…reading sources that you may not only disagree with, but that leave you slack-jawed in amazement. As I mentioned in Holly’s comment the other day, the title of my paper for sociology is Ethnic Prejudice and Homeschooling.
The vast majority of the homeschooling websites I’ve looked at advocate for genuine multicultural study, mentioning one of the things I love most about homeschooling: The ability to spend as long as you want on a subject. There are lesson plans, book recommendations, and suggestions on how to make it a more vivid, real experience for your student.
And then there are the other sites. It’s obvious that I would need to look at the websites of prejudiced people in order to collect some of my data. When you research a subject such as this, you put up your mental shield, expecting to be introduced to statements that you find repulsive. You expect racist ignorance, and you expect some of the websites to be subtle in their racism, promoting contemporary and ancient European heritage homeschooling materials.
And then? You come upon the mad blatherings. The proof that anyone with $10/mo can publish whatever they want to – with or without dictionary and/or spellcheck. The one that starts out saying “Unity! What is it? It is the ability to put aside our small differences for our common goals – race & nation.” and then goes on to say “Our sexuality has been distorted, women have become emasculated. They have been taught that they are no longer needed in the home as wives and mothers.” [sic.]
Note to website owner on the outside chance that they follow my link to this page:
Emasculate –v.t. 1. to castrate. 2. to deprive of strength or vigor; weaken; render effeminate. –adj. 3. emasculated; effeminate. [derived or descended from Latin emasculat(us) (ptp. of emasculare), equiv. to e- E- + mas male + -cul(us) adj. suffix + -atus -ate]. Webster’s Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary. 2001.
In other words… “…women have been (made less masculine)”. Got it.
I fear for the children educated by this person. And the first sentence, about unity/race/nation? Yeah, I threw up a lil in my mouth over THAT one. FORTUNATELY, that site doesn’t seem to do much more than spout above-referenced badly-written rhetoric. BUT!!! I’m not done yet. I do believe I’m going to be spending much of my Thanksgiving break researching and reading.