• Lynfield College fight: another excellent reason for not sending children to school

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Would you want to send you children to school in an era where schools are a combat zone and respect for teachers is nil? Yes, there have been school fights as long as we’ve had schools, but events like this were virtually unheard of when I was at high school.

How the children really view the teacher is clear in this video, and I think that he did very well in a situation where he could never prevail and faced a real risk of injury.

Was this a riot? Consider this definition from S87 of the Crimes Act and decide for yourself:

A riot is a group of 6 or more persons who, acting together, are using violence against persons or property to the alarm of persons in the neighbourhood of that group.

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Related posts:

Thinking about state schools

New Zealand has changed a lot in 20 years, thanks to the liberal left agenda

A biblical perspective on home schooling and state schooling

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• Thinking about state schools

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I’ve been thinking about two current features of state schools and the implications of them…

Feature #1 – nurses

Approximately 75% of secondary (high) schools have nurses now. I haven’t been able to find the figures for lower schools, but I’m guessing that it’s similar. In my humble opinion this is another form of nanny-statism, and another way of teaching children to rely on the state for all their needs. When kids go to school they don’t just have teachers, they have guidance counsellors and nurses: it’s clear that the state isn’t just interested in education, it’s interested in the whole person (i.e. it wishes to be a parent), and the children of today go to school to get their every need met (including, in some cases, food).

There’s also a subtle cotton-wool effect arising from the fact that children grow up expecting to have medical care nearby. Children who are raised by parents that wrap them in cotton wool – remember that the state wishes to be a parent – turn out to be fearful weaklings that are excessively risk-averse. To put it another way, they tend to be wimps who are forever looking for more cotton wool to hide in, and these types are often happy to accept the poisonous ministrations of Nanny State.

School nurses are also agents of state surveillance and state control of parents. Think about it: almost every child in New Zealand goes to school, and a great many of those schools have medical personnel who are watching over the children. Those nurses can spot things that teachers often wouldn’t and, unlike teachers, their time is devoted to monitoring the health of children. They also have plenty of excuses for examining children in intimate ways. Parents know that if they send Johnny to school with a lot of bruises and/or hungry and/or dirty and/or poorly dressed they might get unwelcome attention from the state authorities, so the mere presence of a school nurse pressures parents into caring for their children in a way that meets with the state’s approval. On the other hand, you deserve what you get when you deliver your children into the state’s cruel hands.

Twenty years ago school nurses were virtually unknown and schools functioned perfectly well without them. On second thoughts, “perfectly well” is the wrong term: it would be more accurate to say that schools without nurses functioned as well as any morally bankrupt state brainwashing apparatus can function. In my humble opinion there is no need for them now and they are a waste of taxpayer’s money.

Feature #2 – ID cards

As far as I can tell all children of intermediate age (11 years) and above have school ID cards with a photo. Once again, schools used to function as well as any school can without them, so why are they necessary now?

We have photo drivers licences – a de facto ID card bought in for spurious road safety reasons – and now schools have photo ID cards. Do you detect a pattern?

If the state ever does bring in a compulsory ID card (according to Ian Wishart this has been on the agenda since 1987) they will face less resistance if they do it when a large portion of the population is already desensitised (comfortable with the idea) by having had ID cards at school. To put it another way, the state is ensuring that the children of today are used to Big Brother policies such as ID cards.

As an aside, what is the purpose of state ID cards? Look at it this way: if you’re running a wholesale business and wish to be efficient you need to know exactly what’s in your warehouse, the location of each item, and the specifications of each item. In the eyes of those who rule the state you and I are simply goods in the warehouse, i.e. we exist for their benefit, and an ID card system makes it easy for the state to put everything it knows about you in one place. For example, a lot of people have an IRD number (tax), a WINZ number (welfare), a drivers licence number, and a National Health Index number. With an ID card system it is theoretically possible to collate all that information under one National Identification Number, although they’ll probably give it a cutsie name like Kiwi Care Number. It is also theoretically possible for a policeman to stop you in the street, scan a barcode on your ID card, and read all your personal data right there and then: income, criminal history, medical records, place of residence, welfare assistance received, and so on*. The purpose of state ID cards is collation and control: collation of information to aid in the control of individuals.

If they did something like this they’d justify it by saying that we should be willing to give up our right to privacy in order to allow the state to maintain social order – read more about that in my post What is a social contract?.

Thankfully the state has a history of being grossly incompetent when it comes to implementing massive computer projects, such as the one that would be required to collate all your personal data under a national ID number. Many people curse the ineptitude of governments but I am thankful for it, because the incompetence of our enemy is what keeps us safe.

Back to schools: I believe that nurses and ID cards in schools are simply examples of the state’s efforts to infiltrate and control every area of our lives. State education has always been about teaching the state religion, and state control of individuals is part of that religion so it is taught to children in a subtle way.

