Warning! This post contains emails which according to EO will harm home educators..

Like an alcoholic who is able either to abstain completely or when once he touches a drop goes on a mad bender; I seem to be posting here once again. This must stop! One would think that I would by now realise that it is impossible to debate anything in a rational way with some of those on the main home education lists and I am slightly irritated with myself that I have even been trying.



Just to remind readers, my trouble on the EO list began when somebody posted a message complaining about attempts by local authorities to suppress debate of home education. She went on to say that censorship should be challenged in any form; a sentiment I agree with wholeheartedly. My response to this was a brief message which I shall share with you all in a minute. Before that, I must say that I am relieved that EO admit now that they have actually been blocking my messages. Some people were talking slyly of conspiracy theories, as though the whole business was my being paranoid! Why have my messages been moderated or censored? One of the moderators explains that it was because,



’ I am not, however, personally happy to allow goading, rudeness or debate which would appear to be designed to harm home educators.’



Rudeness! Harming other home educators! Well of course, this is fair enough. If I have been rude or harming other parents, of course I should be prevented. (I am tempted to ask how I am harming them? By exposing them to opinions which differ slightly from their own? Yes, I suppose that could be pretty harmful, but only if one were a sheep or bigot!) Anyway, here is the message which I sent. Readers may judge for themselves just how rude or harmful it was. It begins with a quotation from the post to which I was replying:

　

'Censorship can come in many forms but it is usually recognisable for what it is and should be challenged accordingly.'



Fascinating idea, as though local authorities and newspapers somehow have a monopoly on this unsavoury practice! Many forums and lists for home educators operate censorship quite shamelessly, blocking posts which do not agree with the views of the moderators. Others simply chuck off those who are too vociferous in what the list owners feel to be the wrong cause. Witness how Tania Berlow was banned from HE Forums last year.



I am opposed to censorship, but let us admit that it takes place among home educators as much as it does anywhere else.



Simon.’



Just how harmful could this have been to other home educators? I emailed the moderators when I was told that this had been blocked. Perhaps this was when I began to be rude. Here is what I said:



‘Dear Shoshanna,

I cannot help making one or two points in response to your email. You say, ‘My personal feeling is that the EO group is the wrong place to have this debate’. I find this curious. Yesterday a message was posted complaining about censorship and the stifling of open debate on the subject of home education. Among other things the poster talked of, ’ the reluctance by many LA's keep an open debate’ and also said, ’ Censorship can come in many forms but it is usually recognisable for what it is and should be challenged accordingly’



Here is somebody who evidently wishes to start a debate about censorship relating to home education. You did not block or remove this message and so I must assume that you feel that this EO group is actually the right place for such a debate. When I point out that censorship around home education does not only happen in local authorities and newspapers, but is also undertaken by some home educators’ groups themselves, you apparently decide that this is no longer a topic which should be discussed on the list.



The result of this is, as I have said, to slant debates and give a false impression. The people coming on here seeking support and advice will be allowed to read that local authorities operate censorship and that is a bad thing, but will not be allowed to learn that home education groups do precisely the same thing. Do you really find nothing bizarre about somebody starting a debate on the EO list about censorship and the first person to respond to this being censored himself? I am sure that if you have any sense of the ridiculous, you will grasp this point!



Simon.’



Nothing rude or harmful here either! That this is actually censorship is clear from the way that while not being allowed to read my actual messages, those on the EO list are being told that they are rude and harmful. This is untrue and suggests strongly that those saying such things are not acting in good faith. Believe me, this is not moderation at all but censorship. Refusing to let others read something and then telling them that this is because it would harm them to do so is one of the oldest justifications for censorship. It has never cut any ice with me.



I have also, by the way, recieved an email headed:



　Message not approved: Moderating question

From: catalonia13 Add to Contacts

To: simon



From this, I take it that the posts which I sent to BRAG containing statistics have actually been rejected, rather than just falling victim to a technical glitch.

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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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Free speech about home education

When I wrote a couple of articles on home education last year for national newspapers, I was swiftly chucked off the HE-UK and EO Internet lists. The ostensible reasons for this were that I had used information from the lists to write the articles and that other parents would feel uneasy at my continued presence. I have said several times since that both arguments struck me as weak, which led some of those commenting on this blog to suggest that I must be autistic!

I am observing the same reluctance to tolerate dissent or heterodox opinions now operating on various other home education lists and blogs. I am not the only person whose views are being suppressed; Tania Berlow has also been barred from several places, the Home Ed Forums for example.

There is something deliciously ironic and satisfying about watching stout libertarians imposing censorship in this way. It is not called censorship of course. I have always been perfectly courteous on the Badman Review Action Group list, but that did not stop somebody making an extremely personal attack on me, speculating about my childhood, possible relationship with my parents and resultant hatred of women! When I attempted to respond to this, I was put on moderation. This was done on the grounds that my posts were not helpful, informative or interesting and from then on posts which I have made have been deleted. I have of course stopped posting there, which was the intention of those using moderation in this way. The grounds for censoring Tania Berlow from the Home Ed Forums was that she had been defaming people. Quite untrue of course, but it provided a neat excuse to get rid of her. Kelly Green in Canada, the great defender of civil rights and freedom of speech, simply deletes any posts of mine at once from her blog. This is because she disagrees with what I say and does not wish to have anything on Kelly Green and Gold which suggests less than 100% agreement with her own views.

Sometimes, the censorship is done in a very unpleasant way. On HE-UK, a small group of playground bullies have in the past driven off parents who have asked too many questions or failed to be firm enough in their resolve to refuse visits from their local authority. Several women have contacted me after such episodes, one or two of them very distressed at the treatment which they have received. On other lists, the strategy is a little subtler. Certain people are put on moderation without being told and their posts simply deleted. This means that when somebody posts a message which denounces them, it appears that they are unable to formulate a response! I am not the only person against whom this particular tactic has been successfully used.

Readers of this blog will know that there is no moderation at all. Anybody can say anything they please and their comments will appear at once. I had to use moderation briefly on two occasions, but that was more for disruption that one person was causing, not because I wished to stop his views appearing. I do not agree with Tania on a number of points, as can be seen from things which I have said here, but I consider it absolutely scandalous that her views are being censored by people who claim to be hard-line libertarians. If these people were to be honest, they would admit that they were taking such a step not because Tania is defaming anybody, but rather due to the fact that she is disagreeing with others. This is a terrible reason for introducing censorship. There have been rumblings of discontent on the BRAG list, which Tania has chosen as her vehicle to put across her motives and plans for the project with Graham Stuart and Alison Sauer. I have a suspicion that if she is not careful, she is going to find herself in difficulty there as well. It is rumoured that Action on Home Education have also thrown her off.

This sort of activity by supposedly liberal and right-on home educators is hard to justify. If these people actually approve of censorship and believe that those holding other opinions should be denied a voice, then they have a perfect right to believe that. What sticks in my craw is the way that people like Kelly Green in Canada and others in this country make such a song and dance about freedom and civil rights and then at the drop of a hat impose censorship upon anybody whose views do not coincide with their own.

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