Elsewhere (302)
Stanley Kurtz on tantrums, vanity, and woke pseudo-history:
[Peter] Wood gives us a portrait of 1619’s creator, Nikole Hannah-Jones. A woman who styles herself “the Beyoncé of journalism” acts the part of a diva, and more. Treated by the New York Times, according to Wood, as “exempt from ordinary forms of accountability,” Hannah-Jones didn’t deign to reply to even the most respectful and serious scholarly criticism of her project. She booked herself instead into speaking venues where she was greeted as hero, prophet, or genius. And of course, Hannah-Jones was showered with accolades, including the Pulitzer Prize.
Rudely putting down critics, falsely denying that she’d said things she had demonstrably said, deleting tweets that showed her in a bad light, the behavior that eventually destroyed Hannah-Jones’s credibility was in evidence well before the final collapse. And it was all encouraged by the Times, which treated Hannah-Jones with kid gloves and ignored her critics until its hand was forced. Even when Times magazine editor Jake Silverstein finally answered a critical letter from twelve historians (not the first such letter), that letter’s text was never printed in the magazine.
And Christopher F Rufo on Seattle’s ‘progressive’ alternative to policing and prison:
Though these programmes are ideologically aligned with revolutionary goals, they have failed to serve as practical replacements for the “formal justice system.” In one high-profile case, prosecutors diverted a youth offender named Diego Carballo-Oliveros into a “peace circle” programme, in which non-profit leaders burned sage, passed around a talking feather, and led Carballo-Oliveros through “months of self-reflection.” According to one corrections official, prosecutors and activists paraded Carballo-Oliveros around the city as the “shining example” of their approach. However, two weeks after completing the peace circle programme, Carballo-Oliveros and two accomplices lured a 15-year-old boy into the woods, robbed him, and slashed open his abdomen, chest, and head with a retractable knife.
You see, predatory sociopaths with histories of violence and robbery will be “liberated” by “healing circles” and “narrative storytelling.” Because, we’re assured, these things, when combined with burning sage, will “increase empathy.”
As usual, feel free to add your own links and snippets, on any subject, in the comments.
. . . . Nikole Hannah-Jones . . . .
I’ve been busy with Stuff—Basically more or less daily working, doing research, at least managing to keep up on the daily news and then keep juggling from there . . .
Who?
Seattle’s ‘progressive’ alternative to policing and prison
Hanging is an alternative to prison.
You see, predatory sociopaths with histories of violence and robbery will be “liberated” by “healing circles” and “narrative storytelling.” Because, we’re assured, these things, when combined with burning sage, will “increase empathy.”
When did we stop being a serious civilization?
When did we stop being a serious civilization?
What’s extraordinary, I think, isn’t the existence of ludicrously unrealistic people – people who will reliably double-down on even their most grotesque failures. Such people have always existed and most likely always will. The Clown Show begins in earnest when a society gives these people traction and leverage, such that they can influence social policy.
“Carballo-Oliveros and two accomplices lured a 15-year-old boy into the woods, robbed him, and slashed open his abdomen, chest, and head with a retractable knife.”
I bet they forgot to sing Kumbaya! I had a client [for behaviour management] like that about 20 years ago: 6′ 1″ tall and 15 stone at 16 years. School staff were terrified of him. He wanted to become just like a well known Australian thug and murderer called Chopper Reid. He liked hurting people and animals, took extreme risks and had no conscience: I wrote a memo to the effect that he was the most dangerous client I had ever had on my case load. The loving, caring social welfare folks in case management took me to task and reprimanded me – they apologised after his first rape.
The Clown Show begins in earnest when a society gives these people traction and leverage, such that they can influence social policy.
So long as it’s only the little people that disaster, terror, and death is visited upon.
When did we stop being a serious civilization?
Ehn, one will see over more time—social and cultural developments extending from C-19 are going to be interesting—but there has been that particular steady progression of the last forty years, rather mainly fueled by Eternal September . . . .
Early on there were those hipsters of the era fantasizing that claiming to be a mere label such as preppy thus automatically granted being exempt from ordinary forms of accountability instead of being adults—and then after the WWW got developed, such a blatant debacle extended and expanded.
