It has been exactly two years and 6 days since I have posted a blog. And what changed two years ago is that I left my job teaching at a community college and started a teaching position at a high school. What a difference such a small change can bring. Looking back over the posts on this blog since its inception, I am moderately embarrassed by the candor with which I expressed some very personal feelings and experiences. And while I was tempted to remove those posts faster than a double-chin picture tag on Facebook, I've decided to leave them up for the same reason you put a picture on your mirror of you at your fattest-- as a cringe-worthy reminder of where I have come from and where I never need to go back to!
That said, for the nine followers (bless your hearts) I have or anyone else that ever read my blog (thank you), you can see that I have changed its name and am thus going to try to change its point...to what new point, I don't know, but I suspect it will be related to my teaching career (hence and the nerdy book background).
To that end-- I got extremely angry tonight, and felt like this was the perfect vehicle to vent my frustration (also, because I like to be a courteous social media user and I know ain't nobody got time for a 8000 character Facebook status) about this specific issue.
In October, I remember reading this story and feeling extremely disturbed by the cavalier tone of the police chief's comments to the press. "They should've known better." Hmm. When was the last time a priest was chastised for lack of judgement after repeatedly molesting a little boy?? Um, never. That was the last time.
Over the past few months, it seems like, there have been mounting stories in both Texas and across the U.S., of female teachers caught having sexual relationships with their high school students. I only see them because of specific news agencies I follow on social media. I cannot recall hearing the majority of these stories broadcast on the nightly news...and even the local cases are buried on broadcasts as the fourth or fifth story.
(And then) AND THEN, ABC hand delivers an exclusive Babs Walters interview with none other than the most famous woman to ever seduce a student, Mary Kay Letourneau, and her husband, Vili Fualaau, which casually glossed over hard realities and opted more for the "love story". They quickly brushed over things like... the fact that one of the two Fualaau children was born in prison. That Vili suffers from alcohol and substance abuse. That Mary Kay could not enter the children's hospital one of her other children was being treated in because of her sex offender status. They focused on the "enduring love" of these two individuals. Nevermind, Fualaau was 12 when they first consummated their relationship and 13 when he became a father for the first time. Please, tell me, how-- even this much time later-- we can make a spectacle worthy of an episode of The Bachelor about the relationship between a man AND. HIS. RAPIST. Lets not even talk about her saying she intends to fight her sex offender status and hopefully, get back to teaching!
Then, today on my way home, I saw a brief post about a teacher in Irving accused of her SECOND inappropriate, sexual relationship with a student. And it made me clenched-fists-expletive-screaming angry.
Holding the position of "teacher" in any capacity, in any classroom, from here to kingdom come, is more than just a job. It is a lauded, and sacred position a person steps into with immediate and direct capacity to influence the individuals they are there to instruct. Just like with policemen, priests, firemen, nurses and the like, we are all taught from a young age that people in these positions can be trusted. Automatically.
That is something I take very, very seriously, and there is not a day that goes by that the enormity of that weight is lost on me. And when we hear of teachers abusing their influence and engaging in sexual relationships with students, there is a public outcry...well at least if the teacher in question is a male and the student in question is a female. Right now, there are 100's of articles all over the internet about a sexual abuse scandal at a girl's school in Las Angeles that even Buzzfeed has picked up. But these stories of male students being ABUSED by their teachers? 'Congratulations' and 'way to go's abound in the comments. Our culture does not see sexual abuse of boys by women the same as sexual abuse of either gender by males.
That is the thing about all of this that has been burning in the pit of my stomach over the past few months. Underage boys are victims too. Letourneau repeated several times in her interview about "falling in love" with Fualaau...when he was twelve. Twelve. That is not love, that is pedophilia. But it is more acceptable in our society because why? Men are the typical sexual initiators and aggressors? A boy cannot be "raped" without consent?
In the two years I have worked in a high school, I have had boys between the ages of 14 and 18 cry their eyes out in front of me. I have had them share terrifying stories of the lives they lead at home with drug-addicted mothers and abusive fathers. I have heard about their hardships and the burden they carry every single day because they are considered the head of the household at just 14-years-old. They are the ones left in charge when dad gets deported and there are two kids under age ten in the one-bedroom apartment they all share. These boys have come and shared these fears, these insecurities, these vulnerabilities with me...their teacher, the person from whom they are seeking trust and support. I do not confuse my role or their intentions when they seek me out-- I understand how desperate they are for someone to listen just like most children do. Because that's what they are-- children. Even as boys, they are still children. And when a teacher makes a sexual advance on a student in their care (even if they are 18), they are violating one of the most sacred, special, and important relationships in. this. world.
I am disgusted by these women (and men) who prey on the weakness and vulnerability of kids to fill a void or satiate a thirst they cannot otherwise quench. It absolutely enrages me that there might be one person out there walking who might group all under-30 female teachers into the same group as these women who have been accused of such abhorrent acts. And I am absolutely sickened that our culture is so quick to forget the CRIMES a woman committed against a CHILD all because of their genders and their "happy ending". Show me that interview of the 53-year-old guy and his 31-year-old wife who he first raped continuously for a two year period BEFORE marrying her and living happily ever after.
Except you can't. Because we value the sexual innocence of females far more than we do their male counterparts. And its wrong. And it needs to stop.
No comments:
Post a Comment