Censorship in the world of British home education

There are probably those who will be horrified to see that I am posting here again. ‘Oh no’ they cry in dismay, ‘We thought we’d seen the back of that idiot!’ Well, not quite. I stopped blogging here regularly because I had too much going on in my life to be able to keep this blog. I hoped instead to keep in touch on various home education lists and forums; posting from time to time there as some subject cropped up which interested me. This is no longer possible.

Let us start on the Badman Review Action Group list, where a lively debate has been taking place about the merits or otherwise of GCSEs for home educated children. This is a hot topic, because some parents want state funding for these examinations for their children who are not at school. Others think that this would be inviting official interference in home educating. The opinion was expressed there that employers no longer value these qualifications and I responded by posting some statistics about how employers actually viewed GCSEs. As a result, I was described as a ‘pillock’ and ‘pathetic troll’, to say nothing of being told that I was ‘spewing nonsense’. Presumably the moderators were having a doze! They soon woke up on the evening of November 6th when I posted some more figures. This post vanished without a trace. Another was delayed for five hours. The next morning, people were enquiring as to the source of the statistics which I had posted, as well as asking a few other questions. I sent five messages, each going courteously through all the points which had been raised. Four of these vanished; one was posted eleven hours later. It was plain that I was being prevented from introducing facts and figures into the debate.

I drew attention to this on the EO list to which I belong. This provoked a response from one of the moderators on BRAG who put a message up on the EO list. I replied on the list on the morning of the November 12th. My reply has apparently fallen into the same black hole as my messages on BRAG! That this was not a technical glitch was confirmed when I posted a reply to the concerns raised by somebody else on the EO list. This person was worried about the stifling of debate and called for us all to challenge censorship around home education. True, her concerns were that this was happening with local authorities and newspapers, which is quite true, but I thought that I would point out that it also happens with home education groups. I as sent a message saying that the EO moderators had rejected my message because they did not think that the EO list was the right place for such a debate.

There is something deliciously ironic about somebody quite properly raising concerns about censorship, as was done by the poster on November 11th and that the first person to respond to this message is himself censored. If this sort of thing were limited only to the EO list and BRAG or if I were the only person affected, perhaps this would not be so important. These games are going on all over the home education Internet scene in this country though, especially on the larger forums and lists. The HE-UK list if famous for chucking people off who irritate the owner by their heterodox views and Tania Berlow was thrown off the Home Education Forums site for saying the wrong things. This was particularly unfortunate. I don’t agree with Tania about much, but she did a lot of work during the Badman Review, gathering statistics and so on.

There is something a little bizarre about the sight of people who are very keen on proclaiming the rights of the individual and then engaging in censorship.

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Trust me, I'm a home educator!

Since I am apparently on the verge of being banned from the Badman Review Action Group and shall not, in any case, be posting there again, I feel free to speak my mind pretty freely about recent events on that list.

On February 27th, a man called Christopher Warren posted a message on the BRAG list, providing a link to a website which he ran. He was greeted enthusiastically and people hastened to endorse and cross-post details of his site to other home education lists. He now features quotations from those who welcomed him to BRAG on his website. He had been a member for over four months before posting this, which is alarming in the light of what later came to light. Why was he welcomed so uncritically and trusted at once? The answer is devastatingly simple; he said he was a home educator. It is as straightforward as that. The fact that he was posting under the Lithuanian name for the Russia city of Kaliningrad, which in turn led to the profile of somebody called Mindy Pace, did not seem to arouse any suspicions. I have now explained just who this person is, both here and on BRAG itself. I am indebted to Allie, who comments here, for other information regarding allegations against this truly dreadful man, for example;

http://www.nccg.info/jannicke.html


http://www.nccg.info/memberindex.html


The first of these is sickening. It alleges that Christopher Warren seduced a fifteen year old girl when he was thirty eight. Combined with his own writings, it tells us that here is a man who is best raving mad and at worst an unbelievably wicked child molester.

The response of some members of the Badman Review Action Group to these revelations has been interesting. One might think that the general reaction would be; 'Oh heavens, what on earth have we done? We have welcomed this dreadful man into our community and allowed him to make contact with any number of parents, some of whom might have vulnerable children.' Because this is what has happened. On the strength of claiming to be a home educator, this awful person has wormed his way into the good graces of British home educators. What his motives are, the Good Lord alone knows. Perhaps he is looking for more fifteen year-old girls to abuse. It makes my flesh crawl, even to think about this. The reaction of the list's owner was quite different. The person to blame was me! By drawing attention to this man's mad and/or wicked character, I was spreading poison and 'digging dirt'. the obvious solution was to ban me from the list and then everybody could get back to cosying up to any sort of rogue who turned up, saying, 'Trust me, I'm a home educator.'

