The HSLDA, Bill Gothard, and The Future of Post-COVID Homeschooling
On the HSLDA's podcast, homeschool historian Dixie Dillon Lane obscures the history of Bill Gothard's influence on homeschooling. Her denials provide a glimpse as to what propels the movement.
A New Look
Homeschooling has an image problem. For the first several decades of its modern existence, the Homeschooling movement prided itself on its fundamentalist and orthodox image. Evangelical Christianity had squeezed out other factions for control and became the heart of the movement by the 1980s. The large families, the obedient children, the extreme temperance and biblical literalism are all qualities America would come to find synonymous with homeschooling. Born from the same milieu as Jerry Falwell and his moral majority, Homeschooling intentionally cultivated this image. Each aspect of the identity became a selling point and advertisement, above all the compliant children it produced. By the 2010s the Duggar family became America’s most famous homeschooling family, sequencing every stereotype and trope into the fabric of Homeschooling's DNA. For over ten years the Duggars would have the spotlight with one of the country’s most watched television shows. But in the wake of Josh Duggar’s felony arrest for possessing media sexually exploiting children, the Homeschooling machine could not distance itself fast enough from an image it had put tremendous effort into upholding, and from a family it once considered its star representative.
“Homeschooling is growing rapidly because of a phenomenon I have called the ‘great-kid-average-parent’ syndrome. People look at the kids produced by homeschooling and say, ‘Those are great kids! I’d like my kids to turn out that way.” Then they look at the parents and say, ‘Those are average parents. If they can do it, I can do it too.’”
-Michael Farris in “The Homeschooling Father”
But upon closer inspection, this distancing started before the 2021 arrest. A string of scandals plagued the Duggar family and their ministry. Their show would be canceled in 2015 after news of Josh’s molestation of his sisters reached the public; a spin-off show followed without Josh ever appearing. Just a year prior, the ministry in which the Duggar parents served was found to be led by another serial predator, Bill Gothard. Gothard’s now-defunct homeschool program, Advanced Training Institute, attempted to merge education and the Bible into one. As an education program, the subject matter was subservient to his interpretation of biblical principles, to the detriment of any educational value that may have been within. The Duggars were just one of the over 10,000 students enrolled every year into the 1990s, impressive numbers in Homeschooling’s infancy.1
Bill Gothard made an impression on another key figure in Homeschooling, Michael Farris. Farris founded the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), one the leading institutions in Homeschooling since its inception in 1983. Attending one of Gothard’s seminars in the late 1970s, Farris took up his instruction and renounced birth control.2 Farris would not just be a fan of Gothard, but a colleague. Together they formed Oak Brook College of Law, a conservative fundamentalist online law school with alumni currently serving throughout state governments. Farris would serve on the Board of Trustees while Gothard served as Chancellor, with multiple positions populated by the faculty of their respective organizations. In 2010 Farris and the HSLDA honored Gothard for his impact on Homeschooling by bestowing their Lifetime Achievement Award for being, “a leader who has demonstrated valuable leadership to the homeschool community, [and] inspired and motivated others to effective action.”3
While Bill Gothard and the Duggars had initially been useful for cultivating the movement, their value was waning. Farris and the HSLDA published a letter in 2014 disowning Gothard after details of his sex crimes could no longer be kept secret4, and after previously headlining different Homeschool conferences for several years, the Duggar’s invites would dry up after allegations against Josh became public. The people who watched their shows as inspiration were lost to those who watched as a view into a freak show. The public and even original fans began finding them increasingly creepy and unsettling, the continued revelations only strengthened this view. But in this transitional period, a mutation in Homeschooling’s DNA was taking place. The COVID pandemic was an incredible opportunity for the movement. With public schools in every county closing their doors, the Homeschool institution could make deep inroads with parents weary of COVID policies. Fomenting distrust of both federal directives and local school board decisions could be used as promotion to an entire market that never previously considered homeschooling. Just as homeschooling had begun to boom, the world watched as Josh Duggar was sentenced to over 12 years in prison for his crimes. What was once free advertising had become a liability, and right during a once-in-a-century opportunity for the movement.
