Summary
Social media influencers are fuelling a rise in misogyny and sexism in the UK’s classrooms, according to teachers.
More than 5,800 teachers were polled… and nearly three in five (59%) said they believe social media use has contributed to a deterioration in pupils’ behaviour.
One teacher said she’d had 10-year-old boys “refuse to speak to [her]…because [she is] a woman”. Another said “the Andrew Tate phenomena had a huge impact on how [pupils] interacted with females and males they did not see as ‘masculine’”.
“There is an urgent need for concerted action… to safeguard all children and young people from the dangerous influence of far-right populists and extremists.”
Every teacher I hear from (US) these days basically says the newest generation coming up is completely screwed. Unreal levels of behavioral issues that are not being addressed at home. Complete lack of engagement with the lesson plan, unfinished assignments all over. They need to curve grades left and right just to get the majority of the class to pass. The parents are more emboldened than ever to make the teachers’ lives hell over things they know nothing about and refuse to take responsibility for.
It’s easy to brush it off as the standard generational nose-thumbing…but this seems different. Something is really breaking down and I think social media is at the center of it.
It’s a shame teachers are pressured to “curve grade” rather than just flunk these people and hold them back a grade.
Even when I went to elementary school over 15 years ago in Canada, kids weren’t allowed to be held back without written permission from their parents. I thought it was really fucking weird because we literally had a kid whose mom did all of his homework (everyone knew; he had horrible writing and she didn’t) and yet refused to put him in a remedial class or have him repeat a year.
Schools now lose funding when kids don’t pass, so admins press teachers to move them along.
All Kids Left Behind