Is job recruitment stuck with outdated ways of thinking?
It is very curious to see Liberals who are so incapable of being critical towards Obama that they justify his spying on citizens.
Two vicious freaks murder a child but fetus worshippers have no word of condemnation for them. The killers get off with risible sentences.
Let’s take Austria’s hijacking of the Bolivian President very seriously.
A brilliant post on the brainlessness of fetus-whisperers.
I will never understand why Libby Anne dedicates so much effort to debunking the beliefs of religious fanatics. They should believe whatever the hell they please as long as they keep it to themselves and don’t try to force their convictions on everybody else.
Clarissa's Blog 
// I will never understand why Libby Anne dedicates so much effort to debunking the beliefs of religious fanatics.
I do. People don’t live in a bubble and are relentlessly forcing their beliefs on others in numerous ways. The most brutal examples are legislation and their poor children. The girls especially may not get any real education, in contrast to harmful messages received in abundance since birth. May be, some of their children or even adults have Internet access and such a blog can help them to reevaluate their beliefs.
Also, some (previously) “usual” kind of people get caught in various sects or mainstream religious radicalism. This blog is another warning to those, who feel attracted. A warning that they may lose more than gain.
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If we want others to respect our beliefs, we need to respect theirs. Everybody should believe what they want. Everybody is also entitled to bring up their children within their own system of beliefs.
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If somebody believes in not serving in the army and not educating children to be able to join the work force in the future (Haredi in Israel), I have a huge problem with respecting beliefs part. And they don’t respect my beliefs anyway.
If there were enough uneducated children in US, it would become your tax problem too. Not all of those girls and women will find a husband, and your taxes may go to support people, often crippled for life (in practice) by their parents. You would be against letting parents to practice circumstantion on their children’s bodies, but are OK with children being kept without normal education till they’re 18 and already should start working? Are children property of parents or not?
In Israel it’s a problem because of the groups (mainly Haredi and Arabs) being big enough to affect my secular Jewish part of society too. In US those groups are much smaller, so you don’t feel the influence. And Amish is a very small, special case.
May be, it’s Israeli situation that’s so influencing me. Here “respecting” doesn’t work, if by “respecting” one means letting stay uneducated.
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I think homeschooling should be outlawed immediately. It would be in the US if the country signed the Declaration of the Rights of Children. This is not in the least a religious issue either.
But what does this have to do with what we are discussing?
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I’m starting to think that I might have mislinked. The posts that annoy me are not the anti-homeschooling ones. Those are good, useful posts. The ones that are getting super-boring are the ones about some person called Debbie or whatever who writes books about marriage. She advocates the things that many pseudo-feminists do but at least she is honest and doesn’t claim to be a feminist.
This is just like prostitution: I have every respect for an honest prostitute who practices his or her trade and never bothers anybody. But I despise people who allow others to keep them and in the meanwhile denounce prostitution. Until this Debbie person presents her need to be a doormat to her husband as a feminist choice, it is totally up to her if she wants to live this way and publish books about it.
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I think compulsory schooling should be outlawed.
“They should believe whatever the hell they please as long as they keep it to themselves and don’t try to force their convictions on everybody else.”
The problem is that religious fanatics are always in a proselytic mode.
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Not all religious people are fanatics.
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“Everybody is also entitled to bring up their children within their own system of beliefs.”
So religious freaks are good people now?
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Human rights apply to all, not just to “good people.” 🙂
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Brainwashing kids to become homophobic is not a human right.
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I grew up amid the kind of homophobia and racism that I don’t even want to describe here and I’m perfectly fine. Past the age of 18, homophobia is a personal choice, no matter what one’s parents believe.
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So your parents were homophobic and racist?
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Were, are, of course. I’ve managed to educate them somewhat but our culture is what it is.
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I am always surprised that you think radicals, fundamentalists, whatever may “keep it to themselves” and not “force their convictions on everybody else.” May be, since those people in US aren’t so numerous, unlike f.e. Haredi in Israel? Had they been numerous, you would begin feeling it. Even in US, though, abortion is a hot issue.