Meet Dixie
In October of 2023, the HSLDA hosted a guest on their podcast to give a history lesson on homeschooling. The HSLDA podcast brings on various figures across the Homeschool ecosystem, from hawkers of Homeschool startups, to radio ministers, to former staff and counsel. But in contrast to their normal stable of features, this episode presented a historian with a Ph.D from Notre Dame, Dixie Dillon Lane. Lane’s appearance is a bit of an oddity. While most guests mirror HSLDA’s fundamentalist beliefs and politics, Lane stands out, even ending the podcast stating that her work “isn’t seeking to defend Homeschooling.” Despite her contributions throughout the episode clearly favoring both her host and Homeschooling, she presents herself as a certain impartial and neutral party. Halfway through the interview, she has an exchange with the host about recent media released on Homeschooling. This exchange is noteworthy not only for how the Duggars and Gothard are portrayed but also for what it reveals about the broader Homeschooling movement and its institutions.
With something like the Shiny Happy People Duggar Documentary, which any adult who cares about children will find quite disturbing, you're talking about picking an example of a family that is really a true believer in a particular kind of faith and a particular kind of homeschooling. One of the things that some of my acquaintances and colleagues helped me understand about that is that's not even really representative of that very small sector of homeschooling.
Not representative? Why would an ostensibly neutral historian insist that Gothard’s teachings are not only fringe but fringe within that “very small sector of homeschooling”? Lane’s contemporaries have noted Gothard’s influence as central to the identity of Homeschooling. Milton Gaither’s book on the history of Homeschooling describes his influence in this way, “[Bill Gothard’s] impact on the movement has been so profound that he cannot be overlooked… If the public stereotype of the homeschooling family is that of the firm but gentle patriarch, the Titus 2 mom shrouded in a loose-fitting jumper and head covering, the quiver-full of obedient stair-step children dressed in matching homespun, we have Bill Gothard to thank as much as anyone.”5 Fringe is the neo-Nazi homeschool group in Ohio with only 2,000 Telegram subscribers. Fringe is not leading seminars with 300,000 annual attendees.
It takes a real level of dishonesty to go onto the HSLDA’s show and say the teachings of the man given their leadership award in Homeschooling aren’t reflective of Homeschooling. The HSLDA and its affiliates have an obvious reason for distancing themselves from Gothardism, they were explicit followers and collaborators. Why then does Lane feel the need to aid them in obscuring the connection? On paper, she should not fit in with the HSLDA. Farris founded it unabashedly on fundamentalist ideals, calling for the dismantling of the separation of church and state and the banning of homosexuality through its newsletters and Court Reports.6 Lane on the other hand is a moderate conservative and a Catholic; she reads mainstream liberal newspapers like The Atlantic and has a strong disaffection for Donald Trump. You won’t find long-winded screeds against woke ideology or cultural Marxism in her writings.7 And yet despite this, here she is performing a favor for an organization that in theory conflicts with her own beliefs. By appearing for and providing a service for an explicitly evangelical program, Lane displays exactly what it is that makes the Duggars and Gothard not just an authentic representation of Homeschooling, but what fuses their identity and interests with her own.
The Homeschool Heartbeat
“There is vision here into the machinations of the reactionary brain. They are not merely sensitive to criticism or disagreement. Grievance runs in their veins. It fuels their politics and propels their movement. They cannot operate without it.”
Movements can be difficult to define. They are composed of different coalitions with a variety of strategies and specific objectives. It is a fair defense to say that Homeschooling’s most eccentric families and individuals cannot be used to define the movement as a whole. However neither Gothard nor the Duggars were ordinary members, they were leaders who played a part in shaping Homeschooling into what it is today. It would be a mistake to distinguish their differences from the greater movement without exploring what allowed them to flourish within that same body. Movements can be defined then, to some degree at least, by what they tolerate within their own members and what remains consistent across their power-holding delegates. Lane on the surface seems normal, her bylines and posts typically consist of fairly banal and unobjectionable advice and musings. But by placing the microscope in the right place, we can find the same connective tissue that runs throughout the Homeschooling body.
