Homeschooled Kids in Heartbreaking Abuse Case in Jeb's Florida

[UdoKier]

No, there's no connection to Jeb, but I figure I should link his name to atrocities the same way they always dishonestly link us to communism or whatever else...

Anyway, this couple apparently ripped some of the the kids' toenails out with pliers, and the two 14-year olds were ONLY 37 lbs! This part just killed me because I was 6' and 180 lbs at that age.

Here are the sickos:



http://www.local6.com/news/4161751/detail.html

[nickinSTL]

1. terrible...

But what is with this quote?

"I just can't imagine how people can do that," McMurray said. "We are a Christian family and I just can't understand anyone abusing children. It's just very difficult to fathom that someone would do that."

As if only Christians would have trouble understanding such abuse.

As a non-Christian I find this kind of stuff almost insulting.

[ultraist]

2. "Christian" neighbors never noticed anything out of the ordinary...

excerpt:
"Neighbor Tom McMurray said he didn't ever see the children and does not understand how it could happen. "I just can't imagine how people can do that," McMurray said. "We are a Christian family and I just can't understand anyone abusing children. It's just very difficult to fathom that someone would do that."

Didn't he think it odd that he never saw any of the seven children? Did he ever bother to pick up the phone and inquire as to why these seven foster children were never allowed outdoors or were never seen leaving the house? Apparently, he turned a blind eye.

I'm not suggesting people spy on their neighbors but knowing that seven children live next door but NEVER noticing that they NEVER left the house is odd.

I guess those neighbors didn't drop off any Christmas cookies, did they?

[tsuki]

25. Requote: "We are a morally self-righteous patriarchal family and I

just can't understand anyone abusing children. But I can certainly ignore it."

[TWiley]

46. .

.

[Betsy Ross]

3. How about the same 50 years

as the guy who rape the 6-week old?

[NewYorkerfromMass]

4. they weighed 37 lbs

a big difference, but still fairly sick to let someone get so emaciated.
Also, they were not the biological parents, so that doesn't help this sitaution other than it will be easier to get them into better care immediately, and possibly a long term situation.
These people should be... well, I am glad there are govt. agencies.
and people wonder why we need govt.

[UdoKier]

11. Sorry - brainfart.

Typed 14 twice - I KNEW THAT!

Luckily I made the edit window!

[killbotfactory]

5. Spare the rod, spoil the child

Er...

Spare the torture, spoil the child

[Ezlivin]

6. 14 pound children? Damn, that's small!

..The two 14-year olds were ONLY 14 lbs!

That's only a pound a year. Unbelievable.

[UdoKier]

12. Okay, okay, I screwed up, sorry!

:think: :spank: :shrug:

[madfloridian]

7. It is Jeb's Florida, it is his mess. It is called privatization.

Or partial privatization. There is no oversight, no one watching the watchers.

Jeb set out to do this, and he did it. He bears the blame.

[UdoKier]

13. You've got a point there. DCF has been horrrible under his tenure.

And there certainly should be some occasional checkups on homeschooled kids.

I know most homeschool parents do a fine job, but there are a few who do it for the specific intent of isolating their kids from all social contact for whatever wacko reason.

[Name removed]

16. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[UdoKier]

17. Do kids have full rights under the constitution?

They are compelled to attend school, so seems like occasional checks would be good, even if they weren't mandatory.

But I know what you're getting at. Tricky issue.

[LeftyMom]

19. Thier parents do

Which is why home checks without cause aren't acceptable. You can't inspect my son's education (or just do a welfare check to see that he has food and clothes and he's healthy) without inspecting our home, where I have an expectation of provacy.

[goddess40]

54. No, kids are property

sorry but it's true.

When these abuse stories come out, the home schoolers rally to fight off the attempt by states to provide checks that would protect kids like these. Sorry but all kids should have the right to be protected from idiot parents. I live for the day when some poor kid sues their homeschooling parent that did a horrible job.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

22. Nice bigoted homophobic post

Sorry but homeschooling is used by scoundrels who don't want to send their kids to public schools for fear of showing signs of abuse.

[LeftyMom]

24. Nice job I'm assuming a bigot

when the sarcasm is pretty freakin' obvious. There's a double standard here, is all I was trying to point out.

I don't appreciate your bigotry aimed at homeschooling families, by the way. We have a homeschooling forum here at DU. Are you suggesting that the people who post there (myself included) are child abusers? I'm pretty sure that's a violation of the rules, in addition being really fucking stupid.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

27. Reread my post...I SAID homeschooling IS USED by scoundrels

who don't want to be discovered via the public school system..I did not say ALL HOMESCHOOLERS are scoundrels.

Oh and if you want people to SEE sarcasm, perhaps you should mark your post as such..it wasn't obvious from the post itself.

