Teachers online, vs. Ohio restrictions
Regina Lynn writes an every-other-week Friday column for Wired magazine. This week she respond to actions in Ohio – where a Columbus Dispatch article reports the teachers union advised its members that online profiles could jeopardize their jobs. A saucy profile might imply inappropriate relations with students.
The lot of school teachers has long been circumscribed in America. When communities hired a teacher for their one-room school, they frequently required the (usually) lady to be unmarried, and forbidden to date. The pay was often execrable, and the school teacher was often quartered with a ‘respectable’ couple, paying a pittance for room and board and living under ‘proper’ scrutiny. The school teacher was held to a very strict standard of social conduct, with no PDA (Public Display of Affection) allowed – any hint of scandal, even malicious lies, could cost their job.
We place much emphasis on protecting our children. We limit the content of the films we let them see, the topics and word choices we permit when they are present. The theory is to leave children in a safe and secure world, and introduce conflict and danger gradually, as they mature. Schooling is expected to participate in the sheltering of our children.
In modern times we allow teachers to marry, even during school term. In my life we have gone from sequestering teachers away when they get pregnant, to my niece teaching up to a week or two before delivering.
I guess the question boils down to whether PDA’s in the school are permitted. I can sympathize with anyone that thinks a provocative image of a person online equates to a PDA on the street or in the hall or classroom. So the question for me is not whether to threaten the job of someone presenting sexually suggestive images of themselves, but whether to permit the same imagery – in person – in public.
Let me back up a bit. I am a nudist. I have no problem with nudity in public, in private, or online. I get nekkid regularly – in the last day I have stripped off to change clothes, take a shower, etc., and I expect many other have, too. There are places where now wearing clothes is pretty much understood, including designated volleyball and tennis courts, and pools and beaches. We deliberately gather 5th grade and older students to take (gender segregated) communal showers, so mere nudity cannot be seen as something to be worried about.
Sexually provocative images and behavior, clothed or unclothed, have their place. Mostly when business or fashion are exploiting ‘naughty’ impulses.
Recent Comments