# Is my son's teacher overreacting, or am I underreacting **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 12, 2010, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745 "2010-02-12T18:20:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2010, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/61 "2010-02-14T18:24:52Z")
> [@MsWhatsit](#): > > Still, does it really matter? The photo was fine before the kid announced that he was naked in it. But you can’t see his nakedness! The only thing that changed the photo from OK to not OK was the knowledge that he was naked in the part of the photo that you can’t see. This is ridiculous, and IMO doesn’t warrant a chat with the kid about inappropriate pictures. The picture wasn’t inappropriate. Yeah…it would be like, “Oh, were you wearing underwear under your jeans in that pic?” “Nope, I went commando!” Ensue giggling kids. It just feels like we’re SO frightened of kids in any vaguely “inappropriate situation.” The kids weren’t harmed–they were probably giggling about nakedness or thinking being in a hot tub was cool. I’m sure most of them had forgotten about it ten minutes later. It seems it’s the adults who have to fixate, but it’s such a tiny thing. ---
**Author:** ![Pray\_for\_peace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pray\_for\_peace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pray_for_peace)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2010, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/62 "2010-02-14T19:25:57Z")
> [@CrazyCatLady](#): > > You have to keep in mind that a teacher has thirty other special snowflakes to deal with, not just your kid. And at least one of those other kids is going to go home and announce that your kid was passing around pictures of himself in a hot tub naked. With the teacher’s knowledge and permission to do so in class. Those parents aren’t going to talk to her about this issue–they’re going to go screaming to the administration about having her fired, and there will be a formal inquiry into how she handled this situation. No matter what the picture showed or didn’t show, she’s going to have to at some point have a conversation with your kid about bringing pictures to class that were taken while he was naked if for no other reason than to get the other parents and the administration off her back. I think this is correct, based on the public school teachers I know. The obscured nakedness in the picture raises several tough issues for the teacher, and I think her email was reasonable under the circumstances. First, it’s a way of giving the mom a heads up that the picture had been taken while the child was naked in the hot tub, and that the child brought it to school (either or both of which the mom may not have known about at all). I don’t think there’s anything wrong with a parent taking such a picture, of course, but the picture isn’t appropriate for school because a six-year-olds’ classroom isn’t the place to be discussing what kinds of naked pictures are OK to share in public and why. The kids probably laughed when he said he was naked, and I think the teacher **had to** say something about the picture, for the reason that **CrazyCatLady** mentioned. ---
**Author:** ![MsWhatsit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eb8c5e/32.png) [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2010, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/63 "2010-02-14T19:27:36Z")
OK, but it _wasn’t a naked picture_. “Naked picture” implies, IMO, that there is some amount of nakedness visible in the picture. If you wouldn’t refer to a picture of a shirtless kid in swim trunks as a “naked picture” then a waist-up picture of a kid in a hot tub isn’t a naked picture, either. No nudity was visible. Not a naked picture. ---
**Author:** ![Pray\_for\_peace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pray\_for\_peace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pray_for_peace)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2010, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/64 "2010-02-14T19:29:48Z")
Yeah, in the second sentence I said the nakedness was obscured. If nakedness hadn’t come up in conversation no one would have known. But it did come up in conversation, thereby raising the issues for the teacher to deal with. ---
**Author:** ![MsWhatsit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eb8c5e/32.png) [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2010, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/65 "2010-02-14T19:31:16Z")
So, in your opinion, if a kid in the classroom jokingly asked, “Are you naked under your clothes?” about a picture of a fully clothed student, and the kid said, “Yes,” would that have raised issues that the teacher had to deal with? Because that’s basically the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2010, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/66 "2010-02-14T19:53:30Z")
> [@MsWhatsit](#): > > OK, but it _wasn’t a naked picture_. “Naked picture” implies, IMO, that there is some amount of nakedness visible in the picture. If you wouldn’t refer to a picture of a shirtless kid in swim trunks as a “naked picture” then a waist-up picture of a kid in a hot tub isn’t a naked picture, either. No nudity was visible. Not a naked picture. And what if the kid said he was naked and he wasn’t? Is the picture still inappropriate or is it in the minds of the onlookers? ---