[Name removed]

37. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[KissMeKate]

8. 37 lb 14 yr olds- they will never recover from this.

14 yr olds are in a growth spurt- their brains, their bodies- this amount of malnutrition will affect them for the rest of their prematurely shortened lives.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

14. Yep.. Pretty sad.

Some kids in New Jersey last year were just as emaciated.
A good hug would be more nourishing for them at this point.
I say throw these cretins into solitary and feed them bread and water for a few months.

[KissMeKate]

9. the privatised foster care system

abuse of foster children is common. Social workers have 300 clients and barely see the children every three months, if that.

[elehhhhna]

33. Foster-farms are a big business on the So Side of Chicago.

BIG. You get more $$$ for fosters than for welfare for your own kids--

[classof56]

10. Sure glad they don't let gay couples adopt or provide foster care in FL

Imagine the horrible things that might happen to them in such an environment! <sarcasm!>

Suddenly I feel very, very sick...

[TWiley]

15. Yep. I have not personally

seen much good come out of home schooling. I have heard reports from home schooled people who said it worked out good for them.

I am no expert, but I would expect that the quality of home education would be directly proportional to the families wealth and / or education level.

I am just as certain that there are exceptions out there as well.

Butt, as a general rule:

Ya just kaint teach whut ye nehver learnt, and ya kaint by whut ya downt hav monee four.

[ultraist]

18. This is more about Foster care than homeschooling, IMO

I realize that homeschooled kids are less apt to get noticed by authorities, such as teachers, thus get reported for abuse but these people were foster care parents. Where were the social workers who are charged with monitoring foster care homes?

FL Child Protective Services has a notorious reputation, is this yet another failed case?

Granted, some parents homeschool their children so they can isolate them and indoctrinate them with religion, but are these cases more prevelant than the cases where no abuse occurs?

Does anyone have the real facts on homeschools? I know we've had two recent cases of abused children from homeschool environments, but let's not overgeneralize.

[LeftyMom]

20. I can dig up stats for you

However, I wouldn't rely on them much. There isn't even an accurate count of homeschooling families because what constitutes homeschooling isn't clearly defined (do partial enrollments count, do home-based charters count, do we count kids from the date instruction begins or from the date education becomes compulsory?) and because reporting reqirements vary from state to state, in some cases requiring no reporting at all. Also, some families homeschool "under the radar" to avoid testing requirements in thier state or simply because they have an independent streak and don't believe they should have to report.

If you have a specific question about homeschooling, please let me know. I'll do what I can to get an answer for you if I don't know. :)

[ultraist]

21. Child abuse is more prevelant in homeschools: Sensationalism or fact?

I posted below one perspective that is not conclusive. It claims that applying the national average rate of child abuse to homeschoolers, the number of abused children would have much higher if abuse occured more frequently in homeschools.

excerpt:
http://www.hslda.org/docs/news/washingtontimes/200311040.asp

"According to the National Clearinghouse on Child Abuse and Neglect Information, a service of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 903,000 children were victimized in America, a rate of 12.4 per 1,000, in 2001, the most recent year for which statistics are available. More than half of these victims suffered neglect (57 percent), nearly one fifth (19 percent) were physically abused, and 10 percent were sexually abused. Fatalities resulting from child abuse occurred at a rate of 1.81 per 100,000 children (about 1,300 children).

There are no statistics specifying how many of these abused children were educated at home. Certain realities are apparent, however. Our estimate of the number of children being home schooled is 2 million. Applying the rate of abuse to the homeschool population results in an estimate that there should be 24,800 children who would have been abused in 2001. This is a staggering figure. Applying the same reasoning to fatalities, there should be over 36 deaths a year of homeschooled children. Given the scrutiny of homeschooling by neighbors, relatives, and the general public, it seems impossible that abuse is occurring at anything near the national average.

[TWiley]

44. I have one exception

<<Given the scrutiny of homeschooling by neighbors, relatives, and the general public, it seems impossible that abuse is occurring at anything near the national average.>>

I do not believe this statement logically follows your premise.

For example, it was known that X amount of people died on our nations highways. Those folks had the same level of scrutiny from neighbors, relatives, and the general public. How many were killed by drunk drivers? How many were tired drivers? How many died due to equipment failures. These statistics were never known until the questions were asked on standardized forms.

The same is true with home schooled children. You cannot put check mark in the box if it ain't on the form.

It is entirely possible that the neighbors of dead home schooled children would not realize that the dead children several blocks away were also home schooled. There is no list, and this information is specific to small groups of acquaintances.

I believe the statistics would be approximately correct although low, especially in the religious home schooled circles. There was a Baptist preacher near here about 15 years ago who used to tie naked girls to a ladder and beat them with a belt. Their parents actually brought them to him for this treatment. He was eventually prosecuted, but the entire church knew it was happening. I believe it was a non-member who actually dropped the dime.

