From: Samantha Atkins (samantha@objectent.com)
Date: Mon Dec 04 2000 - 04:23:37 MST
"J. R. Molloy" wrote:
> I saw a documentary on PBS about the Amish. They don't let their kids go
> beyond the eighth grade, because it might tempt them to discard literal
> belief in the Bible. (They believe the Earth is flat, because the Bible
> mentions "the four corners of the Earth").
>
Now this stuff is suprisingly sticky. If we say that the Amish are
obviously harming their kids with such practices and that we should use
state power to liberate them or to force them to let them (the kids) go
to school longer, then we have established in principle that the state
gets to control how we and our children are educated. We establish that
the state is the guardian rather than parents. This is not a happy
conclusion.
To be born under such circumstances in such a family is unfortunate.
But direct intervention of any kind would be worse. The first plays out
the consequences of one's stupidity in the lives of your children. The
other sells all of our children to the state.
- samantha
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