**Author:** ![Pray\_for\_peace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pray\_for\_peace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pray_for_peace)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2010, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/67 "2010-02-14T20:18:23Z")
> [@MsWhatsit](#): > > So, in your opinion, if a kid in the classroom jokingly asked, “Are you naked under your clothes?” about a picture of a fully clothed student, and the kid said, “Yes,” would that have raised issues that the teacher had to deal with? Because that’s basically the same thing. I don’t think it’s the same thing. But I’m not a teacher, so I guess my opinion should be taken with huge grain of salt. ---
**Author:** ![dragoncat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6a8cbe/32.png) [@dragoncat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dragoncat)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/68 "2010-02-15T05:45:26Z")
I’m a teacher and I can’t see the issue ringing any “time to call Child Protective Services!” bells. For example, the boy didn’t say, “my dad and I went in the hot tub, and he took a bunch of pictures of me to show his friends, and this is just one of them” or something like that. If the situation did strike me as potentially one of abuse or neglect, the appropriate response from the teacher would be: 1) talk to the child about the situation and 2) if possible/appropriate, talk to the parent. If the teacher still suspects abuse, call CPS. In the states I’ve worked in, the laws give the person filing confidentiality, and expect them to file as soon as they are aware of the situation, and/or within 24 hours. The younger the child is and the more physical danger they appear to be in, the more urgency. I don’t have any opinion on whether the picture was appropriate. Concepts of “appropriate” about the human body vary hugely from one family to another. I don’t think a meeting with the principal is warranted at this point. Why antagonize the teacher by going over her head? If you want to meet with her, fine; she may call the principal in for back up. Which from her point of view, would probably be a good thing. ---
**Author:** ![Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brown_eyed_girl/32/3574_2.png) [@Brown\_Eyed\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brown_Eyed_Girl)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/69 "2010-02-15T06:29:25Z")
I don’t see why you can’t kill two birds with one stone. Print out the email, write across the top in large letters FATUOUS and drop it off at the school to be placed in her mailbox. ---
**Author:** ![Green\_Bean](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/green_bean/32/1760_2.png) [@Green\_Bean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Green_Bean)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/70 "2010-02-15T07:03:55Z")
> [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](#): > > She also doesn’t know the family situation. As the mom, you do know that this photo was in fact taken by the child’s father, your ex-husband, and you are OK with that. She probably has other kids in her class who are being taken care of by the “uncle of the week” when there’s an unexpected snow day. If for some reason that photo and conversation had taken place and it had not been taken by the child’s father, or if you did not agree that this was appropriate behavior for the father (like he had done it before with creepy friends around), I’m pretty sure you’d want to know about it. Are you suggesting that it’s the teacher’s duty to rat one parent out to the other. No. No. No. No. Oh, hell no. And what makes you think she doesn’t know the family situation? ---
**Author:** ![Sleeps\_With\_Butterflies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@Sleeps\_With\_Butterflies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sleeps_With_Butterflies)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/71 "2010-02-15T07:19:31Z")
I think the teacher might be over-reacting, but I’m not familiar with the ethical ramifications she might deal with regarding the mentioning of children and nudity during class. I’m willing to give her the benefit of the doubt that she wasn’t doing it to be a bitch since it wasn’t written in a rude or accusatory way. On the other hand I think it’s just as much of an over-reaction the responses where people want you to go to the principal. Jeez, chill out. Respond to her and thank her for her suggestion and let her know that you don’t think naked pictures of his head will be a problem in the future and let it be done. Why make so much out of so little? ---
