First, be mindful of your own fingers—and don’t forget to wash them regularly and thoroughly—for you know better than most where they have been. 
An actual argument would be a welcome thing on this forum, as would genuine happiness and laughter.
There were always some nuts that were too tough to crack.
Although the bigger part of me thinks Dan is either a comedian by nature or he has been sniffing too much powder.
He does like the phrase ad hominem too. I am now starting to draw parallels with another Classicist that I would have dearly loved to take up a remote mountain and tell him to show off his survival skills since he knows it all, and scare the bejaysus out of.
The success stories look back on it afterwards and see why you did it and you share a pint, no hard feelimgs because they learned from it The failures hate youfor ever. I think the blond scruff in Whitehall would have hated me for ever.
Oh dear my little joke missed its target. Dan did not twig that I am editing my post purely because he said he finds it interesting to watch.
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I am genuinely happy and currently pissing myself laughing . Just saying
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Hello again Cat—nice of you to take more time out of your busy weekend schedule to join us once again! Hope you’re able to mop up any involuntary spillages quickly and elucidate on your previous message concerning “choosing words carefully” once the flow of liquid mirth subsides.
Heheheh. I have my comedic moments that’s for sure! But in all seriousness, I wish everyone here on this thread and forum nothing but the best. I’m watching with interest, Geoffrey, as you edit and re-edit your last post — the latest appears to suggest that I have a penchant for hard drug abuse. Thus, it would seem that you are incapable of holding a sensible and respectful discussion without veering into ad hominem and oblique insults. This evinces a disappointing but not entirely surprisingly level of immaturity and unsophistication. However, it does prompt me to take back my suggestion that you made a sub-optimal choice of vocation.
Hands Face Space 
Pity you don’t know how to conjugate ‘flummox’ then. 
Have you met Dunning and Kruger?
That’s a nicely ironic Malapropism
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More edits Geoffrey… perhaps your initial flight instinct was wise after all. I only use the term “ad hominem” frequently because I have no shortage of examples of it to call out. However, now I note with your “drawing parallels” addendum a new and altogether more concerning tone which seems to be threatening in nature. Let me try to decipher your last sentence as it’s replete with errors:
" I am now starting to draw parallells [sic] with another Classicist [sic] that [sic] I woul [sic] have dearly love [sic] tobtake [sic] up a remote mountain and scare the bejaysus out of."
by which I think you meant:
" I am now starting to draw parallels with another classicist who I would have dearly loved to take up a remote mountain and scare the bejaysus out of."
I’m sensing unresolved anger issues here Geoffrey, and your tone has taken on a threatening undertone. Thus, I think it is prudent to respectfully wish you all the best.
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Ha ha. I’m familiar with their work. I’m doing my best here in the face of gang warfare! In the meantime, you might want to learn how to use capital letters appropriately. 20/20 for effort though!
I don’t think this perspective is any different from mine. it is of course precisely a question of where you draw the line. My argument (with both Macron and those supporting him here) is that if the view of a majority is to be forced on a minority there really has to be very robust argument and evidence that the majority view does indeed not just shape society, but shapes it in a good, or at least an acceptable direction. (There are many examples in history - surely I don’t need to explain this? - of oppressive legislation ‘shaping a society’ for evil purposes, aren’t there?)
So where is that evidence? Have religious terrorists in fact come out of home schooling? Do home schooled children end up damaged, or less French?!
Surely all legislation should be based on sound evidence - and especially so given that this proposed legislation may be held to contravene human rights, or the fundamental constitutional settlement in France. For this, surely, very robust evidence is absolutely essential?
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Dan, thank you for cheering up a dull afternoon, it has turned out great fun after all.
I am glad you enjoyed my typos so much. I have a damaged hand and this tabletis noteasyfor me so I usually make plenty of errors. Perhaps I will come back and entertain you again another day although I think probably not.
When I listened to Macron’s speech, it seemed to me - for all that part of it contained cinq piliers! - largely about cohesion and, especially, laicité. I think you’re right, @Geof_Cox, and terrorism is a highly unlikely result of home-schooling. Macron seemed to me to be addressing more the fragmentation - the archipelagisation (as Jerome Fourquet wouldn’t have put it) - of society and the perception (likely to be correct, in the case of immigrants of any variety) that the inculcation of French values isn’t being done effectively.
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If we are correcting things we might as well get them right.
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No effort, merely displacement activity as I have a stack of work I am busy with, and I enjoy a bit of communication in English.
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That’s the spirit!
My friend has a son of 12 with a quite severe form of autism. He can be very disruptive in group situations.
Her daughter turned 15 last week,& has just started her gcse’s. She has a high IQ like her father.
My friend has home schooled both kids for some years now…the girl, because a friend was of the opinion she may be held back ; & the boy because of his disruptive behaviour.
Both of them are doing very well.
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No one is saying it doesn’t work for some children,but it needs to be carefully considered
I was taken out of school for 2 years between prep school and school. No homeschooling at all, I was left to my own devices, and I think retrospectively it wasn’t a good idea - I never learnt to work hard.
I never thought school was just about learning stuff like classics, or physics. I went there to socialise, to learn how to interact with people, to make friends, to climb over the fence at lunch time and escape to local chippy, have a fag behind the bike sheds, get away from my parents and siblings, all those sorts of things. How do homeschooled kids do that?
(And by the way despite escaping school regularly, and even being expelled from one, I did also achieve the formal education side to higher degree level)
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