Protest over teacher's erotic vampire website

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

"They" believe its important to deprive students of a senior English teacher (who is also the head of the drama department) in the run up to their final GCSE exams.

Apparantly so!

But then again, she doesn't know the difference between writers plural and writer's possessive...so she's prolly a ####### teacher anyways

Seriously though, I see this sense of 'entitlement' more and more these days. If you have an employer, you have to play by his/her rules. The school has every right to make a code of conduct or to expect the teachers to behave a certain way outside of the school. If you don't like it, then don't work there.

Oh wah wah wah 'the religious b@stards infringing on the rights of so and so!!!'

but as I said before, I'm sure the teach is most prolly loving the attn and the press, and her book sales will have most probably increased since this story broke. This could be her career making moment!

I doubt it will do much for her sales, personally speaking. Her book, which I referenced above is self-published by AuthorHouse. From experience I doubt she makes much money off of it at all - this transitory news story will hardly do much to boost her sales and popularity in any meaningful way.

I wonder if you can show where these "rules of conduct" are set in concrete. My point is that the rules seem to be arbitrary as far as they pertain to this teacher's personal life, which is as far as her writing goes, is not immoral and certainly not illegal. In that context its rather pedestrian to say "If you don't like it, then don't work there" - because aside from the obvious, how exactly is a potential teaching candidate to know exactly what is "inappropriate".

It comes down to the fact that the school personally disapproves of the content of her work. It has nothing to do with the performance of her job, she is not cavorting in strip clubs, seducing her students or an alcoholic/drug abuser. She's a human being like the rest of us. What's next? You get suspended because someone sees you going into the latest Hannibal Lecter movie. Please...

[pedroh 21]

sadly, teachers don't have a private life.. specially in small towns.. we can't go to a club round here cuz then next day some stupid kid who got into the club will start saying 'oh Mrs H was drinking and dancing' and then stupid parents start thinking ohh she must be an alcoholic...

i've been to my wife's school to help her with some spanish projects... and I don't have a private life either.. If I buy a gangsta t-shirt (yes, i know they promote crime, but hey, i like them) and i go to the mall or something, some kid will tell that next day in high school, and my wife will give me sh!t cuz I was wearing a 'dope money' or some tshirt like that... sigh..

i think that's ridiculous, that educators can't have private lives because some @sshole will say he/she's irresponsible..

Edited February 18, 2007 by pedroh

[Fandango 1,440]

"They" believe its important to deprive students of a senior English teacher (who is also the head of the drama department) in the run up to their final GCSE exams.

Apparantly so!

But then again, she doesn't know the difference between writers plural and writer's possessive...so she's prolly a ####### teacher anyways

Seriously though, I see this sense of 'entitlement' more and more these days. If you have an employer, you have to play by his/her rules. The school has every right to make a code of conduct or to expect the teachers to behave a certain way outside of the school. If you don't like it, then don't work there.

Oh wah wah wah 'the religious b@stards infringing on the rights of so and so!!!'

but as I said before, I'm sure the teach is most prolly loving the attn and the press, and her book sales will have most probably increased since this story broke. This could be her career making moment!

I doubt it will do much for her sales, personally speaking. Her book, which I referenced above is self-published by AuthorHouse. From experience I doubt she makes much money off of it at all - this transitory news story will hardly do much to boost her sales and popularity in any meaningful way.

I wonder if you can show where these "rules of conduct" are set in concrete. My point is that the rules seem to be arbitrary as far as they pertain to this teacher's personal life, which is as far as her writing goes, is not immoral and certainly not illegal. In that context its rather pedestrian to say "If you don't like it, then don't work there" - because aside from the obvious, how exactly is a potential teaching candidate to know exactly what is "inappropriate".

It comes down to the fact that the school personally disapproves of the content of her work. It has nothing to do with the performance of her job, she is not cavorting in strip clubs, seducing her students or an alcoholic/drug abuser. She's a human being like the rest of us. What's next? You get suspended because someone sees you going into the latest Hannibal Lecter movie. Please...

I wonder if you can show where the 'rules of conduct' are NOT set in concrete. Who knows...maybe they are, maybe they're not. And 'immoral' is rather a fluid term, isn't it...I mean how long is a piece of string? You're saying 'how exactly is a teacher to know' when the obvious answer is maybe they told her...maybe it's set forth...but I think any reasonable person would imagine that a teacher posting erotic piccies on a site that is most popular between school-aged children seems to be outside the scope of rational thought. It hardly compares to going to see a Hannibal Lecter movie, so spare us all the Chicken Little routine.