[China_cat]

29. Yes, I have a question

why are FOSTER parents, supposedly licensed and overseen by the state government and subject to state laws, allowed to homeschool in the first place? And in the second, why do you object to their being monitored and inspected on a regular basis?

[LeftyMom]

31. I have no objection to foster families being monitored

If foster families are allowed to send the children to private school they should be allowed to homeschool them. If they can't be trusted to educate the children properly, they can't be trusted to raise them either.

I object to the monitoring of homeschooling families in general, as they have an expectation of privacy in thier homes. Foster families have less expectation of pivacy, as foster children are wards of the state.

[ArkDem]

23. This is what bush and the church have brought us to.

[tsuki]

26. It's Spongebob's fault. All that tolerance.

[tralfaz]

38. So,

things like this never happened before Bush became president?

[ArkDem]

53. no

[TWiley]

45. And, it is GUARENTEED to get worse.

Among thousands of bad things, two are happening.

1) Public schools are under attack and being replaced by charter / homeschool groups; most are religious. Taxpayer money is being used to fund these through vouchers.

2) Social Welfare programs are also under attack and their responsibilites are being outsourced to (you guessed it) religious groups.

Will religious groups investigate and prosecute abuse that occurs in their schools? Hell no. 2 Billion went to churches in 2004 for faith based iniatives, and up to 20 Billion will be available in 2005.

There is one more disturbing inevitibility as the result of this trend.

Sooner or later, we will have sane leadership which will want to reverse the damage done by the bushtapo.

Can you fathom the hellfire unleashed by the evangelical pentecostical fundamentalists when their gravy train is derailed? Know this also. Most of these crackpots have an arsenal at home under the nightstand where the Bible sits.

Civil war leads to martial law, and that is when the neo-cons will really put the screws to all of us.

[jbane]

28. All I want to hear about these two monsters is...

They've been caught.
They've been convicted.
They've been sentenced.
They're dead!

[hector459]

30. Didn't Anrea Yates homeschool her children? Keeping them barefoot,

pregnant and now in the homeschool room and the kitchen is making lots of funddie moms depressed and psycho.

[Negatron]

32. Disgusting. I'm not even sure homeschooling should be allowed.

Besides the fact that it is used almost exclusively to indoctrinate children with religious fundie rubbish, I think that the potential for this kind of abuse is too high. With homeschooling, there is little or no oversight. Who knows what is going on in many of these homeschooling situations? For every reported case like this, there may be five or ten similar cases going unreported.

I understand the libertarian argument for homeschooling, and I do have some sympathy for the idea that parents ought to be able to decide how their kids will be raised, but I think homeschooling simply goes too far. There just isn't enough oversight, and it's become a refuge for all sorts of dangerous, cultish nonsense. There ought to be some standards, and there ought to be a lot more attention focused on this problem. Personally, I wouldn't bat an eye if the entire practice of homeschooling was banned. Not only would these abuse cases drop, it would help combat a lot of the fundie ignorance that is being substituted for actual education these days.

My question is always the same. Why in the hell is this kind of thing happening in 21st century America? Intellectual, I understand many of the reasons, but on a gut level, my first reaction is alwas "WTF?! It's 2005, for chrissakes!"

Some of the abuse reported in this case was extremely vicious, and I had to cringe. I don't think that any God, any ideology, or any belief system is worth letting things like this happen to children. As far as I am concerned, the sooner the reasonable people among us are able to clean house and marginalize all of this idiocy, the better.

[qanda]

34. Oh, give me a break!

This is not about homeschooling. Those parents, more than likely, were not following the homeschooling regulations for that state. I hear about children, who are in public schools, being abused all the time. You hear about one or two cases of abuse from people who "say" they homeschool and people go off the deep end.

[Book Lover]

36. Oh fer cri-yi

Come on over...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=251

[tralfaz]

41. What about

all of the teachers who have sex with there students? It's all I hear about these days so it must be happening in every school. I know that when I was a 12-year-old boy I had loads of 25-40 year old female teachers hitting on me and wanting to have my babies. </sarcasm> Seriously, there are good points and bad points to both systems and both systems can be abused. My wife and I have our own reasons for homeschooling our children and I wouldn't have it any other way. This story is not about homeschooling, it is about people who should not have been allowed to keep their own children, let alone be foster parents.

[ultraist]

42. Homeschools are NOT used almost exclusively to brainwash with fundie ideas

There are religious AND secular homeschools.

http://www.ncspe.org/publications_files/406_OP64.pdf
2. Home Schooling Background
2.1. History and Qualitative Evidence
“Home schooling” was the dominant means of education before the common school movement of the nineteenth century, but modern home schoolers have little connection with their nineteenth century predecessors. After the public school system became entrenched in the late nineteenth century, home schooling became a little used
alternative. By the mid-twentieth century, it was limited to families living in remote areas of Alaska, a few religious groups (Mormons, Seventh-Day Adventists, and Amish), and itinerant families, such as military and missionary families, in which
mothers taught children while their fathers shuttled from place to place (Lines 1991).

