I love the discussions at PDE because I do feel like it's a place where I can flex my intellectual muscles in more ways than one. You and JJ and Paul and everybody else make think hard as well.

My resolution though is tough because answering to emails is a very different writing practice from blogging or writing articles or essaying. Yes, it's writing, but when I blog, I have to remind myself that most of my readers do not necessarily know all what I am talking about. Emailing in a list is definitely more of an intimate conversation.

And with that in mind, to y'all out there, the PDE list is a Yahoo!Groups list by the Parent-Directed Education group.

www.parentdirectededucation.org

See what I mean

Yep. It takes me a while, but I catch on eventually.

Nance

[quote=JJ Ross]Apparently we're supposed to accept "progressive" politics as not necessarily related to any actual progress toward any progressive goal?[/quote]

JJ, I love you but you need to get a chill pill and pronto.

I don't have all the answers, honestly, but I feel that what happens in the homeschooling community is such a micro-cosm of what happens at a much larger level among liberal/progressive/feminist groups, that if there is a way I can effect positively the homeschooling microcosm, maybe-just-maybe I'll find some of the answers to better deal with schizopolitics affecting the left.

I mean, schizopolitics may be a good thing, I don't know. I have yet to comprehend a lot of what Deleuze and Guattari wrote about Capitalism and Schizophrenia.

It's one of the many things I ponder and want to put to more of a national discussion that does not deal with the already annoying political noise machine coalescing around some of the top 'liberal' bloggers. Why? Because 'choice' is still a sticking point for them.

Well, you probably already have effected it positively.

It's what else you might want hsers to do that I am not clear on.

I just a had a snip forwarded to me from the HEM-networking list (is that a reference your other readers will get? it's a Yahoo list for hsers of a certain stripe -- not one I generally admire). Anyway, the snip was Helen (HEM owner) talking about their latest project --

"Stillwater Homeschool Alliance: A small group of researchers,
fact-gatherers, perspective-builders and others committed to the
background work of protecting homeschooling freedoms and
responsibilities, who will work toward developing factsheets, white
papers, legal and legislative opinions, etc.

"Whatever Homeschool Coalition: A bigger - very big - all-encompassing
umbrella (comprised of, ideally, a broad cross-section of the
homeschool movement) for anyone supportive of the same kinds of goals
and directions as the smaller group will be working on promoting.
This larger group is where much of the 'legwork' will be done in
disseminating the perspective developed by the SHA."

Now, I don't necessarily want to talk about this actual project. IMO, it's just HEM selling more mags. But do you notice, as I do, that this makes no sense?!

She wants an all-encompassing umbrella, a broad cross-section of the hsing movement. . . but members of the umbrella group have to be true believers and follow the line of the think tank, Stillwater.

So if you don't think like the think tank, you needn't apply to join the larger umbrella. I get it. I need not apply. I don't see charterhomeschoolers as a threat to hsing and I don't lose sleep over what HSLDA gets up to. Those are the basic tenets of any HEM-sponsored activity, so I know I won't fit. I get it.

But. . . otoh, we have the progressive Dems. Or just Dems. I am a homeschooler. An unschooler, even. And you want to effect me -- my little ole part of the microcosm.

I'm a Dem, always have been, can't help it, that's how I was raised.

But need I apply for any real involvement? Are my views eliminated from consideration out of hand because I am a hser?

Not by you. I know that. But in a more general, party that wants my support but doesn't seem to have a kind word to say about hsers, maybe because a lot of party leaders really don't know much about us, think we are all conservatives, but we aren't hard to find, and why not make the effort way.

Or does the Dem party sound good on the surface -- all encompassing even -- but really doesn't mean me?

Or are you not about -- you personally -- the big all encompassing umbrella -- really you want to focus on the left-hand side of the Dem spectrum?

I'm pretty much there with you on a lot of issues -- just not as vehement as you in your posting, as we've touched on -- even though I did live in the big city many moons ago -- but, if I understand the usage correctly, "where's the love" from my party?

And if we can get past that . . . somehow . . . the hsing microcosm is just as dysfunctional as any other group of people thrown into a community with nothing other than their ed choice in common. We don't expect all psers to vote a certain way, do we? No. And I don't think you can build the bridge across the canyons within the hsing community.

So, as in our previous talk, I am feeling unsettled about the whole plan here with regard to hsers -- if there is one.

Clear at all?

Nance

[quote]But in a more general, party that wants my support but doesn't seem to have a kind word to say about hsers, maybe because a lot of party leaders really don't know much about us, think we are all conservatives, but we aren't hard to find, and why not make the effort way.[/quote]

I so don't agree with us being easy to find. In the political liberal blogosphere, I am the only homeschooling parent. There are homeschoolers out there not affiliated with HEM like Lynn Siprelle, Julie Leung and Dru Blood but they're not known as political bloggers. They're more in the tech and academia realm.

Here in NYC, I have yet to have any of my fellow homeschoolers step up to the bat and go out and work with incumbents or candidates in a high profile level. It's one of my notorious pet peeves, that in NYC there are ONE MILLION KIDS GOING TO PUBLIC SCHOOL EVERY DAY because the homeschooling groups/associations of the area have never worked to make it a viable option for working parents. They see homeschooling as a "calling" that people come to on their own. What many don't get is that homeschooling is fucking expensive. Not as expensive as sending your kids to a private school but expensive nonetheless.

Prospective homeschooling families get turned off by the fact they have to reinvent the wheel --classes, social groups, playdates, resources-- because the perception is that parents do the "schooling". So the concept of individual and group learning is lost in the fray, the concept of "it takes a village" is furthere eroded by the belief that homeschooling has to only happen in the home, that it's a "nuclear family thing" that only the rich and highly educated can afford.

Because these distortions of homeschooling exist, the whole concept of homeschooling revolves around being white, upper middle class and college educated; and this affect conversations about learning alternatives in the political arena. The common myth is that if you are black or Puerto Rican you are poor and therefor you need a public school. Of course, I shatter that image, but there is so much I as a single individual can do.

We need more people in the public arena talking about homeschooling. More people who are not white, not middle class and certainly not college educated. We need to shatter those biases and that's why I feel the task of mainstreaming homeschooling has only just begun.

[quote] Or does the Dem party sound good on the surface -- all encompassing even -- but really doesn't mean me?[/quote]
Not only do I don't think Republicans are the party of choice unless you are a fundie; but when it comes to protecting the integrity of the Constitution, I believe Democrats consistently have done a much better job.

That's why I work with Democrats. Am I 100% happy with the party? Absolutely not. But I believe they're much, much better about inclusion and choice than the Repugs.

[quote]Or are you not about -- you personally -- the big all encompassing umbrella -- really you want to focus on the left-hand side of the Dem spectrum? [/quote]

Well, yeah. I don't have patience for the Joe Liberman's of the world; and Hillary Clinton better watch out. She is moving too far to the right for my tastes these days.

I honestly do not believe this is the time for 'centrist' compromises, politically or socially, because they are too much like what the Republicans have been able to impose on the country through the gutting of Roe vs. Wade; the misapplication of interstate commerce clauses and their advocating of "corporate rights" above individual human rights.

Were' in a political retrograde move at the moment. The words liberal, progessive, feminist have been turned into pejoratives in this country. We need to move "forward". Yes, a "centered", "tempered", "focused" energy is needed here. But the political outcome has to move forward.