Home-Education Under Attack

Melissa Busekros (left), 15 years old, detained in a psychiatric hospital for being home-educated.

"Michael Farris, founder of the Home School Legal Defence Association (HSLDA) has said he believes the German treatment of Christian homeschoolers is the "edge of the night that's coming" for believers.

"Germany is the only Western democracy taking this incredibly hard-line approach, but there are growing clouds on a number of national horizons," Farris told WND.

"The philosophy that the government knows best how to raise children is really becoming a worldwide phenomenon," Farris said. "I think Germany represents the edge of the night that's coming."

from World Net Daily, 17 May 2007

More recently, 12 May 2008, Bob Unruh at World Net Daily looks into the situation in Germany, where the Government is blurring child-abuse and home-education into one. Below are a couple of powerful excerpts - click here to read the entire article.

..."The German Jugendamt system is under increasing scrutiny by the European Union as well as other international organizations because of the sheer numbers of custody cases in proportion to actual substantiated abuse and in relation to the overall population," he said. "For homeschoolers, the Jugendamt represents the tip of the spear in the government's persecution of parents who simply wish to educate their children privately at home – a freedom protected by governments of virtually all free societies."...

...Practical Homeschool Magazine has noted one of the first acts by Hitler when he moved into power was to create the governmental Ministry of Education and give it control of all schools, and school-related issues.

In 1937, the dictator said, "The Youth of today is ever the people of tomorrow. For this reason we have set before ourselves the task of inoculating our youth with the spirit of this community of the people at a very early age, at an age when human beings are still unperverted and therefore unspoiled. This Reich stands, and it is building itself up for the future, upon its youth. And this new Reich will give its youth to no one, but will itself take youth and give to youth its own education and its own upbringing."...

...the education authority is in conversation with the affected family in order to look for possibilities to bring the religious convictions of the family into line with the unalterable school attendance requirement."

We in New Zealand need to wake up and realise that everything is not ok. The Government has just passed the Anti-Smacking Law - against the will of 83% of New Zealanders. How much easier will it be for them to outlaw the fundamental and inherent right of parents to educate their own children at home?

Why is the German government scared of home-education? Home-education allows for freedom of thought, and freedom from the indoctrination of the State. The German government is investing a great deal in indoctrinating all young Germans with it's worldview. So, understandably, home-education is a huge spanner in the works for the government, as there is a small but growing group of free-thinkers who believe that it is not the State's job or jurisdiction to indoctrinate educate the country's citizens.