Fortunately, some others on the list saw the danger. Others though said that we should not judge this man and that he was entitled to his views. This, in my opinion, takes liberal mindedness to the length of raving lunacy. I certainly expected no thanks for drawing attention to this dangerous character's true nature. One does not expect that in this world! But to find myself cast in the role of villain for warning people to be careful of him is really a bit much. For this reason, I am withdrawing from the BRAG list and shall not post there again. They can welcome as many cult leaders or paedophiles on there as they wish. I will make one point though. As readers will no doubt recollect, only one of the terms of reference for the review of elective home education undertaken by Graham Badman actually concerned education per se. The others were hinting broadly that home educated children might be at risk of various kinds of abuse. When a cult leader like Christopher Warren finds it so easy to make contact with home educating parents in this country, to be welcomed into their community and swiftly endorsed and recommended to other parents is alarming. It is the sort of thing which makes one wonder how many other such individuals might be out there, perhaps preying on vulnerable families by use of the recommendations which they have received uncritically from high profile home educators here; people whose word home educating parents trust. Perhaps we should be a little more cautious about people of this sort until we know more about them. The fact that somebody claims to be a home educator is not in itself a guarantee that he is not also a crazed cultist or child molester.

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A prominent supporter of the Johansson family

I am always delighted to see particularly awful examples of hypocrisy and double standards. A few days ago, somebody posted on the Badman Review Action Group list, denouncing me and providing a link to a piece which he had written about me. You may find it here;

http://freesweden.net/smear_campaign.html


The author, Christopher Warren, says of me; ' Smearing and slandering innocent people is, in my opinion, a diabolical act.' Plain enough. Later on though, he quotes approvingly a 'representative of the homeschooling community in Britain' who says of my daughter ' his daughter is older now and I am very sad to report is as mad as he is.' So slandering and smearing people is diabolical, but it's OK to describe a seventeen year-old girl as mad if you dislike her father? I think I get it!

I have written before that those organising the support for the parents of Domenic Johansson, setting up websites, circulating petitions and so on, are working to a very different agenda to that of which home educators in this country are aware. They are, to begin with, all Christians. Nothing wrong with that; I go to church every Sunday myself. The problem is that these people are deliberately concealing their true motives and opinions from those whom they approach about the Johansson case. Let us look a little more closely at Christopher Warren and see what he is really up to. His Free Sweden Net website, set up after the Johansson case became public, seems innocuous enough. He says that he is a writer and lecturer. In the section about religion, he mentions that he is a Christian, but says that he has gay friends and that he would describe himself as a 'Christian Humanist'. This is to be found in the section about his 'Personal Agenda'. So far, so good; nothing to scare the horses here! he has even written a report about home education and sent it to the Swedish government. He mentions a teaching career, writing and being a lecturer. Now let us see who he really is. This is a website which he set up to express his real views;

http://www.nccg.org/warren.html


At once, we notice something very odd. He has been the Pastor of various Evangelical churches for the last quarter of a century. In fact he is a full-time Minister of Religion. How is it possible for such a man to write a 'Personal Agenda' of his religious views on the Free Sweden Net site and forget to mention that? The answer is that it is not possible; this is deliberate deception. Free Sweden Net has been set up to appeal to home educators and he felt that mentioning that he was a Minister might put people off. I can tell readers that Pastor Warren wrote everything to be found on the NCCG site and pretty interesting reading it is too! To begin with, it is a compendium of crackpot, New Age beliefs. Flying saucers, levitation, astral travel, the New World Order; it is all here. Pastor Warren levitates, he has visions, Jesus tells him that there is going to be an earthquake, he sees UFOs. I have to tell you, much of this reads like the ravings of a complete lunatic. Still, we all have our own opinions; this is all harmless enough. It is when you start looking at the sections on homosexuality and feminism that the alarm bells really start ringing for many reasons. Remember that this is a man who described himself on the site for home educators as being a Christian Humanist with gay friends? What does he really think about gays? Let's see. It seems that;

'Homosexuals have sex in the same manner as animals, (front to back or oral sex), rather than in the natural way of God's creation.'

We learn that;

'The AIDS virus has come from the perverted life style of homosexuals and drug addicts. (The curse is in their blood). They need help. They need to be taught that their life style is an abomination to God and how to come out of it. They must come to understand that homosexuality is not an alternative life style but a perversion.'


And I bet you didn't know that;

' The disease of AIDS is spreading rapidly because homosexuals will not change their life style. They are even trying to spread it into the heterosexual community so that more money can be appropriated for seeking a cure.'

