I’ve done some stuff with homeschoolers, admittedly in an oasis of blue in a red splodge, and you have an interesting collision of eclectic non-religious types who have no faith in the public system… and Crazy Christians.

True story:

A few years ago a whole bunch of homeschoolers from far and wide held a big old meeting in the Sacramento Convention Center. They managed to get some idiot in the city government to agree to CLOTHE a statue of a male nude that was a permanent piece of public art that had been installed when the convention center was built.

I don’t recall the details now, but I think the guy who agreed to their demands was fired or demoted or something, after all us local townfolk pitched a bitch about these nutty outsiders coming in and vandalizing our city.

Followup: Here’s the story, along with a picture our lovely statue, sans the clothing.

I guess my recollection was wrong, it looks like our industrious city government at the time liked the homeschooler’s money too much to object. I do remember several days of uproar in the local newspaper and at water coolers all over town.

Homeschooler parents are a lot more than Christianist loons getting all pee-pantsed about having Junior and Little Missy spend dangerous time in the company of minorities and atheists and communists. Most are cranks to some degree, but proud of it. They come from atheist, Buddhist, agnostic, Baptist, Muslim, hippie, pagan, Asatru, Waldorf, Montessori, unschooling, Minnesotan, disciplined, free-form, unsure, anti-vaccine, pro-feminist, anti-authoritarian, Boy Scout troop-loving, two Dads, two Moms, three parent, business-owning, welfare-sucking backgrounds, so they’re really easy to pin down.

Homeschoolers are like car-owners: on the whole, assholes. But individually-varied assholes just like any other group of people. I’d say on the whole that homeschoolers are somewhere between The Red Hat Society and Original Series Uniformed Trekker fetishists on the Societal Danger Spectrum.

I’m a former homeschooling parent (actually, the ex did all the work.) I know these people, I love these people, and I don’t fear these people. Their kids, on the whole, are better off without their parents’ involvement in the local school districts, as are the districts themselves. Most are learning all they need to, aren’t getting demented views of the world, and can socially interact with other children and adults just fine, thank you.

One might attribute those same qualities to Michelle Malkin: the IQ of a rotten tomato, the manners of an ass, the mouth of a street thug, and the chutzpah to declare that anyone else has those qualities she so obviously possesses herself.

Homeschoolers are like car-owners: on the whole, assholes. But individually-varied assholes just like any other group of people.

Yeah, you forgot one of the major subsets: the married-spouses-with-degrees who want an excuse for not having a Real Job. “I’m not *just* a housewife — I’m homeschooling!” Well, it works for Godlstein, why not for the NYTimes target market? If we all survive the coming Even Greater Depression, I’m looking forward to a New Professionalism boom in a decade or so, as the offspring of all these so-nuturing homeschoolers vow not to repeat their parents’ mistakes.

I know a couple of home schooling parents, they were nearly normal when we were in college together, and yes both are teaching Christian values. One of my friends, who in addition to the values mess, is teaching her kids from a “Classical” Curriculum, was telling me about her 15 year old son the other day who has grown his hair out and declared that he has no intention of going to college. He is going to join a band and get tattoos.

Both of my friends are college educated stay at home moms. The one above works hard(she has 5 children ranging from 15 to 2); my other friend not so much.

MM’s readers have such heart-warming images of her:

On September 10th, 2007 at 10:46 am, almeehan said:

I always knew that bundled up in that firecracker package of rock ‘em sock ‘em, smackdown the liberals, dominating debater, jump rope jumper, cheerleader, trampoline bouncer, glare down the hip hoppers, top of the line hostess of the Facter, and many many more…was a misty-eyed momma! Got misty-eyed myself reading your description. Praying your son will continue to enjoy the blessings of a rich family heritage.

I only have the past 18 years spent as a (dramatic music cue) public school teacher, but every single home-schooled child who has made the transition to public school that I’ve seen has been one or two grade levels behind, sociallly awkward, and arrogantly conceited.

