Several previous weblog items have dealt with the situation in Sweden. In this latest update, Pete Chagnon of OneNewsNow on 12/30/2009 reported that a Swedish family is faced with the prospect of losing their children simply because they home school. The Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) is reporting that Swedish authorities in June boarded a plane scheduled to depart for India and removed Christer and Annie Johansson’s seven-year-old son Dominic from the custody of the Christian couple. HSLDA attorney Mike Donnelly says Swedish officials did not have a warrant and were acting in accordance to the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child. Donnelly notes that the Swedish government does not believe that home schooling is a proper way to educate a child. "This is one of the most disgraceful abuses of power we have ever witnessed," says the attorney. "The Swedish government is exercising its authority under the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child to unnecessarily break up this family." It is a "very dark time" in Sweden, says Donnelly. "The Swedish Parliament is reviewing an essential ban on home schooling," he explains. "We have heard that other home-schooling families in Sweden are having more difficulty with local officials. We fear that all home-schooling families in Sweden are at risk in what could be the beginning of a widespread persecution." Earlier this month, a Swedish court sided with the officials. HSLDA, along with attorneys from the Alliance Defense Fund, will be defending the family. Note: Of course, we have many officials in this country who "frown on homeschooling" too. How long will it take them to go down the same road as the Swedish officials?
Monthly Archives: December 2009
Judges seek flexibility in child porn cases
Child sexual abuse used to be unheard of. Oh, yes, I know that it happened, but it was undoubtedly rare–much rarer than it is now. However, today it is almost so common place that it seldom rates a mention in the main stream media. Therefore, I was interested in the following information from Alan Gomez of USA Today, hardly a right wing media outlet, that appeared on my computer’s home page, and feel that I have to make a comment on it. The article begins, "People convicted of possessing child pornography are getting support from an unexpected source: federal judges. In hearings across the country, defense attorneys and federal judges are asking the U.S. Sentencing Commission to allow judges greater flexibility to give lighter sentences for possession of child pornography when no other crime is involved. District Judge Jay Zainey of New Orleans, who testified last month, says he is not defending people who possess ‘filth’ but that the prison terms established by the commission are sometimes too harsh." The pro-porn defense attorneys I can understand, but the federal judges? I would like to think that the ones who suggest this are appointees by Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, but I know that Republican Presidents have appointed some boneheaded federal judges too, although to be honest whenever they have nominated truly conservative judges, the Democrats in the Senate go absolutely ballistic. Judge Zainey (now that is a Dickensian name if I ever heard one) may say that "he is not defending people who possess ‘filth,’" but that is exactly what his proposal does! The article points out that for most federal crimes, the commission sets — and Congress approves — a range of suggested prison terms. Some major crimes require a mandatory minimum sentence, but most convicts are sentenced under a range of suggested prison terms called sentencing guidelines. For someone who possesses child pornography, a sentence can be harsher depending on whether the defendant used a computer and whether a large number of images were involved. Judges can order higher or lower prison terms, but if they do so drastically or often, they run the risk of a sentence being overturned on appeal. Well, what is wrong so far? People who are involved in child pornography are not fit to be out in society; they should be locked up and the key thrown away–period. The fact is that judges who order lower prison terms drastically or often should run the risk of a sentence being overturned on appeal. Others agree. Ernie Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, says judges already give sentences that are lighter than the guidelines. He says they sometimes minimize the crimes by not examining the pornography involved and are too often swayed by defendants who appear before them and do not match society’s stereotypes of people who look at child porn. "Doctors, lawyers, business executives, schoolteachers, police officers — they come out of mainstream America," Allen says. "So in a lot of situations, judges look at them and say, ‘They’re not dangerous,’ or they minimize it and say, ‘This is just kiddie porn.’ " Every person who seeks out child pornography, however "upstanding" he (or she) may seem, simply increases the market to exploit and abuse children to produce it and meet the demand. Reducing demand by locking these people up for good actually should work better than trying to go after the makers. U.S. District Judge William Sessions, chairman of the commission and chief judge of the district of Vermont, says judges have been nearly unanimous that the guidelines and the mandatory minimums restrict their ability to sentence convicts based on the specifics of each case and defendant–in other words, the judges want to be more lenient and let them off with a slap on the wrist. However, he also notes that police and prosecutors want to maintain them intact to serve as deterrents to crime, and to use possible sentence reductions as incentives to win defendants’ cooperation in investigations. Hurrah for the police and prosecutors! Maybe they, who actually have to deal with these perverts, know something that the elitist judges do not.
