Thread by @r_diamond

With #ExposeChristianHomeschooling - yep. I have lots to say. Necessary disclaimer: I am not opposed to home education, when said education is properly done (as I am doing with my child, as many other parents are doing with theirs.) I am doing #SecularHomeschooling. (a thread)

We did "School at Home" - starting with ACE. I was 4 when I started first grade; I turned 5 two weeks later. I finished first grade in under 3 months, so my mother made me repeat it.
Then we switched to aBeka for my second grade year.

Don't get me wrong - I loved aBeka because it didn't take me long at all to realize that all I had to do was skim the text for bolded words, and read the sidebars for "terms and definitions" - that's all they ever tested on.

When I would get super frustrated with the world view in the texts - and "worldview" is a big thing in that arena! - I would go to the library. My mother only looked at the top 3, last 3, and 2 in the middle for the stack of library books, so I could sneak a lot in.

I remember feeling guilty reading books about science and dinosaurs - after all, pastor said the government had planted dinosaur skeletons to prove evolution and make us not believe the Bible. My textbooks said God created dinosaurs to disprove evolution.

"Do you believe in Creation?" was a question we were taught to ask; it was a great litmus test to easily define who was and who wasn't a Christian, no matter what they thought they were.

And so it went, grades 2-8 - diagramming sentences, sneaking the real books out of the library instead of the excerpts in my "literature" class, quietly learning to think critically while wrestling with overwhelming fear of being caught using my brain.

When I was 11, I desperately wanted to get my ham radio license. My father said no, so I manipulated him. I asked the pastor's son-in-law, who had his license, and who wasn't a jerk like my father, if he thought I should take the class.

My father didn't dare say no, since it was the pastor's son-in-law, so that's how I wound up in my first official classroom, learning Morse Code and all about radios. Of course my father and my brother had to take it, too, and I was not expected to do well.

Outscoring them on the tests is one of my prouder childhood memories.

I loved the math and the science. I loved my first computer - a Tandy 1000EX that a friend of my parents gave us. I learned to program in BASIC and COBOL.

9th grade, my parents switched to Alpha Omega and BJU. Alpha Omega, the teacher's keys were wrong. BJU was, well, BJU. They just make crap up. Even my parents got fed up with it and went back to aBeka.

I was really looking forward to my sophomore year - I wanted to take chemistry, geometry, trigonometry. As August got closer and my brother's books arrived, I finally approached my father and asked where my textbooks were.

And that's when he enacted his revenge for me managing to sneak in ham radio and computing...

"Jesus doesn't want a woman to learn math and sciences. He didn't create your brains for that. This year, you're going to learn to be a keeper at home."

So he and my mother faked out a homeschool portfolio. I spent my sophomore year cooking, cleaning, caring for my baby brother, cooking and cleaning some more. Learning to be "submissive".

At least I didn't have to learn how to be a wife in the Biblical sense...again. That education was given to me years 4-9. :/ #metoo #churchtoo #homeschooltoo

Grades 11 and 12, I aced...mostly because I finally accepted that my parents didn't care at all about my academics, and were deliberately withholding knowledge. So I skimmed the material, slammed down answers, and went to the library, a lot.

I graduated when I was 16. Diploma, cap and gown, the whole thing. The first ever homeschooling graduating class in the state of Maine (Class of '93.) It was a huge deal.

I remember feeling queasy about how big a fraud it was; watching my parents go on and on about how they started homeschooling the day it became legal in Louisiana, how they were called to do it and how it was the ONLY way to raise children.

Christian Homeschooling, in my life, covered up medical neglect and abuse, physical neglect and abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, mental abuse, spiritual abuse, educational abuse. Not a single need I had was met in Christian Homeschooling.

We were literally the poster family for homeschooling in our area; my mother would help everyone with their portfolios and spin this great narrative portraying us as a nuclear, healthy, God-loving family.

Incidentally, the last time she held me immobile and hit my face as hard as she could, I was almost 18 and long since "graduated" - she only stopped because I told her I'd tell my boyfriend.

(The last time my father beat me was not long before I turned 16. He bent me over, beat me with his belt, and I refused to cry. I looked at him with all the pain and rage and hatred of almost 16 years of abuse and never said a word. He never touched me again.)

Both parents still feel like they own my brothers. Me, though - well, as my mother told me on my wedding day; "I never could break you. You're HIS problem now." She was right that I'm unbroken. But she was wrong about whose problem I am. #ExposeChristianHomeschooling

Again, I'm not opposed to a carefully created, bespoke education for one's children. I'm aware of my privilege in being able to offer it to my son. But I'd send him to public school anywhere before I'd use Christian homeschool material. cc: @C_Stroop