will be find because someone will just make insulin in their bathtub and it will be safe. We don't need governments or regulations or companies, everyone will just freely take care of stuff.
Generally speaking, the philosophical framework of an anarchist society is that in the absence of any hierarchical structures or regulations society can and will coast by on good vibes.
This is why while philosophically i am an anarchist, I can't get behind the idea of trying to implement it society-wide in one go. It should be a shift in attitudes away from power hierarchies and oppression in all parts of life, in whatever way makes sense to make a better world for everyone.
Oh, that’s completely unhinged. FWIW, if there’s a complete societal collapse, us type one diabetics will mostly be dying horribly. Or, if you’re very skilled and have the means, you can extract insulin from animals like we did in the olden days. Making synthetic insulin in a bathtub is absolute BS.
at which point we re-discover horseshoe theory is real because this is the actual serious opinion of the far right ghouls currently dismantling our government at the speed of a dissolving Musk rocket.
And at the intersection of the ends of the horseshoe you basically end up with the most whacko of Libertarian/Sovereign Citizen types of thinking, and you end up with the Bear Town
net result of torching all the things pretty much the same though, mostly because the far right ghouls tend to come in and bulldoze whatever fragile, chaotic coalition was built in the power vacuum.
often, anyway.
I mean, especially when people have no idea what they're doing
I thought it was more the idea that centralizing the process of creating medication for anything creates a system where people can enact authority over those dependent on it? That If you have access to your own source of insulin, no one can use it to control you?
Self sufficiency in the absence of the current capitalist system is one thing but going out like gene hackman because the collective’s insulin barista rebelled against the oppressive power structure of a production schedule is another.
I see I view bathtub Insulin as a path to self sufficiency (or at least small communal sufficiency) vs handing over the reigns to another group simply because they aren't doing so for capitalism
Modern medicine is not possible without centralized production. Extending beyond diabetes, you can't make safe and effective vaccines, PrEP, or gammaknife machines without hierarchical organization
I think plenty of people here are familiar with leftist critiques of state-run education, they just arent interested in engaging seriously when it’s reduced to such inflammatory and simplistic language as “ACAB includes teachers”
I’ve mostly heard ACAB used to talk about police as a system, so I’m curious—how do you see teachers fitting into that? Are you talking about the school system as a whole, or something else?
Also you’re a stupid asshole literally telling people to read and watch shit to educate themselves, like a fucking teacher. acab includes you apparently
In Anarchistnoa’s defense this was just a copypasta shitpost. Their ideas about education are absurd and reflect very poorly on anarchists in general but this was harmless fun.
Someone posting this and also saying "abolish bedtime" is a child and children should not be posting things about "throwing me against the wall and kissing me"
What also makes ACAB a deeply stupid ideology is that all that means is you're going to have dozens or hundreds of entities that are police forces in all but name, which apply their own understanding of the law as opposed to the universalist approach.
ACAB is a fundamentally stupid idea unto itself. So is "prison abolition" and the false notion that, say, a career criminal who's spent their entire adult life victimizing the working class is "akshully" society's greatest prison.
It's probably deserved. You can't say all teachers are bastards, that's just not right. All cops are bastards, sure, maybe in your community they are, I don't contest that. But to equate teachers, responsible for the future of your country, to cops, is messed up.
All the people acting repulsed by this have clearly never witnessed a teacher use their authority and control over children to abuse and exploit them. If only the worst teachers did was assign homework. The reality is much darker than that.
Education is good but I've seen way too much abuse from authorities that were meant to help kids to trust teachers and schooling as they exist. I'm very skeptical of anyone who wants to be in a position over children, and of systems that regularly systematize child abuse.
Literally any amount of educating or raising children at all comes with power over them. That’s kind of the deal with those little humans that can’t yet feed themselves. What do you propose? Give birth and then throw them out into the wild and let them fend for themselves?
Hard to fit into a reply on a micro logging platform, but I propose community-wide, all ages education, focused on respect and liberatory teaching. This kind of lazy incuriosity and ignorance of basic deschooling ideas is why OP is annoyed btw.
If you want people curious about these topics, maybe don’t start with hyperbolic assertions like ‚teachers are cops‘ or ‚anyone who works in that field is suspicious on principle’.
Those are not claims that start a conversation, they just make people (justifiably) angry.
There are a lot easier career paths for people who just want to be mean. Teaching is a soul-draining exhausting job, and I can't imagine sticking with it if my goal wasn't to teach math.
What theory? what changes to education would you make? You know this is an unpopular opinion and yet expect everyone to just change their mind based on this? You are doing a terrible job at explaining anything or changing the needle on this topic.
Or maybe you’re just fundamentally incurious about radical politics you haven’t cone across and your knee-jerk reaction is mockery and assuming people are unserious
Y’all act like 98% of people don’t react to ideas like abolishing the state, or capitalism, or prisons, in an identical manner. Assuming you’d advocate for any of those positions in the first place.
Did you ever stop to think that many of us are well educated on these topics (likely more so than you) and may even support their abolition but we dismiss YOU because of supercilious and ridiculous takes like “ACAB includes teachers”?
I would consider "This person is taking a 40k a year thankless job soley to be a difference maker in kids lives to be "an oppressive arm" of the state knee jerk and reactionary
Many people taking thankless 40k a year jobs hold institutional power over other people and frequently abuse that power. What a lazy nothing of a rebuttal.
Do you not get how the current structure of the educational system, just like the policing system, is flawed? It's the same reasoning behind police and prison abolition.
This sounds like any given parent of any one of my students who have no respect, decorum, or desire to learn...and the parents will lean hard into how all teachers suck.
