Wednesday 4 May 2011

Debating with militant home educators


The signs are, judging by the recent moves to change the pupil registration regulations, that the Department for Education is now amending the law by diktat, rather than seeking debate and consensus with the home educating community. Who can blame them? Events over the last few years have shown that many of the most vociferous opponents of change are capable of neither thinking logically nor debating rationally on the subject of home education. This makes further dialogue fruitless.



I want today to see how ordinary people discuss ideas and the rules that they follow. I then wish to look at a specific example of how some of the more loud mouthed members of the home educating community demonstrate their inability to follow the same rules of debate as the rest of the western world.



We often examine the world and draw new truths from what we observe by the dialectical process. Somebody makes a statement and then another person looks for flaws in it and presents another statement which exposes those flaws. For instance, I might claim that 'All birds can fly'. Somebody might then say, 'Penguins are birds and they cannot fly'. This has shown that the first statement is not true. Perhaps we must now amend it to 'Some birds can fly' or 'Most birds can fly'. Let us look at another case. A man tells me, 'All black men are stupid'. In order to refute this statement, it is only necessary for me to come up with one example to disprove this generalisation. So I might say, 'James Baldwin was a black man and he was not stupid'. My debating partner, if he concedes that James Baldwin was not stupid, must now amend his statement, perhaps to, 'Most black men are stupid' or 'Some black men are stupid'.


Of course he may not be a rational man. Instead of listening to my point and altering his generalisation accordingly, he may say aggressively, ' Are you saying that all black men are clever? Are you saying that there are no stupid black men' Of course I was saying nothing of the sort, merely pointing out that his initial statement was flawed. To do this, I had only to produce one intelligent black man; perhaps all the others are stupid, it does not matter for my purposes.


During the fuss about Schedule 1 of the Children, Schools and Families Bill, the contention was made by many home educators that home education is a private matter which should be no concern of the state unless there is evidence that a child is not being educated or is suffering harm of some sort. I think that this foolish idea is still widely subscribed to. Let us now treat this statement logically, as we did the statements about all birds being able to fly and all black men being stupid. In order to demonstrate that this statement is false, it is only necessary to show that home education can be the proper concern of the state even though a good education is being provided and the child is apparently not being harmed. We can do this simply by observing that a child might be being very well educated, not appear to be suffering any ill treatment and yet as an adult become disordered in some way, perhaps driven mad by a controlling parent or otherwise harmed psychologically. If such a young person then needed psychiatric care as a result of her upbringing; this would mean that her childhood education would have been a matter with which the state should concern itself. It does not matter whether only one child has ended up like this; this single case would be enough to disprove the statement, 'Home education is a private matter'. If the end results affect society, then logically it cannot be a private matter. Since I happen to know of at least one such case, this single case alone disproves the contention that home education is a private matter.


Now the next step would be to amend our initial statement. Realising that the claim, 'Home education is a private matter' no longer stands up, we could say, 'Home education is sometimes a private matter' or something of this sort. Instead, like the racist who wilfully misunderstood my citing of the single case of an intelligent black man, the home educators round on me, place their hands on their hips and say, 'Oh, are you saying that prisons and mental hospitals are full of home educated young people?' The sheer illogicality of the thing makes one feel like weeping! Readers will have watched this happening here a few days ago. I suggested that it was quite possible that some home educated children might not have benefited from their upbringing and the accusation was leveled at me that I believe prisons and Young Offender Institutions to be full of home educated young people. It's like the Mad Hatter's Tea Party, trying to talk to some of these people.


This then is the problem. Time and again in debates, it is clear that the home educators arguing the case have not the slightest grasp of the rules of logic or debate. Talking with them is like wading through treacle, which is why I suspect that the DfE have simply given up and decided to do what they think is necessary to protect the interests of children. It is unfortunate, but given the nature of the opposition, quite unavoidable.

45 comments:

  1. Webb say-which is why I suspect that the DfE have simply given up and decided to do what they think is necessary to protect the interests of children

    What is the department really doing that it thinks is necessary and how is it protecting the interests of home educated children?
    the so called 29 day off rule has still not been laid before the commons and NO new laws are being put forward for home education.should that 29 day off rule come about many parents will use it to take a long hoilday then just on the 20 day say ive changed my mind LOL then wait a few weeks and do the same thing again!