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There are many fringe religious groups coexisting peacefully in this country. Look at the Amish, for example. As powerful as their religious feelings are, they never try to impose their beliefs on anybody. There are also Orthodox Jews, Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus, etc and nobody bothers anybody else. The country was formed so that everybody could practice what they wanted freely. This is a foundational principle that cannot be abandoned.
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“There are also Orthodox Jews, Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus, etc and nobody bothers anybody else.”
I’m not so sure about that…
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Right now absorption is a very hotly contested issue in the 98% atheist Russia. Anti-abortionism has nothing whatsoever to do with any religion, as this example proves v
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In different countries different factors may be involved. In Israel religion (to say directly, religious people’s way of “respecting” my right over my body) is super involved, and judging by blogs it’s partly similar in US.
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Blogging is dead for the same reason the PC is dead; because its death is convenient for people in marketing. People are still using them, but they’re not in the market for a new one. I prefer PC’s over smart phones because QWERTY. I especially love my IBM Model M keyboard. I can’t write stuff in paragraph form with standard punctuation and the like with Swype and other “predictive” systems without many speed bumps.
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Ah, a fellow Model M fan! It truly is the best keyboard of them all. Granted, it does lead to me using predictive systems on a PC when people are sleeping within earshot, but c’est la vie.
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Jeff Atwood posted this:
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What a brilliant piece of writing!!! Thank you.
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David Gendron won’t see it probably, but I wanted to ask how one can say
“I think compulsory schooling should be outlawed.”
when there are situations like:
DEAR ABBY: I’m a 16-year-old girl. I am home-schooled with one friend. I’m lonely, sad, mad and depressed. I have always wanted to go to a real school, but it’s not an option for me. My parents are against it.
AND
Sometimes Outward Appearances Lie
Mary’s story is one of the most horrific yet posted on Homeschoolers Anonymous. I say “one of” because there are others just as bad, and some worse. Growing up, Mary was starved, thrown outside for days at a time in the cold with no coat until she nearly froze to death, and deprived of sleep as a child until she could barely stand. And yet, all those years, no one who knew her family knew any of this was going on.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/lovejoyfeminism/2013/06/sometimes-outward-appearances-lie.html
A homeschooled child is de facto a slave of parents. They can abuse all they want and nobody will notice. They can ignore child labour laws:
Scientology’s Shocking Treatment of Children Held in a Suburban Labor Camp
EXCERPT: At only 8 years old, Shane signed a billion-year contract with Scientology’s Sea Organization and was working 35 hours a week — by the time he was 15, he was working 100 hours, for about $35 a week.
http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2012/02/scientology_shane_kelsey_rpf.php
Parents can teach ZERO valuable in work market skills and make those children future unemployed, forcing the whole society to pay for “free exercise of their beliefs.” And so on.
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This homeschooler I met recently is a very well-intentional, chirpy person. But if she went to school today, she would barely pass fifth grade. The literacy level is extremely low. And I’m just talking about basic reading /writing skills. The homeschoolers’ children are crippled for life because there is no chance they will catch up after this “teaching”. And all this why? What purpose does this serve?
This is the definition of child abuse.
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Parents should not forbid their kid to go to school. I support voluntary schooling, in fact. I’m against compulsory schooling which included compulsory homeschooling.
“Parents can teach ZERO valuable in work market skills and make those children future unemployed, forcing the whole society to pay for “free exercise of their beliefs.” ”
Oh, I think Clarissa could be a very good homeschooler if she wants to do that.
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“Parents should not forbid their kid to go to school. I support voluntary schooling, in fact. I’m against compulsory schooling which included compulsory homeschooling.”
– Children want what their parents need them to want. There is no “voluntary” anything at the age of 5. Parents who claim that their children at that age “chose” something are simply being dishonest and self-serving.
“Oh, I think Clarissa could be a very good homeschooler if she wants to do that.”
– I don’t think I’m really cut out for a role of housewife / child abuser. 🙂
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// Parents should not forbid their kid to go to school …. I’m against compulsory schooling
I gave links clearly demonstrating why it’s all empty words in practice. If you are going to let parents have this power (small children have zero power in practice, browbeaten since birth teens – neither), you have to be intellectually honest and accept the price to be paid for the idealistic principle of freedom (of *parents* only, not of children!) : with lives of abused children who have no respite from parents at all, with lives of not schooled children for whom it will be too late afterwards to fill the educational gaps and hold a middle class job, and so on.