Forty years later I’m informed that we have someone named Nikole Hannah-Jones doing the same sort of behavior, we have assorted right wingers fantasizing that variations on massive amounts of tweets per second mean that Trump actually won the US presidential election, and we have Seattle’s ‘progressive’ alternative to policing and prison:, three instances of yea many these days, again doing absolutely the same sort of behavior . . .
As rather noted, Such people have always existed and most likely always will.
For you will always have the [insert relevant label] among you.
But just the same, basic reality does keep coming back up, the adults keep going to work in the mornings to keep getting things done . . . .
So long as it’s only the little people that disaster, terror, and death is visited upon.
Medical professionals have indeed been providing reports of the little people.
Definitely: As a large scale exercise in competing for the Darwin Awards, over more time—social and cultural developments extending from C-19 are going to be interesting . . . .
When did we stop being a serious civilization?
In the 25 years after the end of WW2.
Off topic, but it seems that Orwell & Goode has been booted from Twitter.
‘Courage’.
Off topic, but it seems that Orwell & Goode has been booted from Twitter.
I’ve heard he’d been doxxed and was being harassed. By people gorged with piety and compassion, obviously.
I’ve heard he’d been doxxed and was being harassed.
Leftists certainly are kinder and more compassionate aren’t they?
Treated by the New York Times, according to Wood, as “exempt from ordinary forms of accountability,”…
TBF, it is the same people who stepped all over real journalist Gareth Jones to support the myth of Stalin’s Soviet miracle, so in pushing claptrap they are at least consistent.
…“the Beyoncé of journalism”…
Editors=autotuning, overrated, it fits.
The Clown Show begins in earnest when a society gives these people traction and leverage, such that they can influence social policy.
We’re supposed to laugh at it. Then it will just go away.
As for Orwell & Goode being booted and doxxed, gird you’re loins. They will pick them off one by one. No one is safe unless there is very serious pushback. The chances of that in our weak society are not good. The vast majority of people have been brainwashed to believe that anything to the right is evil beyond the pale that does not deserve to be heard.
Somewhat related.
These kinds of moral narcissism – generally indulged in at the expense of the law-abiding, including future victims of criminal predation – rarely bode well. We’ve seen the kinds of people they attract, and the kinds of contortions they involve. And we’ve seen how they tend to play out. Shying from punitive correction, in favour of ostentatious leniency and self-congratulation, is not a virtue. It is, more typically, quite the opposite.
From the healing circle article, the charts within use the phrase “under-represented” when referring to several groups of people.
Are they suggesting that the police need to arrest more Asians and fewer African Americans? Is that how crime works? On a quota?
Somewhat related
In the comments…Ten. Had forgotten about him. The quasi(?)-libertarian Minnow.
predatory sociopaths with histories of violence and robbery will be “liberated” by “healing circles” and “narrative storytelling.” Because, we’re assured, these things, when combined with burning sage, will “increase empathy.”
Any day now.
From the Seattle Times: “A controversial new method for addressing juvenile crime stalled after a murder charge for one participant. But instead of backing off, prosecutors are doubling down.”
“We cannot and will not stop until we overthrow it and replace it with a world based instead on solidarity, genuine democracy, and equality—a socialist world.”
Well of course you will. But it’s been tried before, and the results have been uniformly horrific. Democracy is one of the first things jettisoned. You can’t have solidarity and democracy together, as democracy invites a diversity of opinion. And once democracy is gone, there is no way to remove leaders, even as they become increasingly autocratic and unpopular. Your safety valve has been welded tight.
This has little to do with “justice, oppression, white supremacy” or any of the buzzwords deployed to smokescreen the goal. It’s about power. And nothing attracts these amoral sociopathic thugs like neo-feudalism.
And too many people just won’t take this thugs at their word.
On another note – after working 22 years in the justice system, I believe there is a place for some diversion programs — as long as the threat of going to jail if the program is not successfully completed is kept in place AND it was limited to the first-time misdemeanor offender. Most of the time the first time offender is mortified in being caught up in the judicial system and suddenly “having a record”. They are the ones that usually don’t re-offend.