Blocking this OP now bc I take enough shit from idiot parents, I don't have the bandwidth to hear abuse here
Anarchism requires a well educated, organized community.
The structure and focus of schooling in an anarchist system would be different, and teaching would be more cooperative in nature, but “school abolition” is only useful to people looking to exploit an uneducated populace and is not anarchism
Anarchism as a political and moral philosophy doesn’t have any inherent prerequisites, nor is it only possible to engage in anarchism after some utopia is established.
It’s funny how none of you actually engage in school abolition as a concept. You’re just fine with the way education is monopolized by a coercive system and delay fighting oppressive structures to some vague future lol.
The petty rules schools impose are important, and safe, ways to test and see through authority.. it's not foolproof, some embrace the system and become school prefects.
Obviously, curricula must be set by teachers, and schools, not by the state!
Thought there's nothing intrinsically wrong, from an anarchist perspective, with matriculation boards to enable parents and children to identify schools and teachers that are not adequate.
Hello, I'm an anarchist with anarchist positions that discussed the cited texts in this thread with other anarchists and leftists in general. The post was stupid and completely failed at understanding what school abolition stands for.
Anarchist take (if you're on the school abolishonist side anyway) on teachers are that the hierarchical nature of the teacher holding so much power over the student is a problem. Not that teachers are literally the same as a state funded gang of white supremacists.
I also don’t like school as it stands, or schoolteachers. I would support a widespread societal transition towards a mentor/apprenticeship model with an emphasis on small-group learning. I think that there’s a lot of systematic child neglect/abuse that we could be rid of that way.
It shouldn't be gone tho, it should be reformed and made public with emphasis on the development of critical thought, general skills, an introduction to especialization, and support programs for certain youths (neurodivergent or LGBTQI+ youths for example), especially as it also makes it so that
my sister is a special education teacher who buys food with her own money to send home with her students, and gets slapped, scratched and pushed on a regular basis but still talks about those kids like they're her own
if anyone wants to come for teachers I will disembowel them
That sounds exactly like my spec Ed classroom and I wouldn’t trade it for the world. I can say that because I just got offered a significant raise to leave my public school job to become a corporate trainer and I turned it down instantly.
The US government is currently working on abolishing school, so that the children of the poor can work twelve hour shift at the local meat plant.
So maybe this is neither the time or the place for this particular argument.
this person probably also thinks that modern society can "return" to a pre-agricultural standard, based on some weird bullshit anarcho-primitivist fusion with tribal thought.
The fact that this would result in utter chaos and mass suffering doesn't even factor into their rationale.
You are getting hate not because people don’t understand the complicity of the standardized education system in public suppression, but because you are attacking the only individuals within that system that consistently work against its confines to produce a better outcome for its victims.
Furthermore, framing people whose job includes selfless sacrifice and child care as equivalent to the most violent, deadly arm of the state is not only incendiary, but ignorant by any measure.
Levy criticism without a witless attempt at a sound bite and it will bring more reasonable discourse.
You're right. There were no overarching societal issues in the UK in the 1950s that manifested in multiple different areas. A bunch of people of one specific profession got together and formed an evil cabal that existed in an otherwise perfect vacuum.
But to answer the... question? I did almost die by suicide when I was 14, because of my schooling, so kind of? They didn't hold a gun to my head, though, so I suppose it doesn't count. :)
Have you ever considered that your experience is not representative of teachers as a whole? Like, sorry you had a bad time but there are plenty of us who work our asses off to help kids learn about the content and about life.
Fantastic analysis, exactly my thought. Teachers are just like any other worker. Just like unions, they are working through capitalism the best way they can, which like you said, includes much sacrifice as part of their profession. Cops are not part of that struggle.
I am implying that a lot of us didn't have that acceptance, even years after the legislation was revoked. And, because school is mandated, and its policies are driven by the state, there is no way to (legally) escape it. I am glad that I took matters into my own hands.
What an odd thing to say when teachers themselves are queer/ trans, too, and until *very* recently, had to remain closeted in public. Publicly mandated education has provided pathways for kids to get away from abusive families, to find new adults who care about them, or just find personal agency.
Teachers are also a safety net for kids enduring abuse at home, closeted kids, neurodivergent kids. Taking this away from them means suffering and even death. Why you love shooting yourself in the foot is beyond me.
It kind of sounds like you just wanted the attention you got since you haven't really stated things you WANT and just have wild takes about things you don't want that have not been justified or deconstructed in any meaningful way
You said teachers were a safety net from abusive homes & gettting rid of them would result in a lot of home abuse, so I was replying with why that wouldn’t happen (because parents wouldn’t have control over kids) you know exactly what I mean you’re just being mean for no reason
Literally who do you want to step in as caretakers for kids. Kids can't be left alone hello?
If you're for abolishing you can't have no solid replacement. As it is you're advocating for child neglect and erasing the few avenues for kids to learn to be leftists.
To the mf who blocked me: I ain't forgetting you said toddlers and babies should be unschooled, autonomous and have the mental faculties to understand their situation and choose their own caretakers by the virtue of being "nice"
You two are an actual danger to toddlers and children like holy fuck
There’s a different avenue here that I think is what Marxist and anarchist “abolish family” means. To society a parent is the authority and the kid has no autonomy. They don’t get to choose who guides/caretakers/teaches. But in an anarchist society the child chooses not the parent.
many people in the replies cannot fathom being in school and not being "normal". if you have any form of neurodivergence, the teachers and the staff will be your enemy every step of the way, in some cases even moreso than peers.
