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Freedom Friday: WWPHD?

Friday is (usually) dedicated to the promotion and defense of liberty.

Last weekend, I had a friendly, but very revealing, discussion about homeschooling with some folks I will leave unidentified. The conversation was at first very general, not at all polemic, talking about how the kids were doing, what subjects I liked best to teach, and so on. Then one of the other parties pointed out, as someone nearly always does, that they knew of homeschoolers who were doing a positively shameful job of it. I acknowledged that those people do, unfortunately, exist, but then, who can deny that there are public school teachers, and even entire school systems, that fail miserably as well, and that the average homeschool student excels beyond the average public school student? There was agreement, and the observation was made that several recent academic competitions — spelling and geography bees — that they knew of had been won by homeschoolers.

Still, it needed to be restated, some homeschoolers do a really lousy job. And then out came what really needed to be said: there should be some testing — by the government, of course (in Wisconsin, where we were, there is none) — to assure that the homeschool is up to snuff.

Now, a word about the parties involved: I have known them literally all my life; they are nice people, generally “good” people and pleasant to be around. In spite of very serious disagreements, I really like them. They are also yellow-dog Democrats and children of the state. That is, wherever the Democratic party goes is a priori right, and if anything is a good thing to do, the government has the responsibility and authority to do it. The corollary to that is that the Republicans are evil. Any political discussion inevitably leads to thinly veiled proletariat vs. bourgeois language. So I was not at all surprised that they favored government regulation of, well, anything. In fact, the moment they brought up homeschooling, I knew that was coming.

What I was not prepared for, though I really should have been, was what followed. Rather than argue about government regulation of homeschooling, I attempted to get down to the fundamental issue: liberty. Are we wards of the State, servants of the State, or are we a free people? Do we trade our liberty for perceived pragmatic benefits? Finally, I brought it back to the original topic. “What do you value more,” I asked, “education, or liberty?” The answer was stunning, and by now you know what it was: education, of course.