But it is clear that “diversion” isn’t the goal of what’s going on in Seattle.
We cannot and will not stop until we overthrow it and replace it with a world based instead on solidarity, genuine democracy, and equality—a socialist world.
Let me get this straight. “Genuine democracy” good; populism bad.
Defenders of the Soviet Union will tell you they had “Genuine democracy” with a secret ballot and universal sufferage. Of course, there most often was one candidate and when there was more than one, the candidates all belonged to the Communist Party.
as long as the threat of going to jail if the program is not successfully completed is kept in place AND it was limited to the first-time misdemeanor offender.
For minor first-time transgressions, there’s something to be said for a sharp reality check, yes.
But the degree to which the sociopathically inclined can be rehabilitated seems rather limited and attempts are very often futile, and may pose a danger to others. If someone is the type of person who lures children into the woods in order to rob them, and stab them, and kill them – with both premeditation and, one assumes, a certain enjoyment – it’s unlikely that this person will ever be susceptible to any human remedy, short of a lethal injection.
And as noted before, there seems to be no end of people who will show us how virtuous they are, how superior they are, by putting others at risk with their forgiveness and excuses. And so, the next victim, and there typically is a next victim, is expected to be appreciative of this moral preening. Which one might more honestly call selfishness.
When did we stop being a serious civilization?
In the 1960s. Hippies, Yippies, Freaks – suspended adolescence as lifestyle choice. Viva Che, Mao’s Little Red Book, the entire rainbow of psychoactive substances, “freelance ziggy-zig rutting” (h/t Tom Wolfe), the explosion of the porn industry and its normalization of the most extreme degeneracy. The transformation of the justice system into the legal system. The transformation of civil service into a lifelong power and cash-grab industry. The transformation of our arts culture into a dreck culture. And so on. You’re welcome.
I’ve been part of healing circles and other than the victim, if they even show up, no one takes them seriously.
and universal sufferage
They had universal suffrage too.
“When it looked for a moment on election night that Trump might take crucial swing states, I sunk into despair and fell asleep. When I woke up and it had become clearer that Biden was going to pull through, I didn’t feel excitement or even safety. I felt exhausted.”
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/biden-political-unity-myth
“ the explosion of the porn industry and its normalization of the most extreme degeneracy. The transformation of the justice system into the legal system. The transformation of civil service into a lifelong power and cash-grab industry. The transformation of our arts culture into a dreck culture. And so on.”
In other words:
“They deeply deplored the degeneracy of the times in which they lived, emphasising particularly the indifference to religion, the increasing materialism and the laxity of sexual morals. They lamented also the corruption of the officials of the government and the fact that politicians always seemed to amass large fortunes while they were in office.”
So, the same as tenth century Baghdad it seems.
The above quote is from Sir John Glubb’s ‘Fate of Empires’:
http://people.uncw.edu/kozloffm/glubb.pdf
(24 page PDF online)
Things were ever thus; round and round we go.
Cheers
See Twain’s Lionizing Murderers.
From my, admittedly jaundiced, point of view, the nonsense started when free will was discarded for the notion of group responsibility.
The purge continues apace.
Such people have always existed and most likely always will. The Clown Show begins in earnest when a society gives these people traction and leverage, such that they can influence social policy.
This is the key point. There have always been loons, serial killers, child molesters, and all sorts of other undesirables, in every culture, in every age. No religion, creed, or culture is immune; it’s part and parcel of human existence.
Cultures do not have the option to decide to simply not have pedophiles. It’s not a choice.
What cultures can choose is how they deal with them. They can ban them or burn them, prosecute them or persecute them. Or, they can ignore them and hope they’ll go away.
Many cultures have tried to understand them, embrace them, and forgive them. Those cultures tend not to last.
The fact that various parties are now seriously not only accepting them, but actively celebrating them, merely means that there’s another cultural shift on the way.
Eventually, people either tire of the Clown Show and run the clowns out of town, or they move out themselves, and leave the clowns to their own devices (see: San Francisco).
