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The Forum > Article Comments > Memo to students: you should be angry > Comments

Memo to students: you should be angry : Comments

By Kellie Tranter, published 22/1/2014

Isn't it also time for the union and students to question the status quo and review the economic ideology underpinning HECS?

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Free education? Pigs ribs!

There is no justification for expecting tax payers to fund the increasing number of no hopers and time wasters swanning their way through dumbed-down courses (if they even finish) which will be of little or no use to them in the real world. The incompetents of the system are already showing up in the public service – which is about the only organisation that will employ them.

The courses are dumbed down deliberately to attract more of the drones, who were never suited to university education in the first place, mostly due to the socialist state’s appalling secondary education system where most of them barely learn to read and write; and where the poor dears are not stressed by such terrible things as examinations because it might lower their self-esteem! More important to indoctrinate them with Left-wing politics, which, it could be argued, is good grounding for the tertiary system of brain-washing.

We have, at best, a mediocre education system in Australia. There is no respect for anything handed out free of charge. Even the socialists – after the idiot Whitlam – worked that one out. Take away the cost, and we will be knee deep in morons.
Posted by NeverTrustPoliticians, Wednesday, 22 January 2014 9:52:58 AM
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Ms Tranter,

You misunderstand Gramsci's quote and intention. Gramsci was a cultural Marxist, and the "long march through the institutions" meant that institutions should be reformed under cultural Marxist ideals. Incidentally, this has already taken place in the academe, and has been taking place since the 1960s. Australian and European history, along with other subjects taught in the Humanities and Social Sciences, have been thoroughly instantiated with "cultural Marxism". Any reform by the government would be to try and bring the curriculum back to the centre somewhere, instead of the extreme left (not that Pyne was addressing higher education, he was addressing primary and secondary schools).
Posted by Aristocrat, Wednesday, 22 January 2014 10:49:34 AM
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Quote "If free education is good enough for Germany, Mexico and elsewhere it should be good enough for Australian students."

Where will the money come from for free education?

It is easy to have grandiose plans like NDIS etc but again where will the money come from?

Australia is billions of dollars in debt.
Posted by Philip S, Wednesday, 22 January 2014 2:11:03 PM
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The key point of this essay was of course the reference to Gramsci and the soft power strategies used by the ruling classes to maintain their Cultural Hegemony - how they have in the words of Chomsky "manufactured consent"
Pedantic as usual I suggest that Henry Giroux is superb in describing how the hegemonic strategies of the ruling classes have been systematically applied in recent years.
Meanwhile of course the capitalism world-machine, and its now everywhere dramatized "culture" of death has all but destroyed what there once was of Civilization, and is in the process of destroying the biosphere too, and thus by extension (or simultaneously) humankind too.
Posted by Daffy Duck, Wednesday, 22 January 2014 3:15:58 PM
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Dear Kellie,

There is no such thing as free, there used to be of course, it was called the “air we breath”. Then along came the progressives and put a Tax on it.

When you say “free” you don’t mean that at all do you? What you actually mean is that you want to use someone else’s money, right?

It might be much more polite of you to acknowledge that fact and then make a case to those who you feel should pay. Instead you incite students to get angry and demand our money.

The problem the “regulating class” has with the wider public, is that it is gradually dawning on them that the entire progressive block is working contrary to the interests of all Australians.

Sure you are concerned for “some” Australians, just not those who actually generate the wealth.

Like all progressives and their useful idiots, you have formed a parasitic relationship with our society, we give and you take. If we don’t give, you demand. If our demands are not met you threaten, abuse, vilify and bully we plebs with intellectual rhetoric.

I suspect that you are inciting anger to drum up business, because you fully recognize that your human rights activism business is about to go down the gurgle as the entire issue, along with yet more of the government funding upon which you rely, is going to be taken off the table.

Stirring up the campus dependent troops will only antagonize Australians more.

I genuinely hope that you and Wikileaks can find something decent to do for our great country, in the meantime do try to avoid pursuing that which is contrary to self interest.
Posted by spindoc, Wednesday, 22 January 2014 3:16:23 PM
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There seems to be two empirically testable hypothesis in contest here. Kelly’s hypothesis is that HECS will discourage people in general, and disadvantaged people in particular, from undertaking higher education. Under this hypothesis, since HECS was introduced the proportion of people undertaking higher education would have declined, with the decline occurring disproportionately among disadvantaged groups.

The alternative view is that HECS will not act as a deterrent because the lifetime earnings of graduates are higher than non-graduates. Rather, HECS will allow the higher education sector to educate more people and target the disadvantaged more directly. Under this hypothesis, since HECS was introduced the proportion of people undertaking higher education would have increased, with the rise occurring disproportionately among disadvantaged groups.

The data show that participation in higher education by 17-19 year olds rose from 12% to 25% between 1982 and 2010. Participation by 20-29 year olds rose from 6% to 12%

The proportion of disadvantaged and indigenous students has been broadly stable.

It seems that HECS has not had the detrimental effect its detractors expected.

It is also fair that students contribute to the cost of their education. They are the main beneficiaries. The lifetime earnings of graduates are significantly higher than the earnings of non-graduates. While there are also broader social benefits from having an educated population which justify a level of subsidisation, the private benefits make it fair that students also contribute to the cost of their education.
Posted by Rhian, Wednesday, 22 January 2014 3:20:06 PM
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