If it's any consolation, Coach Withee, George Costanza sends his sympathies.

With the notable exception of the high school art teacher who moonlighted on the web as an artist that painted pictures using his butt and genitals while wearing a paper bag over his head, most victims of the “Naked Teacher Principle”(TNTP for short) have been females.  [You can read the initial exposition of the principle here. “To put it in the simplest possible terms, a responsible high school teacher has a duty to take reasonable care that her students do not see her in the nude. It’s not too much to ask.”] This time, however, the naked teacher was not only male but the football coach. And, as the merciless Principle demands, he’s out of a job.

This is a sad one. In Maine, Oxford Hills high school varsity football coach Paul Withee resigned yesterday after school officials received a complaint from a parent that he posted a nude picture of himself on Facebook. . He had, Weiner-like, botched an intended post for one special friend, and instead sent it to the world. It was only up for a half-hour before he realized what he had done, but it was enough to trigger TNTP, Football Coach Variation, and it was game over.

He was not just a naked football coach, but also a naked mathematics teacher at the school. Oxford Hills, wisely (and any school that does not have this today is negligent and naive) had clear policies that made such, uh, exposure on the web a firing offense, so Withee did not have the opportunity to make the usual “this has nothing to do with my ability as a teacher” arguments that other naked teachers have attempted. Not that he would have tried that route; Withee said that he was “embarrassed… ashamed” and “humiliated.” Though one parent quoted in the news article about the event said that the episode destroyed Withee as an object of respect and authority—the usual result of The Naked Teacher Principle—that seems a bit harsh in his case. Mostly, the coach was guilty of being an online bungler and, like countless others, having the strange delusion that anything posted on Facebook is private.  If no parent or student had seen his photo before he took it down, I would argue that TNTP should not be applied to him. Students could not lose respect for a teacher whose naked photo was posted but whose naughty bits were not seen by anyone connected with the school. There would be no foul and no consequences. The Naked Teacher Principle is a creature of moral luck—it only kicks in if you’re caught. Still, he school might want to reconsider its policy of allowing teachers to have students as Facebook friends, though Withee was wise enough not to have any students on his friend list.

He was not wise enough, however, to avoid the Naked Teacher Principal, which claimed another victim. He was caught, and, sadly, the Naked Teacher Principle takes no prisoners.