As in cowmelized?

Bam. But cowmelized is in transition, it seems to be tending towards caamolized.

That would be the influence of the Emeril inflection.

proud to report I have a lovely fixed tooth, completely undestinguishable from what it looked like a few days ago. It's amazing how they do that, and it took all of about 15 minutes. No whiskey afterwards, I'm afraid, but I did get a green tea beard papas creme puff.

About the teacher?

How about joolery? Or nucular? Re the latter, I have heard people besides the President pronounce it that way. Is it possible this is an acceptable alternate pronounciation?

I always thought 'nucular' was regional.

Yes.

is that type of music being played in classrooms for 12 year olds by this teacher or was this one incident?

at this point i have to say i can't decide whether public awareness is being raised or the potential for hysteria being created. i'm not saying there's any justification for someone to knowingly expose children to those lyrics in a school environment (though a lot of p-13 movies contain a lot more innuendo). but i haven't read anything in this thread yet that convinces me that this teacher is a sexual threat to children. all i know for sure is that he's a bit of an idiot--but his worst crime may possibly be trying to seem cool to 12 year olds. as to whether this deserves television coverage and likely stigmatization i'm not so sure.

The thing is, we should expect higher teaching standards from our schools than we do from MTV or movies. Someone has to be the grownup and held responsible, and that would be the teacher,( not the 12 year olds). I think it was good the student spoke to her parents about the music in the classroom and described it as nasty. She has more common sense than the teacher, it seems.

A story like this opens dialogue.

is that what it does? i have to say you have far greater faith in the contemporary newsmedia's interest in dialogue than i do.

and i'm not saying the girl shouldn't have told robert about it or that she and her classmates are somehow responsible...

the teacher can be held responsible and disciplined, if necessary, without the whole world getting involved. if "dialogue" is needed it can be far more productively arrived at via a school investigation into this teacher's classroom practices--to see if this is even representative of what he normally does--followed by conversation at a pta meeting. instead i suspect it will be a lurid soundbite at 7pm "tonight at 10--local teacher plays raunchy hip-hop to 12 year old girls" juxtaposed with michael jackson, and within a week this will turn entirely into hysteria about "values" which will change nothing and do nothing for anyone.

i'd like to think there's some middle-ground between not having sympathy for someone for possibly doing no more than exercising bad judgement and wishing the local news media on to them. (i have assumed that local news team=television.)

this may well be an ongoing annoyance in its own right: when was the last time you saw local news handle anything like this in a responsible manner?

edit: i'm not questioning whether this qualifies as local news--it probably does. i'm questioning this idea of "dialogue" coming from it. what the medium is good at is whipping up hysteria and self-righteous indignation, and i suspect it is more likely to slant that way than towards "dialogue". how much dialogue does this need anyway? if he does this all the time, fire him. if he doesn't make sure he understands he needs to listen to the lyrics of songs he plays to children and find sound pedagogical reason for whatever he's playing. on the other hand if he's playing gilbert and sullivan to them fry the bastard!

I'm trying to think what we did in music class as 12 year olds. Oh yes...we used to sing corny songs like "Bye bye blackbird".

My how times have changed!

You raise a valid point and these are all issues that I spent the last 48 hours considering. But let me give you a update on what took place today.
First, after four messages the principal is still not returning my call's.
Then this afternoon I receive an email from the Director Of Secondary Instruction /Personnel. Part of I pasted below.

I had spoken to Mr. _______ about this situation earlier today, and I am aware of what occurred in Mr. _______'s classroom. Because it is a personnel matter, I am not able to discuss details about this situation, but please know that the district does not approve of the lyrics of the type presented in the classroom, and that steps are being taken in this matter.

I am troubled by what is 'personnel' and why the details about the situation can't be discussed with me. For Gods sake the situation was my daughter!
Should this not been a case where all the cards are put on the table and the parent is insured this was a mistake that won't be repeated ?

I am a reasonable man. Give me some explanation and I will gladly listen.
Tell me look the kids get out of hand and I made a poor choice by letting them play CDs just to get them out of my hair. Fine, I will accept it. But just don't ignore me and think I will go away.
Should this teachers career be jeopardized by making a poor choice? Of course not! But I gave them the opportunity to open dialogue and they refused.
And if this by chance was a red flag and some child down the road is victimized how could I live with myself having seen the warning.
This was not a easy day at all.

Fox, no doubt.

I don't think words of songs can be innately harmful to children even though they may be distasteful to me, that is, unless they're maliciously directed at a particular child or group of children. Not so very long ago people were afraid to have children hear the word "damn".

I really hope it was just a misguided mistake but by ignoring me I'm not able to form a opinion.

You are so right by it being the times. I am from the old school where tell me like man that you made a mistake and I'll accept it as we all make them.
But not today.

and for what? playing a song? this sounds equitable to you?

Were the children traumatized? I doubt it. It's a sorry state of affairs that a person's career has to be ended over a song.

I know what your saying but unless there is some evidence that that was what he was doing, he has been done a huge disservice. Tell me he did or said something to support evidence that he had bad intentions and then I'll feel otherwise but just playing a recording of a publickly available piece of music is not sufficient reason for him to be ruined.

Have a private conference with the principal or something, not a news cast.

I assume (perhaps incorrectly) Robert or perhaps a group of parents. Sounds like a misguided attempt to "correct" the situation.

I remain open to being wrong if there's any other incriminating evidence but at this point I think the guy is much more harmed than any of the children.

Sure it occured to me. But did I not even warrant a return call even if it was to say we are looking into the matter and will get back to you once we have the facts?

So you are punishing them for not feeling that an immediate call back was warranted? And you're not punishing the administrator anyway...you're punishing the teacher who should be deemed innocent until proven otherwise.

robert, i think the idea is that you may possibly have moved a little too quickly, and with too blunt an object in your hand.

and as a teacher myself let me say that there's no indication that he "chose to subject [his] students to lyrics about oral sex". he may have simply chosen to play them a hit song while being enough of a ditz to not pay attention to what the lyrics were. though i do understand that in this climate it may be harder for you to take this more generous position when it is your daughter that's involved.

but do let us know how this pans out. i'm intrigued.

All I'm saying is that you could have waited a bit longer, or called someone higher up the chain, before taking such a drastic and potentially ruinous step.

I don't for one minute think you'd call the press, Mr. Gatti. Maybe punch him out but that'd be far kinder and fairer.

She didn't learn about it from the President either. It was that lovely Linda person. I'm sure all our Presidents got blow jobs. Okay, maybe not Coolidge.