Plan B Forum

GMB guests Sir Michael Wilshaw and Freddie Bentley clashed in a debate over whether kids should be taught about the Second World War.



The debate came after contestants on The Apprentice revealed they didn’t know when WWII began or ended.

Speaking to hosts Ben Shephard and Kate Garraway, The Circle contestant Freddie claimed that lessons on the topic could be ‘bad for their mental health’.

He said: “I don’t think it needs to be put to such young children.

“For their mental health to be told that this amount of people died for you is a lot.”

Former OFSTED Chief Inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw hit back at the comment, saying: “You mustn't exaggerate.”

Freddie defended his comment, admitting that he found such lessons to be ‘intense’.

He said: “I don’t think I am exaggerating. I remember learning it as a child and thinking ‘my God, it’s so intense.’”

The former OFSTED inspector said: “Children need to know that it is a dangerous world out there.

“They need to know that crossing the road is sometimes dangerous.

“They need to know that if they get too fat there are obesity issues.”

Agreeing with his points, Freddie argued that educating kids on the war won’t be useful in the long-run, saying: “Of course, but mental health is on the rise now.

“I don’t think encouraging death or telling people how many people died in a war is going to help someone in the future.”

The Circle contestant also admitted that he had no idea about ‘general life’ issues when he left school himself, saying: “There are so many problems in the world at the moment, like Brexit, that is not taught in schools.

“Climate change, which is a situation that I feel we should be aware of.

“When I left school, I felt like it hit me like a tonne of bricks, because I didn’t know anything about general life.

“I felt like I was going out to the world, completed my GCSE’s and I knew what I was doing in life.

“Then all of a sudden, it hit me because I didn’t know how to save for a mortgage.

“Instead of focusing so much on our history and holding onto our past, we could let it go a little bit, I’m not saying get rid of it totally, but let go of it a little bit and replace it with a subject that is going to be beneficial in the future.”

Asked by Kate Garraway whether lessons on the war ‘matter’ to millennials, Sir Wilshaw said: “It matters, as other major events in history matter.

“If somebody came up to you and said ‘on 12 December you will not be able to vote, we’re going to take the franchise away from you’, you’d be insulted wouldn’t you?

“The reason I mention that is because millions of people have died, 50 million people died in the Second World War, to fight facism to fight tyranny, people who wanted to take away people’s right to vote.

“That’s why people should know about the Second World War, the First World War, the conflicts that have taken place, and the fight for freedom that we enjoy.”

Video here...

Then all of a sudden, it hit me because I didn’t know how to save for a mortgage.

He probably wasn't also taught how to use a straw for drinking

"only 16-30 year olds should be allowed to vote,...

Especially when the entire congress is given LSD.

• Okay, Boomers.
  
  If you've been following my Twitter timeline for the last 24 hours, you know I've once again managed to offend at least two, possibly three, generations.
  
  This amuses me for so many reasons.
  
  It began with a snarky comment about the current faddish phrase "OK, Boomer."
  
  Some silly git jumped into my timeline with "I’m not rich, but making money from the stock market. Get over yourself clown."
  
  Get over yourself, clown. Heh heh.
  
  So, I "OK, Boomer"ed him.
  
  Why not? Because I'm nothing if not hip and with-it when it comes to the current trendy vernacular.
  
  Target of opportunity. My intention was the set up for a joke, "I know. But everybody was doing it and I just wanted to be part of it." Little Twitter humor. Maybe not the pinnacle of hilarity, but it seemed a fairly harmless way to shine on some random troll.
  
  Naturally, social media being social media, Boomers -- which are a large part of my audience, given that I'm a tail-end Boomer myself -- were offended.
  
  I find this utterly hilarious. Seriously. A Baby Boomer being offended at being dismissed as a Boomer is about the most ironically Boomer thing possible.
  
  There's a song from 1971, I'd Love To Change The World, by the British group Ten Years After and fronted by Alvin Lee. It begins:
  

  • "Everywhere is
    freaks and hairies,
    dykes and fairies,
    Tell me where is sanity?"

  
  Now, you listen to that lyric nowadays and you're outraged. Dykes? Fairies? Freaks? Hairies? Where is sanity? Man, that's bigoted bullshit right there.
  