@Russtovich – Things were ever thus; round and round we go.
Not sure because tone can be hard to convey, but I can’t tell if you’re saying “it’s always been with us so you’re just an alarmist,” or “this horror has always been with us and we ought to learn from history and at least hope to defeat it.”
We can agree if it’s choice #2, but not #1. 🙂
@Michael H Anderson
Apologies Michael, I am firmly on the side of choice #2. 🙂
Cheers
No need to apologize, and thanks for the clarification!
@Bill de Haan – if America is circling the drain, California is halfway down. As a Canadian I am sorry for our neighbors – the rational, decent ones – and frightened for our collective future.
…they apologised after his first rape.
I hope you encouraged them to apologise to the victim and her family while they were still feeling contrite.
@ Governor Squid: “I hope you encouraged them to apologise to the victim and her family while they were still feeling contrite.”
That the lad was clearly showing all the signs of serious psycho-pathology from early childhood was clearly known to school psychologists from the Education Department whose only response was to move him through 5 different primary schools before he was referred to me as a behaviour specialist. By the time I met him he was increasingly ‘free’ in the community and very cunning, though not bright – probably borderline in intelligence. His family were also scared of him. As for my learned colleagues in the Department for whom I worked, it was a government department and such departments try not to admit prior knowledge and/or responsibility.
Jim.
@ Daniel Ream: Restorative Justice is very big in Victorian educational circles. Of course it doesn’t work with children who have no innate conscience and interest in other people, save at an instrumental level, whether those with conduct disorders, autism, and others who have learned the magic ‘get out of gaol free’ words: “I’m sorry!” that the ever-loving and caring welfare workers and ignorant politicians want to hear as they progress on their career-paths. Restorative Justice makes all participating adults feel smug, warm and noble, but children participating ‘successfully’ probably have a conscience and feel remorse anyway and didn’t need to participate in such a program.
This reminds me of the old joke about social workers and light bulbs: Q: “How many social workers does it take to change a light bulb?” A: “One, but the light bulb has to want to change.” The majority of children and adults presenting severe [and often dangerous] behaviour with whom I worked over 40 years did not want to change their previously successful [for them], but anti-social, often criminal, behaviour. As Darleen [above] states there needs to be the threat – at least – of a serious sanction, e.g. gaol time, in most cases. Both proverbial sticks and carrots are needed in changing behaviour.
Jim
As for my learned colleagues in the Department for whom I worked, it was a government department and such departments try not to admit prior knowledge and/or responsibility.
I’m certain that the girl and her family are much relieved that their suffering didn’t reflect poorly on the department.
This isn’t insane, this is evil.
“Nikole Hannah-Jones . . . .
…
Who?”
She got the which of the what she did…
This isn’t insane, this is evil.
Yes. But, unlike the Spanish Inquisition, surely something to be expected.
“You can’t have solidarity and democracy together, as democracy invites a diversity of opinion.”
That. “The people” can’t agree on everything. Especially when it really is everything that is subject to the κρατέω of “democracy”.
I’ve always said that my objection to democracy isn’t the δῆμος, it’s that κρατέω. Even if the electoral majoritarianism we actually live under were true democracy, it isn’t the people running their own lives; it’s the crowd ruling (also, to take the Greek at its full meaning, “commanding” and “conquering”) their lives. That may be acceptable to a limited extent – it’s certainly preferable to autocracy – but when it becomes sanctified as the most virtuous arrangement possible, to which everything, including the spontaneous order of the market, civil society, and, in the most extreme cases, the family, must defer, it becomes a grave threat to liberty.
…they apologised after his first rape.
Not a sincere apology unless they did the honorable thing.
I’m only half joking: there need to be consequences for failure, and serious consequences for serious failures.
