Thursday, April 19, 2012

This Is Why You Should Homeschool Your Kids

I have always believed that if a parent has the time, inclination, and proper motivation to homeschool their kids, it becomes a win-win situation for both.  Kids get a lot more attention than they would in regular school, they get a lot less brainwashing than they would in regular school, and parent have more control over what their kids learn (plus, of the many homeschooled kids I know, almost all were much better behaved as the parents actually turn their kids into people they want to be around all day because the alternative would be to have kids you can't stand around you all day, but I digress...).
Over the years, the right to search students at school has come up on quite a few occasions (eventually landing at the Supreme Court), and while I agree with the ruling that was made in this case--namely the fact that schools have to be able to take reasonable precautions to keep a safe and orderly school--and I also agree that a reasonable search of a student can and should be done if warranted (ie: the administrator has reasonable suspicion that a particular kid has something on them/in their purse/in their locker and therefore is deserving of being searched--emptying their pockets, having their purse or locker searched), there should also be a limit to the ability of anyone to search a person under 18 years old (ie: no strip search, no searching an entire classroom of students because one of the students may be guilty, etc.).
And then I read this article a couple of days ago and I was horrified.  This clearly goes beyond any reasonable search and if someone took my kid's DNA without a warrant I would be up in arms.  According to the article, however, the parents of these students were fine with this.  According to me, these parents are idiots.
This warrantless search breaks so many laws I don't know where to begin. First, while a reasonable search by administrators is fine, the minute the police get involved, all rights to a warrantless search vanish (they need to detain the kid at the police station and get a warrant for whatever it is they hope to find).  Second, to DNA test every kid in the school with no actual suspicion that any of then had committed a crime, and skipping over the whole "we need to get a warrant for this" thing is ludicris.  Third, when the administrators bring a kid into the office for a chat that's one thing, but when the police bring a kid in for a chat that is a whole other thing (and requires Miranda Rights as well as a parent or child advocate to be with the).  I am shocked that more people are not outraged over this incident.
So what should you do?  In this incident I would yank my kid out of the school, get a lawyer, and sue everyone involved in this incident (and it takes quite a bit for me to even see a lawsuit as reasonable but this certainly does).  In general?  I think some of the people who commented on the article have the right of it, namely, teaching your kid that in a situation like this they are to only give their name then repeatedly say "I want my parent with me and I want a lawyer" and that is the ONLY thing they are allowed to say, is a good start.  One guy even said that his kid knows that the penalty by the school or police may be bad but the penalty at home for providing any information to the police without the parent there would be worse.  Unfortunately the days when "the police are your friend" has passed.  These days, you respect the police but you also have to protect yourself from them by knowing your rights and, most importantly, not allowing them to step all over these rights and get away with it.

1 comment:

  1. They should figure out why at the end of next month when the New Dark Age Act goes into effect...In light of which: Do you STILL believe there'll be an election?

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