I’m not surprised. Since I’ve been a so-called do-nothin’ housewife for twenty-plus years, any number of people have suggested that I homeschool our sons. My standard answer: I don’t know enough. I could teach them foreign languages, biology, history, etc., but not how to get along with a wide variety of other people, some of whom they’d rather not have to be around. And isn’t that what adult life, sigh, is all about?

Homeschoolers are like car-owners: on the whole, assholes.

Jeebus, but that is one of the dumbest fucking things I’ve read today. And I’ve already been at The Corner.

Always nice when the wingnuts confirm what they are attacking. I would also add Jonah the Whale as further confirmation of Behar’s thesis.

Homeschoolers are like car-owners: on the whole, assholes.

Here, let me help you. They are more like the drivers who are mystified by flashing lights and signs, who fail to grasp the rules of the road and, despite the fact they drive it every day, still have no clue how large their vehicle is and can’t park it or get through anything but a wide-open road without inconveniencing everyone else.

And the esteemed Mrs BiscuitBarrel wins the thread:

I could teach them foreign languages, biology, history, etc., but not how to get along with a wide variety of other people, some of whom they’d rather not have to be around. And isn’t that what adult life, sigh, is all about?

We made the conscious decision to go with public schools for that very reason. The home-schoolers I see are majoring in pre-misfit, with a concentration in John Galt.

Elizabeth should have pulled out her nightstick and bonk bonked Behar’s head!

BONK BONK BEHAR…BONK BONK!!

I know conservatives are childish, but Jebus Crisco, this is some scary shit. This commenter is not only proposing violence as a form of rebuttal, but is doing so in terms taked from children in an episode of Star Trek. And if this person is over 18, he or she has the right to vote.

No to mention the whole “this isn’t the kind of thing the gospels recommend” thing…

In my neck of the woods (rural central Maine), there’s a lot of home schoolin’ going on. Some of the parents are quite capable, they are the ones that get highlighted in the local news. One kid was showcased because he went on to an Ivy League college and graduated top in his class. But for every success story like this, there are a 100 disasters that are neither properly educated nor socially adjusted. I have no idea how these kids will fare in this world; they’ve already got 2 strikes against them.

Remember the opening sequences of MEAN GIRLS (2004), which was actually a really funny movie. Lindsay Lohan is talking about the various groups of kids she has to deal with and mentions homeschoolers; it cuts to a shot of some kids right out of DELIVERANCE and one of them says in a very down-home accent:

“And on the third day, God created the Remington bolt-action rifle, so that Man could fight the dinosaurs. And the homosexuals.”

Here’s the clip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-p51Ic7kgpA

rdale

Well, I for one have a successfully homeschooled adult daughter. We are not ‘Christians’ or whatever other other religious nuts. She decided that she wanted more from her teenage years than having to sit at a desk for 7 hours/day, and then listen to the bitching and backstabbing going on in highschool.
She entered college at age 15, graduated with honors, and now is getting her MBA. She is/was one of the most socially integrated persons I know (we have gotten more compliments on that than we care to count!), and she has always been able to get along with all ages – from toddlers to 90+ years old folks.
Because of her homeschooling, she was able to travel the country and open her horizons and because of her aspirations at that time, she was able to meet foreign dignitaries at an early age, who were very impressed both by her knowledge as well as demeanor.

Proud to be a former homeschooling mom, and not a religious freak!

I’ve known homeschooled kids from both ends of the spectrum; the most impressive were the siblings whose hippie parents simply wanted to be with their kids more, so they both worked part time and taught part time. It helped that they both had advanced degrees, and their 2 kids were some of the most open minded, thoughtful, and intelligent teenagers I have ever met.

I’ve known many, many more from the fundy Xtianist wing of homeschooling, and my friends the school teachers back me up when they say that these kids are more often than not exactly as unclemike describes, with an added sauce of “know it all, can’t tell me a thing, and Jebus said so, that’s why!”.

Maybe the chaperones were afraid that the kids would have an impromptu rainbow party?

