• SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social
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    1 year ago

    It literally is, by the doctrine on parens patriae. It is the duty of the state to act in the best interests of its citizens who unable to pursue those interests themselves, whether it’s because they are incapacitated, or minors. This goes back centuries, to the time of monarchy. Our ancestors resolved the question of “who should care for the orphans?” with the simple answer, “it is the king’s duty.”

    It is the government’s job, in its role as sovereign, to feed kids who don’t get enough to eat. And if it’s not, we should just burn it all to the fucking ground, because why else even have a society?

        • thebrownhaze@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Wow. The first person on this thread to not just insult me.

          I have no issue with free school meals, I just don’t want them to be universal, feeding rich kids is crazy.

          • Astro@sh.itjust.works
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            1 year ago

            It’s easier for everyone to have free meals than a select few, I feel. It would also get rid of an easy target on lower income kids being bullied for having the “free lunch”.

            • AA5B@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Probably also much cheaper per. Trying to set up a meals program for the fee underprivileged - probably should just order Panera delivered. But if you go through the overhead of setting up a program, the cost of more meals is probably marginal.

              Also, how about when kids forget. Why does it always seem to be the teacher who has to buy emergency food?

              To me, it’s like prison: kids always compare school to prison, so let’s go with that. The government is forcing them to be there past meal times, and not letting them out. The school is claiming parental authority to watch out for their needs. One of them is food, dammit

            • thebrownhaze@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Yes, the government is wasteful and bureaucratic I agree. Is my solution anyone can have the free meals if they apply for it they’re simple to apply for through the school.

              That would immediately eliminate a huge number of unnecessary lunches to purchase. I would happily have been buying my kids their school lunches through their first three years of school, but that was not a choice offered to me.

              When I went to school half the kids are on preschool dinners literally nobody cared.

              Incidentally my family were dirt poor when I was a little but we weren’t poor enough to qualify for free school lunches but we may do with sandwiches. Presuming the poor are incapable and requiring of constant charity is the soft bigotry of low expectation

              • DarthBueller@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                Presuming the poor are a monolith is problematic. There’s also a huge difference between being broke and being broke in a poverty-defined culture. There are folks who are broke and still have a big view of the world, and folks who are broke and have a very narrow view of a very small world. That said, I don’t understand the hostility to a hand out.