G’day pst314,
I agree. The systemic failures of the two government departments, first Education [from when the lad I described started primary school] and then Human Services in which I was employed, were inexcusable. However he, though the most dangerous of all my clients, was just one of many referred to me [and other specialist colleagues] who were subject to ‘pass the parcel’ [hot potato?] management until they became so violent that something had to be done and the social welfare bureaucrats accepted that ‘love would not find a way’. A ‘head-banger’ behaviourist who took no prisoners was needed, though the powers that be did not like the notion of behavioural intervention, sometimes playing political games in-house to sabotage behavioural specialists and programs. I’m retired and doubt that a hardline behaviour interventionist would be employable now in modern PC ‘caring’ educational/human service organisations. A strict behavioural approach means that the failings of the System are examined and analysed in detail as part of the intervention and ambitious SJW-types cannot let the ‘Emperor’ and his Court be seen to wear no clothes.
Jim
@NTSOG, I am reminded of company commanders who complained about shitty NCOS sent to them while nonetheless writing non-career-ending NCOERS on their dirtbags, ensuring their dirtbags would inflict some other unit.
NCO ::= Non-Commissioned Officer
NCOER ::= Non-Commissioned Officer Evaluation Report
As an aside, I was an S-1 3 times in my military career. 2 times battalion level; one time acting Brigade S-1.
Someone’s been having fun in the desert . . . .
@ R. C.: I have long believed, based on observation in many organisations, that ‘pass the parcel’ is a favourite ‘sport’ of weak administrators who avoid making waves by firing incompetents lest they might jeopardise their own career options and/or upset the staff who they are meant to manage effectively. Instead they just want to be friends with those staff and to hell with organisational effectiveness. I take considerable pride in the fact that, during my professional career, I was instrumental in bringing about the dismissal of several incompetents through careful and systematic documentation and use of legitimate organisational performance reviews. My resolve to ‘keep the bastards honest’ was strengthened in the mid-1990s by finding out that a senior educator who came with exceptional references and interviewed brilliantly – I was on the interview panel – was actually a paedophile. He was subsequently arrested and gaoled a couple of years later. He was given a brilliant reference by the very school where he had previously taught, though they knew he could not be trusted around little boys and had told him to leave quietly. That school ‘passed the parcel’ to our organisation where he was required to work with young children and their families.
Jim
I can assure you, love, that’s the ‘Royal We’ you’re using there…
http://twitter.com/TMannu6/status/1331169551661355008
[Peter] Wood gives us a portrait of 1619’s creator, Nikole Hannah-Jones. . . . . . . . .
. . . on Seattle’s ‘progressive’ alternative to policing and prison: . . . .
While lining up for twelve to fourteen hours . . . .
Three different scales of occurrences—out of many possible examples—, but definitely one shared mindset . . . .
It’s a great time to be a petty criminal, too:
https://www.local10.com/news/local/2020/11/23/beer-bandits-walk-out-with-cases-of-pricey-brew-from-multiple-broward-county-7-elevens/
Is stealing the beer “restorative justice?” Or would returning the empties be “restorative justice?” I’m really getting confused by the nomenclature.
When you reimagine police, abolish prisons, and defund courts you get roving mobs with clubs and torches rousting people from sleep at midnight, administering justice in the street.
BLM is already doing this in Seattle. More to come…
Is stealing the beer “restorative justice?”
Jesting aside, if you were to tell a given demographic that its members are all oppressed, regardless of any actual circumstance, and therefore entitled to things that others have worked for, and entitled to feel endless resentment, and if you did this daily, for decades, not least in schools, then it would hardly be surprising if such behaviour became much more common, and much more brazen.
https://twitter.com/Cynical_CJ/status/1330633846908465153/photo/1
If you want to look like a complete c*nt, eat sushi with a knife and fork.
Is stealing the beer “restorative justice?”
Not entirely unrelated.
Because if you own a small bakery and you don’t allow children of the elite to rob it, with violence, for recreation, then your livelihood will be ruined and your lives made a misery. In the name of “social justice.”
Wokism evidently means you can destroy your own child’s Life without any guilt. Tough to watch.
via Matt Walsh
Is stealing the beer “restorative justice”?
“Anyone with information about the beer thieves is urged to call Broward Crimestoppers at (954) 493-8477.”
