Thursday, February 24, 2011
CNN buys into homeschooling stereotypes in child abduction case, blames victims
I’m in the middle of an article about homeschooling stereotypes in literature and how they reinforce the assumptions people make about homeschoolers and homeschooling, so this really hit home for me.
A friend of mine just emailed me with the transcript of yesterday’s Nancy Grace CNN segment. A twelve-year-old girl was kidnapped in Lilburn, Georgia, in one of the “it was broad daylight and she was only alone for a minute” worst-case scenarios that terrify us all. As if that weren’t gut-churning enough, Grace had the following conversation on the air with Dr. Caryn Stark, self-described media psychologist. Here’s what Stark had to say about the girl who was abducted by a woman who apparently coaxed her into a van:
“She’s homeschooled, which means that she isn’t that sophisticated. And I hear that she met with this woman possibly the week before. Maybe she seemed friendly to her and exciting, because she is not exposed to that many people.”
Nancy Grace’s response?
“You know, that’s a good point.”
What makes this leap of non-logic that much more egregious is the fact that the girl is described in the same transcript as helping out with the family flower business. Not exactly an isolated pursuit.
So the family is already in agony about the kidnapping of their twelve-year-old daughter, and now they’re being told that they’re partly to blame. Because, you know, school kids never get abducted.
Lovely. Thanks so much.
I want to stress that this is not about homeschoolers getting in a tizzy every time someone looks at us wrong. This is about fighting the spread of damaging misinformation. This is about stomping out a stereotype that hurts us.
Here’s the full transcript on CNN’s site:
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1102/23/ng.02.html
Here’s Nancy Grace’s site, if you want to let her know that actually, that wasn’t a good point at all:
http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/nancy.grace/
Here’s Caryn Stark’s site, if you’d like to give her a gentle hint about the fact that homeschoolers don’t fit her stereotypes — oh, and that it really isn’t very nice to play “blame the victim,” especially in the middle of an emergency:
http://www.carynstark.com/
And if you’d like to call Caryn, I didn’t have to dig to find her phone number — she lists it on her site. It’s (212) 410-5880.
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13 comments:
That is quite the sensational news site. Good grief---almost as though some people love tragedy.
Ugh, on so many fronts!
This makes me incredibly irritated, but sadly I'm not surprised.
So many times a day I see people correctly poo-poo-ing the "bias" on Fox News. But when I ask them if they've noticed what CNN does, they look at me as if I'm crazy.
Every big media outlet is in cahoots with the establishment in one way or another, and it's so easy that way to "divide and conquer".
Well, we need to put a few things in perspective on this article. Nancy Grace is a qualified idiot. The "Doctor" she was speaking with is also a qualified idiot. Neither of these so called "professionals" did any investigation regarding this subject. If they had they would have found that home schooled children are actually better adapted at relating to people, not only in their own peer group, but up and down the age range. Additionally, the stigma that somehow only the "challenged" kids are the ones kept home is not only wrong but disturbingly incorrect. Perhaps my bias towards the South suggests that because you have a southern accent, like our host, you are uneducated and very bad at your job.
Although I agree with all that you have said, I disagree with contacting Grace to let her know how wrong she is. The more publicity Grace gets, the worst the world becomes.
I'm all for educating people about the truth of homeschooling but I'm not going to do that in this case since Grace doesn't want to know the truth nor do I want to give her 15 more minutes of fame.
"Well, we need to put a few things in perspective on this article. Nancy Grace is a qualified idiot."
LMAO. thank you for interjecting that bit of humor into this awful situation. I almost agree with not contacting grace- she won't change, and loves ratings. bleh. terrible.
The thing about choosing to contact -- especially by writing a letter that you reprint on a blog, post on FB, or send a copy of to your local paper -- is that the focus can be on the content of the comment, rather than by who made it. We may never change the minds of the fools who made and agreed with these statements about homeschoolers, but there are *so many* people out there who never hear *anything* about homeschooling except stereotypes like these. We need to give them a chance to hear the truth.
This isn't about publicizing obscure people with unusual fringe ideas. These are people who are already famous, and the ideas they're spouting are extremely mainstream. We need to work to change that.
Last point: if any attention we can bring to what homeschooling is really like also brings these yoyos some attention, I'd still consider it time and energy well spent.
Just been poking around on the 'net about this case -- there are quite a few regular everyday non-celebrity people talking about how, for instance, this girl was homeschooled and "therefore must have been starved for friendship and attention." Someone else asked about the legality of homeschooling -- can anyone do it? Another replied that so far as they know, you have to "submit a lesson plan" to the government.
Homeschooling = isolation and lack of friendship. Because children who go to school are never lonely or friendless.
Also, homeschooling laws are the same everywhere, and they include mandatory tests and "lesson plans."
The fact that so many people are ignorant on basics (like the fact that homeschooling laws differ from state to state) is why we have to keep trying to educate. I find it scary how many people on the forum in question speculated that the abducted girl must have been trying to "escape" from homeschooling. Not from a bad family situation. Just homeschooling.
This incident happened just a few miles from my home. I was talking to my girls about it just this evening. At the time, I didn't know the girl was homeschooled. I'm so sick of the stereotype being promoted. I'm at a loss for words, it makes me so angry.
I just hope they find this little girl. They have not issued an Amber Alert for her which I find to be extremely disturbing. Mark Klaas feels the same way.
An adult, regardless of gender, has no business talking to a child on the street or sidewalk. She needs to be found and people like this psychologist who want to push buttons by focusing on homeschooling as the REASON why she was abducted makes me sick to my stomach.
To ever say that a child or his/her family is at fault for the actions of sick, deranged people is, in my opinion, not only inaccurate, but it also provides positive reinforcement to the sickos that roam the streets looking for kids.
What about all the traditional schooled kids that have been abducted walking to and from the bus stop and the heart wrenching stories of children going to see a puppy? Children are not sophisticated regardless of how they are schooled. They aren't supposed to be...they're children!!
I am beyond livid and I don't get mad easily :(
Writing to the psychologist made sense to me - so I did it. She may be open enough to learning about home-learning and she could use the feedback about her misconceptions. (Thanks Mad Editor for bringing this to our attention!)
Update: The girl has been found in Vegas and may have run away, rather than have been kidnapped.
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