-Caveat Lector- From http://www.lewrockwell.com/edmonds/edmonds37.html }}>Begin merica Is Hazardous to Children by Brad Edmonds Two misadventures involving home schoolers have made news all over the internet in the last week. In one case reported by Michelle Malkin on May 18, a county in Maryland has charged a mother with criminal truancy because she refused to allow officials to review her curriculum while she also had not registered her schooling efforts with an approved sponsor. She was using a strong curriculum, by the way. Another case goes like this: A naked two-year-old gets out the front door of the house, and a neighbor calls the authorities. Social workers demand to question family members, the family members refuse, and the family is now in the third year of dealing with it in court. This case isn�t about home schooling directly, but relates to parents� rights to decide for their own children. It also happens that the parents are home schoolers � maybe coincidence, maybe the reason for the government pursuit. What should be news, however, is that attacks are happening across the nation, and they�re nothing new. Here�s a smattering from the Home Schooling Legal Defense Association: The East Otero School District in Colorado requires parents to report home-schooled children�s standardized test scores. What the district did to at least one family was try to intimidate them into letting the government determine the time and place of testing, which is not the law. In California, the Montabello Unified School District sent a representative to the home of home-schooling parents to try to make them "register" their children with the public schools, which is not the law. Also in California, two families that recently began home schooling went through all the legal rigmarole, and still were treated to "mistaken" accusatory visits from social workers, one accompanied by a policeman. All these cases were reported during the first 17 days of May � highly significant because they involved members of the Home Schooling Legal Defense Association. How much more such bullying is happening to home schoolers who aren�t members of this one organization? The same website details legislative attacks on home schooling. A current proposal in Maine would remove forced-immunization exemptions for those who have religious or other objections, and thus would indirectly (but disproportionately) affect home schoolers. Florida is considering a bill that would allow the government to "assess" the "needs" and "strengths" of families until every child reaches age 9. More openly aimed at home schooling is a bill in Michigan that would impose new mandatory standardized testing for home schoolers, even though the data show that home-schooled children do better than government-school victims on college entrance exams. Minnesota is currently considering adding new testing and parent-qualifications requirements. So, while we have state legislators making it increasingly difficult to home school your children without being prosecuted, we have school districts knocking on doors and lying to parents about the law to intimidate them into giving up the whole idea. I suspect that many of the knocking-on-the-door-and-lying incidents are done knowingly: In the cases mentioned above, the Home Schooling Legal Defense Association faxed a letter to the offending district, and the parents were not bothered again (not bothered so far; these are recent cases). All this after it has become common knowledge that home schooling is the best thing for children, which proves that the best thing for the children is the last thing on the mind of your government. Some states are becoming friendly to home schoolers. Learn about those, and consider relocating to them even if you don�t have children. However, the other states noted above (and more) are desperate to stamp out home schooling, whether by lying about the law or by pressuring lawmakers into changing the law. In these states, the absolute-power ambitions of elected politicians combine with the damn-the-children, protect-our-jobs union mentality of the government schools to produce damaging laws and Orwellian offenses by the "most respected" public servants (respected by the uninformed, anyway) � state senators and educators. All of this is happening now and has been for years, and without much coverage by rightist commentators. As I said, the real news is that it�s yesterday�s news. America is indeed hazardous for children and for loving, informed, involved parents. The time to sit and be outraged is over � it�s time to write to the newspaper, organize rallies, and flood your lawmakers with protests. The really bad news: America is about the best country in the world for children. May 21, 2001 Brad Edmonds [send him mail], MS in Industrial Psychology, Doctor of Musical Arts, is a banker in Alabama. Copyright � 2001 LewRockwell.com End<{{ T' A<>E<>R Forwarded as information only; no endorsement to be presumed + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without charge or profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this type of information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Integrity has no need of rules. -Albert Camus (1913-1960) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. -Marcel Proust ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The libertarian therefore considers one of his prime educational tasks is to spread the demystification and desanctification of the State among its hapless subjects. His task is to demonstrate repeatedly and in depth that not only the emperor but even the "democratic" State has no clothes; that all governments subsist by exploitive rule over the public; and that such rule is the reverse of objective necessity. He strives to show that the existence of taxation and the State necessarily sets up a class division between the exploiting rulers and the exploited ruled. He seeks to show that the task of the court intellectuals who have always supported the State has ever been to weave mystification in order to induce the public to accept State rule and that these intellectuals obtain, in return, a share in the power and pelf extracted by the rulers from their deluded subjects. [[For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto, Murray N. Rothbard, Fox & Wilkes, 1973, 1978, p. 25]] <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html <A HREF="http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html";>Archives of [EMAIL PROTECTED]</A> http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ <A HREF="http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/";>ctrl</A> ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
