Because I have had much more direct exposure to the double standard than most anyone reading this has.

I'll leave the school's name and the teachers involved out of it, only because I'm going to be discussing a former student of mine as well and his name certainly doesn't need to be mentioned.

A little over 10 years ago, one of my two supervising teachers during my student teaching semester landed a job in an urban school district where he lived. I'll just note that he's ex-military and that will be clue enough for those who know the bases in the Tennessee region. Very strict (I thought too strict at the time I worked under him in 1999), no-nonsense, the sort of person that would think the behavior of married couples in 1950s sitcoms was skirting being scandalous.

One day, he pulled aside this girl (who had all sorts of problems, I learned later from another teacher). Talked to her maybe 15 seconds at the doorway to his room. Security cameras could see all this. Despite nothing happening, this girl decides to make trouble for this teacher and complains that he sexually assaulted her. Remember there is camera evidence that nothing happened. He was fired and had to go through the court system to clear his name. He chose to never teach again and went into real estate. All because of a blatant lie and a, to be very blunt (since I've had personal experience with this school district), chickenshit school administration and central office.

Fast forward to late 2008. I took a job at this same school (and within two months, regretted it, but that's another matter). A young, 26 year-old married teacher is serving as a tutor for the school's football program. One of the players is a junior who was in my class. The team uses the auditorium-like room I and another teacher were sharing at the time as an afterschool study hall. I'm slightly puzzled by what I see, but didn't make much of it until after news broke that this student's mother had confiscated his cell phone and found all sorts of images of this teacher on there.

She's arrested and although suspended, she is not immediately fired, as the male teacher had been, despite this time being quite a bit of evidence. She does, however, have to go to court and she accepts a plea deal where she can't teach for two years. No prison time, no probation other than that. She's eligible to teach starting this fall.

As for the student? After the incident, there was a very negative change in his attitude. At times, he would be chattering away, despite being redirected several times and being sent to the office (I should note that little was done there, but my bitching about the principal will be brief this time) for being defiant. Other times, he would just be moody and just stare at his book, saying little. When I asked him about it once, he implied that he was thinking about this matter that had "gotten him in trouble." He was more brazen in his attempts to hit on the girls in class as well. It was as if his overall personality had been amped up, with quite a few crashes for him.

I honestly believe that much of it had to do with his name being whispered as being involved in the investigation. I knew about this within a day of the teacher's arrest at school, but it just was something we were warned never to address with the students.

So let's see...a male teacher gets fired in 2000 at this school for counseling a girl, nothing inappropriate, all on tape. A female teacher gets paid for a few months for sexual images being text messaged to this student, with the implication that there may have been sexual contact. She can return to teaching. The student involved in this has some mood shifts and behavioral changes that may be the result of his name being mentioned in this investigation. All this at the same school, less than 10 years apart.

You think I'd laugh any of this off, knowing that all it takes is a groundless accusation to ruin my career (I should note that I decided last year to leave public school teaching behind, in part due to things like this)? That a female teacher can seduce males and it would be seen as a conquest for the males and just a "weakness" for the females?

These things fuck up so many lives. I feel for that female teacher's husband, who was overseas when this apparently took place. I have no idea if they got a divorce or not. Maybe the student would have had behavioral issues anyway, but I sincerely believe that such an incident gave him a dimmer view of women in general and taught (or perhaps reinforced is the better word) that women are to be treated as sexual objects. I do believe he was confused and then frustrated by the results of this incident. And of course, male teachers, especially the newer, younger ones, are taught over and over again not to be in any situation where there are fewer than 3-4 people around at any time, lest one wants to lose his job over a baseless accusation.

So yeah, I can be quite upset about these type of events, having seen what happens with those involved.