Paranoia point proven

I'm not going to name names, and I am not even going to say where I have got this information from - mostly because for those with a modicum of intelligence finding out, or guessing won't be that hard, but I actually laughed out loud at something today, which proved the very point I made yesterday about how some Home Educators verge on the paranoid. 

A couple of days ago, someone made a post on a well known Home Education yahoo list. It consisted of a brief introduction, followed by several, quite specific questions pertaining to Home Education. 
Basically the person wanted to know specifics about the comparisons between home education and mainstream schooling, as far as children are concerned. The person requested 'hard statistics' which they could peruse, which supported the much talked about academic success of home educated children. The person wanted to know specifics about examinations, and future employability, viability of Home Education and other such things.  

This person was swiftly met with a barrage of suspicion and promptly labelled a researcher. It was suggested to other users - by the list owner - that all further communication with the person who had posed the question, should be halted, until further investigations had been carried out to ascertain if the person in question was indeed a researcher or not.

Now, looking at recent posts by the same person, it is blindingly obvious that what we actually have here is simply a well spoken and written person, able to come forward with exactly the questions they require answers to, in a no nonsense, no frills fashion. The fact that this person did this without fluffing up their introduction with countless details about their personal circumstances is in my opinion what the HE community needs more of. 

Just because someone posts a message onto a list, does not imply that they want to meet up with people and become best friends with the head honchos of the list. I thought that the whole point of a yahoo list being created is to impart and share information for those that want to know. Or do I have that completely wrong? 

As far as I can see, all the naysayers on the list have managed to achieve is to make themselves look completely unapproachable, paranoid, and generally unpleasant people. Not to mention hideously old fashioned and so set in their ways that they refuse to see beyond their own fears of integration and social responsibility.

The list owner did also mention that in all their years of running groups and lists etc, they had never once come across such a message, so full of questions. But more and more people in this country are considering Home Education for a variety of reasons. Therefore surely groups and lists ought to be preparing themselves for further straight to the point messages such as this one, from NEW COMERS, as opposed to those who have been hanging about on the shelves of the list gathering dust for countless years? 


Loz