The Homeschool institution claims to have become a more diverse movement in modern times, and mainstream outlets have uncritically repeated this as a true fact. While a wider selection in demographics have begun homeschooling as individuals, what has failed to be further examined is whether its institutions and leaders actually reflect values and ideals held outside of its evangelical and reactionary interests. Advocates are eager to mention how hippies also homeschool, Lane even mentions this at the beginning of the episode. Yet when mentioned it is left unexamined beyond surface affectations. When inspected, differing ideology is often absent and they espouse the same paranoia as the rest of the Homeschool establishment. There is a reason Qanon was able to merge with red-state evangelicals just as easily as it did wellness gurus and spiritualists. The question then is how do groups from ostensibly unconnected backgrounds and opposing styles of education coalesce around Homeschooling?
In Gothard’s heyday, a common staple of Homeschool conventions and seminars was the proper way to discipline children. This was not a niche position or seen as a personal preference, it was a major focus of the movement. Figures like James Dobson authored multiple books on the topic. Gothard’s seminars gave demonstrations on how to spank your child. The HSLDA’s Court Report would mention repeatedly that the right to discipline your children physically was in danger.8 Yet today’s Homeschool climate barely mentions physical discipline at all. While not completely absent, this language and rhetoric related to corporal punishment is far from the front and center it once occupied. This does not reflect a change of heart, many of these figures remain in the movement and stand by their past statements. It reflects that the utility of the specific doctrine has run dry.
The importance of preaching corporal punishment was not in the physical act but in the unifying emotional response in invoking an absolutist and natural doctrine for raising children. Spanking wasn’t a stylistic choice, it was a necessary part of raising children the correct way. The power of any touted doctrine resides not in any specific teaching, but whether that teaching can be ascribed to fulfilling the organic plans of God or nature. This is the first step in Homeschooling’s heartbeat, but a second chamber in its heart participates in rhythmic succession. It wasn’t just important to instruct parents on the correct way to discipline, it was that the correct way was in jeopardy. Homeschool literature didn’t just give instructions; it told parents that someone was trying to prevent them from following the instructions. Farris wrote multiple novels fantasizing about a tyrannical government taking children away from their parents for spanking their children under Christian principles. Panic was issued in the US codifying the UN’s Rights of the Child, family liberty was in peril by an international cabal.9 It is not enough to be following the natural order, it is that in doing so you are under attack from the government, globalists, or the devil himself.
A few months before appearing on HSLDA’s podcast, both Lane and Farris spoke about how good students were being held back by underperforming students and the schools themselves (coincidentally both incidents relate to Fairfax County Public Schools).10 Farris would echo the Virginia governor’s claim that the school board concocted a conspiracy to bury the results of the National Merit Awards. Farris claims this was done, “Because they're so committed to ‘equity’, meaning that they want to cut off any achievement, and they don't want people to feel bad, and they don't want white people or others or Asians to reign over other people who didn't do well.” In a similar fashion, Lane used the same rhetoric claiming the school board released a letter mid pandemic, “telling parents they should not create learning pods because then their children would receive a better education than public school kids, which would leave the public school children behind. Fairfax County [implies] that parents should neglect their own children just because taking care of them might ‘widen the [achievement] gap.’”11
Both claims are hallucinatory. In the first, Farris took a clerical error and made it into an attack on whites and the principles of meritocracy. This is not new territory for Farris. He has been making claims like this and worse for decades; it is what he built the HSLDA on. Yet after 40 years of near-total victory, he still feels Homeschooling, whites and Christians are under attack more than ever. Lane on the other hand took a line from the school board’s letter that stated, “We do have concerns that [learning pods] may widen the gap in educational access and equity for all students” and claimed this was code warning parents not to seek out additional resources. But no instruction, implicit or otherwise, was given to parents to refrain from collaborating during the pandemic. The letter unambiguously affirmed the opposite stating, “Families have an absolute right to work together and pool resources to provide instruction or tutoring.” To Lane, this wasn’t a basic —and just plainly true— acknowledgment that students differ in access to resources. It was an attack on Lane and families who were “taking care” of their children. This is the Homeschool heartbeat in motion. It is not incidental to the movement, it is the movement.
