Prison vs School: The Tour ( A Youtube video back to back comparison)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogmtAQlp9HI ^

[wintertime]

This video was made before the Sandy Hook killings. I expect that the prison-like conditions will grow worse.

Prison vs School: The Tour

Question: What do children learn when they attend prison-like indoctrination centers similar to those seen in this video? When children are in many ways treated like prisoners, and know that armed police and courts stand ready at all times to enforce the incarceration, what are they learning?

Answer: They risk learning to be comfortable prisoners of the state, comfortable with state compulsion, and they risk learning to be comfortable with the continuous threat of armed police and court action ever in the background of their lives. Their only crime was to born and for this they are incarcerated. They risk learning that the people who they should trust have abandoned them.

Question: How could anyone defend doing this to children? How can anyone deny what the outcome of having a nation of citizens comfortable with imprisonment will be for our continuing freedom?

Answer: I have no answer.

Question: Why would conservatives cooperate with this evil?

Answer: I have no answer.

Universal, police and court compelled government schooling is a very recent phenomena in human history. Our nation's Founding Fathers and 150,000 years of our human ancestors, would be appalled at the way we treat children. If they could speak from the dust they would warn of the evil it is doing to children and the evil consequences it will have for our continuing freedom.

[verga]

What do you think the point of the post was that I intended?

The last line: It seems that two years of homeschooling were insufficient to undo the damage of 11 years of traditional schooling, and a couple of dozen people paid the price for that damage.

If I missed it then I apologize, I have been battling a head cold for 2 1/2 days now.

[verga]

The ostensible reason, or the more likely real reason? Both would be appreciated, keeping in mind that both of them call for an opinion on your part. I would like to see the school records om, but realize that is not possible.

[sitetest]

Dear verga,

Head cold - I understand. I've been sick since December 7. Three back-to-back colds. Yech. It's all my son's fault. He came home from college for Thanksgiving with a cold and I think he infected us with all those college germs, which, being COLLEGE germs are, of course, way smarter than our antibodies. ;-)

Anyway, no that wasn't really my point. Fletcher J made a broad-brush attack on homeschoolers generally in order to attack wintertime, who, I admit, deserves what comes her way. It was just a matter of turnabout-is-fairplay.

Obviously, young Mr. Lanza had something wrong with him. It's been variously reported that perhaps he had Asperger’s. As far as I know, choice of schooling method is not an underlying cause of Asperger’s. But if someone wants to talk about how inappropriate it is to ping this as Another Reason to Homeschool thread because Mr. Lanza was a homeschooler, well, heck, then it's time to have some fun with such a cretin.

I think that perhaps to folks who have never homeschooled, homeschoolers may seem defensive. It's because we are.

I can't count how often my wife and I were verbally attacked for our choice to homeschool. We had neighbors who variously: asked whether we were doing something illegal and whether we should be reported to Child Services (a chilling thing to hear when you've just moved to a new neighborhood); told that we were abusing (that's the phrase that was actually used: child abuse) our children by homeschooling them; called us traitors for not supporting the local public elementary school by refusing to sacrifice our children to the public school system (something similar to something you said in another thread recently); told that our children would grow up to be social misfits; asked whether we were part of some strange religious cult (we're just ordinary, church-going Catholics); told that we should have to be certified to teach like all the public school teachers; told that we should be carefully and regularly administered by those masters of successful education, the public school system, which fails to graduate from high school 30% of its charges; asked whether we're just too lazy to take our kids to school every day.

In my state, from time to time, legislators have introduced actual legislation to move toward criminalization of how we homeschool. Some legislators in my state have occasionally voiced the opinion that homeschooling should be illegal.

So, where we see an attack, we attack back. With just cause.

Perhaps Fletcher J thinks he's a real homeschool lover. I guess it's remotely possible, but he seems to be of the sort of homeschool “lover” like you, which is to say that you acknowledge in theory that we should be free to homeschool, and that there should be “choice,” but then when speaking about actual homeschoolers seem to only be able to focus on the few who fail.

With friends like these...

sitetest

[sitetest]

Dear verga,

The ostensible reason, as reported by the parents upon inquiry was that the administration of these children's schools admitted that their schools just weren't meeting the needs of these little tykes, and that it seemed that some people were having some success with this new-fangled homeschooling business, and perhaps they could try it out.

I was a little surprised, as I thought that violated the spirit, if not the letter of federal education law. But I'm not an expert in federal education law, so I could be wrong, and I don't know precisely how it was phrased, and when talking about the law, violations of the the actual intent of the law are often legal, if phrased properly.

This, by the way, isn't the exclusive province of public schools. Someone who used to work for me sent her children to a local Catholic school, and when troubles arose, and the parents protested that the local public school to which the oldest would be assigned was a hell-hole, it was suggested that perhaps the oldest could be homeschooled.

