Who isn't in any case really homeschooling--yet.

I live in area where homeschooling started in the 1980s and is very popular now. I went through it myself for some time. I have developed a very, very negative view of it over the years.

First off, homeschooling is a relative luxury for those white folks who can afford for the mother to stay at home. It's not for the Native Americans, the Hispanic dairy farm workers, or the Jamaicans imported to clean the hotel rooms of this tourist area. And that's partly the point. Homeschooling is for white people who are clinging to their grandad's smallholding using their Homestead Exemption tax. You talk to them, it becomes clear that an influx of "colored" immigrants and the movement of "those damn casino Indians" off the reservation is part of the reason they are pulling their kids out of public school, thereby deliberately ghettoizing the schools.

Next comes religion: they are fundie Christians of that weird stripe who read the "Left Behind" series of books as real prophecy. They do not want their kids exposed to "humanist ideas" or science. They are anti-tax, anti-health care (because the "coloreds" would get it), etc. etc. you know the type. This mentally stunts the children and cripples their entrance into the adult world. They are bad employees and worse citizens. They can only survive in the fundie parallel universe, in the bubble. That too is the point--to imprison them.

Next, and I say this as a teacher, very often the homeschooling is a cover for abuse, all going along with the rural white fundie profile. These parents don't want to be told they can't beat their kids, so they pull them out of school so teachers won't ask questions about cuts or bruises. In my personal experience, I have known cases of young girls being registered as home schooled to hide the fact that they got pregnant through incest. Some of the "homeschooled" don't even have homes--one family I knew was living out of their vehicle. We have very cold winters, and if they had been in school at least they would have been in a warm building and had one hot meal a day. But no--gotta hide from the "seculars".

Weirdly, this same cohort of parents often attempts to take over the schools by running for the school board. How can you sit on the school board when you won't send your kids to the school? And very loudly bitch about paying taxes for it? It's all about domination.

This is a group of terrified, angry people who are losing their resources and influence very quickly--most of them won't be able to hang on to "the farm" (which, typically, ceased functioning as a farm back in the late 1970s, about the time the whole Rapture/Creationist fundie thing started--no accident, that) much longer, but they aren't going to go quietly. We need to deal with them.

Homeschooling is their way of raising their army--all the ones I know have a high birth rate, 4 to 8 kids--and it is dangerous. As practiced by most of these folks, it is also child abuse.

For these sociopolitical reasons, it is my firm belief that homeschooling in the States should be outlawed as it is in other countries. Germany is one example. Given their history, it's smart (think of what some disgruntled Germans would do if they could home school their kids). Let's get the truant officers back, fund public schools properly, and get to work rooting out this menace.

Because it is a menace. I have no patience with anyone who praises any aspect of homeschooling. None. And my sister does it, and most of the neighbors. I know that as people they have some positive qualities but their antipathy to the larger community scares me. Their home schooling is no better than madrassahs training suicide bombers.

Just my two cents.

Yeah, more sensitivity. That's what the Right understands and appreciates.....

You can't persuade a Chinese firing squad to stop shooting at you if you can't speak their language.

MM is speaking the language of the Right, but not in a bad way, because he's not being disengenuous, vicious, and rude. He's also not inciting people to kill the President and people who...um...look like the President. Never, during the darkest of the Bush years, has MM said 1/10 of the things that Rush, Hannity, and Beck say weekly.

There IS a difference.

I agree with the almost 100% of the posters here who think that this wasn't a movie review but a personal bashing of MM. Okay, the AIG stunt was irritating and predictable. But you know, saying so only takes up one sentence. Couldn't you have spent some time actually discussing the film?

For the record, what stunning, totally original way was he supposed to have done it? And conservatives aren't listening anyway? Who said so? Enough of them sure listened to Sicko.

I think you'd like it better if Michael Moore was apologetic and self-hating in style, the way people like you expect fat, unattractive people to be. You appear to take it as a personal affront that he dares to be confident and (worse, in your eyes) shows himself in the picture. I seem to almost hear you thinking, how dare he? Hasn't he looked in a mirror? It detracts from the message to have it delivered by such a slob!

Yeah, I went there too.

Grow up a little bit, doll.

looking at a woman's "parts" will turn a guy gay, perhaps in revulsion, then it's clear he really, really hates women. Like all those jokes even straight men tell about how women are "fishy", etc.

And he's probably a closeted gay to boot. How lovely.

Seriously, is there any way to get rid of somebody who's abusing the thread with advertisements (and who will probably clone the debit card of any unfortunate who really does happen to go to the site)?

Can't you block it?