I have two forms of neurodivergence and from preschool through two separate attempts at college the teachers were never my enemies - and I wasn't diagnosed with one until I was 17 and the other when I was 20, so I really was just "abnormal" almost the whole time. 🤷
I am autistic, queer, and bipolar. I agree 100 with this take. I'm also an ancom. However. "ACAB includes teachers" just isnt it. Its not how you wanna phrase this, its not gonna get anywhere, its just gonna get you dunked on like this.
Its not a coherent strategy to frame the actual argument.
what you're describing is truth vs strategy. something can be correct, and not strategically wise for a movement, but also, not everyone has to be tethered to strategy in their writings at all times. I agree with you, though.
in addition to this it's reductive in a way that makes the actual argument incomprehensible. if your point is that the education system, based on capitalist ideology, often forces teachers to take on an overseer-like role, then say so.
blaming individuals for the system is doing the exact opposite
yeah, I mean, the school itself? definitely a bad institution. teachers? historically oppressed class very frequently associated with leftist political movements, subjected to political witch hunts etc, comparing them to cops is just not cool.
Yeah. Someone who decides they want to educate, care for, or nurture the next generation of human beings is not inherently a bastard. It's not even close to law enforcement.
Now, I'm all for abolishing schools but people who educate others will still he "teachers".
thats a lot of unfounded whimsy assumptions of why the average chum may want to become a teacher, i would say that imagining a professional field as selfless sacrificial heroes is much more harmful for rethoric than any inflammatory motto
K. Guess we should scrap the entire field because all teachers are bastards. Since ACAB implies that the entire profession is opressive. Lets just have no teachers, right? That's your position? no? then ACAB includes teachers is inherently hurting your message, isn't it.
I have really strong opinions here, it's not so much that 'schools' are a bad idea, as the concept of regimented modern schooling is incredibly outdated, and was designed for a world that only barely reflects the one we find ourselves in.
I mean that just cuts to the core of the problem with OP’s post, in that it takes a reasonable argument (“we should rethink how we do schooling”) and frames it in the most brain-dead maximalist way possible (“ABOLISH SCHOOL. TEACHERS ARE COPS ACTUALLY.”)
I'm just sticking up for the idea that "people who impart knowledge and wisdom to others under the title of teacher are not bastards". School sucks. But it was in part good teachers and thought-provoking educators that are the reason I'm radical today.
Scolding everyone who takes the phrase "school abolition" at face value has probably pushed a lot of people away from anarchism/degrowth/head injury leftism forever. Thank you!!!
You should use accurate terminology. Smugly scoffing at people who take you at your word is bad communication. I think I'm starting to understand why you guys have trouble with the over 17 demographic.
my experiences as a ND kid with poor emotional development taught me that teachers can either be the only thing standing between you and a system that doesn't see you as a person but as a threat, or part of that system, and which one they are depends a lot on how much they're paid
Hey, I'm neurodivergent and queer, was definitely both through a lot of my schooling, was openly gay in high school and faced abuse from homophobic teachers, went to school districts that still had corporal punishment, and I still think OP's take is laughably misguided. You're in a bubble.
You should really oughta read that post again because that is not even close to what I said lmao
"OP's take is laughably misguided" does not in any way equate to "I think the system is perfect" like you had put an awful lot of words I didn't say into my mouth to get from point A to point B =P
You really must've stretched like crazy to reach that far. Maybe try not to fill in the things people literally haven't said with your assumptions though, it doesn't do the other party OR you any good to put a bunch of words in their mouth.
It was the teachers that made me have to redo senior year. Offered tutoring so I could graduate, then broke the law by leaving before she was allowed to.
Teachers are an authority position, and they often weild that power, as you claim to have experience with. Just because some teachers are good hearted, doesn't mean the system is just and the role of teacher is perfect.
We're allowed to think of a better world. Thats what language lets us do
I cannot imagine admiting that you're a victim of a system, and then in the same breath, saying it cannot be criticized. Truly outrageous, but that's what the system does to people, it prevents them from using their brains to think of a better one.
Aye lad, guess who is a fuckin' gay, queer, genderfluid autist leftie who don't believe school should be abolished?.
Also a rotten experience just means the system needs reform, not abolishing it, that's a rather moronic take.
And i'm fairly sure that my general interactions with people have only
leaded to 'em being more acceptive of us LGBTQI+ fellas, imagine now that there's no schools, the child ain't learning shite, nor being exposed to diversity thus meaning they are likelier to feel weird to it, and to not know a lot about themselves (see programs supporting neurodivergent and LGBTQI+
that's way too general and very much differs depending on time period, country, school, even specific teacher.
looking at my history in polish schools, across the people's republic and 3rd republic years, it was mostly not true in my personal case, despite myself presenting obvious adhd traits.
I think this is where they explain that "school abolition" doesn't REALLY mean abolition but instead pushing for better access and options for neuro-divergent folks. An admirable goal, but yelling about ABOLITION is preferable since it's a lot edgier.
I’m neurodivergent and was kicked out of multiple schools by educators who didn’t understand me and couldn’t deal with me, and I still think “ACAB includes teachers” is both offensive and hilariously stupid
I'm not making anything up, I'm suggesting children have a right to safety in education, and not be subjected to "schools" as they are in a capitalist framework.
I was undiagnosed and all of my teachers, minus one very kindly old man, at best tolerated me. Idk fucking fight me or something, but ACAB does include teachers.
I only had a decent school experience once I got into High School, mostly because I wasn't stuck with the same bloody teacher for all subjects. Helps that being "high functioning", I was able to excel in my studies (thus being "gifted" as opposed to a "burden").
Results may vary of course, but I have autism and teachers were generally very supportive of my work where peers weren't. This isn't to say you're never correct but it does seem like a pretty heavy generalization to say you're usually or always correct about this.
