I was looking for the newspaper headline and photo that made me want to write this post. I couldn’t find it in my twitter feed or mailbox, but in the process, saw multiple cases like this. It wasn’t just actual language describing a crime was skewed, it was the whole gender and culture dynamic.
Test Yourself: If you hear a 40 year old male teacher had sex with his 16 year old female student, and a 40 year old female teacher had sex with her 16 year old male student, do you have an automatic revulsion to one more than the other? Does “slept with” feel different than “had sex”? Does “tryst” feel different from “grooming”?
We live in a society that has no problem with sexualizing everything–to sell a product, a music track, a TV series. At the same time, man-up and boys-dont-cry baggage and history blocks (or, doesn’t “allow”) men or boys to be victims. Ever.
I’ve even see it on mainstream media. One news anchor referenced a case where a 6 or 9 year old boy had involvement with his female teacher.
He casually said something like, ‘Back in the day you’d get a high-five from your friends..’
We have to think twice about how we may be reinforcing cultural gender bondage.
While trying to find that article with headlinelike, “Teacher has tryst with student” (“tryst” not sex or rape..) I stumbled on a slew of cases in an epic Rolling Stones article. It rehashed the Mary Kay Latourneau story, a teacher of 34 who had sex with her 13 year old student back in 1996.
My memory wheels started turning, I remembered the name and started to remember the story. But above all, I remember the social sentiment: This was a simple case of CSA and abuse of power and trust, but it played out in media and minds as that of “star-crossed lovers.”
In 1998, Mary Kay Letourneau appeared on the cover of People magazine with her first child. Bathed in warm light, blond hair softly curling.. Letourneau could easily have been confused with the subject of a generic Sears portrait if you didn’t read the accompanying headline: “The Teacher and the 6th Grader: Their Bizarre Story of Obsessive Love.”
-“How the Media Turned Child Rape Into a ‘Tryst’ for Mary Kay Letourneau,” Rolling Stones by EJ Dickson
I remember her being in and out of jail because of breaking court orders to refrain from seeing the child. And she was having his baby.
Holy Havoc, batman!
If the story was instead a 34year old male teacher sleeping with his 13 year old girl student, the public would’ve been ballistic. Or worse, the story would never have come out.
The next time you see a headline about a teacher having sexual relations/intercourse/sex /”sexual activity“/ a relationship/ a tryst/ rape / inappropriate contact, etc.. check the genders involved and read what really happened.
Because even in our increasingly woke state, it can take a whole article to figure out what really happened.
The bottom lines:
Language matters.
Culture changes.
People wake up.
And yes, Boys can be victims too.
Did this article spark you?
Curious how you can protect and empower kids in your youth orgs, schools, communities, homes? Wonder how to even bring this stuff up?
We’ve got you!
The Prevention Playlist has resources and love, + Jasmine @JasNotes is always ready w/coffee for taboo chats, encouragement, a train-the-trainer, or booster for youth-serving orgs. You deserve it because you’re already awesome. And the kids deserve it, because it’s not up to them to protect themselves.
