The School is the State's. Your Children are Yours.

This winter has been awfully cold. It's the midwest. Some winters are colder than others. Government schools cancel, have snow days, and make up those days at the end of the year. It's been this way for always. Whenever the local school district changes the routine and calls off for the day, or asks for a delay for school busses and other transportation, a percentage of parents complain. It's nothing to spend time on, generally. People are always looking for things to complain about.
I homeschool most of my children. My step-children attend a government school. This winter I've had to scan the Facebook page of their school to know when school is canceled and what-not. Whenever the school does not close when parents think they ought, I've noticed a plethora of parents who feel the need to comment defiantly that they will not be sending their children. They aggressively accuse the school system of being dictators and trying to control their family and harm their children. This leaves me saddened as well as perplexed.
I want to see parents wake up a little bit. The public, government school does not own your children. They have ZERO authority over your family. You owe no one an excuse for making a parental choice to keep your child home. Just do it. I think part of the problem is that we've allowed the government school to be the default education (and nanny), and everything else is "alternative" or non-conforming. When you have a child, you should be proactively choosing your child's education, evaluating all options, accessing your child's individual needs, and the values of your family. Then, should you choose a local, government school to educate your children (which far fewer of you would, I believe) you might not feel this sort of stress. You might be more at peace and feel more in control.
 I am usually the first one to arrogantly sneer in the face of the public school and it's pretend sovereignty. Not this time though. While dozens of parents sounded like they were ready to uprise in revolution over a snow day, the school did not respond. They made no comment. No reason to fear any sort of backlash against a parent for keeping their child toasty at home by a fire-place, with a good book, and hot chocolate. Oops, I mean fighting their siblings over a box of poptarts and turning into a zombie in front of PBSKids for 6 hours, whatever.
 My point is that hostility is unwarrented. Take a deep breath and recognize that the words unexcused absence mean absolutely nothing, that your children are yours to parent, and the only person that can make your child attend school, is you. If you constantly need to lambast the school for choices it has to make to consider all who attend, maybe you ought to consider other educational options for your child.