Why? So the cowards of Broward will do what, exactly? Put you on a racist watch list? Two of those stores were located in areas we would pass through quite regularly in high school on our way to practice or when out cruising. Boy were we stupid trying to buy the stuff and risking getting carded when we could have just walked right out the door with it. Free and “no hassle, man” as a buddy used to say.
If you want to look like a complete c*nt, eat sushi with a knife and fork.
When we were in Japan I took my wife to a tiny little sushi place in the Tskiji fish market. She had never had sushi and this was a locals kind of pkace where men who worked the boats frequently ate. As she struggled with the chop sticks a kindly, amused older man told her in broken English to eat with hands and pointed around to the other rough looking characters eating that way. So curious…if chopsticks are out…actually you probably shouldn’t be eating sushi anyway, you colonist! Or anything else for that matter.
then it would hardly be surprising if such behaviour became much more common, and much more brazen.
That’s the disturbing part. “Fuck you we’re taking what we want” is only going to escalate if it’s met with approval from the left and a shrug from law enforcement. That seems to be the path we’re on.
is only going to escalate if it’s met with approval from the left and a shrug from law enforcement.
You’re thinking too much. Try to stay “in the moment”.
If you want to look like a complete c*nt, eat sushi with a knife and fork.
When people whine about whites eating whatever with whatever (it can be pretty much anything), my response is pretty much: Do you think the actual owner and operator wants me to buy this food or not ? Because if they want me to be the food, I’m pretty much going to eat it anyway I want to. Or more succinctly Fuck off
Dr Randomercam takes casual racial bigotry designed to enrage and demoralize and performs excellent judo indeed.
You’re thinking too much. Try to stay “in the moment”.
Between the petty “Fuck you I’m taking what I want” looting to the not-so-petty “Fuck you we’re stealing this election” voter fraud, I’m seeing the most ominous aspects of leftism on the ascent.
They’re not hiding anything. They’re flexing their muscles.
“It will feel good not to live in fear. It will be great not to have to read another essay that is slop. I will miss the students who cared, but I can’t wait to say good-bye to those students who did nothing all semester and then came crying about their grade a week before school ends.”
https://lettersfromflyovercountry.com/the-short-march-to-the-door-803/
They’re not hiding anything. They’re flexing their muscles.
Just wait until the reprisals get rolling. In many regards they have already started. So I’m technically “in the moment”. See Darleen’s link.
That school ‘passed the parcel’ to our organisation where he was required to work with young children and their families.
In NYC it’s not just for pedos and is called The Dance of the Lemons.
In NYC it’s not just for pedos and is called The Dance of the Lemons.
Thanks to leftist lawyers, leftist judges, and criminally amoral teachers unions.
prosecutors diverted a youth offender named Diego Carballo-Oliveros into a “peace circle” programme, in which non-profit leaders burned sage, passed around a talking feather
Should’ve used two talking feathers.
1619’s creator, Nikole Hannah-Jones. A woman who styles herself “the Beyoncé of journalism” acts the part of a diva, and more.
Ghetto scholarship. You can’t beat it.
“Nikole Hannah-Jones…styles herself “the Beyoncé of journalism”.
Have you seen her? “The Sideshow Bob of journalism” is more like it.
Speaking of hypocrites, https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8983251/War-crimes-Australian-artist-calls-inquiry-Australias-character-display.html.
Pretty sure he would be pushed off a building in Kabul if he ever returned home. FWIW, I don’t think Western counties should have gone anywhere near Afghanistan – they should have been left alone to live peacefully amongst themselves…
He was given a brilliant reference by the very school where he had previously taught, though they knew he could not be trusted around little boys and had told him to leave quietly. That school ‘passed the parcel’ to our organisation where he was required to work with young children and their families.
You mean it’s not just the Catholic Church that does that? I’m shocked, shocked!
You mean it’s not just the Catholic Church that does that?
Although it’s near impossible to prove one way or the other, the preponderance of evidence is that schools, public and private, have a child sexual abuse problem much worse than the Catholic church.
the preponderance of evidence is that schools, public and private, have a child sexual abuse problem much worse than the Catholic church.
At my crappy state comprehensive, we had at least two. One of whom I’ve mentioned before.