Real reasons. A little harder to discern, but here goes. The kids were bad apples, not specifically a danger to anyone, not specifically doing anything to warrant getting expelled, but nonetheless, they were disruptive and likely were corrupting others (they certainly tried to corrupt other children in our homeschool community), and the schools probably figured that everything would be much better without the little rugrats. And, you know, I don't much blame them.

I also speculate that, like most public school workers, they had a dislike of homeschoolers and were engaging in a little prospective schadenfreude at the thought of dumping their rejects on us. Obviously, I didn't personally talk to the public school folks involved, but I've gotten that sort of thing off public school teachers I've known personally.

sitetest

[verga]

In the broadest sense both those come under the heading of Danger to others or to self.

Last year I had a student that refused to use the Table saw safely. After the second kickback (Yes they were intentional, he used the fence and miter gage together) I requested a meeting with the parents, guidance counselor, and Asst. Principal. He was removed from my class that day.

[metmom]

Wintertime - given that the Sandy Hook mass murderer was home schooled and the victims were public school children, perhaps using the massacre for a diatribe about public school security and a “Another Reason to Homeschool” ping is in poor taste...

Adam Lanza, who was 20, is believed by investigators to have attended Sandy Hook Elementary, the site of his massacre on Friday, before being removed and partially home-schooled by his mother.

Trying to paint him as a homeschooler is not entirely accurate either.Looks like his homeschool time was after having attended public school for quite some time.

I know of kids who have been removed from public school as older students because of behavior problems and have had to be homeschooled if their parents wanted them to have an education.

It's disingenuous to portray them as homescooled, implying that it was done for their whole lives, and that that is the reason they went off the deep end.

A child who was homeschooled after having been removed from public school because of behavior problems had the problems before being homeschooled, not because of being homeschooled.

[verga]

A child who was homeschooled after having been removed from public school because of behavior problems had the problems before being homeschooled, not because of being homeschooled.

How many of them had "problems" before any schooling began? What definitive proof is there that Lanza's problems were caused by the school?

[SoftballMominVA]

While I will freely admit I do not know the details of every school situation in all 50 states, several things about this statement do not stand up to basic logic.

Schools DO NOT ask children to be removed - this represents a loss in funding. Every school system I have ever been connected with has an alternative environment for students that do not fit in the normal environment for a number of reasons.

Secondly, there is no guidance counselor in the country with the power to remove a child - and I’ll go a step further and posit there are no principals either. Why? Back to the funding idea. For a student to be removed from a school system, the school board typically makes that decision and it’s never made lightly. Again...back to $$

Thirdly, this is only one side of the situation. Consider a child that has acted so badly that they are on the verge of being expelled - a dark mark indeed - I could see a parent removing them before the paperwork actually went through. Sort of a “I’m going to get fired, so I’ll quit first.”

Lastly, if a child is SO BAD that the local public school CANNOT handle them, I hope to goodness they are closely supervsed when in a casual setting such as a church. When children act out at school so much that they are on the verge of expulsion, there is a systemic problem with basic child rearing that shows up in multiple environments. If I had a young child of my own for which I was responsible, I would never, ever want them near a child that the parent claimed was ‘pushed out’ of the local public school.

That’s my view based on many years teaching, and teaching children with a variety of discipline problems. Sorry, your story leaks water like a sieve - most likely from the parents of the given children putting the most flattering spin on the story to protect their child. But someone with a higher education, a doctorate in a health field, and who has made frequent claims to be skilled in logic should see through the holes in that story without having them pointed out.

[Fletcher J]

Cretin? You’ve hurt my feelings. LOL

I thought you were more rational than the other poster on this thread, but I see now you are more like her than you realize.

[sitetest]

“...but I see now you are more like her than you realize.”

Actually, that’s precisely what I thought about you.

[sitetest]

Dear verga,

These kids weren’t expelled for dangerous activities. They weren’t expelled at all. There was conflict concerning behavior between school authorities and the parents, and the suggested homeschooling. It appeared to me that the whole thing was a dodge by the schools, because they didn’t really have any cause to take formal action (other than to give them poor grades and maybe an occasional detention, if public schools do that sort of thing) against these kids, and this was a convenient way to be done with them.

There is no evidence that these children did much more than refuse to keep their mouths shut in class, use poor language, etc. They were just poorly-behaved, and didn’t have an attitude oriented toward learning, not dangerous.

They eventually left our homeschooling community, but not because anyone told them to go. I observed these kids a couple or so times a week. We had a modest co-op and I was coach of the chess club, and took my kids to other activities. These kids were annoying, often loud, crass, stupid and often ill-mannered. However, we parents conferred and all agreed, there wasn't much of any basis to throw them out of the co-op. They certainly weren't dangerous. They just didn’t fit in with the homeschooled kids.

sitetest

[metmom]

Schools DO NOT ask children to be removed - this represents a loss in funding.

