Hmm.
-Do not have meaningful friendships.
How would you define meaningful? Is it determined by the amount of time you spend sitting in the same room with someone?
-Lack social skills appropriate to everyday interaction.
I don't know who you've been looking at, but the homeschoolers we know don't have that problem. Sure, homeschoolers may not necessarily be up on the latest fashions, fads, music, etc., and this can sometimes cause a "culture" gap, but do you really want to connect with people who are that shallow?
We have all sorts of friends from church, neighborhood, community college, assorted extracurriculars, etc. The majority are public schoolers. Are we just lucky, or could you perhaps be mistaken?
-Do not develop strong personalities.
Again, how do you define strong personality? Is it someone who believes totally in their point of view, or it just someone who rebels against their parents? I would say that this is your single most ridiculous point, seeing as how businesses and colleges are always remarking on how homeschoolers are most likely to speak up and take leadership positions. I occasionally get into trouble myself when my personality is
too strong, but never for the opposite reason
-Don't know how to dance.
Neither do the vast majority of public schoolers. Have you ever attended a dance and observed the general quality thereof? I will admit that I don't know how to dance myself, but that's mostly because of physical handicaps. My siblings have taken some actual dance lessons.
-Have never been to a rock concert.
That's a huge loss. My life is now ruined. I have however been to a number of homeschool and juggling conventions. I think juggling conventions trump most rock concerts.
-Center their lives on family life to an abnormal degree.
Abnormal is an ambiguous term. Staying at home all the time is a bit much, but until fairly recently, the alternative was running the chance of having social workers come and take you away. Now homeschooling is more mainstream, there are dozens or hundreds of homeschool organizations in every state, and homeschoolers can safely participate in regular (and in some states, school) extracurriculars. Even if you are correct about homeschoolers being maladjusted in the past - which I still debate - that's not a good reason why people just now starting to homeschool will have the same problems.
-Have never been on a date.
Date is also ambiguous. If you don't stay at home all the time, you will meet people you like, and if you meet people you like, you'll hopefully be able to go out and do fun things with them - but if your definition of date is just making out, you're probably correct that a lot of homeschoolers pass this up until they're an age at which they can marry and actually support a family.
-Do not possess even a periphery knowledge of popular culture, and as a result form outrageous judgments on various aspects of it.
What sort of popular culture? Do you have to jump over a cliff to know you'll go smush at the bottom?
-Develop philosophical, political and religious beliefs which mirror those of their parents.
Statistics show that this is generally the case for all childen, regardless of whether they're homeschooled or not. But I'd consider it quite a compliment to homeschooling parents if in fact very few of their children disagreed with them to any major extent, considering that rebellion usually means abusive, inattentive, or naive parents. I love my parents the way they are
-Are insecure around strangers.
No problems here. Insecurity usually stems from being afraid of being made fun of, and a good education and the knowledge that your family is backing you give you the confidence to weather pretty much anything. Look around the forum, there are posts from people who are so afraid of public school that they get physically sick.
Homeschoolers do typically identify better with adults than children their own age, but that's because the children their own age are so shallow and have nothing in common with them. See the part about popular culture above.
-Can't speak in public effectively.
This is just an expansion of the item above. How big a percentage of public schoolers do you think can give a coherent, convincing argument on any important issue? You do know that Patrick Henry, the college run by Home School Legal Defense Association, has won more debate awards every year since its founding than probably any other college in the US? Just to give a typical example, in 2003 Patrick Henry won the award for best overall debate program; 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th place awards in the open speaker competition; 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th place awards in the open team competition; and 1st place in the singles competition. And homeschoolers take far more than their percentage of major leadership positions in college.
-Hold an irrational distrust of the public school system.
It's only irrational if it's unfounded. Bad education? Check. Violence? Check. Inappropriate curriculum? Check. Public school extracurriculars usually aren't so bad, but that's because only the more motivated public schoolers volunteer for them, and there's a lot more parent interaction.
Given, not all public schools are bad, and not all homeschools are good, but in terms of averages, homeschooling just plain shows better results than public schooling, and I don't see that changing any time soon unless there's some serious reform of the public school system. School vouchers and some form of basic teacher testing would be a good start, if the teachers' unions weren't busily blocking any proposal of that sort.
Against Homeschooling