We looked yesterday at New World Order ideology. Today, I wish to consider one aspect of this theory and how it has permeated, one might almost say contaminated, British home education and those connected with it in any capacity.
In the early 1970s, I was very heavily involved in the Children’s Rights movement in this country. For some of us who went to school during the fifties and were teenagers in the sixties, the helplessness of children was an absolute scandal. They could be beaten without any legal redress by parents and teachers and any adult who wished could strike them a passing blow with impunity. It was not uncommon for park keepers or even bus conductors to hit children and they had no legal remedy. In many ways, their position was almost that of slaves in the eighteenth century. Gradually, this changed and a good thing too. One area where these changes are currently being opposed in Britain is in the field of home education.
I mentioned yesterday that one of the big things with American home educators was ’parental rights’. This means, among other things, the right of parents to hit their children whenever they want. This is an important issue in the USA. Another aspect is the right of parents to allow their children to carry and use firearms. Both these ’rights’ would be under threat if America ratified the United Nations Convention of the Rights of the Child. The USA and Somalia are the only countries in the world which have not ratified this treaty. Home educators in America, of which there could be as many as two million, are among the most vociferous opponents of the UNCRC.
This attitude has crossed the Atlantic and is now prevalent among British home educators as well. Perhaps it has something to do with the Internet and the ease with which crazy ideas are able to travel the world so readily these days. At any rate, British home educators are also very keen now on their ’rights’. Parental ’right’ to home educate has become a big thing on the home education scene here. I have quite a different perspective on this and I rather think that my own viewpoint was more common twenty years ago than it is now. It is based upon the idea of children’s rights, which has, as I mentioned above, been very important to me for forty years or so. When my daughter was little, she had the right to the best possible education which I was capable of providing for her. If I was able to provide the best education at home, then I had a duty to do this; no matter what sacrifices this entailed my making. If on the other hand, I was unable or unwilling to provide a decent education at home and a local school could give her a better education, then my duty was to send her there. Where ’parental rights’ entered into all this, I really could not say. This was my duty.
Reading the 2007 guidelines for local authorities on home education is very revealing. A child’s right to education is mentioned only once in this document, but the parents’ right to home educate rates five mentions. Interesting, no? Government pronouncements on home education these days always talk of parents’ ‘right to home educate’. I suppose that this is in keeping with the spirit of the age. We are all very concerned now that nobody’s rights are infringed and if we fail to acknowledge the parental right to home educate, then who knows? Perhaps they will be bringing a case against us under the Human Rights Act? This is a disgustingly craven way for the government to behave. The reason that they are so keen to emphasise parents’ supposed rights in this matter is that it is the parents, as adults, who will cause trouble. They are the people who must be fawned around and placated. You will notice that there is ten times more talk of parents’ right to home educate whenever anybody is talking about this subject, than there is of children’s rights to education. This is awful and it is a definite step backwards, as least as far as children’s rights are concerned.
As I say, this kind of thinking has drifted over here from the USA. It is popular with both right wing Christians and New World Order nuts; both of whom are over-represented on the American home educating scene. I am horrified to see British parents adopting this reactionary viewpoint and look forward to the day when a more progressive stand is taken on the matter and children’s rights move to the centre of the debate on home education, where they belong.
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I think the emphasis on 'parental rights' has a completely different root structure here than that in the US.
ReplyDeleteIt has many roots, but one could be a reaction to the way children have traditionally been treated by the state. The state makes a terrible parent. Ask adults who have been through the 'care' system about that. Schools also make very poor parents in their capacity as being 'in loco parentis'.
HE parents think about whether they want the predominant influence on their children to be LA employees or themselves and they choose to take the role of parent in its fullest sense, themselves. In this way, they feel able to protect the rights of their children.
When I used to teach, in London schools, I saw the results of some bad parenting. I know there are some children who need to be rescued from bad parents.
However, it's the mindset that children, generally speaking, need to be rescued from their parents that contaminates the attitudes of teachers, social workers, New Labour governments etc that helps to cause the rift between HE and LAs. It's an over-reaction.