    Its all load of hot air and waffle and we see NO changes here in Hampshire?
    i guess the problem LA's and the department for education have is many people just take no notice of them and they crazy ideas! if only they could force people to do as they told LOL

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  2. People might be interested in reading about the Argumentative Theory. It certainly does shed light onto the cognitive bias that many/some home educators have:

    http://edge.org/conversation/the-argumentative-theory

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  3. I guess this is how you've lost all your friends over the years, Simon. And I used to quite like you! :-)

    Clearly, I, the Black Propagandist, 'do not have the slightest grasp of the rules of logic or debate'. Fair enough.

    It puzzles me though, why, when I supplied answers to your question, the answers were ignored and discussion became de-railed whilst you obsessed about this apparent insult.

    By the way, I'm not a militant home educator and I'm not loud-mouthed.

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  4. The business of HE kids and prison does come up remarkably often in your blog, Simon. Apart from the examples given the other day, there is the exchange in the comments section of 'Giving Children Choices' in which you link HE with prison.

    You do it so often that it can't be surprising that people notice it. It runs like an underlying narrative thread throughout this blog.

    Your undeniably magificent logic runs like this:

    ~Many home educators fail to give a good education to their children.
    ~Therefore their children might be illiterate by the time they are adults.
    ~We all know the link between illiteracy and prison...ergo....

    Instead of filling in the next step of your logical journey, you leave it to your readers. When your readers say, 'Actually, I don't think that our prisons are full of ex-HE'd kids.' You jump up and down and accuse them of Black Propaganda, being mean to you, 'slightly cuckoo', militant home educators, loud mouthed, illogical and my personal favourite, 'these people'. Lol!

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  5. Sorry, the title of the blog post I referred to was 'Giving Choices to Children'.

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  6. ' And I used to quite like you! '

    Liking, disliking and insults have nothing to do with the case. I am explaining why some people feel that it is pointless to discuss home education. I do not feel that way personally, because otherwise I would stop keeping this blog. I can sympathise though with those who do feel that way.

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  7. I agree that *some* home educators have reasoned in the way you describe, but to me, you appear to be reasoning in exactly the same way, but from a different perspective. That is, you are arguing that because some HE children end up being NEET that LAs should inspect HE provision.

    As I pointed out the other day in relation to gas and electrical installations and dangerous weeds, the guiding principles underpinning LA powers of inspection are:

    1. That the legislation relating to inspection is based on a real, significant, demonstrable risk of harm

    2. That the LA needs to have evidence of breach of the law before investigating a private individual.

    In the case of home education, the evidence of risk of harm to HE children is certainly no worse than in the case of school-educated children, and there is already legal provision for LAs to investigate cases where 'it appears' the law is being broken.

    As far as the law is concerned, HE *is* a private matter unless there is reason to believe that a child is at risk of not receiving a suitable education. You might not agree with the law, but it's derived from the principles underpinning our legislative system, not the opinions of home educating parents, so I can't quite see why faulty reasoning on the part of HE parents is relevant.

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  8. 'That is, you are arguing that because some HE children end up being NEET that LAs should inspect HE provision.'

    No, I am arguing that because education and upbringing have a profound effect upon how an adult will turn out and that because adults interact with society, then education and upbringing are not purely private matters.

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  9. One could argue that because childhood nutition has a profound effect upon how an adult will turn out in terms of health, and that because adults interact with society, then how a parent feeds a child is not a purely private matter.

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  10. 'then how a parent feeds a child is not a purely private matter.'

    This is quite true and children have been taken into care because they have become grotesquely obese or all their teeth have decayed to stumps through being fed on nothing but sugar.

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  11. And you are entitled to your opinion.

    What I am arguing is that the law should formulated not according to people's opinions, but from a known degree of risk. Since the risk of HE to children themselves or society at large doesn't appear to be very great - certainly not compared to the outcomes from school education - there is no reason to change the law.

    And even if the risk from HE was deemed high enough to warrant a change to the law, there would still be the issues of what grounds the LA would have for monitoring HE, and how the chain of accountability would work.

    You, of all people (I believe one of your areas of interest is history) should know what has happened in the past when private individuals have been held accountable to the state, rather than the other way around.

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  12. 'This is quite true and children have been taken into care because they have become grotesquely obese or all their teeth have decayed to stumps through being fed on nothing but sugar. '

    So, you mean that evidence of their poor nutrition had become so obvious that someone needed to intervene.

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  13. 'the law should *be* formulated...'