“Our work is clear. Our mission is before us. We have an administration who has taken a direct assault on us. This is not just about a disagreement … this is about an agenda to silence the people of Christian faith and not allow us the room to speak or even believe what we know is right.”
The Upswell
Lane's appearance for the HSDLA makes sense once we understand the essence of Homeschooling. While her statements are outright biased in favor of Homeschooling, they now become clear as a statement directly from the mouth of the machine rather than as a supportive bystander. Lane goes on to say that while the support for homeschooling in the early days of the pandemic was an upswell from the general public, the recent criticism of Homeschooling has been from an outside force. She refuses to listen to the disaffected and instead strips the power from their words by ascribing their actions to an outside force. This is a continuance of a conservative legacy denying the agency of those speaking out. Just as opponents to Civil Rights in the 1960s claimed black American’s activism was the result of South-Savers and Communists, and modern-day figures are claiming university students protesting the genocide of Palestinians are instead outside agitators, Lane claims that the motivation for the media could not simply be the result of harmed homeschoolers looking to have their voices hears. It must be the result of some controlling external influence with unknown motivation.
“Recently we've seen journalism and other media change tack and are raising alarm about homeschooling … That's been very interesting to watch because we had an upswell of support and gratitude, but this alarmism is not an upswell… Generally, what they do … is find people who had terrible experiences or did terrible things and then they generalize from those people… The implication is parents aren't trustworthy… A lot of that intimates or implies that we need to be afraid about homeschooling.”
While the entire appearance on this podcast is an attempt to legitimize Homeschooling and control the definition of who is and isn’t representative of Homeschooling, Lane is simply repeating standard party talking points that align herself with the types of figures she wants to minimize. Lane’s statements put her in the same company as friend of HSLDA, Alex Jones. Nearly two decades prior —when the HSLDA made one of several appearances on InfoWars— this near identical conversation took place. Lane hasn’t said anything new, she has only rehabilitated the words of the supposed fringe she claims not to represent.
“They give a couple of examples of trash that mistreated their children so they were homeschoolers. But what about one public school, the horrible stuff that goes on there? Out of millions of homeschoolers in the last decade, they pick a couple of cases. They say it's got to be regulated. It's got to be shut down. They're freaking out, folks. They're panicking. They're saying your children belong to them while they turn the public schools into purveyors of filth and degeneracy and evil.”
-Alex Jones to Chris Klicka, Former HSLDA Senior Legal Counsel
Lane and Jones’ conclusions are the same. Criticism of Homeschooling cannot come from a legitimate and honest concern for children, it is always an attack on the essence of good parenting. On the whole, Lane’s appearance is not meant to illuminate anything new and her defenses are mostly a distraction not worth engaging in. The defining element here is that Lane’s false presumptions have redirected the criticisms away from Homeschooling’s goals specifically, and towards a threat to parents generally. In reality, the implication of the criticism is not that “parents aren’t trustworthy” as Lane suggests. The very direct and explicit criticism is that the interests of the Homeschool institution are not grounded in the well-being of children. It isn’t that “we need to be afraid about homeschooling”, it is that we should be concerned about an institution that views children as weapons in a holy war. It is this mindset of viewing children as tools and objects instead of individuals that makes the Homeschool institution dangerous. Its goals are not about the enrichment of children’s lives or about seeking the best education for a particular child, it is about using children as a means to protect a perceived purity that is under threat.
“Children are … the greatest weapon in God’s arsenal to reform our society.”
-Michael Farris in the HSLDA Court Report - Spring 1988
Beyond Ecumenicism
Homeschooling, like all reactionary thought, is based on the premise of in-groups and out-groups. Threats from the inside jeopardize the movement’s legitimacy, but threats from the outside strengthen it. It is an ideology that can never protect its vulnerable because the movement’s existence is predicated on only defending from the out-groups, not the in-group. This is why the Duggar parents hid Josh’s crimes, it is why Farris won’t acknowledge that his policy goals endanger children, and it is why Lane obscures Gothardism’s influence. To the extent that they will protect children, it is only on the condition that the harm comes from out-groups. If a child is harmed by those inside, the only concern is to place distance between themselves and the accused. It is this mentality that allows Lane and Farris to discard the stories of dissatisfied graduates, general neglect, abuse, and even death of children under homeschooling. Weapons are expendable after all.