What are your thoughts regarding nurses and ID cards in schools?

What other implications of these things can you see?

I believe that the state should not be involved in education in any way whatsoever.

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Related posts:

The anti-smacking law lets citizens be agents of state terrorism

The problem with democracy – Part One

The New Zealand government is holding 2.1 million blood samples taken from citizens

A biblical perspective on home schooling and state schooling

* the UK government wanted to make ID cards compulsory for everyone but faced opposition. Now the cards are voluntary for most people, but compulsory for permanent residents who come from a country outside the EU. Click here to see what data is stored on the UK ID card: I believe that this is the thin end of the wedge and that more data will be stored when the opposition has gone quiet.

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• Govt makes it harder for beneficiaries to get off the benefit

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I believe that the state should not be involved in welfare in any way whatsoever. However, if a state is daft enough and immoral enough to get involved in welfare then it makes sense for it to provide assistance to those beneficiaries who wish to earn a wage and get off the benefit. Quite apart from the intangible gains for the beneficiary (e.g. independence), assisting beneficiaries who wish to get off welfare is usually cheaper than continuing to pay that welfare.

Caution: the person who dreamed up this policy is hard at work on his next Bright Idea

Until now WINZ (Work and Income New Zealand, the state welfare agency) has provided the Training Incentive Allowance (TIA), which paid for course fees and related costs when a course would supposedly lead to employment. However, the NZ Herald is reporting that the TIA will now only be paid for courses that are NZQA level 3 or less. I’m not 100% certain, but as far I can tell that’s equivalent to 7th form/year 13 (the highest high school level. Finding out what these levels mean in reality is difficult). There are ten levels and level 7 is a Bachelor’s degree – remember that you need a degree to be a nurse these days. From my own experience I can tell you that Level 3 qualifications are only good for the most basic unskilled manual jobs.

According to WINZ people who have already started a course that’s level 4 or higher will still get the TIA:

Before 28 May 2009, approved courses did not have to be below level four of the National Qualifications Framework. Training Incentive Allowance can continue to be paid to clients who were undertaking a level four course and receiving Training Incentive Allowance for that course on 28 May 2009 and the course of study is continuing after 28 May 2009:

* until they complete study for their current qualification or

* until 31 December 2011

whichever is the earlier.

That’s good for those people who have already started courses, but this change was announced in the May budget so people planning to do a course have only had three months warning that their plans are scuttled. It appears that many haven’t even been given that.

Welfarism is a disease that has wrecked our country (click here for more on that) and the TIA was one way of reducing welfarism. Does the government actually want to keep people on the benefit or in low-paid work?

This new policy is penny wise and pound foolish.

What do you think about this new policy of stopping assistance for qualifications of Level 4 or higher?

Click here for an update to this post.

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• Update: Sweden wants to outlaw homeschooling done for religious and philosophical reasons

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• This is an update to my post titled Sweden wants to outlaw homeschooling done for religious and philosophical reasons. This is an important issue, so please have a look at that post.

When I wrote the earlier post I wanted to read the text of the proposed law but was unable to find a way to translate the PDFs. Now HEF has an email from Rohus, the Swedish homeschooling organisation, which says in part

The actual proposed law reads like this:

Chapter 22 (my translation):

§18
A school-aged child can be allowed to fulfill the school obligation in other ways than what is stated in this law. Permission shall be given if…
1) the operation appears to be a fully satisfactory alternative to the education otherwise available to the child according to what is prescribed in this law.
2) insight into the operation [by the authorities] is provided, and
3) there are extraordinary circumstances

§19
Permission according to §18 can be given for up to one year at a time. During this time it shall be tried how the operation turns out. Permission shall immediately be withdrawn if it can be assumed that the prerequisites according to §18 no longer exits. A decision about withdrawal of permission takes effect immediately unless other decisions are made.

[...]
In the preparatory text, the possible acceptable “extraordinary circumstances” are: geographical difficulties, special medical care or a short term stay for foreign families in Sweden.

That’s crystal clear: the Swedish government wants to make homeschooling illegal for Swedish families unless there are geographical difficulties or special medical reasons. Even this will only be allowed if the state authorities believe that the education given is “fully satisfactory” (by their definition, presumably), and if it’s not permission will be withdrawn immediately. It sounds like there’s no appeal and the state thugs will immediately force the children into state schools. Note the use of the word “permission”, which clearly shows that the state considers children to be its dominion or property*. Parents should not need the permission of the state if they wish to homeschool, because their children are their dominion.

As I said in my earlier post, this is Socialism/Marxism with the gloves off, showing it’s true totalitarian arrogance.

Will we see a lot of Swedish homeschool families moving to remote areas?

What do you think about this proposed law?

