Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

So, no teachers should ever mention their partners/spouses?

I cannot remember a time when a teacher mentioned or needed to mention their spouse. Good try on trying to push your agenda.

Every teacher I, or my kids, have ever had started the year telling about themselves, including their spouse, pets, etc. They tell the kids about where they went on school breaks with their spouse. They have family photos on their desks.

You never had a problem with ANY of this, until you used it as an excuse to be an ignorant homophobe.

You are right. But what is happening now is people are going on tiktok and talking about how they "came out" to their class and how they are polyamorous or polygender. That is different than saying you got married the past weekend to someone of the same sex, how you baked cookies with your same sex partner, or go skiing every Christmas break.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

So, no teachers should ever mention their partners/spouses?

I cannot remember a time when a teacher mentioned or needed to mention their spouse. Good try on trying to push your agenda.

Every teacher I, or my kids, have ever had started the year telling about themselves, including their spouse, pets, etc. They tell the kids about where they went on school breaks with their spouse. They have family photos on their desks.

You never had a problem with ANY of this, until you used it as an excuse to be an ignorant homophobe.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

So, no teachers should ever mention their partners/spouses?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

So just to be clear, their straight teachers must also never reference their husband or wife, have no personal photos in their classroom and not wear a wedding band, correct? Because, you know, “sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand.”

Just making sure we’re clear.

Anonymous wrote:I run a youth org and am gay. A number of staff are LGBTQ. We are located in a diverse small city in the northeast and honestly, I do not worry about being targeted for being gay. I think there has been a significant change in how we interact with youth over the past 10 years. Stuff that we considered normal a decade ago: a student and staff working in our office after hours, giving a young person a ride home, giving a student a gift card as a graduation gift. Now we have a handbook and all of those things are explicitly forbidden. I think maintaining really clear boundaries is important to keep youth safe (even if you would never approach a student sexually, having bad boundaries can normalize that behavior in ways that make young people vulnerable) and to maintain our professional reputations.

Does your school have written policies about how adults can and can't interact with you?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

So, no teachers should ever mention their partners/spouses?

I cannot remember a time when a teacher mentioned or needed to mention their spouse. Good try on trying to push your agenda.

Are you kidding? Teachers reference their spouses ALL THE TIME. It’s totally normal, as it should be. THey are humans.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

So, no teachers should ever mention their partners/spouses?

I cannot remember a time when a teacher mentioned or needed to mention their spouse. Good try on trying to push your agenda.

Are you kidding? Teachers reference their spouses ALL THE TIME. It’s totally normal, as it should be. THey are humans.

I can’t think of a single time any of my teachers or professors mentioned a spouse. My husband recalls this was very rare in his case. In any event, mentioning a spouse is fine. Still, teachers should keep their personal lives personal. That will limit any risk. Any male teacher needs to be especially careful. My husband taught for years and worked never to be alone with a student. He also had no cause to mention his personal life. If you truly want suggestions, these will help.

Sounds like our experiences were pretty different. I knew, generally, the marital status (and thus sexuality) of most of my teachers, at least in high school, based on passing things they said in class. It wasn’t a topic of deep discussion, and they weren’t sharing deep personal stories. They were just people living in the world, telling anecdotes to illustrate a point in class or even just making small talk.

The point is, they weren’t worried that referencing their spouse was going to get them accused of grooming children. That’s what OP and other teachers in some parts of the country are facing right now. And the idea that LGBTQ teachers will be fine and free of this sort of harassment and persecution if they just “keep their personal lives private” is absolute bad-faith BS.

Majority of parents don’t care about your sexuality, we want ALL teachers to keep their lives private and separate home from work regardless of their sexuality. My child doesn’t need to know about someone’s wedding day or vacation at the beach whether they’re gay or straight. We want teachers to focus more on teaching and maintain professional boundaries with children because they’re children and not everyone is comfortable with their children knowing certain things at certain ages. Because you don’t know what each family is comfortable with you keep it professional and just teach the curriculum. That’s it, no chit chat, no small talks about your weekend, no asking kids about their opinions on hot button topics or anything like that, just leave everything that isn’t part of the curriculum at the door. If kids have a problem you speak to the guidance counselor privately and they deal with it appropriately and privately. The gay community gets more heat for this topic because of young inexperienced teachers filming themselves and putting it on tiktok so it becomes blatantly obvious to parents that their children are not just being taught the curriculum anymore and they begin to question what else is being taught that they don’t know about. They then find out that the public education system is in disarray and very broken and just want answers that nobody can seem to give them. See LibsOfTikTok on Twitter

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

So, no teachers should ever mention their partners/spouses?