I think that your daughter did well in homeschooling because she’s extremely intelligent, not vice versa.

Best thing about this to me is that this is the first comment on the “My Baby Weet Off To Let Other People Teach Her About Cutting And Rainbows” thread:

“On September 10th, 2007 at 9:46 am, purplepeep said:

‘none of it was more important this morning than my son’s very first day of preschool’.

No preschool – but my first day of Kindergarten was overwhelming. I even got lost in the K-thru-6 school.

A whole new world is opening up for your little one, may you all be much richer for it.”

Besides, you can’t be a cheerleader if you don’t go to school…

She and other like her are one of the primary reasons I and my husband are home schooling our two kids. — Quoted Malkin commenter

Um, I think you mean “she and others“, dearie. Oh, and BTW, that would be “my husband and I” doing the marvelous job of “schooling”.

And just remember, according to our current POTUS, the answer to the question Is our children learning?” is “Our childrens can learn.”

I have to say, if I were Jebus, I would so be riding dinosaurs. Fuck all that looking after the meek, etc. – I’d be out all day on Tyrone the Tyrannosaur. You betcha!

I homeschooled two daughters from ages 9 & 7. No religion (none), just learning, travel, work, volunteering–a wide experience of the world. They nailed the SATs (700+), got accepted at Amherst, Colgate, Middlebury, Pomona, and elsewhere. One is now a Berkeley Law School grad, the other a geologist working on environmental clean-up. Y’all really need to stop treating homeschoolers as a clump. True, the Christianists predominate, but homeschooling is as diverse as America.

I think it’s possible to have success with homeschooling, but overall, I’d say this http://ezinearticles.com/?id=1576813 woman is a typical homeschooling mom (and this is from South Africa). Do note the sexist attitude that it’s your duty as an xtian woman and “obedience to God” to sacrifice anything and everything to make this a reality.

I think it really comes down to the parents’ motives. Homeschooling isn’t really a problem unless it’s homeschooling to prevent the kid from ever getting a thought in his/her head that isn’t parent pre-approved. When someone is homeschooling not for education but for control, their kids are going to suffer. And it is in fact possible for a kid to be academically advanced but socially behind, which was the reason I put my son in a public preschool this year, and it’s made him a lot happier and better behaved.

Yeah, I have to say I really dislike it when homeschoolers are all painted with the broad brush of “a bunch of jeebus fundie freaks”; or the children that are the product of same are characterized as being universally misfits. I mean, I know a lady down in the buckle of the Bible Belt to whom I don’t believe either of those characterizations would apply. (We Have Always Lived In A Homeschool)

Actually, she quite personifies the OTHER, stereotype of a homeschooler: a hippie who considers themselves better than everyone else (really, the smug tone did her no favors) and won’t let their precious, brilliant darlings be subjected to the tortures of traditional schooling. Oh and there was lots of self-righteous, “I was victim and I’m super-special” to be had, as well.

Don’t get me wrong, my daughter’s quite non-conformist (as am I), I frequently butt heads with her teachers and I don’t believe in forcing children into molds. But I also think her school offers her a vast variety of exposure and social interaction that I cannot. And she overall enjoys the experience.

There are plenty of good reasons for homeschooling that have nothing to do with religion. I homeschooled my daughter on and off throughout school because she has a genetic disorder that causes her to get lung infections frequently. After missing 70 or 80 days each year and getting lousy “tutoring” to help her stay caught up, we finally decided that being born with bad lungs should not mean you have to accept a second-rate education. If the school year was going pretty good and she was keeping up, she stayed in school. If not, we pulled her out and worked at home. The thing that frustrated me was the lack of a really good non-Christian curriculum for secular homeschoolers. I guess secular homeschoolers are just not as well organized as the religious ones.

My daughter did graduate from a traditional high school and went to college, but frequent hospitalizations are making it difficult for her to finish. She is now trying the homeschool version of college, taking online courses when she can’t be in school. Frankly, I’m just thankful there are so many options these days. She would have been screwed a couple of decades ago.