When Lane says Gothardism and the Duggars are not representative of Homeschooling, she is only correct on the surface. Most Homeschoolers may not practice that same religious denomination, subscribe to the same ideas on corporal punishment, or have so many children, but almost all have the same motivations as her. The face of Homeschooling has many veneers: “homeschooling allows parents to teach to their child’s learning style”, “My child can focus on what’s important to them through homeschooling”, “Public education is not what it used to be.’” None of these are sincere primary motivations, but they are useful for recruiting potential converts and to justify their decision in a colorblind manner. As specific doctrines and purported motivations are cycled in and out of the movement, what remains constant is the belief that parents are under attack for raising children in line with a perceived natural order.
Bill Gothard and the Duggars are no longer invited to Homeschool conferences, but it’s not because their beliefs have fallen out of favor. It is because they have become a liability. Without their crimes made public, both would still be welcomed and promoted. Quiverfull messaging is still preached by conference exhibitors, and bragging rights are given to those with the most children. Those messages still fit in just fine with the larger movement, and will continue to blend and crossbreed with the incoming class of homeschoolers. Because it doesn’t matter whether someone preaches that you should have 1 child or 20, what matters is if you can provide divine enlightenment on the way to raise children.
The HSLDA doesn’t go on InfoWars anymore, and their outward-facing rhetoric has de-escalated with the leadership transition from Farris through today. This doesn’t mean their underlying motivations have changed, it is just part of the rebrand Lane is helping to facilitate. But Lane isn’t just covering up the Duggars and Gothard’s role in Homeschooling as a favor to the HSLDA, she is doing it for herself. She is choosing to ignore established facts and instead ingratiate herself to an organization that can advance her career. Even beyond that, her sub-style of Conservatism craves a distinction between herself and MAGA Republicans. Even though her interests align to a high degree with theirs, she recognizes the distastefulness and must do what she can to draw distinct lines where there are none.
Lane is fulfilling an important role. The Duggars and Bill Gothard aren’t a good look for Homeschooling, but a historian with a Ph.D. from Notre Dame can give the legitimacy they taint. Underneath their individual identities and observed as a whole, Farris, Lane, Gothard, the Duggars, and even Alex Jones are motivated by the same worldview. Specific tactics and practices will differ, but at its core they provide different functions for the same body. Not because they homeschool, but because what they believe Homeschooling is: not a mode of education, but a weapon to protect the pure from contamination by the unrighteous.∎
Oh wow, you read the whole thing? If you enjoyed this piece you should also check out the last post about how the largest homeschool textbook publisher has covered up its past as a segregation academy. Maybe even share the piece. Maybe get a little crazy and smash that subscribe button.
Milton Gaither. Homeschool: An American History. Page 174
ibid Page 173
ibid Page 175
https://homeschoolersanonymous.wordpress.com/2014/08/31/hslda-gave-this-man-their-prestigious-lifetime-achievement-award-just-4-years-ago/
https://hslda.org/post/a-line-in-the-sand
Milton Gaither. Homeschool: An American History. Page 173
HSLDA Court Report. Jan/Feb 2004. Can Judiical Tyanny Be Stopped?
HSLDA Court Report. Summer 1988. The True Origin of “Separation of Church and State.”
Yet.
HSLDA Court Report - Summer 1990. Crime Bill Likely to Pass With Dangerous Child Abuse Provisions.
HSLDA Court Report. Nov/Dec 2007. A Deeper Understanding of the Threat of International Law
Ok, not really a coincidence. Both Farris and Lane live just west of Fairfax. It is also one of the most liberal counties in Virginia going +42 Biden in 2020. It is and will continue to be a target of conservatives.
https://merionwest.com/2023/02/03/arguments-against-school-choice-presume-we-have-options/
Just as a fun note, Lane very liberally uses brackets in adding to the school board’s letter. In addition to just straight-up fabricating intent by the school board, she takes “widen the gap in educational access” and turns it into “widen the [achievement] gap”. Not the same statement, but it allows her to use a buzzword that will trigger her audience—sloppy work.