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  14. I think there must be LSD in the water or maybe it's in the food supply...

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  15. 'And even if the risk from HE was deemed high enough to warrant a change to the law'

    The level of risk has no bearing on the matter. The original contention made and still beng made by many home edcuators is that home education is a private matter. If first we limit ourselves to establishing whether or not this is really the case, then only after that will we be able to move on to discussing if something needs to be done about it. Because it has not proved possible to discuss the business rationally and move beyond this intial point, the DfE are just going ahead regardless. This is unfortunate, but I can quite see why they have adopted this course of action.

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  16. "'And even if the risk from HE was deemed high enough to warrant a change to the law'

    The level of risk has no bearing on the matter. The original contention made and still beng made by many home edcuators is that home education is a private matter. If first we limit ourselves to establishing whether or not this is really the case, then only after that will we be able to move on to discussing if something needs to be done about it. Because it has not proved possible to discuss the business rationally and move beyond this intial point, the DfE are just going ahead regardless. This is unfortunate, but I can quite see why they have adopted this course of action. '"

    You are setting up a straw man. As far as the law is concerned, what home educators think about home education is a secondary issue; the key issue *is* the level of risk involved because that's what most of our laws are about. They have come into being to deal with problems. It's pretty pointless to go through the rigmarole of law-making just to deal with something that's a minor problem for a handful of people.

    The regulations regarding gas installations are very strictly enforced because if someone's gas cooker blows up, it could endanger the lives of an entire streetful of people. The regulations pertaining to electrical installations aren't so rigorous because if an electrical fault develops, it could be serious but fewer people are likely to be affected.

    With regard to the risk from HE, it was clear from the Badman review that we don't know what the risk is, but whatever it is, there's no evidence that it's any worse than school education, so there doesn't appear to be any pressing need to change the legislation.

    The DFE might consider that there is good reason to go ahead with changing de-registration regulations despite HEers comments - it doesn't follow that they are doing so because HEers couldn't discuss the business rationally. You have only to read the submissions made by HEers to government during the Badman inquiry to disprove this hypothesis.

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  17. Webb says-the DfE are just going ahead regardless.

    going ahead with what?nothing been laid before the commons yet?

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  18. ' it doesn't follow that they are doing so because HEers couldn't discuss the business rationally. You have only to read the submissions made by HEers to government during the Badman inquiry to disprove this hypothesis.'

    I'm guessing that this is a joke. The majority of those rambling and incoherent submissions looked as though they had been put together by the mythical monkeys who had been typing randomly at keyboards for eternity.

    'It's pretty pointless to go through the rigmarole of law-making just to deal with something that's a minor problem for a handful of people.'

    Classic circular reasoning. You are taking as given the very controversial point which lay at the heart of the debate. Although the expression has been debased, this is the logical fallacy known as 'Begging the question'. You begin by assuming what you wish to prove.

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  19. I was making a point about legislation in general.

    Why, in your view, do we legislate, if not to deal with problems, and why do some problems trigger legislation and others not?

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  20. Simon,

    Why don't you invite both of your friends over to discus this topic, then you can have mass debate!

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  21. A fine example of Webb at his worst, derisory lies about home educators, no research just the ranting of a bigoted narrow minded self publicist.

    Meanwhile, in the real world, one particular list has exchanged hundreds of emails in a debate scrutinising every plausible aspect of Deregistration with a demonstration of intellectual prowess and rigour that eludes Webb and moreover a debate that his bigoted views are purposefully excluded from.

    These discussions have stimulated a veritable barrage of protestations and valid suggestions to the government, whom as a result, have today, formally announced a rethink.

    Dave M

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  22. 'Meanwhile, in the real world, one particular list has exchanged hundreds of emails in a debate scrutinising every plausible aspect of Deregistration with a demonstration of intellectual prowess and rigour that eludes Webb and moreover a debate that his bigoted views are purposefully excluded from.'

    Do you suppose that this person talks like this in real life? If so, it must be rather wearing for his friends and relatives! I suspect though that he is a computer buff who has perfected a programme which automatically translates normal English into this bizarre jargon. This is precisely the sort of thing to which I referred above, when mentioning the submissions made to the select committee and Graham Badman's enquiry.

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  23. 'Why, in your view, do we legislate, if not to deal with problems, and why do some problems trigger legislation and others not?'

