Earlier quoted context omitted.
As a homeschooled kid: Be warned that I heard “homeschooling has changed since we were in school” in the early 2000s, from multiple parents who are now estranged from their adult children. It hasn’t really changed that much - it’s just something parents like to tell themselves to avoid thinking about the experiences their children are missing.
Throwaway for sensitive topic. I came here to write your comment and was thrilled to find it already here. As a homeschooled kid who considers myself damaged as a result, I completely agree. The OP comment is eerily similar to stuff my parents said in the 2000s-early 10s and were totally wrong about. My parents weren't religious at all and were totally in it for academic enrichment. They were all about the "new wave…
I got bullied pretty relentlessly (the goods are odd... and an easy target) and what little solace I could find was in doing my academic best, and receiving recognition and accolades from my parents and teachers. Thus I have also ended up a people-pleaser.
> Homeschooling is the ultimate egotistical project of attempting to form a living, human child [...] into a mirror of one's self.
Certainly for some, but that is not our goal and I am trying to be very mindful and cautious of that pitfall. I am trying to give my children the tools and skills that they will need in order to live fulfilling lives (by which I mean, able to keep themselves housed and fed, and with whatever calling or vocation or work pleases them most. I suppose that does carry a bit of my own projection with it, that it would be difficult to find life fulfilling if one is starving or without reliable shelter, but I feel that such beliefs are shared by enough of our society that the kids would receive them if they were in school as well). Will I make mistakes? Certainly. Will we be able to maintain a good relationship? I dearly hope so, but time will tell. Do I think the odds of us achieving those goals are higher than if we forced them into a school? Yes, I do.
The kids are involved in a number of extracurricular activities (mostly physical activities like biking and swimming and dance, but likely robotics at some point sooner rather than later) many of which include a range of kids with varying ages, many (most?) of whom are not homeschooled. Why wouldn't this expose them to different cultures, and provide them with other sources of approval and validation (friends, teammates, coaches, other parents)? Hopefully it will, even as that means I have to quash my desire to discourage them from hanging out with people whose views I don't necessarily agree with--just as I would if they were in school.
Anyway, in closing, to me it seems like the challenge is more one of helping kids, especially neurodiverse ones, learn how to navigate a variety of social dynamics and to be strong, independent persons who have a sense of personal identity and the skills to share that with other people but also to defend their boundaries when pushed... and that neither public school nor homeschool are necessarily good or bad at that (or perhaps, given our respective experiences, that both are bad at it ~wry grin~)