People like Clarissa, who are well educated, are exactly the people who do not homeschool. Since they have their own careers and don’t have time (and, in higher classes, neither knowledge) to teach all subjects from chemistry to Spanish (Clarissa can, but most even educated parents can’t).
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“I gave links clearly demonstrating why it’s all empty words in practice. If you are going to let parents have this power (small children have zero power in practice, browbeaten since birth teens – neither), you have to be intellectually honest and accept the price to be paid for the idealistic principle of freedom (of *parents* only, not of children!) : with lives of abused children who have no respite from parents at all, with lives of not schooled children for whom it will be too late afterwards to fill the educational gaps and hold a middle class job, and so on.”
– EXACTLY!!!!! How can a 5-year-old evaluate the benefits of formal schooling, express a desire for it, and assert his or her will in a discussion with parents? This is completely ridiculous. Let’s remember ourselves at 5. Were we qualified to decide such things for ourselves? I didn’t even know how to tie my shoelaces at that age!
“Since they have their own careers and don’t have time (and, in higher classes, neither knowledge) to teach all subjects from chemistry to Spanish (Clarissa can, but most even educated parents can’t).”
– I wouldn’t venture into teaching high school sciences. But in any case, there is also emotional, psychological and social crippling alongside with the intellectual crippling. Another issue is that one needs different sources of information. One wonderful source is actually worse than 5 less sophisticated sources. This is why, for instance, you can’t get all of your degrees in one place and still expect to have a career as a scholar. Even adults require to be exposed to different and competing schools of thought, let alone children. The most well-informed parent in the world is a worse source of education than a group of not-so-well-informed teachers. Simply because these teachers are different. Of course, the best format is intelligent, interested parents + a group of teachers.
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If someone doesn’t want to be schooled, why forcing him/her to be schooled?
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Who suggests forcing anybody?? If a child doesn’t develop properly, you shouldn’t force them. Instead, parents should analyze what they (the parents) are gaining from the child’s problem.
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If your kid doesn’t like onions, why forcing him to ate onions?
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I can only repeat that nobody should force children to do anything. Forcing people is wrong.
If a child refuses to go to school, parents should find out how they are causing the problem.
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Parents should not forbid their kids to go to school. I support voluntary schooling, in fact. I’m against compulsory schooling which includes compulsory homeschooling.
“Parents can teach ZERO valuable in work market skills and make those children future unemployed, forcing the whole society to pay for “free exercise of their beliefs.” ”
Oh, I think Clarissa could be a very good homeschooler if she wants to do that.
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// I think homeschooling should be outlawed immediately. It would be in the US if the country signed the Declaration of the Rights of Children. This is not in the least a religious issue either.
But what does this have to do with what we are discussing?
It has to do because when you say:
“Everybody is also entitled to bring up their children within their own system of beliefs.”
You don’t define the limits. Many people would say this sentence while arguing for their right to homeschool or f.e. not teach math to children past most basic level (Haredi education in Israel). Because it’s their own system of beliefs that teaching secular disciplines is bad and will take children away from religion. Israel is suffering because of their decision and were those Christian not daughters teaching people numerous in US, US and you would suffer too. When Muslim immigrants in Europe bring up their children within their own system, there are statistics showing high levels of criminal activity among 2nd generation.
You can’t have completely different cultures in close proximity, if both groups are large enough. Did you like living near Muslim immigrants who didn’t assimilate? Do you think there would be real equality for women, if half of US believed daughters need no education, only a husband? May be you don’t force your beliefs on others, but most fanatics are too happy to force them, like no husbands in preparing for birth course.
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When I say “a system of beliefs”, I mean precisely that: beliefs. Beliefs are different from actions. There is an enormous difference between believing that schooling is evil and voicing that belief (which is everybody’s inalienable right) and committing the action of depriving OTHER PEOPLE of schooling.
Here is an example: I have very strong anti-medication beliefs and I express and practice them openly. However, I also recognize that imposing them on what will become another person is wrong. Which is why I take a battery of pills and have been undergoing all kinds of tests at the hospital since morning.