    A very good point. Up to 1968, anybody could walk into a gunshop and buy a shotgun without any license. There was no evidence that this caused any problems, but the government decided that it was an anomoly and so restricted the sale of shotguns. This was not in response to any problem at all; simply done to prevent a theoretical future problem. More recently, what problem was the law banning fox hunting supposedly dealing with? The idea that legislation is only introduced to deal with problems is an odd one and does not accord with the real situation at all.

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  24. I don't know where you get the idea that being able to own a shotgun without a license wasn't a problem. I suspect you weren't reading newspapers prior to 1968.

    You could be forgiven for not being aware of the problems caused by fox hunting - I don't suppose it happens much in Hackney.

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  25. 'You could be forgiven for not being aware of the problems caused by fox hunting - I don't suppose it happens much in Hackney.'
    Very sharp, suzyg, but I actually live in Essex and am quite familiar with fox hunting. We have our own horse.

    I was certainly reading newspaper before 1968 and then, as now, very few criminals bought their weapons over the counter at a gunsmith!

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  26. "'Meanwhile, in the real world, one particular list has exchanged hundreds of emails in a debate scrutinising every plausible aspect of Deregistration with a demonstration of intellectual prowess and rigour that eludes Webb and moreover a debate that his bigoted views are purposefully excluded from.'2

    Beautifully written, despite Webb's bluster that attempts to distract from the truth as usual
    - not a trace of dignity in this chap Webb is there

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  27. Pratt Webb says - "o you suppose that this person talks like this in real life? If so, it must be rather wearing for his friends and relatives! I suspect though that he is a computer buff who has perfected a programme which automatically translates normal English into this bizarre jargon. This is precisely the sort of thing to which I referred above, when mentioning the submissions made to the select committee and Graham Badman's enquiry"

    Coming from Dork webb this is rich - he wrote this yesterday:-

    "What I am to induce from this gnomic utterance is anybody's guess!"

    Most people observe this to be like a poorly educated pratt that tries so hard to impress

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  28. 'Beautifully written,'

    'every plausible aspect', 'purposefully excluded'

    A quick glance at a dictionary to check the meaning of words like 'plausible' and 'purposefully' and then look at the context in which they are being used here might not be a bad idea. I am guessing that the writer means that I am 'purposely excluded'. What is meant by 'plausible aspects' though is wholly beyond me!

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  29. As a general rule, one finds that the more personal abuse being used, 'pratt', 'dork' and so on, the weaker the argument being made. So it proves in this case.

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  30. "The regulations regarding gas installations are very strictly enforced because if someone's gas cooker blows up, it could endanger the lives of an entire streetful of people."

    Yet even in this extreme case, the authorities do not routinely check household gas systems for safety or even follow up on all purchases of gas appliances to ensure they are installed safely.

    Yet Simon seems to think this is necessary for a child's education. As in the case of obese children, there is a mechanism in place that is capable of recognising failure to provide a suitable education in the vast majority of instances. There may, possibly, be a minuscule number of cases of poor education provision that are missed. But when compared to the level of poor education provision in schools and the amount of harm done to children and society as a result of this tiny minority, there can be no justification for the expense and harm caused to innocent families by false-positives by a more intrusive and labour intensive system.

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  31. Simon wrote,
    "We can do this simply by observing that a child might be being very well educated, not appear to be suffering any ill treatment and yet as an adult become disordered in some way, perhaps driven mad by a controlling parent or otherwise harmed psychologically. If such a young person then needed psychiatric care as a result of her upbringing;"

    So you are back to using home inspections as a safe and well check rather than a check on education provision, despite evidence to show that these are likely to cause more harm than good. If there is a genuine need to check on the health and welfare of children, all families should be visited by social workers. Teachers are in school to teach and do not have the necessary training to recognise the type of harm you describe. In fact, I'm not sure many social workers could. Maybe all families should have to visit a psychologist annually to check that they are a mentally healthy family? Oh, but then, these doctors have already decided that this kind of check would cause more harm than good.

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  32. Readers who have struggled through all the preceding comments will have noticed that we are still no closer to addressing the fundamental question in this debate; is home education a purely private matter or is it something in which society at large might reasonably take an interest? I explained in my post that this was a question which vexes many professionals and that they and home educating parents often seem to have opposing views about this. We are no closer to answering this question. Until we do so, it is pointless to argue the pros and cons of new legislation. If home education is a purely private matter with no implications for society, then the debate ends here and all talk of monitoring and regualtion is unnecessary. If on the other hand, it is not a private matter and affects others in society, then we can look at the extent to which society should concern itself with the practice.