Beginning in the 1970s, the modern home schooling movement had a dual impetus, one group “fervently religious and . . . the rest might best be characterized as the philosophical heirs of Jean-Jacques Rousseau” (Guterson 1992). Jane Van Galen, a sociologist, distinguishes between these groups (1991), writing that the essential motive for “fervently religious” fundamentalist Protestants (frequently Baptists or Pentecostals) is their belief that local public and even private schools teach a curriculum objectionable to their religion. 2 For others, home schooling is a way to provide a superior education. Sociologist Mitchell Stevens similarly contrasts religious and secular groups, based on field work (2001). Among popular home schooling magazines, newsletters, web sites, and support groups, the split between two culturally distinct groups is evident. The work of Van Galen, Stevens, and others is largely descriptive, but is useful in that it indicates the potential importance of unobserved heterogeneity in home schooling. The practical consequence is the necessity of examining not only complete data sets, but also subsets separated by exogenous characteristics.3

"Unschoolers" liberal movement vs. Fundies
http://www.asbj.com/2001/08/0801coverstory.html
A grassroots movement
Home-schooling has been practiced in this country for centuries. Eleven presidents were home-schooled, advocates point out, as were Patrick Henry and Thomas Edison.

But it was during the 1960s that home-schooling became a true "movement." Ironically, what is now a largely conservative Christian phenomenon got its biggest push from the left and the writings of John Holt, who advocated "unschooling" in the face of what he considered an authoritarian and bureaucratic system of government-run schools.

"It wasn't until the mid-1980s when Christians really exploded on the scene," says Brian D. Ray, president of the National Home Education Research Institute in Salem, Ore.

There are still secular home-schoolers, to be sure. Some would place themselves on the left side of the political spectrum, while others would call themselves libertarians. Some, according to Pat Lines, a Washington State researcher who has studied the issue for the U.S. Department of Education, are home-schooling "underground." They do not notify their school district and want minimal contact with the government.

[cags]

48. Lets outlaw pliers too, since they can be used as a weapon.

:eyes:

[Cleita]

35. Back when I went to school, there was no home schooling.

Also, all kids had to go to school or the truant officer was sent after the family. Teachers were usually alert to cases of abuse as contrary to just poverty. Even if kids got spanked a lot, parents were wary not to go too far, like starving the kids, and doing physical mutilation because they knew the teachers would be sending social workers to talk to them. I also remember there being some program for poor kids and those who seemed hungry to get free lunches in the cafeteria. I guess all these safety nets have been dismantled.

[tralfaz]

51. Back when I went to school

teachers could thump children on the hands with rulers. The old days were not always the better days.

[BiggJawn]

39. Are those their mug shots?

They're SMILING??? Like the dummy who tried to pass the $1,000,000 bill at Wally-World?

They must think Jeebus is gonna get them out of jail....

[notadmblnd]

40. They've been arrested in Utah..

see thread in LBN

[Tactical Progressive]

43. Sorry, but this doesn't rise to the level of

'damage equivalent to that of organ failure'.

Which means no harm, no foul! Straight from the highest law enforcement officer in the land.

[TWiley]

47. Home Schooling anyone?

There are organized alternative thought systems out there that do teach a world vision that is largely unavailable in the public school curriculum. Today, these are examples are of the minority.

But, the day is still young. Faith Based Initiatives, and School voucher programs (over 20 Billion this year) are still in their infancy. Their future is funded, but the image is still fuzzy.

How will these alternate belief systems fare under the evangelical / bush plan as opposed to the previous Federal social welfare system / public school system arrangement?

http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?...

This teacher needs a job. He has home schooling experience.

http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?...

[gollygee]

49. Why is this framed as a problem with homeschooling?

Is the issue that kids need to go to school to make sure they aren't being tortured? Or is there some problem with homeschooling?

[tralfaz]

52. I homeschool

and the problem is not with homeschooling, the problem is that some people should not be allowed to be parents let alone homeschooling parents. I'm sorry to be so vocal about this but homeschooling has a reputation for being a bunch of crazy people, and that may be true with a small percentage, but not with all of us. Thank you for letting me vent.

[bread_and_roses]

50. The problem is the nuclear family

weather natural or artificial. It has the to be if not the worst, among the worst constructs ever devised for nurturing children. It is isolating and relies on the goodness of the individual adults involved. It is pointless to lament these cases unless we are going to look at fundamental change, because they will just keep happening.