Good Reading
The Sept./Oct., 2009, issue (#90) of Practical Homeschooling ( www.home-school.com ) has articles by Mary Pride about the importance of the library to homeschoolers, by Joyce McPherson on the National Bible Bee, by Jeanette Webb on Creating a school profile and transcript for college, and by the always interesting Sam Blumenfeld (83 years old) on going to school back in the Great Depression (excellent!), along with the 2009 Practical Homeschooling Reader Awards, spotlight reviews, and a tribute to the late HSLDA attorney Chris Klicka, among other useful items.
Imprimis: All homeschoolers ought to be acquainted with Imprimis, a monthly publication of Hillsdale College, 33 E. College St., Hillsdale, MI 49242 ( www.hillsdale.edu ). Mailed free (occasionally, the college may ask for contributions but it has never been with high pressure), it is a journal of speeches delivered by leading conservative thinkers at Hillsdale College events. In the Nov., 2009, issue, Victor Davis Hanson, the Wayne and Marcia Buske Distinguished Fellow in History at Hillsdale College, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, and a professor of classics emeritus at California State University, gave a fascinating lecture on “The Future of Western War.” No one likes or wants war, but it is a fact of life on this earth, and Davis points out the particular challenges that now face the West in any warfare that might erupt (such as with rogue terror states and militant Islamists). A study of American government and Western Civilization is incomplete without the kind of thought found in the Imprimis speeches. It would make a great resource for a homeschool “social studies” (government—world affairs—Western Civilization) curriculum for high schoolers.
And one more
Again, the school officials reacted appropriately, but the fact that incidents like this just keep happening and happening and happening (didn’t I just say that yesterday) continue to remind us of the rabidly anti-Christian bias that has infested our society. On December 16, 2009, WorldNetDaily reported about a third-grade New Jersey girl’s once again being allowed to read her Bible during classroom "quiet time" after her teacher ordered her to stop reading the Good Book. The dispute developed after Michelle Jordat learned her daughter, Mariah, was told to put the Bible completely out of sight at Madison Park Elementary School in Old Bridge, N.J. "She was upset and she was hurt that she wasn’t able in her own free time to read the Bible," Jordat told New York’s WNYW-TV. "Her teacher told her to put it away, and she put it in her desk. And then the teacher told her, ‘No, put that in your backpack. I told you to put it away.’ And it hurt her feelings and confused her. Why would my teacher say that I can’t read the Bible when I’m not bothering anybody else?" The principal has since apologized, acknowledging a mistake on the teacher’s part, since school policy does allow children to read the Bible or any other religious book during quiet reading time. "This was injustice," Jordat says. "No other child has to go through this again." Although Jordat accepted the principal’s apology, she is looking for something in writing confirming that reading the Bible is permissible during personal reading time. She also indicated she’ll be seeking legal counsel.