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  33. "is home education a purely private matter or is it something in which society at large might reasonably take an interest?"

    Like most things, and I think this has been covered by previous replies, it is a private matter until their is cause for concern - evidence of failure - based on the usual, innocent until proven guilty approach. Informal enquiries allow LAs to recognise cause for concern, along with reports from concerned members of the public, health workers, council employees in other departments, etc. Just as in your obese child/bad teeth examples.

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  34. "until their is cause"

    or even,

    until there is cause

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  35. "You begin by assuming what you wish to prove."

    You're obviously referring to Badman with that comment.

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  36. "Classic circular reasoning. You are taking as given the very controversial point which lay at the heart of the debate. Although the expression has been debased, this is the logical fallacy known as 'Begging the question'. You begin by assuming what you wish to prove."

    No. The point was that you assume there is a problem to be solved (hence your support for Badman, schedule 1, etc) without any evidence of a problem.

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  37. Webb Says -= 'Beautifully written,'

    'every plausible aspect', 'purposefully excluded'

    A quick glance at a dictionary to check the meaning of words like 'plausible' and 'purposefully' and then look at the context in which they are being used here might not be a bad idea. I am guessing that the writer means that I am 'purposely excluded'. What is meant by 'plausible aspects' though is wholly beyond me!


    Insanity rules in webb house still

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  38. 'every plausible aspect', 'purposefully excluded'

    A quick glance at a dictionary to check the meaning of words like 'plausible' and 'purposefully' and then look at the context in which they are being used here might not be a bad idea. I am guessing that the writer means that I am 'purposely excluded'. What is meant by 'plausible aspects' though is wholly beyond me!


    Webb - you are the only person that would need a dictionary for these phrases - and even then you choose to misinterpret them to suit your own purpose

    Your English is stall appalling despite your delusions to the contrary

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  39. " 'You could be forgiven for not being aware of the problems caused by fox hunting - I don't suppose it happens much in Hackney.'
    Very sharp, suzyg, but I actually live in Essex and am quite familiar with fox hunting. We have our own horse.

    I was certainly reading newspaper before 1968 and then, as now, very few criminals bought their weapons over the counter at a gunsmith!"

    Well, you might not have found that hunting is a problem, but then you are not an arable farmer or farm worker.

    And if you were reading newspapers prior to 1968 you would be aware that the weapon of choice in gun-related crime was, increasingly in the post-war period, the sawn-off shotgun. One source of these weapons would have been former agricultural labourers who found themselves with a gun they no longer needed for work, and a bloke down the pub who was prepared to give them a couple of quid for it.

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  40. "Talking with them is like wading through treacle, which is why I suspect that the DfE have simply given up and decided to do what they think is necessary to protect the interests of children."

    So does the fact that they listened and are thinking again mean the opposite - that you were wrong?

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  41. 'So does the fact that they listened and are thinking again mean the opposite - that you were wrong?'

    Well not really. I observe that the officials are going to be talking to other officials, rather than home educators. This suggests to me that they think that it is still not worth talking this matter over with home educating parents!

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  42. Webb: 'So does the fact that they listened and are thinking again mean the opposite - that you were wrong?'

    Well not really. I observe that the officials are going to be talking to other officials, rather than home educators. This suggests to me that they think that it is still not worth talking this matter over with home educating parents!

    Then your 'observation' is wrong again Webb - they are already talking to HE people - but not you!

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  43. 'Then your 'observation' is wrong again Webb - they are already talking to HE people - but not you!'

    Why on earth shoulds they talk to me; I'm not even a home educator? Here is what was actually said:


    'Ministers are not yet
    convinced that the proposed change is the best way to address this concern and have asked officials to explore other policy options'

    As I say, officials will be talking to other officials about the proposed change in the pupil registration regulations, rather than to home educators. I find your aggression a little surprising. Have you considered an anger management course?

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  44. "As I say, officials will be talking to other officials about the proposed change in the pupil registration regulations, rather than to home educators."

    Not necessarily. It doesn't say that they will explore other policy options only with other officials. This could just as easily include officials exploring other policy options with home educators/stakeholders.

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  45. And they have effectively 'talked' with home educators already by listening, reacting and replying to those who contacted them about this issue.

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