WSVN-7 ran a small item yesterday about the yanking from the classroom of a Blanche Ely High School teacher who was arrested on charges of domestic battery and cruelty to a child. The yanking, it seems, was caused by the arrest.
The man hasn't been convicted of anything. If he is acquitted, we must hope he'll be promptly reinstated and apologized to. Either way, the event does pose the question: Why do we always identify and suspend teachers who are arrested?
Google "teacher charged" and you'll find all kinds of things for which teachers are charged, identified in the media, and dismissed from duty. It kind of makes sense in cases of child abuse, but what about regular domestic abuse? Petty theft? Drunk driving? I'm pretty sure you don't need to know if your kid's teacher knocked back a few too many before driving home from the dive to which she alights to drink away her sorrow at having committed her life to such a thankless, dead-end profession.
I would, however, like to know if my neurosurgeon has been caught driving drunk.
So here's the deal: If we're going to constantly identify and sack our misbehaving teachers, why not also identify and sack our:
Doctors! Especially
when they've been drinking and driving, which suggests a certain
callousness w/r/t to mortality that I find unbecoming in someone who
might take a scalpel to my guts or prescribe me strong medications.
Lawyers and judges! Especially when they've been caught beating their wives. Tempers and the law don't mix.
Cops! For absolutely everything, because they've got guns.
But
no. Mostly, we're just scandalized when teachers misbehave. Probably
because they've got access to our kids. But also probably because deep
in the heart of every otherwise decent person lives a little particle
of bully that delights in the embarrassment of the weak, the poor, and
the hapless.
That said -- this particular Blanche Ely Teacher sounds like a douche.