I’m so glad that our family has nothing to do with the public school system
In an item headlined, "School goes ballistic when 2nd-grader draws Jesus: Boy, 8, said to gets psych evaluation after sketch of Christ on cross called ‘violent’" on December 15, 2009, Chelsea Schilling of WorldNetDaily reported that an 8-year-old boy at Lowell Maxham Elementary School in Taunton, MA, was suspended from school and forced to undergo a psychological evaluation after he drew a picture of Jesus Christ on the cross, his father claims. His teacher allegedly said the second-grade student created a violent drawing, the Taunton Daily Gazette reported. The boy’s picture portrayed a crucified Jesus with Xs over his eyes to indicate that he had died on the cross. The child’s father, outraged at the school’s action, asked to remain anonymous to protect his son. He said his boy drew the picture after returning from a family trip to see the Christmas display at the National Shrine of Our Lady of La Salette, a Christian retreat. He said when the teacher asked students to draw something that reminded them of Christmas on Dec. 2, the boy recalled his trip and created a portrait of Christ on the cross. "As far as I’m concerned, they’re violating his religion," he told the newspaper. Associated Advocacy Center educational consultant Toni Saunders said, "I think what happened is that because he put Xs in the eyes of Jesus, the teacher was alarmed and they told the parents they thought it was violent." Saunders said the boy has special needs, and the school reacted inappropriately. "They made him leave school, and they recommended that a psychiatrist do an evaluation," she said. The boy’s father told the newspaper the school required an evaluation – at the parents’ expense – before the student would be allowed to return. However, the school district claims the boy was never suspended. "This incident occurred nearly two weeks ago," said a statement from the district. "It was handled appropriately, and the school staff and family had been working together in a cooperative and positive manner." [Note–that’s what they said, but that’s not what the evidence seems to indicate.] The father said his son, who receives special reading and speech instruction, has never shown a propensity toward violence. "He’s never been suspended," he said. "He’s 8 years old. They overreacted." The boy returned to school on Dec. 7, but he said his son has been traumatized and will be transferred to another school in the district. The district said its actions were not religious and nature and were based solely on the wellbeing of the student. [Note: yes, there are always two sides to any story, but my reaction to this is, "Yeah! Right!"] Bloggers have overwhelmingly demanded that the teacher be fired. One said, "I would like to start a petition to suspend this teacher immediately pending a full investigation into whether or not she should be terminated. Some parents try very hard to instill the values of religion in their children, and for this teacher to tell this student he did something wrong is disgusting. If my kids were in her class, I would pull them out and demand a new teacher or a change of schools." I would just choose to homeschool. I realize that this may be an extreme reaction, but things like this just keep happening and happening and happening and show a decidedly anti-religious bias that seems to permeate the public school culture. I saw a later item in which the school claims that its decision was not the result of the picture of Jesus on the cross, but there are still a lot of unanswered questions that abound about this incident.
Florida College, 119 N. Glen Arven Ave., Temple Terrace, FL, just outside of Tampa, is a private, non-sectarian institution of higher education that is founded on Biblical principles. I attended there when it was only a junior college with an additional four-year certificate. It is now a bachelor-degree granting institution, although it still offers an associate degree for those who want it. Though it sits in the shadow of enormous government-run state universities, large community colleges, and well-known private institutions, its small campus and enrollment hovering around 500 draw little attention to the school which largely escapes the notice of newspapers and local politicians. Students, whether they study art, literature, politics, world events, the sciences, or whatever, are presented with a worldview that is grounded in the timeless truth of God’s creation and God’s word. The school stands against the moral turbulence and tidal extremes of our relentlessly changing world, unapologetically holding to the fundamental principles of God’s sovereignty and the unchanging truth of His word. Unfortunately, in today’s world, this has consequences. Two of their largest matching gift corporate donors, IBM and GE (now remember, these are not outright grants to the college, but only promised gifts matching those from people who work for these companies and contribute to Florida College), recently withdrew their support of Florida College. GE wrote, “Our records indicate that your organization was rejected due to the following discriminatory information found on your website: ‘Homosexuality is not acceptable.’” IBM said, “Your organization must not advocate, support, or practice activities inconsistent with IBM’s non-discrimination policies…based on…gender identity or expression, sexual orientation.” They want diversity, UNLESS it is diverse from their promotion of homosexuality. They promote tolerance, EXCEPT they will not tolerate those who differ with them on the subject of sexual orientation. The college replies, “The loss of revenue from these two companies alone amounts to thousands of dollars every year that the school will never see again….Our dedication to God’s standard of moral conduct will not prove popular with companies whose principles are morally relative and politically motivated. We don’t need—we don’t want—the support of the IBMs and GEs of this world who make financial donations contingent on moral compromise.” AMEN!!!!! It is amazing how INTOLERANT those who claim that our society needs more tolerance can really be.