Also, to say that she probably won't receive more success is kind of short sighted to me. The whole world is talking about this teacher from Manchester, whereas a week ago, no one knew her name. She ran a website....presumably to gain notoriety. She succeeded

Edited February 18, 2007 by LisaD

[Fandango 1,440]

adding: if there was nothing untoward with the Myspace page, one needs to ask the question WHY was the page closed?

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

"They" believe its important to deprive students of a senior English teacher (who is also the head of the drama department) in the run up to their final GCSE exams.

Apparantly so!

But then again, she doesn't know the difference between writers plural and writer's possessive...so she's prolly a ####### teacher anyways

Seriously though, I see this sense of 'entitlement' more and more these days. If you have an employer, you have to play by his/her rules. The school has every right to make a code of conduct or to expect the teachers to behave a certain way outside of the school. If you don't like it, then don't work there.

Oh wah wah wah 'the religious b@stards infringing on the rights of so and so!!!'

but as I said before, I'm sure the teach is most prolly loving the attn and the press, and her book sales will have most probably increased since this story broke. This could be her career making moment!

I doubt it will do much for her sales, personally speaking. Her book, which I referenced above is self-published by AuthorHouse. From experience I doubt she makes much money off of it at all - this transitory news story will hardly do much to boost her sales and popularity in any meaningful way.

I wonder if you can show where these "rules of conduct" are set in concrete. My point is that the rules seem to be arbitrary as far as they pertain to this teacher's personal life, which is as far as her writing goes, is not immoral and certainly not illegal. In that context its rather pedestrian to say "If you don't like it, then don't work there" - because aside from the obvious, how exactly is a potential teaching candidate to know exactly what is "inappropriate".

It comes down to the fact that the school personally disapproves of the content of her work. It has nothing to do with the performance of her job, she is not cavorting in strip clubs, seducing her students or an alcoholic/drug abuser. She's a human being like the rest of us. What's next? You get suspended because someone sees you going into the latest Hannibal Lecter movie. Please...

I wonder if you can show where the 'rules of conduct' are NOT set in concrete. Who knows...maybe they are, maybe they're not. And 'immoral' is rather a fluid term, isn't it...I mean how long is a piece of string? You're saying 'how exactly is a teacher to know' when the obvious answer is maybe they told her...maybe it's set forth...but I think any reasonable person would imagine that a teacher posting lewd piccies on a site that is most popular between school-aged children seems to be outside the scope of rational thought. It hardly compares to going to see a Hannibal Lecter movie, so spare us all the Chicken Little routine.

Also, to say that she probably won't receive more success is kind of short sighted to me. The whole world is talking about this teacher from Manchester, whereas a week ago, no one knew her name. She ran a website....presumably to gain notoriety. She succeeded

She's a self-published author. She makes little, if no money, from her writing (if anything she probably makes a loss). Even published authors make relatively little - and unless you are a huge, well-known author its simply impossible to make a living solely from your writing. As I said, many authors hold down full-time jobs to pay the bills so that they can indulge their writing interests in their spare time. Whatever interest she will gain short-term will not boost her career in any meaningful way.

If the school can decide a teacher has acted improperly for writing "lurid material", then what's to stop them being lambasted for their movie-going / TV viewing tastes? This goes a little beyond this specific school - its directly about the ability to manage your private life separate to your job. In short, its not their business.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

adding: if there was nothing untoward with the Myspace page, one needs to ask the question WHY was the page closed?

Smoke without fire eh? Sorry - the fact that it 'looks suspicious' doesn't mean that it is. The woman has been told by the school that she can't comment and the pulling of the page is no doubt tied to the "ongoing investigation" - if she didn't comply she would probably have been dismissed on the spot. I'm sure you can relate to a career worker wanting to preserve their primary source of income and future employment prospects.

Edited February 18, 2007 by erekose

[Caladan 19]

Meh. erekose has summed it up nicely, writing bad gothic vampire stories is only equivalent to child molestation if you're on crack, and if your pen name is Paigen Stone you probably deserve whatever's coming to you on grounds of bad taste.

Edited February 18, 2007 by Caladan

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

...if your pen name is Paigen Stone you probably deserve whatever's coming to you on grounds of bad taste.

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