I cannot remember a time when a teacher mentioned or needed to mention their spouse. Good try on trying to push your agenda.

Are you kidding? Teachers reference their spouses ALL THE TIME. It’s totally normal, as it should be. THey are humans.

I can’t think of a single time any of my teachers or professors mentioned a spouse. My husband recalls this was very rare in his case. In any event, mentioning a spouse is fine. Still, teachers should keep their personal lives personal. That will limit any risk. Any male teacher needs to be especially careful. My husband taught for years and worked never to be alone with a student. He also had no cause to mention his personal life. If you truly want suggestions, these will help.

Sounds like our experiences were pretty different. I knew, generally, the marital status (and thus sexuality) of most of my teachers, at least in high school, based on passing things they said in class. It wasn’t a topic of deep discussion, and they weren’t sharing deep personal stories. They were just people living in the world, telling anecdotes to illustrate a point in class or even just making small talk.

The point is, they weren’t worried that referencing their spouse was going to get them accused of grooming children. That’s what OP and other teachers in some parts of the country are facing right now. And the idea that LGBTQ teachers will be fine and free of this sort of harassment and persecution if they just “keep their personal lives private” is absolute bad-faith BS.

Majority of parents don’t care about your sexuality, we want ALL teachers to keep their lives private and separate home from work regardless of their sexuality. My child doesn’t need to know about someone’s wedding day or vacation at the beach whether they’re gay or straight. We want teachers to focus more on teaching and maintain professional boundaries with children because they’re children and not everyone is comfortable with their children knowing certain things at certain ages. Because you don’t know what each family is comfortable with you keep it professional and just teach the curriculum. That’s it, no chit chat, no small talks about your weekend, no asking kids about their opinions on hot button topics or anything like that, just leave everything that isn’t part of the curriculum at the door. If kids have a problem you speak to the guidance counselor privately and they deal with it appropriately and privately. The gay community gets more heat for this topic because of young inexperienced teachers filming themselves and putting it on tiktok so it becomes blatantly obvious to parents that their children are not just being taught the curriculum anymore and they begin to question what else is being taught that they don’t know about. They then find out that the public education system is in disarray and very broken and just want answers that nobody can seem to give them. See LibsOfTikTok on Twitter

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

This. No place in schools for this. Keep it professional and on topic.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

So, no teachers should ever mention their partners/spouses?

I cannot remember a time when a teacher mentioned or needed to mention their spouse. Good try on trying to push your agenda.

Anonymous wrote:I'm a gay middle school drama teacher (cliche I know) and the thing that is pushing me out of the field isn't the pandemic or the kids' post-quarantine behavioral problems/mental health crisis, but the idea that I might get accused of "grooming" a student.

The attacks on teachers across the board are so demoralizing but the worsening levels of overt homophobia and transphobia on the right are just so terrifying and exhausting. I love my students. I love teaching. I really don't know if I can stick it out if this is the new normal.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My advice would be to do your job and not talk about your personal life. In fact, that's the advice for ALL teachers. I'm not sure why my kid's gay language teacher insists on saying things like, "That was a gay thing to say." Sexuality has no place in the classroom because it is irrelevant to the task at hand. Doubtful you will be accused of grooming anyone if you keep your personal life private. Again, that goes for all teachers, not just gay ones.

I disagree. It’s important that gay teachers be open and talk about their sexuality precisely because moronic parents try to shelter their children from the reality that gay people exist. Don’t hide who you are.

Are you crazy?? Teachers should not talk about their “sexuality” - no matter what. THAT is a quick way to get fired. As it should be.

I definitely had female teachers that mentioned their husbands hand children. How is that any different from a gay man mentioning his husband or children?