Waiting for a Rabbit to Kill Itself.
In which I teach economics to children, pray to the ghost of Mrs. Thatcher, and have a pleasant argument with a good friend.
My good friend Ken Anderson, with whom I ran an organization (he founded it) and wrote my first published book, lives in the neighborhood and often comes over for dinner. We’ve been friends for eleven years, and have some traditions, like making obscure jokes about the history of addiction treatment - Congratulations Ken on the publication of your latest volume! The Corporate Octopus: Volume Five of the Untold history of addiction treatment in America. It’s here, friends.
Our other tradition is arguing about politics! While I greatly enjoy a conversation with anyone who will speak proper English, Ken is a real treat because he knows so much. He spent six years in Japan in the 1980’s, speaks fluent Japanese, and got his first Masters in East Asian Languages so he reads ancient Chinese in the original.
Ken describes himself as a Socialist. I most assuredly do not.
We argue and make fun of each other and I always learn something because he brings up a fact or theory that I didn’t know. Or maybe had forgotten.
A large percentage of you already know where this is going. The rest of you are probably worried about the rabbit, so I’ll assure you that it’s a character in a story, not a guest at the meal or the meal itself.
We repeated the argument that Socialists and the rest of us have all the time. Where are we going to get the money for all this free stuff? In a real Communist country, you know, you don’t get to sit around and write poetry all day. If other people don’t want to pay you to do what you want to do, you’re going to have to spend at least some time doing what you don’t want to do in order to survive. There’s no other way that a civilization can function.
AS: It’s like sitting in the middle of a farm, saying that the crops should grow, then waiting. Doesn’t seem like a good strategy.
KA: Or waiting for a rabbit to kill itself!
AS: What?
KA: The rabbit in Han Feizi’s story. A farmer sees a rabbit run into a tree stump, break its neck and die. The farmer cooks and eats the rabbit. Then he sits by the tree stump waiting for it to happen again, instead of working the fields.
AS: Aha! I vaguely remember this! But waiting for a rabbit to kill itself sounds like a terrible survival strategy! That’s not my career plan! (by this time we are laughing hysterically.)
Ken describes a bit about Chinese Legalism. Any of you are welcome to give an explanation… I read up on it a bit but it’s hard to know what’s a good source outside of your own field.
The story of the farmer expecting a rabbit to kill itself on a regular basis, therefore quitting his work and sitting to wait, struck me because it gets to the heart of something I saw every day. Kids standing at the back of the classroom, making Tik Tok videos of dances and ignoring their actual school work.
“My dears, you know that Ms. Smith will enforce policy on making videos in class.”
And I did. I loved being a sub who enforced the rules in a place where I was supported. A Dean or other official comes and confiscates the phones.
“Now ladies, how is it you presume to making a living and provide for you own family if you’re making Tik Tok videos instead of doing your school work?”
“We’re going to be influencers!”
The kids start to yell out how many followers they have.
All over cities like this, all over the country, young people actually believe that they will become wealthy influencers by doing these dances on Tik Tok.
Sure, some people find this strategy successful. The rest either get a job, or live on government programs and the off the books economy.
This is not theory. I see it, they tell me.
“Ladies and gentlemen, do we remember when the EBT cards didn’t get refilled for awhile?”
“Oh yes miss…”
Often a vibrant discussion will ensue, but if I thought I was going to make a living as an economics professor because I got a few kids to stop making Tik Tok videos and think, I’d be… waiting for a rabbit to kill itself.
“Do you know that taxpayers, like me and your teachers and grownups you know, are paying for your education right now?”
You’d be alarmed at how often I heard, “Miss, what’s a taxpayer?”
I briefly pray to the ghost of Mrs. Thatcher and give out some stickers while I explain where the money comes from that pays for the school, the Chromebooks, the teachers and staff, the lunches, the breakfasts, the heat and air conditioning.
I love getting kids to think. When you’re subbing, you are doing more keeping order than actual teaching. Those young people who do their work get stickers and lavish praise from me. But usually they run out of work or won’t do it, so I figure the taxpayers who pay me to do this may as well get their money’s worth and we should try to give the kids an education.
Still, I ask myself, “What are we doing here?” No one member of the system can take it on and reverse it alone - and the people I’ve worked with are all trying, so hard, doing better than any other urban public school I’ve been to.
You probably know what I’m going to say:
We have to stop making excuses for it. We can not just wave the magic “systemic racism” wand and pretending that excuses anyone from working.
Decades of failed liberal policy has taught these children that a rabbit will routinely kill itself in order to provide their breakfast, lunch, snacks, housing, Chromebooks, and who knows what else. As the relatively well off people I know on Facebook blather on about taxing the rich out of existence to fund social programs, I wonder:
Do they really think that suicidal rabbits will continue to appear?
The rabbits are getting sick of this. They work for a living, and they won’t kill themselves so that others can make Tik Tok videos indefinitely. If public education is not about teaching these children to become grown ups who can get jobs, what are we doing here?
One of my favorite capitalists, J-Lo, starts her famous song, “Jenny from the Block” with the line, “Everyone’s got to make a living.”
It’s true, you know. Maybe that quote should grace the school walls.
