As I have said countless times, Government schools truly believe that your kids really aren’t yours – the kids, ALL kids, belong to them. I’ve heard teachers say it. I’ve heard administrators say it. Sometimes by nuance and sometimes straight out (a “gaffe” as it is called).
This time, it’s worse. Read this whole thing from Reason and tell me if I’m wrong. Reformatted, emphasis mine:
You may recall the saga of the South Carolina mom who granted her kids—ages 9, 10, and 11—permission to walk the mile home together, without her. School officials refused to let them to do this, on the grounds that a nearby intersection (with walk/don’t walk signals) is too dangerous. This particular mom’s kids happen to cross it at other times, unaccompanied, on their way to and from extracurriculars.
Has the school never heard of crossing guards? No matter. The children were required to be picked up by an approved adult. If not, they would have to take the school bus.
The mom, Jessie Thompson, didn’t understand why it was up to the school to decide what her kids did after leaving school property. She offered to sign a liability waiver. This did not move the needle and the issue came to a head this past week. I’ll let Thompson take it from here. She’s a surgical neurophysiologist, which means that she monitors a patient’s nervous system during surgery. In an email with the subject line, “It’s Over!” she wrote:
Hi Lenore,
Just wanted to give you the final update.
We quit. I pulled the kids and I’m homeschooling. The school was making me go into the office to show my ID at dismissal. That worked for a time, until one day I forgot my ID. When the secretary (who has known me for three years) said to me that she couldn’t let me take the kids, I responded, “Just try to keep my kids from me” and then told my kids to exit the office.
My kids stood there, not knowing whether to listen to their mother or the secretary.
Like I’ve said: Who owns the kids? Look at what happened to the kids – they believed that the school was more important than Mom. Their Parent.
Think about that. Then get mad. Once again, the school system over stepped its authority using “safety” as the reason EVEN AS THEY KNOW THE MOM.
I had to ask them twice to exit. That was the day I stole my kids from their school, because after all, the school has the primary authority and I, the parent, am only so lucky to be given access to the kids when the school allows.
And this is what is beginning to happen all over. Mostly. I’m in the circumstances that when I have to go pick up my grandkids at school (e.g., The Eldest, Daughter-in-Law, or another kid had appointments), I’ve never had to show an ID. The kids to greet me as GrandPa and the school was notified that I was coming in – but no ID and I’m NOT the Parent??
The next day, my kids were all held in their classrooms until I showed my ID (to the same woman who has known me for three years), at which time she called each classroom individually to tell the teachers they could release the kids. The following day, I refused to show my ID until they dismissed my kids, per the usual dismissal routine, and did not hold my kids hostage in order to play games with me.
They called the police.
Again, who owns the kids? Certainly not her. In this case, Government does.
And if it happened there, it is happening lots of other places as well. Because Parents care more ’bout their kids than schools do. Until the Government doesn’t recognize that primary relationship any more. Like this school did in “pulling rank”.
I had about a 30-40 minute interaction with two police officers, almost being arrested at one point. I was successful that day, as the police instructed the office secretary to dismiss my kids and then I showed my ID before leaving with them. The officers informed me that if I did the same thing the following day that I would be arrested. And so for the next two weeks, the school held my kids in their classrooms, hostage, until I, their mother, showed my ID to a secretary who has a three-year history with me.
My attorney was unable to have that stop and I just couldn’t take it anymore. This lawsuit was going to cost us $10-15,000.
So my homeschool journey begins. Wish me luck!
Thanks for your help. It was quite a ride.
I do wish her luck. Her case has me thinking about Voltaire’s observation that “those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.”
The absurdity here is not just that kids can’t cross a street by themselves. It’s also that the mom picking up her kids must show proof that she is the person everyone knows she is. As if the ID is more reliable than her own kids saying, “Hi mom!”
“Mom” >> “GrandPa”, yet here we are where Government officials can make life a living hell when they get a hair across – City Hall, fight, and all that.
And the cruelty is that those rules allow the secretary—and cops—to torment the mom while claiming this is just for safety’s sake.
BTW, Lenore is Lenore Skenzay who I first discovered at Free Range Kids (and now blogs at both Reason and LetsGrow). She advocates for what was normal for me gowing up – let kids roam all over the neighborhood, ride for miles on my bike all over the city (EVEN IN TRAFFIC to get to the tennis courts!!!) with my friends. Gadzooks – Mom used to even “sweep” us out the door and told us to come home for lunch and then again before the street lights came on (yes, suburbia). The “Mom Network” was more online than my home’s WiFi” and you can be sure that if one of the gang went home crying, each node on the MN mesh network was pinged in what seemed a heartbeat with the appropriate Moms broadcasting “be there on the back door heartbeat” protocol.
But we had Freedom (within the range allowed by Mom). Today, if not by law but by Societal norm as the story above recounts, ALL parents are to be “Helicopter” parents – always within eye sight of their kids as if some massive event like a kidnapping will happen any second. This is bad for (and by) Society, bad for the parents (who sometimes need a break and should feel ok to send the kids out to play), and really bad for the kids because they will never grow up to be independent.
Back to the school bit, though. We outsourced their education to the “professionals” who used to do just that – educate them the way we were. Now, with the self-esteem movement and the “caring is sharing” onramp to ideological indoctrination, they turn and twist the kids away from what the parents are trying to raise them to be. Think I’m kidding?
Look at that bit from above: “My kids stood there, not knowing whether to listen to their mother or the [school] secretary. ”
You think that happens by happenstance? Nay, it’s deliberate. Schools are supplanting the parents in various small ways – sometimes hardly noticeable ways. But each adds up over time like here. And it seeming never stops – READ your school district’s policies and see if they can be used to rule over your kids lives outside of actual school times and property. Most have them – more than a few abuse them. Each reduces YOUR authority over your kids.
So Parents, if you were in the same situation, what if you were in the same situation? Would your kids instantly obey you – or the secretary?
Do you know what is said, what is assigned, what is read, and what your curriculum is that is being spoonfed to your kids?
My rant is not aimed against what I would consider “old school” school teachers – there still are some in the biz and they can be wonderful for your kids. But what we have been seeing in colleges are worse than the Wuflu which only affects the body – their malevolent virus shown above affects and afflicts the minds of our children.