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Related posts:

Paula Bennett claims ownership of all New Zealand children

A biblical perspective on home schooling and state schooling

The problem with democracy – Part One (Democracy brings in immoral rulers who make this type of law)

*New Zealand is just as evil, requiring parents to get permission for homeschooling and sending state assessors enforcers into homes to check that the standard of education meets the standards required by the state. This is the same state that runs an education system that produces functionally illiterate teenagers who (I presume) stop counting at 20 because they run out of fingers and toes (males have an advantage and can go all the way to 21).

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• Sweden wants to outlaw homeschooling done for religious and philosophical reasons

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This is from Rohus, a Swedish homeschooling organisation. My comments are in blue:

The 16th of June, 2009, the Swedish Government presented its proposal for a new Swedish School Law, that has been in the works for many years.

The position on homeschooling in the suggested law is a return to darkness. It is unbelievable. Homeschooling will NOT be permitted for those referring to philosophical or religious reasons according to the European convention on Human Rights!

The added words used to make home education virtually impossible, are FOUR:

“Education otherwise is allowed if… there exist extraordinary circumstanses.”

“Education otherwise” means education outside the state system. What is the definition of “extraordinary reasons”?

The reason given is:

“…that the education in school should be comprehensive and objective and thereby designed so that all pupils can participate, regardless of what religious or philosophical reasons the pupil or his or her care-takers may have.” (our emphasis)

This is essentially dishonest. State education always has and always will teach the state ideology; after all, the state does write the curriculum. Remember that one of the ten steps for the transition to communism proposed by Marx is free state education. In the Communist Manifesto he also says:

“Do you charge us with wanting to stop the exploitation of children by their parents? To this crime we plead guilty.

But, you say, we destroy the most hallowed of relations, when we replace home education by social.

And your education! Is not that also social, and determined by the social conditions under which you educate, by the intervention direct or indirect, of society, by means of schools, &c.? The Communists have not invented the intervention of society in education; they do but seek to alter the character of that intervention, and to rescue education from the influence of the ruling class”.

Thus, the proposed law argues:

“…there is no need for the law to offer the possibility of homeschooling because of religious or philosophical reasons in the family. All together, this means that this proposed change cannot be said to contradict Sweden’s international obligations [i. e. Human Rights Conventions].”

This is Socialism/Marxism with the gloves off, showing it’s true totalitarian arrogance. Personally I don’t give a damn about Sweden’s international obligations, I just want to see Swedish parents free to choose how they educate their children.

A few families homeschool due to distance or medical problems, but I believe that the vast majority do so for religious or philosophical reasons, so this effectively outlawing the vast majority of homeschooling. This also amounts to discriminaton against religions and philosophies. To put it another way, this is persecution of religions and philosophies by the state. Oh, I forgot: the Church of the State is supreme over all, so that makes persecution of the others ok.

The quotes above are my translations from the proposed law on page 584. The proposed law can be downloaded in Swedish from the Swedish Government homepage – here.

The proposal is now out for review and Rohus will submit a very stern review to the government’s proposal. The review closes on October 1st 2009. The re-working of the proposal will be finished by the spring of 2010. The final proposal will then be voted on by Parliament during the spring/summer of 2010 and will take effect in July of 2011. Due to the many changes in the proposal, it will take about a year for all schools to adapt to it. And for home educators… many may emigrate, if the law ends up the way the proposal reads today.

The Swedish Government is making homeschooling illegal, for religious or philosophical reasons, thus showing off its worst totalitarian socialist roots. We need international support to show that Sweden, as a member of the international democratic community, cannot take such a position. As Sweden is often seen as the great social utopia of the world, it is important for Swedish homeschoolers to win this battle. Any and all help is appreciated immeasurably.

Sensible international comments about the new Swedish school law can be sent to: registrator@education.ministry.se

Please, also sign our petition HERE if you want to support us in our work to ensure that home education stays a legal alternative to school. They’re collecting signatures internationally, so go for it.

To add insult to injury, when Swedish homeschoolers go to the government website they read this:

The new Education Act – for knowledge, freedom and security
[...]
The new Education Act includes education from the kindergarten up to adult education. The law is a coherent laws which will form the base of knowledge, choice and security in all kinds of schools and other activities covered by the Education Act.

If that’s not hypocrisy, what is? What about the “freedom” and “choice” of those who wish to homeschool for religious and philosophical reasons?

I wouldn’t be surprised if Sweden becomes like Germany, where homeschooling is illegal and the state persecutes homeschoolers by taking their children into state custody and fining or imprisoning the parents.

Two words describe the situation in Sweden and Germany: evil and totalitarian.

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I believe that the state should not be involved in education in any way whatsoever.

What do you think about the Swedish government’s plan to outlaw homeschooling for religious and philosophical reasons?

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Hat tip: HEF

Related posts:

Who is responsible for uneducated children? (Part 1)

Paula Bennett claims ownership of all New Zealand children

Does homeschooling impair social skills?

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