I had ADHD (very common), and I was suspended, assigned extra internship hours on weekends (to learn how to work hard), sent home early. This was a private school with small class sizes, which is probably the only reason I graduated at all. They were cops the whole time. All of them.
Im sorry you seem to have had a bad time in school but eliminating schooling over a perceived anti-neurodivergent bias is the definition of cutting off one’s nose to spite the face
I personally didn't notice this until grad school. It might've been going on in primary school and college, but I was too busy worrying everyone would notice I was a fraud (straight A student, never studied, just retained info). I was hypersensitive to peers, but teachers liked me...
...until those 6-hour Saturday doctoral classes. The teachers "liked" me because I was smart. But I was not "smart" in the way they wanted, and I got two emails about "my behavior" as a 29-year-old. "My behavior" meant talking and fidgeting and taking frequent bathroom breaks bc I had ADHD.
None of it affected my academic performance. They got all the research (& sexual harassment of course) they wanted out of me, but it was really disheartening being talked to like a child when I was doing everything right on paper (4.0, etc). Doctoral professors were the worst versions of teachers.
Oh, I see. I am not saying that every teacher is a bad person, I am saying that the system's role designated to them is inherently problematic. Open to a further discourse!
Advocating homeschooling as a basis of education is treating education as a part time activity which can be done by anyone. It isn't. Teaching is skilled work, like nursing or dentistry. It's a profession. It's arrogant and stupid to think otherwise.
We literally have entire specialized plans and accommodations for students and their needs. It’s called a 504 plan.
Do not speak as if you know the perspective of educators who are over worked, under paid and clearly under appreciated. Especially when yours come from one of a literal child.
Your ignorance of education in general does not give you the credibility to critique it, you’re just upset because you’re ignorant and dislike being educated.
Hit up Wine moms for Liberty, they make the same stupid remarks at school board meetings.
I'm extremely neurodivergent and didn't graduate high school. I know how garbage the schooling system is for us, but saying that participating in it makes you the same as the system like it does with policing is straight up incorrect.
not all teachers are inherently evil, but the role of "teacher" in our current social culture and society is inherently problematic. you can be a one-off "good apple" but the default is to go along with a corrupt system
The education system can be reformed. There's schooling systems out there that can account for us and have measurably worked for us, unlike cops. It needs a major rework, but demonizing an entire group of the least privileged people in the workforce is not a part of that. Look at the top.
I am neurodivergent and I do not wish for you to speak on my behalf as to who my enemies are or what my relationship with communal education is thanks. You can certainly speak to your experiences, but that would read "I am neurodivergent and..."
i’m a teacher and every single teacher i’ve met who is my age is a committed leftist that goes out to protests and group action. not me though I stay indoors and post about how the REAL cops are the people teaching kids about consent and critical thinking
can't get behind your teacher take for a variety of reasons not least that teachers are often the only barrier between kids and an administrative apparatus that doesn't see students as people, but school as it is currently organized IS an abusive system and SHOULD be dismantled.
But we need people who's job it is to squash curiosity, creativity, and individuality by following a system of education based entirely around finding those most willing to do objectively pointless bullshit like homework whilst adhering to a schedule that goes against human biology
My imagination isn't gonna teach a bunch of kids, especially not at a societal scale.
Someone said that there are other ways to teach kids that don't involve school, and someone else asked for an example. That's not an unreasonable request.
oh my god. fuck no. montessori schools are quite literally preparation for capitalism. i went to one briefly and i have three family members who work at them right now and there is little to no encouragement of creativity and exploration.
Going to need either of you to explain the nunber of kids you have before you have significant opinions about adaily schedule for kids and human biology.
This isn’t the fault of teachers and in an anarchist society, one of the most important parts of it are teachers and mentors. I don’t think either of you have actually read much anarchist thinkers or understood them if you come away with this from it.
There's a difference between mentors and teachers in an anarchist non heirarchal society and ones who teach under a capitalist society built on the Prussian education system and other education systems whose sole intent is to create the next gen of bootlicking zombies
It’s not the teachers who build that and uphold it. And unlike cops, they have a union that works with other unions to uphold workers rights and come from a history of radical communist and socialist movements. If you want to say admin or BOE are acab, that would make more sense
I will say I didn't think this post would blowup like it did so I oversimplified for the sake of a sarcastic joke for my first reply however I do still put some responsibility on the individual teachers who have agreed to treat others in accordance with a system designed to squash creativity
Plus from personal experience there were plenty of teachers who openly did shitty physiologically tortuous things to different students (typically the queer and kids of color) and the entire staff knew about it and never did anything unless a parent was rich enough to afford a lawyer
A large number of anarchists are teachers and professors, which you would know if you worked with the unions like I have. They came to that conclusion by seeing how important education is, while also seeing the flaws in the hierarchal system. You should get more involved
One of the high points of Spanish anarchism was providing free schooling when the state or church wouldn't. School is a historically progressive alternative to children working in factories or fields, and the idea of completely scrapping even a flawed school system is insane.
There's a lot of discussion that could be had (and has been had!) on the flaws of schools as institutions, their roles in various forms of oppression, and whatnot, but I don't know if "acab includes teachers" is the reduction you wanna make here.
everyone on the internet makes "ACAB includes X" jokes but as soon as it's an anarchist you must take everything extremely literally and also ad absurdum
Yes, that's called context collapse. So, you're friends with the OP and can vouch that this is an in-joke among you? Usually "inside joke" is meant for, like, if someone says something absurd/random but it makes sense to their friends, not a bad take like this.
yeah I considered the stupid shit you said then rejected it because if it was a joke maybe your bestie would've said "this was a joke" and made some of us take the L
that did not happen. also "lol it's just a joke bro" is weak shit. own it or don't.
you're allowed to make a joke sentence that your ingroup would understand, where some fraction of the sentiment behind it is true. not every joke needs to be the opposite of truth
I realized this take reminded me of an article which actually contains a good take about the ways in which some parts of teaching can be cop-like, and how they probably don’t have to.
