Kindless Philosophy

Fraternity   “ In section 4 of Chapter 2 we noted a wide range of ideas connected with a broad notion of fraternity which often appeared in the rhetoric, and indeed sometimes the argument, supporting mixed ability grouping. We suggested there that this cluster of ideas, though often confiated with ideas of equality and social justice, was actually about something else more to do with a positive valuing of social integration and feelings of community as things to be approved of in their ownright. Thus, as we pointed out, segregation of pupils into groups based upon specific abilities was seen by some teachers as deplorable, not solely because such differentiation represented the injustice of unjustifiably different treatment, but simply because it acted to support social divisiveness and against the possibility of social cohesiveness and mutually supportive cooperation. Sometimes this idea is part of a wider sociopolitical spectrum in which presentday society is seen as damagingly c...