unhappy boys

[brenton]

I am a headteacher in a primary school. We have some lovely children but I am concerned for the future of some of them. Particularly boys. I read Sue Palmer's book, Toxic Childhood and she brings together research from scientists who have investigated the impact of many aspects of today's society on children's wellbeing and behaviour. I see the effects of all of these things in school every single day. It worries me because I know how unhappy some of these children are.
We spend millions of ponds in our country, dealing with the effects of too little sleep, too much tv, poor diet, etc etc etc... People are deeply hurt in many ways as a result of the effects and we are finding it hard to educate these children in our schools.
What I would like to see is firm support for every new parent - compulsory learning about how to bring up a child, regardless of age or class; regardless of circumstances. Scientists have done the research - let us use it to move forward and make the world a better place.

[David Chester]

In many places it seems that recently less and less is being spent on educational and social services and more and more is going towards the perverse greater separation gap between the rich and the poor. As a preson who is directly connected to seing the effects of this I can sympathise with you and the poor state of some of your pupils, but for a necessary change to take place there is a crying need for political reforms and greater social justice.

The work towards this by the British Science Association should surely be along the line of improving our understanding about how our society functions and the manner by which the poverty gap is growing and should be stopped. A useful part of this is through education and the teaching of macroeconomics to a logical and comprehensive level so that more of the public become aware of the causes of this polarization of our society. This is a long-term process with no simple and direct solution in sight.

There is however a clear explanation for what is causing this gap to widen and how to close it. Interested students of macroeconomics might benefit from studying the writings of Henry George 1879, see http://www.progress org ) and other related sources.