There is much to despise in our education system especially the pervasive institutional focus on grading and credentialing. And yeah when teachers act like cops they are bastards. But you can’t have expected your chosen phrasing to be effective can you?
All the disagreement comes from their k-12 education and the impact that brainwashing has had on them. They just dont know any better. We never had a choice. Families had to be broken up by the colonial systems of oppression, instilling the ideals of the colony by mandated assimilation.
The idea that you can take a system built for the purpose of brainwashing us, molding us and conditioning us to the system from the point of our youth and reform it is full of so much irony. So many people never think twice about how unnormal it really is.
Families dont have a choice but to send their children off to strangers. They don't know and can't trust. These strangers instill morals and ideals into your children that aren't yours. I'm sure many who disagree would think that Indian boarding schools were just fine.
All of this and the loss of youth, not having a childhood. None of us had a childhood. We had to work, and playtime was relegated to short periods of time. Children can't even play when they get home cause they have homework and their parents are stressed out from working all day and grumpy.
‘Everyone who disagrees with me is brainwashed’ is certainly one of those statements that will endear you to people outside of a niche ideological circlejerk
Well whats your reasoning here and dont tell me to read a book lmao. Convince me. Im open to listening but i feel 'acab includes teachers but nobody is reading the theory!!!' is maybe the worst way to get the point across
We don’t know anything about your beliefs because all you say is to read a book about them. If you can’t communicate them succinctly, then no one is going to understand your beliefs. Give us some bullet points or something at least
The point is im not being challenged by the idea. Its basically thrown into the void contextless and immediately whining about people finding the slogan silly. Generally if you want to convince people of something you try to convince them you dont just tell them to figure it out.
This isn't just a ridiculous thing to say, it's extremely disrespectful and counterproductive to actual advocates for abolishing the current policing structures in this country. Please do better.
So I align closely with ancom, and uh, you’re wrong. There are some teachers that take perverse joy in the modicum of authority they have and become cop-like; but that’s a bug, not a feature. We need schools and teachers. Even within anarchy there is society. It’s simply society without hierarchy.
That's just a fuckin' stupid opinion.
Public education focused on support and critical thought, that's what should be made, not a rather moronic focus of just destroyin' the thing down cus yer country and the systems active are shite.
Big teacher fan here. I didn’t love all my teachers growing up but I know that “ACAB includes teachers” is probably the dumbest thing I’ll read on this app today
I'm begging all the white people who peaked in high school to read this fucking book rather than post stupid fucking comments on this thread because they like their math teacher or something dear lord
Yeah, me and my husband both had to read this in grad school while we were getting our Masters in Teaching. Not quite the dunk on teachers you think it is.
Yeah I read this when I got my MLIS, my bf read this while getting his M.Ed. in a class taught by Bill Ayers who is a pretty good example of someone who isn’t a cop
I'm begging all the people arguing about if schools are carceral or not and then assigning homework to read this book instead of arguing!
It has nothing to do with the conversation, I just think it's a good book.
People, as a fellow anarchist, Freire's compatriot and someone that have read his stuff on the original text and even discussed it on leftist groups. So I can safely say that he NEVER said Teachers are Cops.
If you took that from his writing you are exactly the kind of people he spent a ton>
>of time writting about in his discussions about a false sense of class consciouscess and the inability to understand education because of a failed educational system.
The last thing in the universe Freire was is someone that considered Teachers an oppressor class. Not even Foucault, in his most>
"Leaders who do not act dialogically, but insist on imposing their decisions, do not organize the people--they manipulate them. They do not liberate, nor are they liberated: they oppress." that's chapter 4 bud
That literally means that the teachers that REPLICATE the logic of the oppressive educational system are perpetuating it. The context for why you are wrong is in the quote itself. He never said that Teachers are cops. Teachers are as much victims of this system as the students.
>anti-hierarchical writings said something so stupid.
Freire commented on the nature of schools as tools of oppression, because, as he actually put it, the liberal/capitalist school environment is idealized not as a place to feed and enrich the mind, but to box it into piece for the machine.
Teachers are also victims of such system, and the ones that give up on trying to fix it are just forced into becoming perpetuators of such thought. The power over schools is the system itself, not Teachers. Freire was a teacher his whole life FFS.
this was an excellent summary and lines up with my experience not just of education but with other similar professions. most workers are drawn in by a genuine desire to help, but the larger system forces their work to take on forms that are frequently harmful for both parties
im begging people of all colors that when we have a fascist in government our fight isn’t oriented around abolishing the one institution most apt for fighting fascism. idk if it’s a book I don’t gotta believe it.
That book was written in the 1960s and is not about education in the United States.
My mother was a teacher for thirty years, and she would have flunked you and your pretentious little friends who've read a book in translation and think you know all.
I'm a dark-skinned man and I think you and the OP are a joke. If one of your takeaways from Pedagogy of the Oppressed is "ACAB includes teachers", you should re-read it or better yet, read it in a leftist book club.
And as someone who has encountered police abuse of power since I was a young teenager, I take offense with you comparing teachers/schools to police/LEAs. You're crying victim and all I can say is, the backlash you're getting is well-deserved because what you said was crazy disrespectful.