If some people choose to bring up their daughters by telling them that women should be submissive doormats, that’s their right. Just as it is my right to teach Eric that such people are brainless freakazoids. 🙂
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// I also recognize that imposing them on what will become another person is wrong. Which is why I take a battery of pills and have been undergoing all kinds of tests at the hospital since morning.
I was unsure of asking that, but since you referred to it yourself, feel it’s OK. Do you think you would feel better without those pills? That they don’t help? If they do help, why are you against taking them? Without fetus and with diabetes, would you take no pills at all?
You talked how all illnesses are from the brain before. I understood it to mean that had I described to you suffering from XYZ during pregnancy or at any other time, you would’ve said that had I felt differently (about my life, job, pregnancy, etc), I would be 100% healthy. That it’s my brain channeling dissatisfaction with life into symptoms. It doesn’t seem to be so here.
I don’t understand your approach because it’s one thing to be against taking unnecessary drugs as a “hobby,” but “strong anti-medication beliefs” seems strange to say the least. I was ill and got antibiotics, now I am healthy. Without antibiotics, I had a good chance of being dead by now. Following your beliefs, would you have refused antibiotics (when you aren’t pregnant)? How does it go with C-section? After all, there must be lots of drugs involved, like painkillers, etc. Without C-section, would you take epidural anesthesia during birth? It’s much stronger than a simple painkiller pill.
Also, “imposing them on what will become another person is wrong” makes me think you do see the possible danger to the fetus, were you to refuse all drugs. Why it’s OK to treat others, but not yourself? Psychoanalysis can be used too, if you believe it will help, but meanwhile why not get relief via pills to shorten one’s own suffering? Afraid to get addicted? Harmed? Ideological purity? I don’t understand where the limits of your approach lie.
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“Do you think you would feel better without those pills? That they don’t help? If they do help, why are you against taking them? Without fetus and with diabetes, would you take no pills at all?”
– The pills don’t help me because I feel great as it is. 🙂 Obviously I would never take them if I weren’t pregnant. My grandfather who was a doctor of medicine lived with diabetes for 60 years and never used any medication. He died at the age of 83 which is 26 years longer than the life expectancy for men in our country.
‘Why it’s OK to treat others, but not yourself? Psychoanalysis can be used too, if you believe it will help, but meanwhile why not get relief via pills to shorten one’s own suffering? ”
– I’m not suffering, though. The only symptom of gestational diabetes is, if I’m not mistaken, dry mouth and shortness of breath. And I can’t say I feel either.
“Afraid to get addicted? Harmed? Ideological purity? ”
– I just never felt the need because I always felt very good.
“Following your beliefs, would you have refused antibiotics (when you aren’t pregnant)? How does it go with C-section? After all, there must be lots of drugs involved, like painkillers, etc.”
– A one-time dose of medication in extreme circumstances is fine. But getting on something that you have to take constantly for protracted periods of time is insanity. If you have to take it all the time, it means you are not getting better. You are just deadening the symptoms.
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Okay, it’s not as bad as I thought first…
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// I just never felt the need because I always felt very good
What if one feels very good, but in reality is not healthy? F.e. one person I know found via a blood test by a complete chance that the thyroid gland wasn’t working well enough:
Hypothyroidism is the underproduction of the thyroid hormones T3 and T4. […] Hypothyroidism is treated with hormone replacement therapy, such as levothyroxine, which is typically required for the rest of the patient’s life.
A doctor said that side effects include poorly working (thinking) brain. During pregnancy without treatment it leads to special ed child. Btw, the doctor also said that this is extremely common thing.
If there is a lack of the hormone but the person feels great (so far), does it mean the brain’s abilities don’t get hurt? I can’t believe that. Should such a person go into (very costly and time consuming) psychoanalysis? If one needs well thinking brain for work, taking the supplement seems the lesser evil.
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Everybody should do whatever they think is right for them. My choice would be to discover what my body is trying to tell me with this sickness and address the issue rather than try to shut it up with medication. You can do that but the issue will not go away and the body will find some other collection of symptoms to attract your attention. I believe in managing my life instead of letting a bunch of pills manage it.
And actually, psychoanalysis lasts a lot less than any chronic condition. 🙂 After 6 months, you are out of the acute stage.
Do you know how much money doctors get from pharmaceutical companies to convince people they have all sorts of conditions that require medication?