Virginia school cancels Taliban debate
I realize that students need to learn critical thinking and that it is always good to look at all sides of a question, but this seems a bit much for middle school. A middle school principal in Virginia has called off an assignment that asked some students to represent the views of the Taliban in a mock United Nations debate. Eighth graders at Swanson Middle School in Arlington had been asked to research nine conflicts around the world, including Afghanistan, and debate solutions. Some students would have presented the Taliban’s views. But Principal Chrystal Forrester dropped Afghanistan from the list Monday, according to The Washington Post. She says she didn’t want controversy to undermine a lesson about building persuasive arguments and supporting them with research. Parent Chris Wilson, whose daughter was one of those asked to represent the Taliban, says he found it morally questionable to ask students to echo the extremist Islamic group.
“Best Interests” Means Junk Food and Child Removal
“While we understand Mr. and Mrs. Hessey’s distress, Zak’s welfare was paramount, and we believe we acted in [the child’s] best interest.” So said a spokesman for the British hospital that called in Social Services and had the two-year-old removed from his parents and four older siblings for four months. The charge? Mom refused to follow the doctor’s advice to feed her son sugary snacks to address his failure to gain weight. “They said I should feed Zak chocolate, cakes and junk food just to get calories into him,” Mrs. Hessey told The Daily Mail. “But I objected, saying that was only a short-term answer and not a proper solution.” The result was four months without their little boy, during which time the State-funded foster care program obviously applied the doctor’s prescription. “[N]ow it is hard to get him to eat anything else,” Hessey laments. On the doctor’s prescribed “regimen”, the boy gained about a pound. “[I]n foster care, Zak was the same with his food as he was at home. They [eventually] said we were very good parents,” Hessey adds. The hospital’s defense quoted at the start of this article demonstrates perhaps the greatest danger of the UN’s Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC): “In all matters…the best interests of the child shall be a primary concern.” Should the U.S. ratify the CRC, this core principle will replace the current standard, “proof of harm,” with the “best interest standard” applied in this case. Since the hospital and Social Services worked to ensure what was (in their opinion) in the best interest of the child, they did nothing wrong under the CRC. In the U.S. today, because we have not ratified the CRC, such an event would be illegal. Fit parents have the right by law to make medical decisions for their children unless and until neglect or abuse can be proven. While this event is an outrage in England as well, the bureaucrats there were simply obeying the law, the CRC. The proposed Parental Rights Amendment to the Constitution will end the threat of the CRC ever becoming binding law in America. So spread the word to your family and friends to sign the petition for the Amendment’s passage. Check with ParentalRights.org.
And as if to prove my observation in yesterday’s blog that there are all kinds of people in power who would like to see homeschooling in the United States heavily regulated by the government, here’s the following. The Centralia Sentinel is the only daily newspaper in Marion County, IL, where we live, although we do not subscribe to it, so I did not see the letter referred to in this HSLDA announcement of December 14, 2009.
HSLDA Senior Counsel Scott Woodruff recently wrote this letter to the editor of the Centralia Sentinel: “Dear Centralia Sentinel Editor, Your recent article, ‘Fewer students registered as taught at home,’ said that local school superintendent Keri Garrett ‘would like to see more monitoring of homeschooled students.’ Presumably Garrett envisions that homeschooled students would be monitored by public school teachers. According to large-scale scientific studies, students being monitored by public school teachers (i.e., public school students) score at the 50th percentile, on average, on standardized tests. But homeschooled students score at the 83rd percentile. The remarkable scores of homeschooled students would need to come down 33 percentile points to equal the scores of students already being monitored by public school teachers. There is no justification for having public school teachers monitor homeschooled students.” Our thanks go to HSLDA member Jason Branch who brought our attention to the Centralia Sentinel article.