Hey, read it & it informs my life’s work …in schools. We have an infrastructure for educating vast majority of Ss for free. That’s a liberatory tool. Abolishing it & trying to ensure every individ comm is conducting circles is insane. Using schools to develop critical consciousness is right there.
Ah, I wondered how long it would take Foucault to enter the discussion. Sorry, not taking lectures on what things are or aren't like prisons from a man who wanted them abolished because he thought it should be legal for him to rape children.
short read. none of this implies freire would be pro-school abolition and the author himself does not agree with the depiction of schools as prisons. pretty much all of these problems could be dealt with by radical reorganization of the education system, like, what freire would actually advocate for
Everyone should read that book and the follow-up he wrote, "Pedegogy of Hope." Also "Teaching to Transgress" by bell hooks and "The Unschooled Mind" by Howard Gardner.
The school to prison pipeline exists because of the State, which is an instrument of the Bourgeoisie in Capitalist society. Policr are tasked to enforce the will of the Bourgeois state unlike the teachers, who are exploited in Capitalist state. Education is weapon for liberation.
Ok school might not always be well equipped for every single individual need, but sure, let's throw it all out cause a 14 year old read about some problems
delete your Twitter. It's not worth enriching musk just to go viral and get verbal abuse & mockery from people that haven’t read a word of school abolition theory or even watched a video or read a zine or article
Well if this particular child gets their wishes then they'll probably be spending it in the coal mines.
I get it, the education system is outdated and only caters to a very specific type of student, but for fuck sakes we don't attack the teachers that are just trying to make the best of it
Anarchists are against UNJUSTIFIED hierarchy. The hierarchy teachers have over their students is generally justified. Some teachers might overstep their authority but education is good and it requires structure
If you think you are incapable of telling what relations are legitimate and which aren't then anarchism isn't for your. It is an intellectually demanding philosophy. You need to be your own judge.
Seriously this. In political activism - as in all other places - people aren't born with an understanding of all the important concepts. Class consciousness must be developed - and it's the responsibility of those who already have it to guide those who do not.
I don't get why so many online anarchists - upon seeing someone who doesn't understand, but is trying to learn - look down on them as unworthy and push them away. We should be trying to nurture curiosity, not stifle it.
I'm interested in reading more about this, I'm extremely critical of how schooling is traditionally run, what with having set curriculums, tests, grades, all of that sucks, but I also love education and one of my dreams is to be the kind of cool inspiring teacher I had in high school
The way I understand it is we should let students dictate their education, choose what topics they want to learn, and let them decide what success in that study looks like, then help guide them to that- is that more or less what "school abolition" is advocating for or is there more to this?
But at the same time I can't deny there are a lot of things traditional schooling focuses on that I feel is good for society as a whole to be educated in, stuff like arithmetric, what nouns/verbs/adverbs are, natural sciences etc. I think it's good if everybody knows this stuff
How about that Flagpole Sitta song though, they talk about publishing zines. I thought it was Wheatus that did that song but it turns out it’s not. Anyways, good day to you all.
Your post tells me that you were the kid with a 1.2 GPA who ate Hot Cheetos and Sprite for breakfast every morning before sleeping through every class because you "had a headache."
Well that’s because that statement is silly, when you get older and have friends that become teachers you’ll see what they actually do and say. A real person is a better reference than a “zine”
So many people dunking on this without thinking about simple facts like "school is a place that you cannot make the decision to go to the bathroom by yourself". It treats children like they are not people, that's going to always lead to prison-like conditions.
im sorry children need to be coddled and guided, THEYRE CHILDREN. Giving them the responsibilities to make the decisions of adults is a horrible idea. Have you talked to a child, like ever?
Hey what happens if you decide you need to go to the bathroom and the teacher doesn’t want you to? You get punished. And if you refuse the punishment? Physical force.
I know many teachers. Most of them admit that, regardless of their enjoyment of it or not, they have to act like cops to continue teaching, doing things to kids that would be actual crimes to do to adults. Teachers are the people children interact with the system through.
"Teachers inherently rat out students" is a funny take in a world where conservatives are trying to convince people that teachers not ratting out queer students is like paedophila.
Or how there's often an obvious pot smoking clique who somehow never have the cops called on them
Different things are different. Police operate almost exclusively to protect capital where educators perform a series of necessary functions and would exist in a world without most hierarchies.
Under your same logic there is no job that does not qualify as a cop. Which makes the designation useless
Again though that goes back to requiring individuals to all be anti-carceral instead of, you know, getting cops out of schools so that a teacher's individual views on carceralism don't matter
Also giving them the resources so that when a student is disruptive, falling behind, or violent, they're actually able to *get them proper help* instead of being forced to choose between protecting and serving the needs of other students/themselves, or (*maybe*) helping out that one kid
Like, you know all those "White vs Non-white kid" academic/IQ measurements that *miraculously* stop showing significant differences once class/schooling quality's taken into account?
They're not part of the pipeline, they're operators trying to keep as many kids as possible out of it
Well yes, and this goes way beyond cops, and would require teachers to have ultimate authority, not administrators who obviously have motivations that run counter to children's well-being
we're living in a world where dictatorships across the world are targeting teachers and education systems btw, and exercises that power via state enforced violence, so like, no time for dat goku
“Anyone who calls the cops is also a cop” is a take that probably slaps when you’re circle jerking it with other anarkiddies but unfortunately has no applicability to the real world
Ok, this is a fair set of points, but however.
I think that using the language noa did however is a fools errand and actually hurts the cause of talking about those issues. I think there are much more productive ways to say these things about teachers and schooling than.. this. As we see here.
