Hillary Clinton
It has long been asserted that the left believes that children don’t belong to their parents, but is there any proof of this claim? The answer is a resounding “yes.” In this post I will let prominent progressive leaders and educators speak for themselves.
However, I think it is necessary before we before we begin to remind you that to a certain extent the state DOES own your children – at least when you drop them off at a public school. This is why I caution every parent to understand the legal concept of “In Loco Parentis.” “In Loco Parentis” means “in place of the parent.” It is the legal responsibility of schools to act in place of parents when students are in their care.
It is also necessary to remember that whenever the government is using “their money” to provide a service or administer a program they are going to expect oversight, accountability, and results. This is exactly why, as homeschool parents, we should be extremely cautious of “school choice” programs, which offer government money to private schools and homeschools. While the allure of “free” money is enticing, privately funded, parent-directed homeschooling is currently the only way to ensure true parental rights and autonomy from government intervention in the most private and sacred aspects of your family.
If you are ready to take back your children but don’t know where to start, let me suggest the Free Homeschool Survival Kit. This 70+ page resource will give you the encouragement and tools you need to start strong and finish well.
America’s Kids Belong To Communities, Not Parents – Melissa Harris Perry
“We have never invested as much in public education as we should have because we’ve always had kind of a private notion of children. ‘Your kid is yours and totally your responsibility.’ We haven’t had a very collective notion of ‘these are our children.’ So part of it is we have to break through our kind of private idea that ‘kids belong to their parents’ or ‘kids belong to their families’ and recognize that kids belong to whole communities. Once it’s everybody’s responsibility and not just the household’s we start making better investments.”
Why caring for children is not just a parent’s job, Melissa Harris-Perry
“My inbox began filling with hateful, personal attacks on Monday, apparently as a result of conservative reactions to a recent ‘Lean Forward’ advertisement now airing on msnbc, which you can view above. What I thought was an uncontroversial comment on my desire for Americans to see children as everyone’s responsibility has created a bit of a tempest in the right’s teapot. Allow me to double down.”
“One thing is for sure: I have no intention of apologizing for saying that our children, all of our children, are part of more than our households, they are part of our communities and deserve to have the care, attention, resources, respect and opportunities of those communities.”
“I believe wholeheartedly, and without apology, that we have a collective responsibility to the children of our communities even if we did not conceive and bear them.”
The Principles of Communism, by Fredrick Engles, 1847
“What will be the course of this revolution?”
Education of all children, from the moment they can leave their mother’s care, in national establishments at national cost. Education and production together.”
“What will be the influence of communist society on the family?
It will transform the relations between the sexes into a purely private matter which concerns only the persons involved and into which society has no occasion to intervene. It can do this since it does away with private property and educates children on a communal basis, and in this way removes the two bases of traditional marriage – the dependence rooted in private property, of the women on the man, and of the children on the parents.”
Do kids belong to their parents, or their community? Peter Weber
Hillary Clinton popularized the saying “It takes a village to raise a child” in the mid-1990s, but it was hardly a new idea. Clinton was citing a traditional African proverb, but Africans don’t have a lock on the idea of collective responsibility for the welfare of children, either. ‘Your children are not your children,’ wrote the Lebanese-born poet Khalil Gibran in 1923. ‘You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.'”
Despite what you hear, parents aren’t in charge of schools. That’s a good thing. Brian Dickerson
“Parents aren’t in charge of our public schools – and they shouldn’t be.
That’s not a problem; it’s a best practice, and one that has prevailed in this country for a hundred years. It also happens to be the law.
Maybe you don’t like that law. Maybe you believe that parents alone should dictate what goes on in the classrooms their children attend. If so, you’re in luck: Dozens of private and parochial schools are in frenzied competition for your tuition check. Almost certainly you can find one whose curriculum, library catalogue and hiring practices are compatible with your own political views, religious values and cultural preferences.
But my concern here is public schools, which Merriam-Webster defines as ‘”‘free tax-supported schools controlled by a local governmental authority‘ (emphasis mine).
See? Not a word there about moms, dads or legal guardians.
Because public means everyone – or at least, every citizen eligible to vote in the election for whatever local government authority calls the shots in the school district they reside in.”
Biden tells teachers students are ‘like your’ kids, ‘not somebody else’s’ while at school, by Ryan Foley
“Biden made remarks at the 2022 National and State Teachers of the Year Event in the East Room of the White House Wednesday.
‘And the reason you’re the Teachers of the Year is that you recognize that,’ Biden said. ‘They’re not somebody else’s children; they’re like yours when they’re in the classroom.’”
Opinion: Want true equity? I propose, modestly, forcing California parents to swap children, Joe Mathews
“If California is ever going to achieve true equity, the state must require parents to give away their children.
