Stark Raving Rant
CBS is running a two part story called A Dark Side To Home Schooling today and tomorrow and it's slant makes me furious. The basic story is about alleged homeschooling parents who kept an incredibly filthy house and had a prior conviction of child abuse from another state. According to the previous investigation:
"The children are tortured physically and emotionally."
Why did the children stay with the parents after officials made this discovery? The mother came home and found this:
In the bedroom, 14-year-old Brandon had committed suicide with a rifle after killing his brother Kyle and sister Marnie. Their mother discovered the bodies.
This is a tragic story which proves that true evil exists in the world and we should punish those who perpetrate it to the fullest extent of the law, but that’s not the point that CBS wants to make:
Since it became legal in North Carolina in 1985, the number of home school students has jumped from just a few hundred to more than 50,000. But there's been no change in the number of state employees overseeing the program - just three for the entire state.
"I think there's so little supervision that they really are not protecting those kids," Marcia Herman-Giddens, of the North Carolina Child Advocacy Institute.
Here’s a question for CBS and Ms. Herman-Giddens. Logically following this argument how on earth were these sadists investigated in Arizona if the looming threat or cause of this tragedy is home schooling?
In addition, let’s talk about the supervision or overseeing that is taking place in this country right now. A Dark Side to Pennsylvania:
According to the annual child abuse report, there were 49 children who died in Pennsylvania as a result of abuse or neglect in 2002, which is two more than in 2001.
And of course there is this from A Dark Side to California where a girl was repeated raped by the son of her foster mother:
County officials admit Brinson was abandoned by social workers and that allegations of sexual abuse were ignored. Karla Coleman, her foster mother, was herself a social worker. In October, Brinson received $475,000 from Los Angeles County in an out-of-court settlement.
Also A Dark Side to Social Workers. Or this statistic from A Dark Side to Colorado:
An average of 25 children die in Colorado each year because of neglect or abuse, about 5 percent of the total number of child deaths in the state.
From 1990 to 1995, 47 percent of families with children who died from abuse or neglect had previous Colorado Department of Human Services involvement.
If you want to read story after story of children who’ve fallen through the cracks of just Social Services alone, go here and read A Dark Side to Social Services all night long.
Supervision doesn't seem to cure the problem. Using the logic of the CBS story, we should be leery of allowing Child Protective Services or the foster care system anywhere near our children. These people are already supervised and overseen and they still have stupid or evil people in their systems. The states of Pennsylvania and Colorado should also be avoided since children are dying and one supposes that CBS would advocate every parent in these states being be put under a microscope. After all, some of them kill their children.
Sending the kids to school isn’t necessarily going to protect children either. I hope you didn’t miss the very personal case on my blog of a mother who choked her child, left bruises around her neck, was reported to CPS, and is still living with her mother.
A Small Victory has an even more revolting story about abuse that happened at a football camp and the school has actually tried to stonewall the investigation. If you have the stomach for it go here for A Dark Side to Football, start with #1, and read the whole disgusting, evil story, but don’t assume that school officials are going to supervise abuse away.
There is also A Dark Side to Florida. Turns out parents are killing their children in Florida too so we‘d better start supervising all Floridian parents. Follow this link to the State Child Abuse Death Review for the State of Florida, click on the report, and you will read this chilling sentence:
The cases of thirty-five children who had prior involvement with child protection services and who subsequently died from abuse or neglect during 2001 were presented to the Child Abuse Death Review Team for review. This report is dedicated to these children.
Isn’t that special. They were already in the system being supervised and they died anyway, but in a ridiculous and empty gesture the report is dedicated to them. Gee thanks, Florida child abuse reviewers. I’m sure the dead kids feel so much better. They can join the ranks of the children from Pennsylvania, 47% of whom were already being supervised by the system as well.
Still think we just need more supervision of selected groups to stop child abuse? Here’s another little statistic that I found in the Florida report: of these 35 children only 6 were old enough to go to school and be monitored. The vast majority, 29, were 5 or under.
This little girl wasn’t old enough either:
Prosecutors allege the Killpacks forced their 4-year-old adopted daughter, Cassandra, to drink at least 2.5 liters of water on June 9, 2002, as punishment for taking her younger sister's juice.
A Fort Campbell soldier was convicted Wednesday of lesser charges in the beating death of his 2-month-old daughter a year ago.
If you don’t understand why I find an attempt to force supervision on innocent home schooling parents this should help you relate. Do you have a child under school age or do you ever watch a child under school age? You just might be next on the list of the perpetually supervised even though you’ve committed no crime. Be waiting for the report on A Dark Side to Parents of Under School-Aged Children.
Finally, I didn't have time to research every state. Using the criteria given for homeschoolers by the CBS evening news, after each state's statistics are tallied every parent in every state would require more supervision though the vast majority have done nothing wrong. Again, using this logic if you live in the United States you'd require more supervision if you happen to parent. We eventually arrive at A Dark Side of Parents. We're all suspects.
Let me be absolutely clear. I think people who abuse children should be given the stiffest penalties in our criminal justice system because they've murdered a child's innocence and possibly murdered their chance at having a normal and happy life. I don't think any of them deserve probation. I have no problem at all with giving the death penalty to anyone who kills a child through abuse and think it should be mandatory.
However, last time I checked every citizen in the country is innocent until proven guilty . We should not pass laws that seek to strip rights and privileges from law-abiding citizens in an ill-conceived attempt to stop the guilty. Or as I suspect is the case at CBS News, an attempt to supervise or stop those with whom we disagree.
Update: CBS seems to have also left out some information. Considering the above statistics regarding children who die even though they are already under the supervision of Child Protective Services, it's tragic but unsurprising to learn this about the murder-suicide of the Warren children:
According to a report in the Charlotte Observer, state Social Service inspectors recently warned the parents that if they didn't clean up their home, they could lose their children. The boys had been spending nights with a neighbor for about two months.
This family was already being "supervised" by Social Service inspectors, yet CBS chose to leave this information out of their story in order to spread their bias and misconceptions about home schooling. That is also unsurprising.
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