This is not a man whom I would personally care to be in the same room as, let alone be his friend! It is this man, the levitating, flying saucer seeing, gay hating full time Minister whom home educating parents in this country are being invited to cosy up to. Nor is he the exception among those active in the campaign about Domenic Johansson. It is people like this whose word is believed when he posts on BRAG. Why I wouldn't take this man's word for it if he told me the sun was shining!

In addition to the fact that he has gone to great lengths to conceal the fact that he has for twenty five years been a Pastor, there are serious questions about his past career. In his submission to the Swedish government, he claims that he was for ten years the Principle of a private school. Elsewhere, he specifies that this was St Albans College in Oxford. The problem is that he only left Oxford University in 1977, when he was twenty three. He moved to Norway in 1988. On the NCCG site, he says that he studied theology at Cambridge University after leaving Oxford and then trained to be a Systems Analyst in Business Computing. Cambridge do not do mail order degrees and so we must assume that he went to live there for at least a year or two. Then training to be a systems analyst; when did he manage to fit in the ten years as head of an independent school? We will leave aside the implausibility of any independent school appointing as its head a twenty four year old man with no teaching experience or even a qualification in teaching.

There are many more questions to be answered about this strange man and I hope to look into his background in more detail. In the meantime, I would caution readers to be very careful about giving their support to any campaigns run by such people.

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My 'smear' campaign against the Johannson family

I recently posted on the Badman Review Action Group list, sounding a note of caution about support for the case of Domenic Johannson, the boy taken into care in Sweden. As it is presented, this case is one of a home educated child taken from his parents by the state just because he was being educated at home. As is usually the case with real life; things are a little more complicated than that. My post from BRAG was then sent to somebody running a website in support of Swedish home educators and the result was this:

http://freesweden.net/smear_campaign.html


My original post on BRAG was mild enough. I said;

'Questions have been raised as to just how happy and normal this child's life was
before he was taken into care. His father is heavily involved with the Vaken
website, which specialises in anti-semitic conspiracy theories. Domenic was not
taken into care just because he was being home educated. I think that the
Swedish authorities were genuinely concerned for his welfare and when they heard
that his parents had given away all their belongings and were taking him to
India so that he could live with them while they started an orphanage; I think
that they were worried.'

let us go through this point by point and see how it could be said to be part of a smear campaign. I said;

'Questions have been raised as to just how happy and normal this child's life was
before he was taken into care.'

They have indeed been raised.


'His father is heavily involved with the Vaken
website, which specialises in anti-semitic conspiracy theories.'

Christer Johannson certainly is heavily involved with this site. When Domenic was taken into care, his father believed and told others, that the refusal to allow him to home educate had been based upon his involvement with Vaken. See, for instance;

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:s8wxovV4tzsJ:www.renewamerica.com/columns/hank/090910+


This is by a very strong supporter of Christer Johannson, who told him that it was his connection with Vaken had made the authorities refuse him permission to home educate. this is referred to in the article when the author says;

'But in the meantime, some locals decided that these parents should not be allowed to do this. The reasons for this are no more clear than they are legal, but Christer was once involved in an alternative on-line news mag that expressed politically incorrect ideas and as near as anyone can tell, this was the reason his home schooling plans were opposed.'


Is Vaken anti-Semitic? It is obsessed with the idea of the Jews taking over the world. They are held to be responsible for all sorts of things, particularly the 9/11 attacks. They are usually referred to as 'Zionists' rather than 'Jews'; readers are expected to understand this code. It is like a modern day version of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Believe me, this is anti-Semitic all right. I went on to say;

'Domenic was not taken into care just because he was being home educated.'

This is also accepted by the families supporters. Jonas Himmelstrand, the
president of the Swedish National Association for Home Education, (ROHUS),
says of this case;

'Homeschooling was not the only issue regarding taking Dominic Johansson in
custody by the social services. But having read the court verdict with all the
issues, there stills seems to be no reason for this severe action. The young boy
has most likely been much more hurt by the custody action than the conditions in
his family. One cannot avoid the thought that the prejudices and lack of
knowledge about homeschooling, could have been the pivotal reason for the
custody action.'

I have not really got room to go into this further here, but I shall be posting more about this case tomorrow. The support for this case is being orchestrated from the USA by right-wing, Christian groups who are stridently pro-spanking and militantly anti-gay. Obviously, it is no affair of mine if people in this country wish to align themselves with such groups, but they ought to know with whom they are getting into bed before they do so. The fact that such a restrained post of mine on a private home education list could provoke such a strong response, accusing me of running a smear campaign and being an agent of the Swedish government, is interesting and causes me to think that there might be even more to this than I have guessed. As I say, I shall be posting more extensively tomorrow.

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