I don't know what you were like as a child but my Mum would sometimes say "don't open x", or "don't go in x cupboard". Inevitably this led to an overwhelming desire to do the prohibited thing. It was with this in mind that I greeted the news from San Francisco that Junior high school students have been asked not to search Internet sex sites for a teacher who may have been moonlighting as a porn star, a Southern California school district said in a letter to parents.
This according to the San Francisco Chronicle, which states that Oxnard school district officials say a junior high school teacher was put on paid administrative leave this week after allegations surfaced that she was moonlighting as a porn actress. District officials stressed the teacher is not being accused of a crime, but they are concerned about the effect the allegations might have on the students.
So, no crime, nothing done wrong. Officials are concerned about the impact on children who wouldn't have known (unless they were busy constantly looking at porn and happened to come upon this teacher (as it were). A highly unlikely event. At least it was, until parents were sent letters telling them to not search/discourage their children from searching porn videos for this teacher. The only thing more amazing than this approach is the fact that nobody in the administrative chain thought "hang on, will this actually make matters worse, and potentially make us look rather inept?".
The man - whose alleged to be the porn performer 'Hytch Cawke' (not one the best names) - claimed to have no idea what Fox were on about. All of this is a story for Fox because the man is now a school teacher as they revealed in this piece. The school seems fine, noting the high standard of references received in the course of recruiting him. They seem to be standing by their man but the state Department of Education is investigating so we'll see how long that lasts. Fox also confronted parents who seemed shocked. One provided the quote Fox were looking for when they answered whether the news worried them: “Very much so. Especially since he's teaching our children. Everyday. It does bother me a lot,” the parent replied.
Why silly parent, why? You child is probably a result of you engaging in a spot of bonking with your other half, and they seem to cope with living in the same house as you despite your ignorant views. You may still even get up to some shameful heterosexual activity when your child is merely feet away in the home. Is it that your sex teacher is revealed to have a sex life that disturbs you? That he's gay, or simply that he was apparently good enough at sex to be paid as a porn performer in three films? Would you rather the teaching profession was limited to unattractive people who are bad at sex? I'd such celibate member soy the clergy but that's generally not worked so well. It's also striking to hear a parent praise the teacher, reporting how popular he is as a coach and teacher with students. This is a guy who's apparently brilliant at his job and his previous work as a porn performer had not - until Fox stuck their nose in - impacted on that performance.
This sort of silly story seeks to explore the 'morality' of teaching, suggesting some sort of non-sexual purity which I genuinely find puzzling. Nor is it restricted to the US, for we've seen similar stories in the UK. Yet whilst I say it's silly, it is in fact devastating to this guy and similar teachers who find themselves 'exposed' in this way. It's nothing short of a disgrace that journalists have carried on in this way, throwing lives and careers to the wind. We also see towards the end of the clip that the reporting journalist admonishes teachers who also post pictures of themselves drinking alcohol on line. This is the mentality of these moralising nuts. Words fail me.
I've had a few requests in the last week for my module guide - essentially what I teach on my Law and Sexuality undergraduate course. I'm not grumbling as I'm always pleased that anyone shows any interest in my modest attempt to explore some aspects of law and sexuality, but I figured the rest of you might be interested in seeing it too. I've uploaded it to my slideshare account and you can view/download it below.
