Sending children to public school is an act of child abuse

What is wrong with abusing a child? When we use the term "child abuse", many of us get highly emotional. Images of neglect and abuse run through our minds, we see images of a child with bruises or the signs of neglect, and we get angry. We want to do something about those kinds of abuse - physical abuse, sexual abuse, verbal abuse, psychological abuse, and the abuse of neglect are all inherently unjust. We tend to think that child abuse and neglect occur in only dark shadows of the elusive "unfit" parent. However, I maintain that abuse is common in many other areas of life, though I admit that this is difficult to see when abuse is common, or when we don't want to admit it is abuse, or the abuse is even a part of society itself. In that case - we don't dare call it abuse.The power imbalance between a defenseless child and a towering parental figure or adult is too often seen as a justification for behavior that we would never condone for any other kind of relationship. We use euphemisms to hide the horror of physically assaulting a defenseless child. We don't "hit" our kids, but we may "give them a spanking" every once in a while. We don't "yell at" our kids, but we may "raise our voice" every once in a while, to "show them who's the mommy" or "who's the daddy". Child sexual abuse is much more common than many people would like to believe, as it is seen by many that inflict it as "normal".But how, you may ask, can the claim that sending a child to public school be in the same category? How could I label this "child abuse"? After all, it is the obligation of parents to ensure their child is educated and prepared for the real world. In fact, you may assert (quite correctly) that REFUSING to give your child a quality education can be seen as "abusive". If so, I agree, and that is one of the reasons sending a child to public schools is abusive.The inherent nature of public schools is abusive.Schools uses force - coercion, and the threat of punishment for non-compliance. We are not talking about punishment of destructive behavior, but punishment as an arbitrary consequence for disobedience - not obeying the commands of the state. They are funded by force and theft in the form of taxation, and the parents are threatened if they do not comply with the state's requirements -- threatened with multiple levels of itimidation and abuse. The euphemism "compulsory" is used to hide the force inherent in the public education system.What do children actually learn in public schools:1) First, they must learn the "rules" of the school system. That is to say, they must learn to sit down, be quiet, request permission to speak, request permission to use the bathroom, and obey the commands of "authority".2) They must learn to perform boring, monotonous, repetitive tasks without complaint. They are encouraged to obey to please the 'authority".3) They are to go only where they are told to be at the times they are told to be there. Autonomy (ei, "freedom") is expressly forbidden and will result in punishment by the authority figure.Compulsory, standardized schooling does not educated children - it indoctrinates them.Doesn't the fact that children learn in public schools compensate for these "necessary evils"?Children will learn whether they are in public schools or not. Education occurs through the pursuit of information and the understanding of that information, and through the experience of making mistakes. What school provides is a framework for guiding the education of children. By imposing a framework onto the child regardless of the child's interests or aptitude (ie, schools will force all children to learn essentially the same things), they are actually RESTRICTING the information and understanding that a child could possibly have if the natural curiosity of the child were allowed to pursue a genuine education using a framework more appropriate for the individual child. As Noam Chomsky, professor of linguistics at MIT in Boston has said, "Education is a system of imposed ignorance".How not to identify abuse:Perceived normalcy - If a victim or abuser perceives the abuse as "normal", or if such abuse is ubiquitous across the culture, it is still abuse. We can imagine a culture in which an extreme level of abuse is common practice (for the sake of this argument, let's use genital mutilation of young children as a baseline for abuse that should never be accepted). Is it any less abusive if it is practiced by the majority of society? Is it any less abusive if people perceive it as "normal", or even "good"?