All it takes is one case to prove that not true and I know of one.

The school kicked the kid out and the mother was forced to homeschool.

FWIW, this boy excelled at academics at home, which he did not in the public school, and graduated from a community college, instead of JD which is where he was headed while in the public school system.

[metmom]

Sorry, your story leaks water like a sieve - most likely from the parents of the given children putting the most flattering spin on the story to protect their child. But someone with a higher education, a doctorate in a health field, and who has made frequent claims to be skilled in logic should see through the holes in that story without having them pointed out.

I am not lying.

FReepmail....

[Fletcher J]

Ah, the “no true Scotsman” defense again... :)

If you guys really think that using Sandy Hook is a great lead-in to a pro-homeschooling / anti-public school thread, I hope you aren’t in charge of PR or advertising strategy anywhere. I’m not saying that homeschooling was at fault, I’m saying that it’s really poor “optics”, given that the general public’s perception is that an adult homeschooler murdered tiny public school children.

You claim I was being disingenuous about Adam being a homeschooler, but “not entirely accurate” (your words), is a good synonym for “far from wrong”... ;)

But, I’ll gladly concede that Adam wasn’t really a homeschooler, if you’ll ping your ARtH ping list with your opinion on how many years (or percent) of homeschooling it takes before a kid is a “real” homeschooler, and ask for feedback. Let’s get a thread started!

Once you’ve developed a consensus, you can use that as a determination on whether any given achievement is by a “real” homeschooler, and can therefore be celebrated on a ARtH thread. It’ll require some investigation into each child’s past, but it’s the only way we can all be “entirely accurate”, which is clearly very important.

[sitetest]

Dear Fletcher J,

“Ah, the ‘no true Scotsman’ defense again... :)”

I passed this up the last time you wrote this, figuring you mistyped or just had a senior moment or something. But I see you've trotted out this canard again, so let me lend a hand.

What posters, including myself, have written, isn't actually the No True Scotsman logical fallacy. In my case, I actually confirmed that Mr. Lanza was homeschooled, but pointed out that in context, he'd spent most of his school years in traditional schools, public and private, and for this reason I asserted that your original post was not so much false as dishonest because of the failure to note context.

In the case of others, the tack is a little different.

Here is a short blurb from wiki:

“No true Scotsman is an informal fallacy, an ad hoc attempt to retain an unreasoned assertion.[1] When faced with a counterexample to a universal claim, rather than denying the counterexample or rejecting the original universal claim, this fallacy modifies the subject of the assertion to exclude the specific case or others like it by rhetoric, without reference to any specific objective rule.”

Although you may debate its merit, it is a reliance on an objective standard to state that someone who attends traditional schools for primary and secondary years for 11 years and is homeschooled for the last two is far more a traditional schooler than a homeschooler.

Better luck next time.

sitetest

[verga]

These kids weren’t expelled for dangerous activities. They weren’t expelled at all.

Exactly the point I was making.

These kids were not expelled. It was suggested that the parents look into homeschooling. It was the parents choice, until the kids were so bad that it wasn't their choice

[SoftballMominVA]

I believe you — and the situation you described is the exact kind that I described - leave before you are kicked out.

some kids are bright but go through rough patches behaviorally. Some work that out later in life, some do not.

However, the child you mentioned was not kicked out by a principal or counselour but rather given a chance without a bad mark on his record

Glad it worked out for him in the long run

[sitetest]

Dear verga,

Not sure of your point. I never said they were expelled, only “encouraged” to leave.

My original reply to you was to your post where you replied to wintertime:

“This failure of logic demands a response...”

And then you talk about the three reasons why kids are removed from schools. But you're the one talking about forcible expulsion, not cases where parents are coerced to take their kids out of public schools by less-formal means.

You actually quoted part of the post to which you'd replied:

“Before we moved, in our other state, we were members of congregation that had many lower class members. It was appalling how many “push-outs” into homeschooling there were in our congregation. These kids were not being homeschooled. They just weren't wanted in their government indoctrination camps and it was the **principals** and counselors in these indoctrination camps who encouraged the parents to remove their kids.”

sitetest

[metmom]

“Before we moved, in our other state, we were members of congregation that had many lower class members. It was appalling how many “push-outs” into homeschooling there were in our congregation. These kids were not being homeschooled. They just weren't wanted in their government indoctrination camps and it was the **principals** and counselors in these indoctrination camps who encouraged the parents to remove their kids.”

And then some people go and use that as examples of how bad homeschooling is and when the kids really go off the deep end, then the homeschooling is blamed for it, when in reality, they were really messed up before they were *encouraged* to be homeschooled by the very school administrators who blame homeschooling for messing kids up.

The hypocrisy is staggering.

[wintertime]

I respectfully request that you not ping me or send private mail to me. Please feel free to comment as you like, even using my name, but, please, no contact.

Politely and respectfully,

wintertime