But what about the people who dig ditches?

[meadowlander]

26. To be clear, I'm not talking about formal education

as much as I'm talking about valuing learning as an inherent good.

I don't think someone who dropped out of school at 14 to support their parents raising their younger siblings is an inherently less valuable member of society than someone with three PhDs.

But there's no reason the high school drop-out or neurodivergent person who struggled with formal education or person who just loves a career path that doesn't require a degree (acting or hairdressing or being an electrician or whatever) should denigrate learning for its own sake.

Or that we need to agree to pander to that person to get their vote. That kind of inauthenticity reeks from a mile away.

My immigrant forebearers busted their asses so that my parents could get good educations so they could break into the middle class. What a gigantic fuck you it would be to all that hard work and sacrifice if I then turned around and said "actually I'm autistic, school is hard, and therefore anyone else who does get more education that me is an elitist snob I don't have to show any respect to."

It just reeks of sour grapes. And it's silly anyway because college isn't even remotely the only place to learn things. The point is that you want to learn things and you see the value of doing so, even when you don't always have the opportunity to do it yourself. And you want your kids to learn things, to be curious and to keep growing and trying to see things from new perspectives. If we can't agree on that as a core value, then what is our society based on?