This monster was my 9th-grade English teacher

The BBQ Pit
1

I was googling, and decided to look for one of my junior-high English teachers.

From one of several links I found:

http://www.recordonline.com/news/sigler/sigler_main.htm

Yikes.

At first, I hoped it was a different Robert Sigler. But the above link contained a picture, and it’s definitely the same guy I had for English in 1973-1974.

(Note: I am outspokenly pro gay rights. I do not associate homosexuality with pedophilia, and I would be just as pissed off if this 50something superintendent had used his influence to molest a 14-year-old girl. Also, I grimaced at the account of the beating he received in prison – I believe the guy belongs behind bars, but I don’t believe in anarchy).

Reflections:

He wasn’t a bad teacher. I especially remember how fair he was with grading – I was a brat, and I talked a lot in class, which he noted on my report cards. But he never let it influence my grades. I specifically remember once when he wrote, “F. consistently talks out of turn in class. F. achieved the class’s highest average, 97%”. This was unusual for that place and time – teachers were allowed more leeway in grading then, and it was assumed that if a teacher didn’t like you, your grade would reflect it.

He did, however, have a streak of the petty authority figure about him. (More, apparently, than just a streak, to work his way up to superintendent).

He was from the east coast, and to us West Virginia bumpkins, his mannerisms seemed effete. Consequently, some of the students teased him about having crushes on the boys, in the generic way that adolescents razz each other. This was just a few of the nerviest kids, and no one took them seriously.

There was an another, more unusual teasing campaign that almost everyone took part in: He had a sputtering mannerism that involved flapping his lips. One of the kids dubbed him ‘zebra lips’, and it became a long-term goal for everyone to slip the most oblique references to zebras under his radar. (E.g.: The kid who started the campaign once wore a referee’s shirt to class, explaining he had a game right after school). This bratty exercise in humor and authority-defying really galled Mr. Sigler, to the point that he was still throwing people out of class for it two years later, when my younger brother was in his class. (When I showed this story to my brother, he suggested we send him a stuffed zebra in prison).

Curiously, there was a kid in my 9th-grade English class later became a teacher, and got in trouble for molesting teenage boys. I wonder semi-seriously if Mr. Sigler had any ‘contact’ with him?

Weird, ugly, bad scene.

2

I know what you were probably feeling when you read about that. My grade 11 English Media teacher was convicted on a charge of molesting a 15-year-old boy he had hired to take care of his lawn & garden. This happened when I was in my first year of college. He was always a little odd, but I never would have guessed he’d do something like that. It was a blow to what was left of my innocence, I’ll tell ya.

3

I was horrified a few years back to read the news that a former higher-up from a job I had many years ago was being arrested on federal child pornography charges. The man had nine children of his own and was quite publicly religious.

I was shocked because I had never gotten the slightest creepy vibe off him whatsoever.

4

Dear god, is it possible that women don’t have this magic sixth sense to detect which individuals might go onto harm themselves or their children or other acts which supposedly correlate to “creepiness”?

5

threemae? Th’ hell?

6

I think threemae is commenting on a frequent reaction to this sort of news, especially news that a boyfriend or whatever has been molesting the kids: “She should have known!” It’s not that simple.

7

Yes, as well as some other things. I really don’t want to come off as sexist here, but a number of women claim to have some sort of sixth social sense that permits them to say if someone is just “creepy” or something.

I’m working as a resident advisor in a college, and on my floor, I had one resident last semester that had one glass eye, had a little trouble seeing with the other, and didn’t have a lot of friends. He was prone to doing some “weird” things, like apparently getting exercise by jogging around the building in the evenings in boots, but he was afraid to run on paths or areas that he didn’t know well. Frankly, this could be kind of disconcerting in social situations because he didn’t pick up well on subtle social cues and his glance was always askew. I saw him as a resident that we should make a special effort to reach out and interact with, but (again, personal observation, not trying to be sexist) all of the female RA’s would do strange things whenever he would walk by like stop a conversation, stare at him while he passed, and then pick up where they left off.

When he moved off-campus at break, I actually heard comments like, “Good, that guy was a creep.” Yeah, he was a little off in social situations, but he never did anything that actually fell into my book as “creepy.” He didn’t draw penises on white boards, bang on doors drunk at 2:00 AM demanding sex, or anything that so many other residents get away with without being labeled as “creepy.”

Maybe I need to go get my own thread…

8

Wow, you live in Denver!

Uhh, sorry, I just noticed that. I’ll stop sharing now.

9

Yup. That is partially how serial killers Ted Bundy and Ed Kemper managed to get so many victims into their cars even though all the young women in the area were paranoid about a serial killer doing the same thing. Creepy just means lacking superficial social skills, and neither of them lacked these. If you have or can fake superficial social skills you wont set off any alarm bells in most women.

10

Not nearly as bad as a Doper who found out an ex Co-worker volunteered to have his penis cooked and eaten.

goes off searching for thread.

11

Revtim and the incredible edible penis.

12

My eighth grade teacher was later exposed as a pedophile, many years after I left town and moved away. I didn’t know anything about sex then, and he didn’t do anything to anyone that we ever knew about at the time. But he was a disturbingly smarmy, arrogant dickhead. Many times, parents had to go have words with him to stop picking on their children (verbally) and calling them names. My mother was included in his visitors, many times. It’d work for awhile, then he’d be back to his old ways.

I didn’t find out until I went back there for a visit, five years ago. I saw some old friends and acquaintances, and during conversation about what was new in the last 20 years, the subject came up of how he was discovered to have been molesting boys. He was one of those people who you just know there’s something he isn’t telling you, and it turns out that we were right.

13

Eep. I know how that goes; one of my 9th grade teachers is now in jail for molesting the boys on the Litlle League team he coached. He had 4 kids and was well-known for mentoring troubled teens. (:eek:) We quite liked him; he was not in the least creepy, though a little over-enthused for my taste.

It was quite a big deal in my smallish hometown, especially since he got wind of the arrest ahead of time and skipped town, provoking a manhunt.

14

I’m probably gonna get flamed for this, but… “monster”?

Years of hell in prison (he won’t hold up well there, I promise you) followed by a lifetime of unemployability, shunning, and public humiliation.

All for giving a kid an orgasm.

I ain’t saying it’s right to have sex with kids. I just wonder if our reaction to this kind of thing these days is really sensible.

You may attack me now.

15

My first reaction was to agree with you that “monster” is a little harsh. But if you track down some of the back story, this kid was apparently mentally challenged and the guy had been grooming him and earning his trust for quite some time. So, in general, 14 year old having consensual sex with an adult is ethically questionable and illegal; but probably not “monster” calibre. Fostering a several-year-long trust relationship with a developmentally slow kid, pulling strings to get him out of trouble and out of class and then taking advantage of him when he’s a teen is creepy at least.

16

Ummm…how does sodomizing a 14 year old boy equal “giving a kid an orgasm”? :frowning:

17

He was convicted of performing oral sex on the boy. Sodomy, in a legal sense, doesn’t always mean buggery.

18

Ok. I was posting while ignorant then. That really is deplorable. Thanks for the info.

19

“Monster” fits the bill for this guy and anyone else that would pray on an underaged kid. Just do this, put YOUR kid in that kid’s place while this former educator was alone with him and think of all the things you’d like to do to him once you found out! He’s lucky they didn’t stick a shank in him during that beating. Peace.

20

Live and learn.