A Short Treatise on the Dignity of Honest Labor

 

I resigned last week from the faculty of a charter school in Fishtown, New Mexico. The name of the school and its actual location will remain anonymous. I have no desire to damage the reputation of the institution where I taught or offend the residents of the town. The summation that follows applies to Fishtowns everywhere. 

The problems facing Fishtown are as complex as they are numerous. Books have already been written on the subject, so I’m going to focus on a single deficiency in that stratum of our society known as the underclass. American pundits, academics, and politicians tell us that labels can be cruel, but only because such people are prone to excuse moral failures, or because they benefit, personally and politically, from the misery of others. I am compelled by the situation to be brutally honest.

Not enough can be said about the dignity inherent in honest labor. Hard work is one of the virtues conspicuously missing in Fishtown, New Mexico. Idleness and laziness have become so pervasive in the underclass that avoiding work has become reflexive. The opportunity to improve oneself through work is always met with an excuse about why such action is impossible. The residents of Fishtown avoid work with a practiced proficiency that has become ingrained in their community. The attitude is passed down from parents to their children, which is one reason why the schools continue to fail.

I was assigned by my principal last year to oversee an accredited course based on community service. The idea was to put each of my students into a volunteer position, working one hour per week, where they might contribute something to the community as a whole. Their excuses for not showing up at their assigned posts were legion. I tried to adjust the program by assigning work on campus. At one point, I came up with the idea of building a campus pumpkin patch that would provide for a fundraiser later in the year. One of my students responded succinctly when I suggested the idea: “I don’t do shovels.” And not much of anything else, kid, as far as I can see.

The same lack of a work ethic translates to academic achievement (or the lack thereof). Not doing an assignment is always an option. An impending ‘F’ on the report card is usually met with one of two scams: a teacher gets a plaintive call from a parent asking to make up overdue work or the student begs for an extra credit assignment. The first option was often fulfilled by copying an assignment already graded and returned to another student. The second option was usually met by downloading something from the internet — followed by insistent denials that the paper was plagiarized. In Fishtown, scamming for what you want is a constant.

The final straw came for me during finals week. I put about five hours of hard mental effort into creating a comprehensive final exam for my students. Nearly two-thirds of my kids didn’t attempt to finish the test. They didn’t even bother to finish the multiple choice section with random answers! It’s another characteristic of our underclass to sacrifice the future in the face of an immediate demand they might find distasteful. Once again, work avoidance is the norm … damn the consequences.

Fishtown was not always like this. There was a time when subsistence agriculture meant that hard work ensured survival. Social parasites were driven from the village under a hail of sticks and stones. It was a time when the virtues meant community cohesion. Governments at all their various levels conspire today to destroy civic virtue. The worst thing any government can do to a citizenry is make poverty comfortable. It’s from idleness that all the other vices flow. Government as chief provider for the populace is a false compassion. Hard work remains a noble virtue.                       

              

        

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  1. user_1029039 Inactive
    user_1029039
    @JasonRudert

    Excellent piece, Mugwump. Judging from this and some of your other posts, you’ve fulfilled your duty to the young people entrusted to you. What are you going to do now? Keep teaching somewhere else?

    • #1
  2. MLH Inactive
    MLH
    @MLH

    Jason Rudert:

    Excellent piece, Mugwump. Judging from this and some of your other posts, you’ve fulfilled your duty to the young people entrusted to you. What are you going to do now? Keep teaching somewhere else?

     There’s a new Basis school opening in Prescott. Probably already staffed though. 

    • #2
  3. The Mugwump Inactive
    The Mugwump
    @TheMugwump

    Jason Rudert:

    Excellent piece, Mugwump. Judging from this and some of your other posts, you’ve fulfilled your duty to the young people entrusted to you. What are you going to do now? Keep teaching somewhere else?

    I’m back to driving a cab for the short term.  More lucrative than teaching and less hassle.  I might get back into teaching later, but only for a genuinely functional school.    

    • #3
  4. user_278007 Inactive
    user_278007
    @RichardFulmer

    Some years ago, a young woman from another Fishtown was interviewed after she had been fired from her first job – a job that had lasted just one week.  She had shown up for work the first day, but did little or nothing while there.  During the rest of the week, she either arrived late or not at all.  When she was finally fired, her reaction was shock.  She said that it was the first time in her life that she had been expected to (a) show up, (b) show up on time, and (c) actually accomplish anything.  She had graduated from school but school had clearly failed her.  After reading Mugwump’s story, I think perhaps it wasn’t just her school.  “It takes a village.”

    • #4
  5. Yeah...ok. Inactive
    Yeah...ok.
    @Yeahok

    Good post sir. You may need that carbine some day.

    I agree with Clive Bundy, the slavery of the welfare life which leads to idleness is worse than the slavery of picking cotton.

    • #5
  6. Rightfromthestart Coolidge
    Rightfromthestart
    @Rightfromthestart

    Like every other rotten thing we live with today it stated in the 60’s when the concepts of charity, home relief, welfare etc. began to be called ‘entitlements’.  No need to be grateful or appreciative or ashamed when, after all, you are  justly ‘entitled’ .

    • #6
  7. user_1050 Member
    user_1050
    @MattBartle

    Wow, what a sad story.

    • #7
  8. user_513938 Inactive
    user_513938
    @RobertHam

    Thank you for sharing –

    The most recent issue of Hillsdale’s Imprimis featured a very detailed summary of the state of the welfare society in today’s UK – essentially pointing out that with no incentive to leave the welfare state, behaviors become ingrained over the course of generations – leaving dependence on the ruling class for their very existence.

