This from a professional teacher's forum!

[samstown]

Hello! I often read the feminism topic with interest and often find myself agreeing with much of what is being said, although I am sometimes slightly at some of the more extreme views presented here and this is my first post.

With all this talk of the Slutwalk going on, I came across this thread on the TES forum:

community.tes.co.uk/forums/t/487168.aspx?PageIndex=1

I was shocked to see some of the views expressed on there and the clear male/female divide in views on there as well. Indeed there is one (male) poster who seems to think that the way a woman is dressed should be a factor when it comes to sentencing a rape, because it is 'provocation'

And these people are teachers, educating the yoof of today!

TBH I'm not at all surprised.

Teachers represent the nromal population and most people still thnik like this, so it's not surprising that most teachers still think like this.

What's disturbing, is that as a profession they are obviously not receiving any meaningful training about equality issues when it comes ot sexual equality. They do receive training about racial equality issues, but sexual equality still isn't considered particularly important.

Gosh. I really didn't think it was that difficult to understand that it is never ok to assault someone and that the responsibility for assaulting someone is with the attacker! It just sounds so simple and understandable to me!!!

Please do not think that a teacher would be allowed to express those views or teach them in class. The TES forum is like MN, only often much nastier.
People say things under the cover of anonymity that they would be reprimanded for in their job and rightly so.
We are assessed and observed lessons check whether we are prioritising one sex over another, or giving out sexist messages, and that our materials are appropriate and have positive role models and images of female and male.
But you can't control people's thoughts and opinions outside the classroom.

Herein lies one of the reasons I no longer frequent TES forums

It is awful that the TES forum has been taken over by the swivel-eyed nutter contingent isn't it?

Normal teachers are really outnumbred on there.

I'm surprised they allow it actually, it makes the teaching profession look bad. Sensible people will assume that the loons on there are not representative of the profession as a whole, but all you need is a Daily Mail focus on the site and you could have a really nasty furore.

It's been a constant AIBU-type melee for years, but there are a lot of useful shared resources uploaded by members on there. That's why I'm a member.
There are some seriously vicious threads on SN issues too.

Right. Ok. So does that mean that when, say, a jeweller's has a window display and someone robs that shop, they can plead for a reduced sentence as the window display was provocation?
Or what about a flashy car on a driveway or on the street, could a joyrider get a reduced sentence because they were being provoked by it?
How about a charity box on a pub bar or a shop side counter? All that change, just tempting people.
No? Then how come the pathetic excuse of provocation is deemed acceptable when it comes to a person's body? .

Not a person's body bullet.

A woman's.

We're not people, you see.

Are you being sarcastic? I am having difficulty telling.

LOL no, just saying what I think lies behind the thinking.

Women aren't considered real people. Not real ones. People are horrified by the thought of a man being raped. Really horrified and disgusted. But they aren't that horrified by the thought of a woman bieng raped. Somehow, women's suffering just isn't worth as much as men's. Because we aren't worth as much - we're not quite as human as they are, in the popular mind.

Most people would vociferously deny that they held this opinion, but you only have to see how much mroe readly everyone, male and female, identifies with men, to see how uncomfortably true it is.

It is sad but seems to be a widely held opinion in all walks of life that while women's clothing might not be the direct cause of them being raped it is still a factor and that women should take responsibility for provoking unnecessary attention. I cannot understand why it cannot be part of education/campaigns that your body is yours and yours alone and no-one NO-ONE has the right to violate that, even if you're walking naked down the street. What makes me even more sad is remembering that as a young woman my friends and I probably shared that opinion (i.e. that showing flesh was partly to blame for unwanted attention/rape) to some extent.

What this idiot who sparked the slutwalk failed to mention of course is that stranger rape in the stereotypical "scantily clad woman attacked walking alone at night situation" is incredibly rare compared with the amount of women raped and assaulted by their friends, partners and husbands. Of course they were probably asking for it too .

The TES forum has some weird people on. Their views on SEN are just as scary.

I've posted before about being asked to cover this kind of thing in a PSHE lesson - the 'message' sent out by the way a girl dresses. I choose instead to point out that boys should not be reading anything into the way a girl dresses and might well find themselves very much in the wrong if they do. Mine is not a popular approach. It seems other teachers can't help but think of the "responsibility" of the girl rather than the boy.

See Annie this is what I'm talking about - your approach ought to be mainstream - teachers are obviously not being trained to teach this stuff properly. It's about personal responsibility after all, and the knowledge that we are all responsible for our own feelings and desires and responses and behaviour. It's all very well people saying that teachers are not allowed to express appalling opinions like the ones on that forum, but they are allowed to express appalling sexist opinions (like women being responsible for men's rape) in a way they wouldn't be allowed to express appalling racist opinions.

God, Broadcasting House was broadcasting rape myths this morning - it was vile.

Annie that is shocking. Good for you teaching properly!

TES Opinion is a very scary place to be. I tend to stick to Personal and Primary.