Are Homeschoolers really similar to Islamic Terrorists?

You know how there are terrorist cells embedded throughout the world? Well, in my neighborhood we have numerous "homeschool" cells humming in the cul-de-sacs. They're almost as scary as the terrorist ones in some ways -- and they definitely have some traits in common with them.

When we first moved to Charlotte, the houses next to us, behind us, and diagonally across the street all contained children who mysteriously never seemed to leave home, and mothers with glazed expressions on their faces. The whole set-up of moms stuck with their school-age kids 24/7 gave me the willies, and that was before I even had one of my own.

Middle class areas seem to be magnets for little suburban schoolhouses. Even though there must be homeschooling pockets all over Charlotte, somehow I don't picture your basic Ballantyne babe risking breaking a nail on a chalkboard in the bonus room, or skipping a tennis set for an educational excursion to the sewage plant. Likewise, I doubt many Belmont moms miss a beat packing those kids off to public school. It's the middle class that gets suckered into the myth that mothers and older children can survive being together all day without somebody being strangled. The true "haves" and "have-nots" know better.

What's scary is that a lot of the homeschooling faithful are as fueled by a fanatical, religion-based belief in their mission as Islamist terrorists, and seem to be just about as brainwashed. Sometimes I even wonder if they're a manufactured race along the lines of the Stepford wives in Ira Levin's book, but assembled in fundamentalist Christian churches instead of family basements. Like the Stepford robots, they're programmed to fulfill their husbands' fantasies, only in this case it's their role as the Ultimate Selfless Mothers.

Other times I feel like the heroine in another famous horror story by Levin, Rosemary's Baby, at that chilling moment when she puts together the anagram "All of Them Witches" and realizes it refers to her seemingly harmless neighbors. Some of the homeschooling moms (HMs) are kind of witch-y, with the uncut hair and the long skirts because pants on females are unholy, but the description that really applies to this coven is "All of Them Zealots."

They're not only terrorist-like in their conviction that their calling is divinely ordained, homeschoolers also often have a broad martyr streak. Rather than suicide bombings, though, they commit "suicide book-learning," sacrificing their own lives to teach their kids. I've known one or two to get pregnant as an excuse to get out of homeschooling hell, but the true martyrs keep right on instructing, with the newest little pupil glued to their breast.

Beyond a certain age, children and mothers are just not meant to be isolated together. It's unnatural. Keeping the kids at home might have worked back in the Stone Age, but cave women would've at least had each other for company, and I bet they made damn sure the youngsters stayed off in a group together while they grunted gossip and drank their Cro-Magnon coffee.

Kids need their teachers to be adults, separate from their mothers. That way they can idolize or despise them apart from a parent figure, and don't have to depend on one person for everything they require. Did a parent of yours try to teach you to drive? How'd that go? 'Nuff said.

All young animals must be immersed in a mass of their peers so they can figure out what it means to function as a member of the larger group. Believe me, I'm aware that homeschooling families get their children together, since occasionally there'll be a flood of them from next door scrambling over the fence to play uninvited in our yard, but being with maybe a dozen other kids once in a while doesn't do the trick. It takes serious numbers for developing humans to catch on to the nuances of accepted behavior and to have a chance to make enough friends. I just can't see homeschooling providing adequate socialization.

One of my neighboring HMs taught her two kids through eighth grade, then threw them to the wolves in public high school. The boy ended up dropping out and doing jail time, and the girl got pregnant.

Yes, I know that homeschooled kids have won high-profile academic contests, but for every homeschooler who aces a spelling bee, there's some poor child being "instructed" by a parent who's barely literate herself. Teachers in the public school system are required to have certification and college degrees, yet any yahoo can force their kids to stay home as long as they pass an annual test.

What's really scary about homeschooling is what it can do to the sanity of a mother deluded into thinking it's her Christian duty. No woman was ever meant to be trapped in a house all day with children old enough to spell "homicide."

So if new neighbors move in next door and you notice that the kids never leave for school and mom wears her hair in two braids, be afraid. Be very afraid

"It takes serious numbers for developing humans to catch on to the nuances of accepted behavior and to have a chance to make enough friends. I just can't see homeschooling providing adequate socialization."