And if you think that the answer is to homeschool, you may need to think again
Yesterday, I blogged about how parents in Germany have been sent to jail for keeping their children out of explicit sex education classes in schools, and wondered if it could happen here. Of course, in this country, we are blessed with freedom to homeschool our children if we feel that the values (or lack thereof) promoted in public schools go against what we feel is best for our children. However, other nations have had this freedom too and in some places it is being taken away.
The same folks who have the "it takes a village" mentality that leads to not allowing parents to opt their children out of immoral sex education classes in schools also want to take control of homeschooling to make sure that if it is done it meets their “standards.” It may be happening in the United Kingdom. In an item headlined, "Criminal background checks proposed for homeschoolers: Plan called most ‘overbearing law in the English-speaking world’," also on Dec. 11, 2009, Bob Unruh of WorldNetDaily again reported that a proposal in the British Parliament calling for mandatory criminal background checks for parents who want to homeschool their children is the most "overbearing law in the English-speaking world," charges a U.S. advocacy group. "This bill is breathtaking in its scope and reflects a perverse level of suspicion towards parents who home-educate their children," said Michael Donnelly, a staff attorney and director of international relations for the Home School Legal Defense Association. The group is the world’s premiere advocate for homeschooling and has been active in cases in Europe as well as the U.S. Donnelly said the bill "places total discretion in the hands of local education officials to determine whether or not they will ‘register’ a home education program and would require criminal background checks for parents before they could begin homeschool their own children." Norman Wells, director of the Family Education Trust, which promotes stable family life and children’s welfare, told HSLDA the background checks wouldn’t make any sense. "If it is deemed unsafe for children to be with their parents during normal school hours, it is equally unsafe for them to be with their parents in the evenings, at weekends and during the school holidays," he said. "To impose a system of routine monitoring home-educating families would represent a breach of their right to a private and family life and constitute a waste of public resources," he continued. "Furthermore, the proposal to grant the local authority a statutory right of access to the homes of home-educated children is in effect reversing the presumption of innocence in British law and treats parents with suspicion until they have proven themselves innocent." The HSLDA said the British proposal, which already has had its first reading in Parliament, stems from the Badman Report, issued last summer. [Note: I had read items about this previously but have not included any of them in this newsletter.] WND reported the June 11 report from Graham Badman, a former managing director of Children, Families and Education in Kent, was accepted by the British Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families. HSLDA said at the time the report advocated the "extensive" regulation of homeschooling across the United Kingdom. It keyed on the United Nations concept that children should be granted rights to make decisions for themselves about education, religion and their lives. That’s the belief expressed in the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, a document the HSLDA has been warning about for a number of years. It has been adopted in the U.K. and might be on its way toward approval in the United States, lacking mainly the approval of two-thirds of the U.S. Senate. The new legislation in the U.K., according to Wells, would "require local education authorities to solicit the views of a child regarding home education, to visit them and interview them alone." The plan would allow government officials simply to terminate the registration of parents who want to homeschool if they do not "cooperate." Paul Farris, chief of the HSLDA in Canada, said the U.K. proposal is based on faulty assumptions, including that there is "systematic monitoring" of homeschoolers around the globe. "The Badman Report and this bill shows real ignorance of homeschooling and will not facilitate success in home education but will rather interfere with home education," he said. Such proposals should be of concern to U.S. parents, too, according to Michael Farris, chief of the Parental Rights organization. Farris cited other European nations, such as Germany and Sweden, where officials have cracked down on homeschooling, and warned Britain now is following the same "dangerous path." If the U.K. law is adopted, there could be serious ramifications, according to Mike Smith, chief of the HSLDA. "The experience in Germany suggests that [British homeschoolers] will lose custody of their children, be fined and potentially be jailed," he said. "We hope and pray that this legislation will not become law because it will turn a nation that was once a free country into one which has become a shadow of its former self." And again, we have to ask, could it happen here? There people in power who would like to see it!
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