I highly recommend: http://www.amazon.com/Selling-Sickness-Pharmaceutical-Companies-Patients/dp/156025856X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1373401084&sr=8-1&keywords=selling+sickness
and http://www.amazon.com/Overdiagnosed-Making-People-Pursuit-Health/dp/0807021997/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1373401084&sr=8-2&keywords=selling+sickness
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Another topic:
The California Department of Corrections has been coercing pregnant female inmates to undergo sterilization for more than a decade.
http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2013/07/07/female-inmates-in-california-pressured-into-sterilizations/
I read this post of yours:
https://clarissasblog.com/2009/06/19/prostitution/
And while I myself am not sure, one of the comments pushes me for legalization to an extent:
I have a family member adopted from prison. Her biological mother was in prison for using drugs and “prostitution” at 14.
IN JAIL? I find it hard to believe that the men she was services were all under 18– we’re putting children in jail for being sex trafficked. A child who is impregnated by sex trafficking should be whisked away to a place where they can get empowering rehab, trauma services, and a lot of compassion.
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// If someone doesn’t want to be schooled, why forcing him/her to be schooled?
Who is this someone? A parent, who doesn’t want a child (not a parent!) to be schooled?
I recommend you to check Love, Loy, Feminism blog in general. F.e. how parents taught children to fear US child services, made them believe any complaint would lead to be forcibly pulled from the family. Will such a child complain to “the bad” state about abuse? Of course, not.
Do you think 5 year old can decide whether he or she can be schooled? In practice, parents decide all at that stage.
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The vast majority of 5 years old kids hate schooling, and that includes me. Almost all I’ve learned between 5-12 years old was not in school. I’ve learned way more with books than schooling with idiot and boring teachers.
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“The vast majority of 5 years old kids hate schooling”
– ????? I come from a long line of teachers and I can assure you that normal kids LOVE schooling. My niece loves her daycare. She loves being with other kids, loves learning in a group, loves her learning activities. The kids who don’t – their parents have already messed things up big time. Leaving such children with those parents 24/7 will only aggravate the problem.
“I’ve learned way more with books than schooling with idiot and boring teachers.”
– You would have seriously preferred to stay at home with Mommy all day and every day until age 18?? Seriously??
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Schooling is not the same thing than daycare. I could have learned way faster and way more things by myself with books in a daycare than sleeping almost all the time until the end of high school. Jeez, primary school and high school suck for me.
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The most important lessons we learn at school are not contained in any book. We learn to interact with peers and adults; we try out different identities; we learn to be away from our parents; we learn strategies of time management; we learn conflict resolution; we learn to exist within a hierarchy’ we learn to be individuals on our own.
None of this can be learned with an unemployed Mommy hovering around 24/7.
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I’ve said that schooling is not the same thing than daycare. I support the idea of daycare and changing places, but not compulsory schooling.
I begin to like school when it was not compulsory, i.e. in CEGEP. This was the first time that schooling was not an everyday platitude for me.
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You still haven’t answered, though. Would you have preferred to stay at home with your mother all day long until the age of 18?
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No, but this answer doesn’t require compulsory schooling because daycare is not the same thing than compulsory schooling.
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But what’s the alternative? Between the ages of 5 and 18, you are either stuck at home with Mommy or go to school. What else is there?
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There are no other options because of the compulsory schooling.
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What could an alternative be? What would you have preferred? Not school, not Mommy, what would be the ideal scenario for you? Being left at home alone for 13 years while other kids play and have fun together?
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Being not at home with other kids without the compulsory schooling.
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Personally, if I would have an adopted child, I would not favor homeschooling but I would have no problem to give him/her any lesson in any school subject (except plastic arts, bricolage and guitar) until the end of the high school because I’m better than the vast majority of teachers (except in plastic arts, bricolage and guitar).
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Кнессет предупреждает: украинская ”Свобода” заразна
http://davidaidelman.livejournal.com/1775734.html
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The hypocrisy is overwhelming. How some people manage to defend the idea of a Jewish state that doesn’t want to have a non-Jewish Muslim majority while denying the right of Ukrainians to a Ukrainian state without a Russian-speaking non-Ukrainian majority is a mystery.
People in glass houses should be very careful when throwing stones.
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