Tag Archives: Secularism

Quebec judge orders three-year-old into daycare for “socialization”

Map of Canada
Map of Canada

From Life Site News. (H/T Mary, Eleanor)

Excerpt:

A Quebec judge has ordered a three-year-old and a five-year-old to attend state-funded day care following claims that the children lacked proper “socialization.”

The parents of the Notre-Dame-des-Bois family were also ordered to place their two elder homeschooled children in public schools, and accused of failing to act quickly to correct learning disabilities, despite their doctor’s testimony to the contrary.

“This is a shocking decision,” said Paul Faris of the Canadian branch of the Home School Legal Defense Association, who have backed the family’s case. He told LifeSiteNews this is the latest in the Quebec government’s ongoing effort to “clamp down on choice in education.”

He said the most concerning part is the judge’s decision to “order the younger children who were not of compulsory school age into day care for socialization.”

The family, who have homeschooled for four years, were reported to the province’s Youth Protection Services in November 2009 after a run-in with the local school board.  The elder children were ordered into school in April 2010 after court proceedings began in February 2010.  There was a four-day trial in November, and Judge Nicole Bernier issued her ruling in March.

Faris said the court refused to hear the parents’ expert witness and dismissed the testimony of the family doctor, who has been fully supportive of their medical decisions.  In her ruling, Judge Bernier claimed the family doctor’s testimony lacked objectivity and was “full of bias” owing to his relationship with the parents.

Faris said the judge gave “excess weight” to the government’s experts, who he says “found that one child’s hearing impairment ‘indicated’ that the parents could not be trusted and therefore all the children should be enrolled in public school programs.” Judge Bernier determined that the security and development of the children was compromised by parental negligence.

In her ruling, Judge Bernier called the mother’s teaching approach “outdated,” saying it emphasized repetition exercises and acquisition of knowledge rather than the Ministry’s preferred approach of teaching learning skills.  She also criticizes the elder children’s social development, noting that they had difficulty at first with the other children when they entered the classroom.

“The parents, though aware … of the need to stimulate each child by interactions with peers of the same age, outside of the family, either at school, kindergarten, or day care or occasional education trips, maintain their interest in the teaching model of the home school,”  she wrote, going on to lament that they are “refusing to integrate the youngest in kindergarten or day care, and opposing educational outings for the children.”

“Their reasons are always the same and regard a social mistrust that does not meet the needs of their children,” she added. She also took issue with the fact that the parents apparently had not obtained a homeschooling exemption under the Education Act, which requires that the parents offer a program equivalent to that offered in the schools.

I do not recommend that anyone get married or have children in Quebec. The government and courts seem to think that they are the parents of your children, and the regulators of your marriage. So why bother letting them run your life? Go somewhere else instead. Just imagine – being these parents and paying taxes to these fascists for years, so that they can now take your children away from you. This is where the secular leftist obsession with equality of outcome and uniformity of thought leads. They really are fascists, and they really do hate marriage and family.

This story is particular ironic, considering the news story about the 16-year old homeschooled child entering LAW SCHOOL, having completed her Bachelors degree prior to turning 16. Perhaps this child could move to Canada, get on the Supreme Court of Canada, and overrule this left-wing judicial activist? That should be the mission of all homeschooled children, in my opinion. They should be planning on it.

And in other news, the gay rights lobby is forcing their agenda into the Ontario’s Catholic school system. The governments in Quebec and Ontario are both Liberal, and are supported even by some Catholics. These Catholics think that it is the government’s job to redistribute wealth in order to equalize life outcomes and achieve “social justice”. Imagine how shocked they must be now, to find government intruding into their private lives.

Dennis Prager on dependence, responsibility and character

I found this video on Evan Sayet’s Facebook page.

You may also be interested in this article by Dennis Prager that explains the conflict between equality of life outcomes (redistribution of wealth) and equality of opportunity (liberty and responsibility).

Christian electrician faces termination for displaying cross

But wearing a burkha is just fine. (H/T Dina)

Excerpt:

An electrician faces the sack for displaying a small palm cross on the dashboard of his company van.

Former soldier Colin Atkinson has been summoned to a disciplinary hearing by the giant housing association where he has been employed for 15 years because he refuses to remove the symbol.

[…]Throughout his time at work, he has had an 8in-long cross made from woven palm leaves attached to the dashboard shelf below his windscreen without receiving a single complaint.

But his bosses at publicly funded Wakefield and District Housing (WDH) in West Yorkshire – the fifth-biggest housing organisation in England – have demanded he remove the cross on the grounds it may offend people or suggest the organisation is Christian. Mr Atkinson’s union representative said he faces a full disciplinary hearing next month for gross misconduct, which could result in dismissal.

The association strongly promotes ‘inclusive’ policies and allows employees to wear religious symbols at work.

It has provided stalls at gay pride events, held ‘diversity days’ for travellers, and hosted a gender reassignment event entitled A World That Includes Transpeople.

[…]Despite the company’s treatment of Mr Atkinson, the boss of the depot where he works in Castleford has been allowed to adorn his office with a poster of the Argentinian revolutionary Che Guevara.Denis Doody, who is WDH’s environmental manager, also has a whiteboard on which are written several quotations by the Marxist guerrilla leader, who was a key figure in the Cuban revolution in the Fifties.Colleagues said staff and even members of the public who were visiting the depot would be able to see the poster and whiteboard through his office window.

[…]But the company’s equality and diversity manager, Jayne O’Connell, who was recruited from HBoS bank in 2009, replied: ‘WDH has a stance of neutrality. We now have different faiths, new emerging cultures. We have to be respectful of all views and beliefs.’[…]At another meeting, Ms O’Connell said Mr Atkinson could express his faith but ‘it is quite clear it cannot be associated with WDH and displaying the cross gives the impression that WDH is a Christian organisation’.She said staff could demonstrate their personal beliefs ‘discreetly’, even adding that the company could provide extra material in its official corporate colours ‘for employees who wish to wear a different style of uniform’.Pressed by Mr Cunliffe on whether a Muslim woman who wore a burka at work would be considered discreet, she said: ‘If they could do their job effectively, then yes.’

Asked whether she would think a burka in WDH corporate colours was discreet, Ms O’Connell replied: ‘Yes, it would be.’

Read the whole story, there are many more alarming details.

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