It's as if both sides have coloured specs on. LAs have the 'Must rescue children from their parents' specs on and they colour everything they see and HE parents have the 'Must protect my children from the LA' specs on and that colours the things they see.
What I don't see, which is the idea you promote in this post, is a 'Must protect my rights OVER my child'. I see parents protecting their children and their right to a good education and indeed, usually, they are the people best placed to do that.
You make some exceedingly good points here Anonymous and I dare say I have not made myself clear. You say,
ReplyDelete'What I don't see, which is the idea you promote in this post, is a 'Must protect my rights OVER my child'.
This is true; parents are not thinking in those terms at all and I am sure that most home educating parents have their children's needs at the forefront of their minds. The problem is that that the debate has become framed in terms of 'parents' right to home educate' and this is distorting the perspective of those involved in the business, whether parents or professionals.
You talk of the state as parent and rightly point out that it does not make a very good job of this as a rule. It is this idea of the state as parent which is so prevalent on the American scene. I did not mean to suggest for a moment that parents in this country are home educating because they wish to beat their children and teach them how to handle a six-shooter! The problem is that the terminology and expressions that we use tend to affect our thinking and the constant repetition of phrases like 'a parent's right to home educate' cannot help but skew how the matter is seen.
Simon.
Yes, I agree that an emphasis on 'Parents' Rights' is not helpful.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I only noticed this term being used AFTER, and as a result of, the Badman Enquiry. I can't remember if GB mentioned them, as being in opposition to Children's Rights, or whether it was various govt ministers/spokespeople.
As far as I recall it was the Badman Report which first hinted that parents rights and children's rights were somehow in opposition to each other. I don't think HE parents had ever thought of HE in those terms before. I remember seeing HEAS's response to the report where this was mentioned as being a false (and highly insulting) argument. In fact, parents are the best people to protect their children's rights.
When the argument is framed in these terms, 'either you're in favour of parents having rights or children having rights', then it seems to me there's a problem with the argument.
'However, I only noticed this term being used AFTER, and as a result of, the Badman Enquiry'
ReplyDeleteIt has certainly taken off since then, although it was being used increasingly in the years leading up to Badman. As I said above, the 2007 guidelines mention a parent's 'right to home educate' five times, while only once talking a child's right to an education.
I agree with you that the idea of some opposition being et up between parnets' rights and children's rights is absurd and has led us down a blind alley. I have an idea that after Graham Badman, people in government felt that they needed to emphasise that they were not opposed to home edcuation in principle and so started talking about the parents' 'rights' in this way. To be fair though, they probably picked this up from some home educators in the first place.
Simon.
Simon.
Yes, here it is in the Badman Report.
ReplyDelete'Indeed, as the national Children’s Plan makes clear it is “Parents not
Government that bring up children”3 and there is nothing in this report which sets out to
contradict or modify this contention. However, there has to be a balance between the rights
of the parents and the rights of the child. I believe that balance is not achieved through
current legislation or guidance, and the imbalance must be addressed.'
I may be quite wrong because I was not on the 'big lists' but I don't remember this idea, of parents' rights, being a big theme among HE families before then. Perhaps others can remember.
Parents rights?
ReplyDeleteDo you mean the me, me, me it's all about me attitude?
'However, there has to be a balance between the rights
ReplyDeleteof the parents and the rights of the child.'
Yes, I too remember gasping at this! It would indeed be intersting to hear from parents as to when they first became aware of this mad notion that parents' rights and those of children were somehow in opposition.
Simon.
I agree Anonymous that I had never really heard of, or thought of the term 'parents rights' until the Badman thing came about. I had certainly never considered them as mutually exclusive and as separate issues never really gave it any thought because I didn't until that point think of it as 'rights' as much as doing the best you can for your child.
ReplyDelete"As I said above, the 2007 guidelines mention a parent's 'right to home educate' five times, while only once talking a child's right to an education."
ReplyDeleteMaybe because the right of a child to an education is such a given these days? Nobody disputes that children have a right to an education and LAs are highly unlikely to forget this, so why would it need repeating in the guidelines? The right of parents' to choose the form of the education (as long as it's suitable to A, A & A & SEN) is less accepted by LAs so they do need reminding. Repeatedly.
