Well, there goes THAT suit…
The latest KABOOM occurred when I read this report about Felicia Smith, a Houston 40-something middle school sexual predator masquerading as a teacher, who gave a a male student a lap dance in class, in front of his classmates, for his birthday.
I’m not going to reprint the details here; there are not levels of inappropriate lap dances for pre-teens. The teacher is under arrest; that’s not enough. A school that vets its teachers this negligently is a menace; a profession that allows a practitioner with such wretched judgement and such vile proclivities in its ranks is innately untrustworthy and an ugly sham. And a society that entrusts its vulnerable young to a system so corrupt and inept that this could occur is irresponsible.
One young maniac attacks a school in New Town, and a national movement of fear is launched to remove a Constitutional right. Teachers sexually assault students nearly every day. What are schools doing about it? What are teacher unions and the education profession doing to protect potential victims? Where is the oversight? Does anyone believe that until she turned into a middle school stripper, Smith never demonstrated any suspicious tendencies? She just awoke one morning and decided that this was the day to give a child a lap dance? I don’t.
I nearly experienced a second KABOOM when I read the cheerful account of Smith’s crime in the Daily Caller. The author, “education editor” Eric Owens, has been flagged here before for his sick appreciation of teacher-on-child sexual predation. It’s all so hilariously titillating, in Owens’ view, when grade school education becomes a carnal exercise and children are turned into sexual playthings. Here was his snickering version of the Smith assault, in part:
Prosecutors in Houston, Texas charged a middle school teacher because she gave a full-on lap dance to a boy for his birthday in front of an entire class of no-doubt impressed preteens.The teacher, Felicia Smith, staged the lap dance in her classroom at Stovall Middle School on February 26, reports local CBS affiliate KHOU. When police interviewed the unnamed student, he said Smith, 42, had seductively placed a school chair in front of the classroom after the tardy bell rang…Once the kid sat down, the fortysomething teacher gave him what was perhaps his first full-contact lap dance. According to a police report, Smith did the thing where she turned around and swiveled her butt on the middle school student. She rubbed her hands all over his body. She also got down on her knees and stuck her head between the boy’s legs. It’s not clear if the kid enjoyed the lap dance. However, he admitted that he did slap Smith’s ass a couple times. The incident lasted a little over three-and-a-half minutes — presumably the duration of the song that was playing. It’s not clear which song was chosen for the special occasion…
Creeps like Eric Owens, in the media, on school boards, and receiving ties on Father’s Day, enable the casual tolerance of a system that fails to protect our kids from teachers who see their students as sexual conquests. I’m tired of reading these stories; I comment on a tiny percentage of them. I wonder when educators will tire themselves sufficiently to take responsible steps to clean up their untrustworthy, unprofessional, profession.
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Sources: Yahoo, The Daily Caller
Ethics Alarms 
*pinches the bridge of his nose and lets out that deep sigh of the defeated*
Anyone who finds such conduct to be anything other than vile and a danger to children is himself a danger. Culturally, we’ve managed to degrade the status of our children to that of occasionally useful tools in whatever agenda or ambition motivates the adult in charge of them. I might also point out that the Houston Independent School District has a pretty dismal reputation when it comes to teacher hiring practices and has for quite some time.
” Does anyone believe that until she turned into a middle school stripper, Smith never demonstrated any suspicious tendencies? ”
People do notice. There is a tense period where students complain and staff members become suspicious. This can unfortunately can last for years, before the teacher in question does something sufficiently serious to force dismissal and/or arrest. There needs to be a way to effectively address some of the lesser inappropriate behaviors, which over time are plenty damaging to the students.
I don’t know what qualities and characteristics exhibit themselves during hiring processes that would clue anyone in to predicting an individual would engage in such unbelievable behavior as that.
This is ethics incompleteness theorem at its worst in a society in which most social standards have completely slid, Jack. When any level of personal conduct is allowed, then the very behaviors that might clue a hiring authority in to possible miscreant conduct are the very SAME behaviors that if discriminated will land the hiring authority in a big old lawsuit because with any other candidate, those behaviors are “innocent and private”.
A properly motivated and organized terrorist group would cut the incidence of teacher-touchies-of-students WAY back. The group could even call itself “The PTA” – for Parents and Teachers, Avenging – FOR THE CHILDREN. Just sayin’.
No…
No. No NO No No.
I just… I donno…
How? I don’t know how.