Thursday, December 18, 2008

Yet another reason to homeschool

It is bad enough that public schools often try to brainwash the students. In the UK there is an effort to have the children try to go home and brainwash the parents. Frank Furedi starts his column Schools Unleash ‘Eco-Kids’ to Badger Their Parents with:

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Educators sometimes give the impression that they are in the business of protecting their pupils from the negative influence of their parents. Schools are sometimes devoted to the project of correcting the “outdated values” that parents have taught their children. That’s bad enough! However, in recent times policymakers and educators have also embraced the idea that through influencing children they can reeducate parents. Instead of parents socializing their children they advocate a reversal in roles.
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While reading the column I often thought of 1984. Professor Furedi had similar thoughts as he concludes with:

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In previous times the practice of mobilizing children to police their parents’ behavior was confined to totalitarian societies. Authorities who attempted to harness youngsters’ simplistic views of good and evil are reminiscent of Orwell’s Big Brother. But who needs Big Brother when the then-prime minister of the United Kingdom, Tony Blair, can assert that “on climate change, it is parents who should listen to their children”?
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(Hat tip: Joanne Jacobs)


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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education, parenting, children, public school, public education, education

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is this new? I always felt like they were trying to do that with me when I was in school. Of course I'd go home and share with my parents and we'd laugh hysterically. ;)

(I graduated high school in 1993)

Henry Cate said...

You are right, this isn't new. I do think it is more blatant.