Yeah in the real world no one considers "snitches" cops. That is unironically true.
Like usually the only people who aren't cringe and use the word "snitch" unironically are referring to people who have voluntarily chosen a criminal life and *then* gone to the cops or whatever.
The more you double down on the cosplay anarkiddy bullshit the more obvious it becomes that that's all it is and you have no actual real world experience
I think cops should be the only thing included in the “All Cops Are Bastards” idea because they exist as arm of the state that dulls out corporal punishment to civilians with wanton violence and it’s the promise of that violence which attracts people to the field. That’s why they’re bastards.
Teachers are attracted to the field because they want to teach. God knows it’s not the pay or the recognition they never receive. It’s fundamentally informed by altruism. TLDR; Education is a good thing. Police brutality is not. Cops are bastards. Teachers are not.
okay so would i include some (in fact many) teachers in ACAB? absolutely, most of my elementary school teachers traumatized me for life. but with all due respect, please do not call my roommate, who is currently studying towards being a teacher, a cop. education is not synonymous with policing it
all depends on how the education is done. educator/student relationships can be liberatory if executed accordingly. nuance is essential here, making a blanket statement comparing all teachers to cops is pretty wrongheaded. that all being said some of these replies are disgusting and i’m sorry that
I’m going viral on the other app because I posted “abolish monarchy includes The Burger King” i’m facing a lot of verbal abuse & mockery from people that haven’t read a word of Whopper abolition theory or even watched a commercial or read a BK Chicken Fries box or sauce cup.
You don’t know the history of public education. If you destroy education with no alternative, destroy literacy, you are denying the masses the ability to liberate themselves and sentencing their children to death by labor.
Have there been various issues at various times with how specific schools or school districts are run? Of course. But those problems usually involve people trying to prevent school systems from providing a full education for everyone as intended.
That’s not a problem inherent in schools or teachers
Comments
DA BEARS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWycuaWJFCM
net result of torching all the things pretty much the same though, mostly because the far right ghouls tend to come in and bulldoze whatever fragile, chaotic coalition was built in the power vacuum.
often, anyway.
I mean, especially when people have no idea what they're doing
I didn't vote "no" on your confirmation, but I did wrinkle my forehead very convincingly several times.
thing to say to someone with whom you simply disagree
I mean if that's what you want, go for it.
otherwise it doesn't change the fact that "law enforcement" and policing have always existed in organized societies.
Derp.
you deserve every single bit of roasting you're getting for being such a huge piece of shit.
fuck you, trump supporter.
Those are not claims that start a conversation, they just make people (justifiably) angry.
Do you know any educator, anywhere, ever, who got into this low-paying low-respect profession because they want to be in a position over children?
Congratulations on being that, I guess.
This sounds like any given parent of any one of my students who have no respect, decorum, or desire to learn...and the parents will lean hard into how all teachers suck.
Blocking this OP now bc I take enough shit from idiot parents, I don't have the bandwidth to hear abuse here
The structure and focus of schooling in an anarchist system would be different, and teaching would be more cooperative in nature, but “school abolition” is only useful to people looking to exploit an uneducated populace and is not anarchism
Do you understand what the word abolition means?
And school co ops and self managed social centers already exist in the U.S.
The petty rules schools impose are important, and safe, ways to test and see through authority.. it's not foolproof, some embrace the system and become school prefects.
Religion @school, smooths the road to naturalism.
Depriving children of peer interaction by home schooling isn't, I think positive.
Good schools can, through ernest effort, curtail bullying & authoritarianism.
Thought there's nothing intrinsically wrong, from an anarchist perspective, with matriculation boards to enable parents and children to identify schools and teachers that are not adequate.
I hope it clarifies that for you.
and it's not leftists.
also, maybe I'm a little down to earth,
but who would take care of teaching the children ?
or maybe we abolish writing too ?
no one except the fash want to end teaching or teachers
school abolition is not about ending education
I was 28 when I finally met a teacher who wasn’t just a pain in the ass to be around. They are too used to being the only adults.
But that’s personal, not political.
if anyone wants to come for teachers I will disembowel them
So maybe this is neither the time or the place for this particular argument.
The fact that this would result in utter chaos and mass suffering doesn't even factor into their rationale.
Levy criticism without a witless attempt at a sound bite and it will bring more reasonable discourse.
Take the false equivalency elsewhere. It’s absolutely ridiculous to compare a teacher to a cop and you know it is.
Sorry you got hurt but this ain't the way
This does not have anything to do with my presented arguments
Who the fuck is gonna take care of the kids, then, smartass?
If you're for abolishing you can't have no solid replacement. As it is you're advocating for child neglect and erasing the few avenues for kids to learn to be leftists.
You two are an actual danger to toddlers and children like holy fuck
where tf do you think you learned to read, kid?
translation: I don’t want to do homework 😡😡
Its not a coherent strategy to frame the actual argument.
blaming individuals for the system is doing the exact opposite
Now, I'm all for abolishing schools but people who educate others will still he "teachers".
I'm just sticking up for the idea that "people who impart knowledge and wisdom to others under the title of teacher are not bastards". School sucks. But it was in part good teachers and thought-provoking educators that are the reason I'm radical today.
Conservatives want to eradicate school as we know it, because they want knowledge to be a privilege of the elites.
They want Newspeak, badly.
But you do you, jack
I'm sorry you feel this way. Some of us want to make things better for the next generation.
"OP's take is laughably misguided" does not in any way equate to "I think the system is perfect" like you had put an awful lot of words I didn't say into my mouth to get from point A to point B =P
You're going on mute now so have a nice day!
It doesn't mean teachers in 2025 are cops. At all.