At my crappy state comprehensive, we had at least two.
At my state alma mater, which I’d wager was several orders of magnitude more crappy than yours (at least you learned something) there were two apparently consensual teacher-pupil liaisons that I was aware of (one ending in marriage) and then a rather sordid affair ending with the strangulation of the girl (probably non-consensual) and the consequent life imprisonment of the teacher.
…Because if you own a small bakery and you don’t allow children of the elite to rob it, with violence, for recreation, then your livelihood will be ruined and your lives made a misery. In the name of “social justice.”
In the old days, members of the aristocracy would “neglect” to pay their bills. (Didn’t Terry Pratchett define a Lord as someone who doesn’t pay his tailor?)
Oscar Wilde once wrote: “The English country gentleman galloping after a fox — the unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable.”
Clearly our “woke” elites are even more unspeakable.
Although it’s near impossible to prove one way or the other, the preponderance of evidence is that schools, public and private, have a child sexual abuse problem much worse than the Catholic church.
Well, predators do go where there is prey.
Well, predators do go where there is prey.
See also, social work.
two apparently consensual teacher-pupil liaisons
At my high school, the ~30ish chemistry teacher began openly dating one of his students the second she graduated. The only question was whether he’d also been doing so prior to graduation. At this time the province of Ontario still had “Grade 13”, so she would have been 18 during her last year of high school.
apparently consensual
For fairly obvious reasons, I have trouble with the word “consensual” being followed by “teacher-pupil liaison”.
At my high school, the ~30ish chemistry teacher began openly dating one of his students the second she graduated
At my secondary school, in addition to the the two predators mentioned above, we also had an English teacher, mid thirties, who was dating a former pupil, a young woman who’d very recently left school and was, I think, a year older than us – at the time, in the sixth form. There was a class outing to a cottage in the countryside, a weekend stay, during which there was much gossip about why the young lady in question had been invited along, as she was no longer a pupil, and where she might be sleeping.
My impression at the time was that our English teacher, a devout Guardian reader, not only liked bedding pupils, or as close-to as he dared, but also enjoyed the thrill of his class knowing about it.
And once you mention these childhood events, you very often discover that other people have similar stories.
My impression at the time was that our English teacher, a devout Guardian reader, not only liked bedding pupils, or as close-to as he dared, but also enjoyed the thrill of his class knowing about it.
Just part of the regalia of a higher mind.
At my MOR Methodist Church growing up we had a guy, youth group leader, who everybody loved. All us kids, especially the boys, thought he was the neatest (not coolest, though) guy. He could tell the kinds of stories that elementary age boys enjoy hearing. Mostly stuff about the Founding Fathers, Ben Franklin, Daniel Boone, Civil War history, and he could even make Bible stories interesting to us boys. He would organize coin collecting clubs and chess clubs and hay rides and such. His wife worked mostly with the girls. Typing this out…kinda odd even for the early 1970’s, that the chess and coin clubs were only boys…but then again, maybe not. He also organized a week long “Adventure Camp” sleep-away camp at a popular nearby state park. I really liked the guy but the first time I started to feel uncomfortable was when we would be showering at night and he would come by with his Polaroid camera and take pictures of us in the shower. He kinda encouraged (don’t recall it being his idea, but probably was) a Mr. Clean thing where we were in competition to see who would take the most showers in a week. I decided at that point that I’d shoot for the opposite end of the spectrum. Having a man with a camera around me when I was naked was something I reaaaaaly didn’t care for. Anyway my parents, and especially my father, were very active in the church. One day they start asking me questions about Mr. Bowen. While by most counts I was probably too young to understand where their vague questions were going, I understood well enough to give vague answers. Turns out Mr. B was molesting several of the boys at the church. They fired him and I don’t know what happened beyond that but one day in college I’m walking past the TV and my roommates had the local news on. The name James Bowen jumps out at me. I stop to watch him being led into the courtroom and sure enough, it’s him. And his wife as well. I tried to follow the story over the next couple weeks and as I recall they were both convicted. So me thinks, thank God for that. End of story…until about 6 or 7 years later. Again strolling through my living room, TV on the news, what comes up but a story about a James Bowen busted AGAIN for child molestation in Daytona Beach area. This time at a school that he ran. Same MO. Kids loved him. Parents thought highly of him. No one wanted to believe it. Yet there it was. This time I took it upon myself to contact the Volusia County to make sure that they know the history of this guy. They told me they had recovered some kiddy porn at his house and asked if I could come in and possibly identify some of the boys in the photos whom I might know such that they could possibly gather more evidence. Horribly awkward…and creepy. I wasn’t in any of them, and I was quite sure I wouldn’t have been, but I did recognize some of the shower photos by location. Most of the boys that I could identify I wasn’t really sure of because I knew them more recently growing up and thus my memory of what they looked like was different. But I was kind of sure of a couple of them.
