I like what he said about mobility, opportunity, and everybody works hard (or at least the vast majority of people). I wish he could have expanded more on just what he meant by an opportunity and how he changed his mind.

This is something I've wrestled with too; even having lived it, it's surprisingly difficult to put your finger on it. Sometimes I wonder if my advantage was simply that my great-grand-parents were highly educated. This somehow resulted in my farmer grand-father being adamant that his children be educated, even though it wasn't until my generation that this vision materialized. In any case, education was framed for me as some kind of holy grail, even though many in my community didn't see it that way. So when I ended up getting a chance to go, I felt very lucky and took advantage of it.

(I should add that I couldn't have waited any longer, and that if I had been raised in America, I likely would have been lost much earlier.)

Hi Liza,

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Social control = lame. I didn't know you couldn't vote if you had a felony. And the opportunity factor was not overstated, like the statement about his mother working hard her whole life and not advancing. Good and interesting points!

This reminds me of another video that went up recently on this site where the speaker addressed how we run schools like factories. That thing about age being the most important factor in how we group students stuck with me.

And dears, always remember to enunciate. He is handsome, obviously smart, and would be absolutely captivating if he didn't sound so much like Milton from Office Space. And take a tip from Carlos of Desperate Housewives and shave the goatee. Then he'd definitely be Rios Suave!

I have to be honest. I had some difficulty following the conversation, but I'm going to give my two cents.

If you put a sticker on a civilian (regardless if that civilian has done something to 'deserve' it or not, good chances are that this civilian is going to act like a criminal. It makes me think about the Standford Prison Experiment. Just average college students becoming sadistic only because of their fictional role they had been given (guard), and students with the criminal role began rebelling right from the start.

And who hasn't heard of the young criminals who had committed a relatively small felony, who came out of jail with series of new tricks up their sleeves.

I have no idea what the solution is for this problem...But this system isn't working I believe.

you ever heard the expression:

"Give a dog a bad name"?

That's what this is.

Seems like a complicated way of saying something we all should bloody know to me.

And Inny, you're a little mistaken - that experiment [replicated] showed the inherent flaw in unregulated power, along with the levels of conformity/complicity of 'unwilling guards' who allowed the abuse of that power - the whole point was that it had absolutely nothing to do with the 'inmates' behaviour - good or bad.

But your analogy is spot on - cloths don't make the man, labels do.