Article in NYT today re: students, tik tok and targeting teachers

[Anonymous]

This article discussed students who made fake tik tok accounts as if they were teachers, sometimes even indicating the teachers were pedophiles (when they were truly not). I have a friend teaching 4th grade who is posting terrible things about her on tik tok. It's time for teachers to start suing parents for their children's terrible, sometimes criminal, behavior. It's time for teacher unions to band together and say "no more". THIS kind of stuff is worth striking over. This kind of stuff is worth lobbying for law changes. Parents with kids who do this kind of stuff should be held accountable.

[Anonymous]

I read it. This is what happens when you don’t hold kids accountable for their actions. I hope educators start fighting back by bringing this to light, suing parents, etc. And not only ban phones in classrooms—actually enable admin and staff to enforce it.

[Anonymous]

I could see this being a thing that teens/tweens just think is absolutely hilarious, but it also sounds like they went entirely too far with it. You can parody your teacher’s manner of speaking or their assignments. You can’t call them pedophiles. I hope the teachers unions come down hard on this and advocate for hard rules on no phones in the classroom. It will protect themselves and the kids too. Such a no brainer but everyone wants to make it sound like the most difficult thing ever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I could see this being a thing that teens/tweens just think is absolutely hilarious, but it also sounds like they went entirely too far with it. You can parody your teacher’s manner of speaking or their assignments. You can’t call them pedophiles. I hope the teachers unions come down hard on this and advocate for hard rules on no phones in the classroom. It will protect themselves and the kids too. Such a no brainer but everyone wants to make it sound like the most difficult thing ever.

No, you CAN’T parody your teacher. That’s also not okay. I see how that’s not as serious as the TikTok issue, but it’s a slippery slope.

Teachers shouldn’t have to deal with any of this. Dangit. The job is already ridiculously hard without this. And stop expecting teachers to police phones. YOU are the parent. YOU police your child and YOU come down hard on them when they use the phone inappropriately. We can’t expect teachers to fix all of society on 60K and no sleep.

[Anonymous]

This happened at Pikesville in Baltimore County. Athletic Director did it to a Principal.

https://wtop.com/education/2024/04/athletic-director-used-ai-to-frame-principal-with-racist-remarks-in-fake-audio-clip-police-say/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I could see this being a thing that teens/tweens just think is absolutely hilarious, but it also sounds like they went entirely too far with it. You can parody your teacher’s manner of speaking or their assignments. You can’t call them pedophiles. I hope the teachers unions come down hard on this and advocate for hard rules on no phones in the classroom. It will protect themselves and the kids too. Such a no brainer but everyone wants to make it sound like the most difficult thing ever.

No, you CAN’T parody your teacher. That’s also not okay. I see how that’s not as serious as the TikTok issue, but it’s a slippery slope.

Teachers shouldn’t have to deal with any of this. Dangit. The job is already ridiculously hard without this. And stop expecting teachers to police phones. YOU are the parent. YOU police your child and YOU come down hard on them when they use the phone inappropriately. We can’t expect teachers to fix all of society on 60K and no sleep.

Parents of the perps don't care. Now what?

[Anonymous]

I read it. Have lawyers in my family so free representation. If I were one of those teachers, I would sue the kid(s) (and therefore their parents) for intentional infliction of emotional distress, and maybe also libel, and would not settle.
Hopefully their legal costs would make at least some the families lose their home, or better, everything down to the last shirt on their back. It would be hilarious! Then I'd create a Tiktok account and post a video about the whole thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I read it. This is what happens when you don’t hold kids accountable for their actions. I hope educators start fighting back by bringing this to light, suing parents, etc. And not only ban phones in classrooms—actually enable admin and staff to enforce it.

Or pass laws to make all tech illegal and return us to a god fearing Amish type society!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I read it. Have lawyers in my family so free representation. If I were one of those teachers, I would sue the kid(s) (and therefore their parents) for intentional infliction of emotional distress, and maybe also libel, and would not settle.
Hopefully their legal costs would make at least some the families lose their home, or better, everything down to the last shirt on their back. It would be hilarious! Then I'd create a Tiktok account and post a video about the whole thing.

Better hurry since TikTok is getting banned.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I could see this being a thing that teens/tweens just think is absolutely hilarious, but it also sounds like they went entirely too far with it. You can parody your teacher’s manner of speaking or their assignments. You can’t call them pedophiles. I hope the teachers unions come down hard on this and advocate for hard rules on no phones in the classroom. It will protect themselves and the kids too. Such a no brainer but everyone wants to make it sound like the most difficult thing ever.

I could see this being a “taking justice into one's own hands” thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I read it. Have lawyers in my family so free representation. If I were one of those teachers, I would sue the kid(s) (and therefore their parents) for intentional infliction of emotional distress, and maybe also libel, and would not settle.
Hopefully their legal costs would make at least some the families lose their home, or better, everything down to the last shirt on their back. It would be hilarious! Then I'd create a Tiktok account and post a video about the whole thing.

I'm a Plaintiff's lawyer. A decent Plaintiff's lawyer can easily cause the other side to have to spend a quarter of a mil in defense costs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I read it. This is what happens when you don’t hold kids accountable for their actions. I hope educators start fighting back by bringing this to light, suing parents, etc. And not only ban phones in classrooms—actually enable admin and staff to enforce it.

This. I have been a middle school teacher for over a decade. This happened at my school years ago, pre covid. Kids (a rough bunch) impersonated teachers on instagram, saying racist and sexist things.

I felt so violated. The way it was handled (lack thereof) was disgusting. We didn’t even learn who the kids were let alone get an apology. They had an in school suspension and that’s it. I felt extremely disrespected by them, the admin, the district, etc. but it happened before I had tenure so I was afraid to speak up.

[Anonymous]

The teachers should sue the every loving crap out of the parents for both slander and libel. It can entirely ruin their careers.

Sorry parents, you let your kids use garbage like TT, you should be held accountable. I'd sue the parents of every kid who made the post and comments for $10M each.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I read it. Have lawyers in my family so free representation. If I were one of those teachers, I would sue the kid(s) (and therefore their parents) for intentional infliction of emotional distress, and maybe also libel, and would not settle.
Hopefully their legal costs would make at least some the families lose their home, or better, everything down to the last shirt on their back. It would be hilarious! Then I'd create a Tiktok account and post a video about the whole thing.

I'm a Plaintiff's lawyer. A decent Plaintiff's lawyer can easily cause the other side to have to spend a quarter of a mil in defense costs.

Also a lawyer and I'd be a little cautious here. Intentional infliction of emotional distress is an extremely weak claim and rarely succeeds on its own so it's really mostly a libel or defamation charge. Under the right circumstances it could work but in most of these cases it would be tossed on summary judgment because you would have no evidence of harm and the defendant could argue that it was clearly parody or that too few people saw it. Again with the right facts you could press a lawsuit that really cost them but in the vast majority of cases there would not be any evidence of most of the elements of these claims.

[Anonymous]

Have to say, when I read this article I was glad to have sent my kids to private school, where this sort of behavior would result in expulsion.

As to the lawyering up, for some of those posts - like the ones where the kids accuse teachers of pedophilia - there are definite damages, and a reasonable charge of libel. Parents should worry that if their kids do this sort of thing and their children's names get out, that that may affect college admissions chances.