OK, so as coincidental and creepy as that is…Just a few years ago I found out that one of the boys that was molested in Volusia County was the son of a guy I used to work for in my Space Shuttle launching days. The reason I found that out was that story passed from ex-coworkers that the kid had killed himself. He had developed drug and alcohol problems which might have been intensified as he was one of the key witnesses in finally getting Mr. B convicted and put away. I tried to check on the molester in the prison system searches and near as I can tell he died in prison. One of the kids he molested at my church was later a good friend of mine in high school and college. His parents and my parents were very good friends. My friend got some of the best counseling middle/upper-middle class people could get at the time. He is a very successful software developer, working mostly free lance. Works half days quite often in the winter and goes skiing in the afternoon. Goes on skiing trips around the world. Never married and I never heard of him having a girl friend. A fairly good looking, rugged looking guy. Extremely athletic for a man in his late 50’s. We’re not real close, except for work/slight politics things on Facebook..and now MeWe. I get together with him once every couple years or so if we’re in the same town. But he is a bit…intense. I don’t think he knows that I know what happened to him.
OK, sorry for the long post but as we were relating these stories, I thought I’d share. Maybe NTSOG could use or add to that sort of info.
OK, sorry for the long post
Some stories need more words to tell, and some stories need to be told.
Sorry about not putting a blank line between the quote and my comment, David.
[slips quietly behind bar, opens notebook, and removes one digit from tally of offenses.]
In the old days, members of the aristocracy would “neglect” to pay their bills.
“Don’t you know who I AM??!!”
And the low-rent lords and ladies of today are called “influencers”.
At my high school, the ~30ish chemistry teacher began openly dating one of his students the second she graduated
At my high school (I attended 1968-72) the vast majority of girls had a huge crush on the late 20 something biology teacher — with a French name and a passing resemblance to a young Omar Sharif. AFAIK he never fished off the company deck BUT in the early 1970s married a girl who had graduated in 1970.
Then there was the married 20 something Drama teacher who evidently almost got caught getting a little too close to one of the more ambitious of the girls in class. She wasn’t at all above dropping a hint in front of the whole class when she was displeased with him.
Because I’ll have forgotten by Friday… Truth is spoken.
From the thread where Truth is spoken…
there is an almost 1:1 correlation between people who wear masks in their car and those who can’t figure out who goes next at a four-way stop sign.
In the old days, members of the aristocracy would “neglect” to pay their bills.
Old days, as in 1960:
Old days, as in 1960:
Heh. Indeed.
That quote was from Presidential campaigns: from George Washington to George W. Bush, by Paul F. Boller (Oxford University Press, 2004).
Thanks, pst314 – I was remiss in leaving out the source reference.
“Thanks, pst314 – I was remiss in leaving out the source reference.”
It’s often hard to do: You don’t remember where you read something, and when you search the internet none of the hits cite the source.
When did we stop being a serious civilization?
Ehn, one will see over more time—social and cultural developments extending from C-19 are going to be interesting—but there has been that particular steady progression of the last forty years, rather mainly fueled by Eternal September . . . .
The dark side of Black Friday
. . . that particular steady progression of the last forty years . . .
Not since the nineteen-sixties.
Not since the nineteen-seventies.
Since that social and cultural, utter and absolute fiasco of the nineteen-empties.