[email protected]

For years I accepted private responses, but I don't think it's right to do
what basically amounts to following someone home from a public meeting and
punching her on her own front porch.

The e-mail is below, but I want to say that I am not "in the answering
business." If it were a business I wouldn't be doing it voluntarily and every
single day. I care more about the children than the parents, but that's how
unschooling works. Someone who can be publically harsh about her own child
might want to accept someone simply pointing out that she had been so.

Too many parents care more about their own sensitive feelings than their
children's.

Sandra
=======================================================================

I cannot believe your response to me. Of course i love to be with my son or
he would be in school !

Do you have a maid ? I don't . I HAVE to do other work. My hubby is rarely
around and it is just me and a HUGE house.

How dare you insinuate I should put him in school  ! You really should get
out of the answering business if you can't be supportive. WHat kind of example
did you just set for the unschooling community ? Not a nice one.

Candy
==================================================================

I offered, freely, links to information by MANY unschoolers, every single one
of whom HAS found a way to live happily with children and has shared that
freely and generously.

That is not something for me to need to suffer insult about.

Sandra


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

k

Sandra,

You are wonderful in the "answering" business! Ok yeah, so I'm a fan.

I have read your writings for years and found them some of the most
encouraging I've ever read.

That doesn't mean the words won't zing the old ego. Your words are
edifying for the very fact that you do not go around Robin Hood's barn.

Maybe that came from the idea that he didn't have a barn because some
people put out a lot of words without saying anything meaningful. That

is not you. You write for a purpose. This is why from the comfort of
my
home before my computer screen I have entertained ideas that have not
been customary for me. It hasn't always been comfortable.

This is no one's fault. If I express myself in a similar language to
that which you use, which I sometimes do, I find myself alienating my
listener. Broader horizons are hard to come by. It's like busting sod

to plant crops on soil that has never been used for that purpose. The
clods break down to make room for the crop. If someone doesn't want
their "soil/soul" to be used for the purpose of unschooling or
whatever,
they decide to think about ideas, dismiss them, postpone them, abuse
them, etc. There are a myriad of choices. If someone is unschooling
who finds the work burdensome: never to unschool is one possibility,
not
to unschool now is another, finding out how it could work better in
one's life is yet another, unschooling incorrectly in an attempt to
lighten one's load (which doesn't work) is another choice, and there
are
a ton of others available. They all wait in the wings. We direct the
"play."

Unschooling to me is an incredibly freeing idea. It lightens the load,

not the other way around. One reason unschooling is not always a
freeing idea to people is that some of what passes for love of children

is really not so. It's ownership/narcissism, and many of people who
relate in such a way with children.. especially their own... have no
real wish to deal with the truth of it. This doesn't mean they have NO

love for their children (which might be true but hopefully isn't).
Rather it might mean there are other things in the way curtailing its
fullest expression. I know that I can be highly insensitive to the
needs of others, and I don't want to do that, and so I know the first
step to avoiding insensitivity is to realize that it exists in ME...
unhappy thought.

Children join the household mileau as people or as different types of
personal accessories or accomplishments for the ones in charge of the
household, or other unacceptable things rather than having the freedom
to be their own person. Parents are more powerful than children, and
it
is a mistake not to realize the responsibility of this power. Of
course
many parents never admit to the less humanizing roles they put in place

for their children. To do so requires dismissing the role of being in
charge in order to become fertile ground for other ideas that actually
appeal more, which mean pain and growth, that replace "old soil" with
"new soul" to shine life through.

Kathe



SandraDodd@... wrote:

>For years I accepted private responses, but I don't think it's right
to
>do what basically amounts to following someone home from a public
meeting
>and punching her on her own front porch.
>
>The e-mail is below, but I want to say that I am not "in the answering

>business." If it were a business I wouldn't be doing it voluntarily
>and every single day. I care more about the children than the
parents, but
>that's how unschooling works. Someone who can be publically harsh
about her own
>child might want to accept someone simply pointing out that she had
been so.
>
>Too many parents care more about their own sensitive feelings than
>their children's.
>
>Sandra
>=======================================================================
>
>I cannot believe your response to me. Of course i love to be with my
>son or he would be in school !
>
> Do you have a maid ? I don't . I HAVE to do other work. My hubby is
>rarely around and it is just me and a HUGE house.
>
> How dare you insinuate I should put him in school ! You really
should
>get out of the answering business if you can't be supportive. WHat
kind of
>example did you just set for the unschooling community ? Not a nice
one.
>
> Candy
>==================================================================
>
>I offered, freely, links to information by MANY unschoolers, every
>single one of whom HAS found a way to live happily with children and
has shared
>that freely and generously.
>
>That is not something for me to need to suffer insult about.
>
>Sandra
>






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