Here's some examples of government-school "socialization":

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My youngest son, who is in the fifth grade, brought home a letter from the principal yesterday. I seems he was disciplined for fighting. The letter stated that he had been knocked to the ground and was being kicked by a group of fellow students, and he got up and started hitting them back as I have always taught both of my boys. My son was punished for defending himself.
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At my Jr. H.S., it was standard policy to send BOTH parties involved in a fight home. A bully always slapped a friend of mine in the back of the head when he came into class EVERY day. And the wimp of a teacher did NOTHING!!!!! So one day my buddy switched seats with me an the bully hit me, and I stood up. I kicked his ass, of course. The teacher did NOTHING, AGAIN!!!!! But I was sent home, even though the priciple told my dad that the bully admitted to starting the fight. It was just school policy.
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Beginning of the school year some high school kid decides to establish a pecking order that includes my son...........resulting in him being pushed off his bike and picked on over a few days.

Our school has a "policy" against bullying, fighting, etc. At the open house my wife and I meet with the vice principal (after phone conversations) and put him on notice - we have noted the problem, the school has failed to deal with the issue-----he states that they will try to monitor the situation.

Fast-forward to a week later------big kid pushes my son off the bike at a corner......as my son gets up to brush himself off big kid comes in for more......a combination sweep of his legs and blow to his chest leaves the big kid gasping for air and in a world of hurt for awhile Big kid's buddy trys to get involved........ and discovers my son's foot in his face.
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I have been attacked several times at school. If there are teachers or administrators around, I just take it like a good little sheep. I already have bad enough grades, no sense making them worse by being suspended.

Now, if there aren't any admins around... at least I only have to hit back once or twice before they quit.
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My brother had the same problem. The school bully and his posse thump my nephew around a couple times, nephew won't fight back because he doesn't want trouble. School won't do anything about it.

Brother tells him to fight back in the future. Next time it happens, the bully ends up with a bloody snoot, and the principal called a meeting between parents to resolve the situation.
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I was standing in line to have my test graded in 5th grade math, and there was this jerk behind me. His back was about 3ft from the wall, as the line curved and they were standing parrallel. This is important for later.

So I was standing there, and the little jerk wouldnt leave me alone. Poking, hitting, slapping the back of my head. No matter what I said, he wouldnt stop, and the instructor was oblivious. Luckily, he was also the basketball coach.

Much to the dismay of the jerk in question, I had seen Goldfinger the night previously, and for some reason, the get-out-of-a-choke hands up then slammed into the ribcage move stuck with me. So, I turn around, and push him and tell him to stop. He decides he is going to grab me by the sholders and try something. Having remembered the move well, I executed it flawlessly. Hands up between his, knocking his arms out of the way, then straight down into his ribs with authority! He doubled over, and then I promptly body slammed him (little skinny punk, I weighed almost twice what he did) into the concrete wall. I then told him in a scary calm voice to "leave me alone." He did so after that...

My teacher said to take it outside next time, and not in his classroom. Ehh.
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I just have to share my daughter's experience when she was in JH. She's not imposing to look at, at 5'2", but swam competitively for about 9 years and even swam a 1500 freestyle event using the butterfly stroke to make a point. (Mostly the coach making a point about her to her).

One day near the end of school some boy attempted liberties with regards to her clothing that were uninvited, unwanted, and inappropriate. She decked him and made him cry.
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Personally, when I finally found myself surrounded by my elementary school tormentors, shoving me and calling me names, and swung out and caught one of them on the lip with my dentist's-office ring, I was sent to the office.

When I was being daily tormented by a pair of classmates during my newspaper route, it only came to a halt when I finally whipped a rock at him and hit the ringleader in the thigh from about 10 feet away.

How does this typical, run-of-the mill government-school socialization have anything to do with real life? In real life, if this kind of thing happened in a workplace, the oblivious supervisors would be sued right down to the kitchen sink and the perpetrators would be rotting in jail.

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