My thinking that underpaid humans working within a shitty system aren't bastards is informed by AuDHD.
Do you blame the cashiers at Walmart for corporate greed?
What happens if you need to pee and the teacher says no?
What happens if you need special attention and none is available?
The fascists are taking over, and you're here kicking the ladder from under you
We're allowed to think of a better world. Thats what language lets us do
Also a rotten experience just means the system needs reform, not abolishing it, that's a rather moronic take.
And i'm fairly sure that my general interactions with people have only
looking at my history in polish schools, across the people's republic and 3rd republic years, it was mostly not true in my personal case, despite myself presenting obvious adhd traits.
Grade 7 was the worst for me. 1/
Got suspended twice for various meltdowns. Not to due with studies. Just social interactions with people who pissed me off.
You are describing Western systems of pedagogy and schooling, not teachers.
Indigenous cultures have teachers that are subject to literally none of this critique.
C'mon.
Do not speak as if you know the perspective of educators who are over worked, under paid and clearly under appreciated. Especially when yours come from one of a literal child.
Hit up Wine moms for Liberty, they make the same stupid remarks at school board meetings.
I am neurodivergent and I do not wish for you to speak on my behalf as to who my enemies are or what my relationship with communal education is thanks. You can certainly speak to your experiences, but that would read "I am neurodivergent and..."
But bully for you I guess.
or find the theory
or, idk, read
Someone said that there are other ways to teach kids that don't involve school, and someone else asked for an example. That's not an unreasonable request.
like please read Pedagogy of the Oppressed and tell me how that conception of education and teachers’ role in it is simply being a “cop”
Or further back to when only clergy or similar specialists could read and write and do math
that did not happen. also "lol it's just a joke bro" is weak shit. own it or don't.
https://dailynous.com/2022/08/09/teacher-bureaucrat-cop-guest-post/
We’ve all read Foucault.
don't make me deconstruct a bitch
it's okay to stop when you're ahead or behind. the important thing is...
sometimes it's okay to stop.
you know nothing about my own ideas and beliefs
nor is this a "line of argumentation" lol
including mocking it, I guess
Public education focused on support and critical thought, that's what should be made, not a rather moronic focus of just destroyin' the thing down cus yer country and the systems active are shite.
Be ffr.
Either BlueSky has been expertly trolled over the last few days or we're just seeing bb anarchists doing the "Everyone I hate is cops" routine.
she can't keep getting away with it!
...I am gleeful for the opportunity to block some very stupid children.
It has nothing to do with the conversation, I just think it's a good book.
If you took that from his writing you are exactly the kind of people he spent a ton>
The last thing in the universe Freire was is someone that considered Teachers an oppressor class. Not even Foucault, in his most>
Freire commented on the nature of schools as tools of oppression, because, as he actually put it, the liberal/capitalist school environment is idealized not as a place to feed and enrich the mind, but to box it into piece for the machine.
I don’t need to read a fucking book to know bullshit when I see it, thanks.
Bettina Love’s latest book, Punished For Dreaming, is more on point.
I see Freire, an educator, working to educate people. I see him pointing to issues with the educational system and ways to reform it.
I do not see him advocating for the destruction of public education.
My mother was a teacher for thirty years, and she would have flunked you and your pretentious little friends who've read a book in translation and think you know all.
Either that or cite the "teachers are cops" passage for us, please.
the school to prison pipeline and the experience of violent surveillance by teachers is not new
You are a dumbfk!
Gunna be hard to get people to read without teachers
I don’t ever remember learning or ever being taught to read
I do remember being able to read before kindergarten
ha
funny
no, really. super funny. hilar.
I get it, the education system is outdated and only caters to a very specific type of student, but for fuck sakes we don't attack the teachers that are just trying to make the best of it
Hierarchies are everywhere. Anarchists don't object to all of them.
If you think you are incapable of telling what relations are legitimate and which aren't then anarchism isn't for your. It is an intellectually demanding philosophy. You need to be your own judge.
Anarchism is for everyone. If you have solidarity with the oppressed, everything else can be learned over time.
Yeah, that shit needs to be fucking abolished. We need to replace that old as hell bullshit with educating that respects individual autonomy.
This is how the anarchist get ya
https://bsky.app/profile/energetic-nova.bsky.social/post/3lklzudrwcc26
It did not turn out well.
It absolutely does not go the fuck away
I disagree with OP but your rebuttal is trash
Do you know any teachers? Most of them don't like those parts either.
Or how there's often an obvious pot smoking clique who somehow never have the cops called on them
Under your same logic there is no job that does not qualify as a cop. Which makes the designation useless
They're not part of the pipeline, they're operators trying to keep as many kids as possible out of it
this thread has really exposed a lot of folks who grew up in the suburbs and had a nice time
I think that using the language noa did however is a fools errand and actually hurts the cause of talking about those issues. I think there are much more productive ways to say these things about teachers and schooling than.. this. As we see here.
Like usually the only people who aren't cringe and use the word "snitch" unironically are referring to people who have voluntarily chosen a criminal life and *then* gone to the cops or whatever.
But, no, people in service professions aren't inherently cops. They perform, you know, services that people need.
very clever, very cool
for the love of god please go outside
but maybe
just maybe
the system we have now could be better?
maybe it could be less painful? more inclusive? less propagandistic?
I never said otherwise
What the heck?
Step 2) see step 1
"Why is everyone so mean to me? You guys-uh!"
A whole lot of people fought various battles in the past to enable people other than wealthy white males to have access to a full education
There’s a reason why the current ghastly US government is trying to destroy the Department of Education!
That’s not a problem inherent in schools or teachers