    • #8
  9. neutral observer Thatcher
    neutral observer
    @neutralobserver

    At one time ‘becoming a burden on society’ was something so shameful that it was to be avoided at all costs.  Now, it’s a Career Goal.

    • #9
  10. douglaswatt25@yahoo.com Member
    douglaswatt25@yahoo.com
    @DougWatt

    In some countries your class status is determined from birth, in the US it is evolving into the type of work you do. The mechanic that repairs my car becomes at least to me just as important to me as many of the good teachers and professors I had while in school for the simple reason that my car gets me to my job, enables to bring the groceries home, and allows me to travel on vacation. My professors and teachers instilled a love of reading that enables me to travel on the road of imagination. Both are equally important.

    • #10
  11. chorton65@comcast.net Inactive
    chorton65@comcast.net
    @GoldwatersRevenge

    Great piece Mugwamp and excellent responses. As a septuagenarian I now look back and realize by today’s standards I grew up in poverty. My widowed mother struggled mightily to provide for us but never would she have considered taking charity even if it was offered. I can remember her saying “Have a little pride in who you are”. Then there was a stigma against living on the dole. Those not willing to provide for themselves and their family were looked down upon. That all changed with the “Great Society”. 

    For years I have hoped that eventually conditions would get bad enough that even the Democrats would realize the destructive consequences of the “free lunch”. Not any more. The takers outnumber the givers and the Democrats see the welfare state as their road to a virtual one party system. Very hard times are ahead before this ship is righted. I will not get to see it.

    • #11
  12. Tuco Member
    Tuco
    @Tuco

    Thoroughly depressing and completely consistent with my own observations.

    • #12
  13. Fricosis Guy Listener
    Fricosis Guy
    @FricosisGuy

    Even worse, those who try to escape Fishtown are pilloried as being race traitors, wanting to abandon their kinfolk, etc.

    • #13
  14. St. Salieri Member
    St. Salieri
    @

    Well, it is spreading and becoming endemic, sadly well beyond the Fishtown’s.  I taught in a private Christian school in my home county of western PA.  On upbraiding my students for their laziness, I was met with, “Well, Mr. Salieri, don’t you know, our generation, we don’t do work…”  “Yeah, we’re proud to be lazy!”  Exact quotes (except for my name of course).

    Now I teach in the confluence of the oil patch and grain fields of Eastern Montana, and from the sons and grandsons of farmers…I get the same attitude and excuses as your New Mexico Fishtown students…some do work hard on the farm, but school…well, “school don’t count”…

    When rural farm kids have bought into the entitlement attitude we’ve got a problem, but then, many of them work farms that are entitled in a very different way.

    • #14
  15. user_981769 Inactive
    user_981769
    @Derringdoo

    I think there is a ethic in our nation that confuses defining success as not having to work.  After all, it is the characteristic most visibly striking in celebrity obsession where no credentials or accomplishments are required.  I’ve been aware of it, and somewhat impacted by it, since my childhood in the 60’s.  Work too hard or too diligently and you get chided for making someone else rich.  Reply that it is the way to get noticed and get ahead and get chided for being duped by ‘the Man.” 

    Combine this ethic with a safety net that does not judge merit in support decisions and the result is that too many people come to the conclusion that work and self-support, and dignity, are optional. 

    I used to tick my friends off when I would loftily say that poverty is primarily a spiritual condition.  But it is.

    • #15
  16. A Beleaguered Conservative Member
    A Beleaguered Conservative
    @

    I am sorry that you are leaving teaching; we need people like you to educate the young.   I hope you find your way back.

    • #16
  17. user_1030767 Inactive
    user_1030767
    @TheQuestion

    I’ll add that for eliminating poverty, wealth is that only solution, and wealth can only be created by work.  At any given time, there are always going to be segments of the populations who can’t work because they’re too young, or too old, or too disabled.  If we want to make sure we have enough wealth to support them, liberal unemployment and disability payments do not help.

    • #17
  18. user_142044 Thatcher
    user_142044
    @AmericanAbroad

    Mugwump, great concluding paragraph.  I especially like the line of how we used to be able to drive away the lazy with sticks and stones.  Good stuff, but obviously heartbreaking as well.

    On a more practical note, if you need a new teaching job, there are a whole host of international schools where achievement and effort is still valued.  Let me know if you are interested.

    • #18
  19. Pete EE Member
    Pete EE
    @PeteEE

    The medieval mind thought work was sullied: it was a compromise of the spiritual life we made for the world.
    Calvin redeemed work. Work was how we served and thus loved one another. It is an exaggeration to say that work is our purpose in life but it is likely to be the bulk of what makes our lives meaningful. I wish your Fishtown citizens appreciated work as how we help one another.

    • #19
  20. Grendel Member
    Grendel
    @Grendel

    Pete EE: The medieval mind thought work was sullied: it was a compromise of the spiritual life we made for the world. Calvin redeemed work. Work was how we served and thus loved one another.

    What?  Have you never looked at the monastic rules?  Laborare et orare!

    The idea of the “higher life”, wherein one did not get one’s hands dirty, was carried over from classical antiquity, but to say that it characterized the mediaeval mind is incorrect.  The Calvinists envisaged society as a whole as a monastic community.

    • #20
  21. Grendel Member
    Grendel
    @Grendel

    Laurence Baker: I think there is a ethic in our nation that confuses defining success as not having to work.

    Sounds like retirement.

    • #21
  22. No Caesar Thatcher
    No Caesar
    @NoCaesar

    The cost for idleness is too low.  In many cases, it pays.

    • #22
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