I know that some of the people talking about protecting parent's rights do so in order to protect their children's rights. The right to choose how and where they are educated, for instance. The state does not allow children this right. The only way children can have this control is if their parents give them that right and this would be at risk if the state became the arbiter of the child's rights. How do you feel about the right my children have to choose what and when to learn? Do you think it should be removed?
ReplyDeleteand I think that Mr Webb is trying through this blog to raise a false alarm over right wing Christinity and New World Order theory being prevalent in British home education.
ReplyDeletePerhaps his reasons for doing this is that he anticipated that more monitoring would mean a nice contract for him through government who would hire him as an 'expert'
That the Badman Enquiry failed to become law has possibly left him at a loose end now he is no longer a home educator and his book is not selling.
Implying there are reasons for more monitoring , without any solid proof may fool some people who read this dreadful little blog but I doubt it will make Government or Local Authorities sit up and pay attention.
Simon, I really wish you would get information on American home ed from something other than right-wing magazines. Yes, there are some right-wing christians who use the rhetoric of "parents rights" to sanction very bad conduct - your favorite US organisation - the extremists in HSLDA - are very big on this, as are Vision Forum, AFI, and others.
ReplyDeleteHowever, most American Homeschoolers mean something very different when they talk about parents rights. They particularly mean the right to make choices other than state schools, and the right to opt out of certain activities in state schools. They also mean the right not to have children removed from parents because those parents make unconventional choices which don't harm the child, such as being a part of an unpopular religious minority, homeschooling or unschooling, choosing to have a father as the stay-at-home parent, speaking a language other than English in the home, or allowing a teenaged child to attend a gay/lesbian support group. (All of these have been used as grounds for overzealous social workers to attempt to remove children on the grounds that they weren't conforming to 'community values'.)
The US has a very different history than the UK. There is no American state church, and (even though America is more religious) religious institutions have far less _actual_ power than British ones do. (They can't control a state school, for example - religious schools must be private.)
In the US, parental rights are generally about the right to teach ones children ones' own values if one wishes - not about hitting, guns, or militias.
You really should stop getting your views of the US from extreme-right publications! The combination of World Net Daily and The Guardian will give you a very odd view of the US indeed!
Badman is probably waiting to see you get on with the HE, instead of pseudo political posturing.
ReplyDeleteThe amount of time and energy you spend in exasperation and anger, corresponding to every little comment on here and other forums must make anyone wonder just how much time you've got left to devote to your childs development.
"The amount of time and energy you spend in exasperation and anger, corresponding to every little comment on here and other forums must make anyone wonder just how much time you've got left to devote to your childs development."
ReplyDeleteWho are you talking to?
Must say that most of the HE parents I know see that education is a parental duty which like you they feel they carry out better by HEing than they would if they sent their children to school.
ReplyDeleteElizabeth
'Implying there are reasons for more monitoring , without any solid proof may fool some people who read this dreadful little blog but I doubt it will make Government or Local Authorities sit up and pay attention.'
ReplyDeleteWhat this post has to do with monitoring is anybody's guess!
Simon.
"What this post has to do with monitoring is anybody's guess!"
ReplyDeleteWell, if you read through the comments, Simon, you'll see that the discussion moved on to the Badman Review and how he appeared to pit parents against children with regard to rights as you appear to be repeating in this article. His solution to this 'problem' was monitoring. I guess anonymous is suggesting you brought this 'problem' up again because you like the solution Badman suggested since you supported his report. Your previous articles on right wing Christians and NWO fanatics also seem to suggest that you think home educators need close watching, again suggesting support for monitoring. Does that help any?
'Your previous articles on right wing Christians and NWO fanatics also seem to suggest that you think home educators need close watching, again suggesting support for monitoring. Does that help any? '
ReplyDeleteNot really, and I shall post a little more about this tomorrow. The fact that a parent follows a religion different to my own or subscribes to a seemingly weird worldview, would not be sufficient grounds to monitor them more closely than anybody else.
Simon.
If you're doing NWO, can you do a bit on the UFOs while you're at it?
ReplyDeleteTa, in advance.