keelyblog

I can’t keep quiet on this any longer. Coming from a homeschooler’s prospective–what’s the difference? Public school social studies/history has always been a lie. I was taught lies. My husband was taught lies. I am sure my parents were taught lies as well. Anyone who believes what they learned in their public school social studies and history classes is the God’s honest truth should run strait into a wall. right. now.

Why do we expect our public schools to offer reasoned and unbiased history? Public schools have an agenda, as does every large organization. I like the way Melvina Reynolds describes it. “They all got put in boxes and they all came out the same.” That is the goal of public schools. They want to spit out a workforce who believes what they are doing is righteous. And why not? Why would we expect them to want something different? Why do people just put blind faith into public schools? No other option, or no reason to believe otherwise, I guess.

If you rely on public schools to educate your children, you will have uneducated children. By this, I do not mean that everyone should homeschool, as public school might prepare your children to survive in the inane bureaucracy of American life. I say “might” because I was never good at dealing with societ despite graduating with a public school education. And now that I have escaped dealing with society at large, I am not sure I can go back. Sure, in an emergency situation I would do whatever it takes to survive and support my children. However, as a choice? I need some job where I don’t have to deal with customers, co-workers or superiors. Basically the job I have now!

So there you go, sending your kids to public school may or may not help them succeed in a bleck world, but it will definitely not ever teach them accurate, well rounded history. Ever. Never, ever, ever. Stop complaining about it and teach your own children history! Read more history yourself. Lots of perspectives. Try to understand every angle. Have deep philosophical discussions over dinner. And in general, if you are planning to let public schools be totally in charge of your child’s education, stop having kids. Just don’t have them; you don’t have time for them anyway.

Reducing Infant Mortality from Debby Takikawa on Vimeo.

I guess it all started when a friend posted a blog about wishing she had a significant other to share the expenses of parenting and home ownership. She said, “Secretly I’m a traditionalist who believes in the two-parent (or, at least, two-income) family” (I am not linking back because she generally does not invite open public to her blog and I do). My immediate response was that when did a 2-income family become traditional? Over the days since that post I have come to accept that really this idea–a 2 income family–is the new “traditional”. Why?

Somewhere along the way, a feeling of shared unity splintered. Women who chose to stay at home and raise families became “traitors” to the feminist movement. Feminist told women to have babies and return to work, leaving strangers to raise the children.

Don’t get me wrong, I believe any one has the right to choose what ever career suits them best. This does not mean you get to have 2 careers. Raising a baby to a school-aged child is a career. If neither parent wants to postpone their other career to accept this one, then they should not have a baby. This does not mean they need to go childless. There are lots of children 5 years old and older waiting to be adopted. Not everyone is cut out to be, or has interest in being, a breeder. I’m cool with that.

Telling people they could have babies AND careers outside the house, is like saying they can be an architect AND a surgeon at the same time. Someone has to raise the babies and that person(s) has a huge impact on the future world.

The problem is that most babies in this country are being raised by persons who don’t have a vested interest in what happens to the kid in 5, 10, 30 years. Those first 5 years are so very formative. I have read recent studies that show “friends” having more impact on what a child chooses than that child’s parents. This does not surprise me. Starting from just a few weeks to a few months old, who do babies spend most of their waking hours with? Friends. Sometimes for the better, and sometimes for the worse, I think the most influential people in my life are my parents.

So, why am I separating myself from the feminist label? It doesn’t help that feminist organizations claim to fight for reproductive rights while staying completely silent on the maternity crisis in this country. By “reproductive rights” they seem to only to mean the right to not reproduce. I am on an email list of “feminist” working moms fighting for paid maternity leave and breastfeeding support from employers. They claim to be a mom’s action group, but even they are completely silent on birthing rights. They certainly aren’t helping mothers find creative ways to stay home.

“Feminism” is not accepting “all aspects and possibilities of being a female human - body, mind, spirit, emotion and relationship with others - with compassion and respect.” It is instead just as feminism.com describes it, “It’s mostly about gender imbalances — i.e., how many women and how many men are in certain professions, etc.” Basically a political cause that has little to no relevance for me, that I disagree with some of the principles of, and that puts out literature that I often find offensive (namely the ones that scorn stay-at-home parenting).

I am not an anti-feminist, just like I am not anti-republican or anti-democrat or anti-libertarian or anti-socialist. Historically, feminists managed to accomplish one good thing–the right to vote. Every citizen should have the right to vote and to take advantage of that privilege.

Disposable diapers should definitely have a sin tax attached to them. A high one! And those yucky gel things should be banned from use! This way, a family may consider using only disposable diapers for 1 or 2 children, but if you start having more kids it will be financially unfeasible to use anything but cloth. The economic value of cloth if you plan to have more than a couple kids is HUGE. A one time expenditure of $300-$500 can last for 4 or 5 kids! Maybe with a booster purchase of $20-$50 just for new cute covers or supplies for each kid–just for fun. :) It definitely seems like a sin for parents with lots of kids to put all those awful disposable diapers first on their poor babies, and secondly on our earth. Of course, the diaper company lobbyists would be against this….