  Except that wasn't Alvin Lee talking.
  
  That was the squares. That was Future Shock. That was the words of the Greatest Generation, puzzled and confused by their own children, the Baby Boomers, filling the streets with music and protest and sexual revolution. That was THEIR words. What is going on? Who are these people? Has the world gone mad?
  
  But the song goes on:
  
  

  • "Tax the rich,
    feed the poor,
    till there are
    no rich no more."

  
  THOSE are the words of the Boomers.
  
  

  • "Tax the rich.
    Feed the poor.
    Till there are
    no rich no more.
    
    I'd love to change the world
    But I don't know what to do
    So I'll leave it up to you."

  
  The song is a brilliant, brilliant snapshot of revolution, the voices of generations caught in between worlds.
  
  You see it right?
  

  • "World pollution,
    there's no solution,
    institution,
    electrocution
    
    Just black and white,
    rich or poor,
    them and us
    We'll stop the war!
    
    I'd love to change the world
    But I don't know what to do
    So I'll leave it up to you."

  
  I love that song so much and the more things change the more they stay exactly the same.
  
  And here we are, ten years after -- and how utterly prophetic the name of that long gone band, yes?
  
  Ten years after.
  
  Thirty.
  
  Forty years on.
  
  And here we are. OK, Boomer. We've grown old, we Baby Boomers. WE'RE the generation being rejected and dismissed now.
  
  I find that ironic. Hilariously so.
  
  Naturally not everyone sees it that way.

  "No. Because it always comes out of nowhere from some ass I'm not even speaking with. I'm not a boomer. They aren't paying attention. Just lobbing asshole grenades."

  
  That was a response to my comments. They're not listening! I'm not even speaking to them and they butt in anyway! They're just being assholes! And you don't even have to play back the news recordings of 1971 to hear my dad's own complaints about my generation. Makes me miss him even more, it does. sincerely.
  
  Another Boomer weighed in:

  "It's just an attempt at a belittling way to say 'Whatever' and walk away. It's a bullshit way to not have to have an actual conversation."

  
  Never trust anyone over 30, right?
  
  Remember that? I sure do.
  
  But this was the one that really made me laugh:

  "I am a left wing, bleeding heart liberal .. and I am a boomer. I fought for civil rights, women’s rights, environmental change. I marched against the Vietnam war. I continue to do these things. I am tired of being disrespected."

  
  I'm tired of being disrespected.
  
  Oh, I so remember the Greatest Generation, in their brush cuts and dark suits. The generation who fought Nazis across Europe and who built the rockets that took us to the moon and safely home again. Tired of being disrespected by dykes and fairies, freaks and hairies and I don't know what to do. Right? Oh, man. Like I said, it makes me nostalgic for 1971. Tax the rich, feed the poor, until there ain't no rich no more. Oh, god, the sweet irony.
  
  The truth of the matter is that we blew it.
  
  We did.
  
  You want respect from the next generation? Well, then you should have left the planet in better shape than you found it. Simple as that. And we didn't.
  
  I don't know if that's a unique failing of my generation. I suspect it's simply a matter of viewpoint a generation on, forever and forever as we roll on through history. You "Okay boomer" me? I'm not offended. I *am* a boomer and I'm ashamed, disappointed, that we didn't do better.
  
  I'd love to change the world, but I don't know what to do. So I leave it up to you.
  
  Those words from 1971 haunt me.
  
  I hope Generation X, and Y and the Millennials will do better than we did. I leave it up to you.
  
  But, I suspect thirty years on and you'll be right here with us, talkin' 'bout my generation.
  
  Or not.
  
  We can always hope.
  
  More than any other generation, Baby Boomers rejected the ideology of previous generations, everything from their music to their sexual mores. Never trust anybody over 30, right?
  
  

  • "Population,
    keeps on breeding,
    nation bleeding,
    Still more feeding economy
    
    Life is funny,
    skies are sunny,
    bees make honey
    Who needs money? Monopoly!
    
    I'd love to change the world
    But I don't know what to do
    So I'll leave it up to you...
    
    Oh yeah"

  
  Thirty years later, the current generation dismisses US.
  
  God is an iron.*
  
  And getting old sucks.