My solution is simple, and while we wait for the legislation to pass, we can act now: The rich should give their children to the poor, and the poor should give their children to the rich. Homeowners might swap children with their homeless neighbors.
Now, I recognize that some naysayers, hopelessly attached to their privilege, will dismiss such a policy as ghastly, even totalitarian. But my proposal is quite modest, a fusion of traditional philosophy and today’s most common political obsessions.”
McAuliffe says parents shouldn’t tell schools what to teach, handing Youngkin a campaign ad, by Emily Brooks
“’I’m not going to let parents come into schools and actually take books out and make their own decision,’”’ [Virginia Governor (D),] Terry McAuliffe said. ‘I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.’”
Jill Biden Dismisses Parental Control of Books in School Libraries: ‘This Is America. We Don’t Ban Books.’ By Gillian Richards
“’Parents and politicians are now weighing in on what books should be in our school libraries, and what their kids are being taught,’ Jones began. ‘Where’s the line, in your opinion, with how much of a say parents have when it comes to what their kids are learning in school? Is there a balance between, you know, “This book should be in the library, this book is under review … “
Before Jones finished the question, Jill Biden jumped in: ‘All books should be in the library. All books. This is America. We don’t ban books.’”
Children do not belong to their parents, Roy Hattersley
“A common complaint – voiced most vociferously by the newspapers that also glory in the good old cliche about the nanny state – is that the authorities do too little to protect desperately vulnerable children. I agree. Perhaps Ms Hodge’s critics forget that the constant defence of social workers who fail in their jobs is the claim that they did not want to intrude into family relationships.”
Head of teachers union praises op-ed claiming parents don’t have right to shape kids’ curriculum, by Sam Dorman
“’Great piece on parents’ rights and #publicschools,’ tweeted Randi Weingarten, who serves as president of the American Federation of Teachers. Her tweet on Monday came amid an uproar over the op-ed, which was published in The Washington Post.
The title of the article, ‘Parents claim they have the right to shape their kids’ school curriculum. They don’t.'”
Your Kids Don’t Belong to You, and That’s Okay, by ParentCo
“There are parents who think they made their children for themselves, and parents who think they made their children for the world; those who regard their children as belonging to them, as opposed to belonging to the world.
Now, I’m really not the back-to-the-earth, Paleo-Parent, ‘It Takes a Village’ type, but in this case, I’m of the latter persuasion. My daughter is the world’s child.
Don’t be sad when she gets on that bus for her first day of kindergarten, or walks into that classroom with her tiny hand in someone’s besides yours. That’s her job. That’s why she’s here. That’s why you had her. This is what you prepared her for. This is her first step to fulfilling her ultimate destiny; becoming one with the world, which is exactly where she belongs.”
Despite what you hear, parents aren’t in charge of schools. That’s a good thing. Bruce Dickerson
“Parents aren’t in charge of our public schools – and they shouldn’t be.
That’s not a problem; it’s a best practice, and one that has prevailed in this country for a hundred years. It also happens to be the law.
…[M]y concern here is public schools, which Merriam-Webster defines as ‘free tax-supported schools controlled by a local governmental authority.’
See? Not a word there about moms, dads or legal guardians. Because public means everyone – or at least, every citizen eligible to vote in the election for whatever local government authority calls the shots in the school district they reside in.
…[T]hose with no children of their own are stakeholders, too – and they have every right to expect that the schools they subsidize with their tax dollars will prepare students to live and work in a democratic society that includes people with political and religious views different than their parents.
…[P]arents worried that any exposure to any perspective incompatible with their own views may prove noxious can opt out entirely by joining the ranks of home-schoolers,”
This is, by no means, an exhaustive compilation of examples of progressives intent on undermining the role and rights of parents. So, what should we think? Do children belong to their parents, to the village, to the schools, or to the state? God’s Word tells us “Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward.” Psalm 127:3 ESV
It turns out that the Bible has a lot to say about the relationship between parents and their children, especially when it comes to who should be teaching them and training their hearts.
“Train up a child in the way he should go;
Proverbs 22:6
even when he is old he will not depart from it.”
“And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.” Deuteronomy 6:6,7
“Hear, my son, your father’s instruction, and forsake not your mother’s teaching, for they are a graceful garland for your head and pendants for your neck.” Proverbs 1:8,9
Not surprisingly, the Bible also includes instruction for children on how they should respond to the instruction of their parents.
“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.” Exodus 20:12
“Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.” Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” Ephesians 6:1-4
The Lord is calling parents to turn their hearts back to their children. Me must face down the enemy of our families and heed the Word of the Lord. “And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.” Malachi 4:6
English Standard Version (ESV)
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.
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