Thanks for the review! It's definitely an incredibly important topic; I wish people discussed it more. This issue is a big part of the reasoning behind why Yattsuke and I want to homeschool any children we may have, and why we want to heavily limit screen time in our home. I worked in America last summer in a childcare role caring for hundreds of children, and the effects were so evident in so many of them.

So many of them had a hard time being away from screens for the duration of their stay (I worked at a screen-free wilderness camp), and most of them had severely limited attention spans, behavioural problems, an expectation for constant instant gratification, and struggled to follow more complex conversations and sentences.

That's disturbing and fascinating at the same time. It really does seem like home schooling is inevitable for anyone who wants sane children. Thanks for sharing your experience.

That is a really good review. Lots of food for thought in there.

Great review, I'll definitely have to read this sometime. I feel strongly about this issue, which is rare for me.

i heavily disagree with that ngl, im no expert in anything education-wise and its a complex issue with a plethora of cause and effect but im sure kids are getting so much more going to school than homeschooling. believe me, even if your kids have limited screentime, they would not adjust well to society if they dont regularly engage with peers their age

@ruinacci Check out https://digdeeper.neocities.org/articles/school.xhtml

Thanks for the recommendation, the book piqued my interest. However, is it primarly about amerca/american politics? I'll pass if it is

@mentaldump The book is about television epistemology and how it affects important matters in general with politics being one example among many. I wouldn't say it's about America exactly, but It does focus on it because that's the country with the highest TV consumption during that time. But the ideas are applicable to virtually any country today.

@ruinacchi I think a big issue with that reasoning is that an assumption is being made that homeschooled children cannot be adequately socialised outside of a conventional school environment, and that a conventional school environment is 'the' healthy or productive means of socialising a child. I have worked with many homeschooled children and found them to be far more well socialised, adapted, and stable.

There are many ways in which parents who wish to make an active effort to socialise their children can do so outside of sending them to a standard school. I have also met many children who actually suffered socially from the structures found within standard schooling systems, ending up withdrawing and becoming antisocial as a result.

im speaking from my experience so im absolutely biased when it comes to this stuff. there's always more to it than just simply yes or no. there's A LOT of research that needs to be considered before making new policies. that being said, imo, if you think you're capable of deciding whats best for your family then you do you. even tho i have a damn hard time blending in, i still think school is invaluable for a kid.

@literaturegirl at least til they're in middle school or smth. again, depending on the environment, the teachers, neighborhood, (variables, variables)

i've always found the idea of a hedonistic Heaven so stupid! "Tiganiada" by Ion Budai-Deleanu (not sure if it was ever translated into English) uses this idea as satire. one of the main characters does a Dante(tm) and travels to Heaven and Hell; when asked by his friends what Heaven was like, he described it like "rivers of milk, mountains of polenta, trees with sausages .." you get the point xD

even when i was an atheist, I still would think of the Christian idea of Heaven as something more akin to the state an artist feels when creating, or a musician when composing after all, God is the Ultimate Creator