**Author:** ![Roland\_Orzabal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c2a13f/32.png) [@Roland\_Orzabal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roland_Orzabal)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/72 "2010-02-15T14:57:46Z")
“Obscured nakedness”? Someone’s head sticking out of a hot tub? Really? If that term is at all meaningful (which I question; I’d say the whole idea of nakedness is that it is by definition unobscured), it applies to full-body nude pictures altered after the fact to hide some or all of the subject’s body by (e.g.) the addition of black bars. If “obscured nakedness” is an apt description of the photo from the OP, then it also applies to a picture of a fully-clothed person; in both cases, physical objects in the photo are fully blocking the body from view. I understand the point that the teacher may have been covering her own ass against complaints from parents of classmates who went home and talked about Tommy’s naked show-and-tell picture, but do we really want to start tailoring our behavior to suit the knee-jerk reactions of misinformed idiots jumping to conclusions? We already have plenty of “oh, we’d love to behave sensibly in this situation, but morons wouldn’t like it and they might stir up trouble” precedents (tempted as I am, I won’t bring up the first example that comes to mind lest it derail the thread, but this sort of argument is a pet hatred of mine) without endorsing the setting of another one. ETA: I’m still in favor of the OP ignoring it now that what’s happened has happened, but the idea that the teacher’s reaction was in any way reasonable is ludicrous. ---
**Author:** ![Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harriet_the_Spry)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/73 "2010-02-15T15:21:49Z")
> [@Green\_Bean](#): > > Are you suggesting that it’s the teacher’s duty to rat one parent out to the other. > > No. No. No. No. Oh, hell no. > > And what makes you think she doesn’t know the family situation? Why do I assume she doesn’t know the family situation? Because she has about 30 kids in her class. Knowing the individual kids’ family situations is unrealistic, and to a large extent none of her business. Presumably she knows it to the extent to know that the OP is the main parent to contact. If no one is hiding anything from anyone, there is no ratting out to take place. Maybe the teacher should have informed both parents, if they are both listed as contacts. And if someone is hiding something that results in a disruptive situation in the classroom, the teacher has no need to be complicit in hiding it. Calling CPS over this would have been overreacting. Having a conversation directly with the student may have been overreacting, depending on what was said. Telling one or both parents is not overreacting. That is letting the the parent handle the situation. ---
**Author:** ![DivineComedienne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c67d28/32.png) [@DivineComedienne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DivineComedienne)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/74 "2010-02-15T15:43:31Z")
> [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](#): > > Why do I assume she doesn’t know the family situation? Because she has about 30 kids in her class. Knowing the individual kids’ family situations is unrealistic, and to a large extent none of her business. Presumably she knows it to the extent to know that the OP is the main parent to contact. She does know our situation (inasmuch as any outsider “knows”). We are divorced and share equal custody. The issue of one or both of us (parents) doing anything inappropriate or dangerous to my son is not the question. My ex was not a good husband for me but he is a good dad, and I have no concerns about that; neither does the teacher. I don’t think most people think it’s odd that a six-year-old could be naked occasionally in front of his parent. My son frequently brings in photos to share of things he has done that he thinks are interesting (his trip to visit Grandma in CA at her dairy farm, complete with cows; our haunted yard at Halloween; launching his model rockets with dad), so this, to us, was just one more “sharing” moment. > [@](#): > > Calling CPS over this would have been overreacting. Having a conversation directly with the student may have been overreacting, depending on what was said. Telling one or both parents is not overreacting. That is letting the the parent handle the situation I agree, telling us was not overreacting. I object to the use of the word “inappropriate” and its inferences. My kid was just trying to show his friends something he did that was unusual (swimming outside in the snow), and now he feels like he did something wrong. AND, she did NOT let us handle the situation, she had already “handled” it with my son, and now was scolding me via email without discussing it with me. _PS: I can tell you from experience, when you go hot-tubbing in below-freezing temperatures, it’s nice and warm in the water; but as soon as I get out, the water begins to freeze on the fabric of my bathing suit. My skin is still warm from the water, but my suit is freezing and it is EXTREMELY uncomfortable. I can dry my skin right away (although the damp towel begins to freeze), but not the fabric. It’s a lot easier to wrap a naked kid in a towel and hurry him into the house than it is to have to strip a frozen bathing suit off him in the house. In the warmer months, it’s not an issue._ ---
**Author:** ![GreatStuffMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f04885/32.png) [@GreatStuffMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreatStuffMan)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/75 "2010-02-15T15:46:57Z")
That’s one sensitive teacher… ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/76 "2010-02-15T16:00:45Z")
> [@DivineComedienne](#): > > This is also the teacher who paired up the kids by 'Good reader with a poor reader", so that the good readers would encourage the poor readers to do better. Yeah, my son’s partner was REALLY happy to be paired up with someone who would show him how much worse his reading was compared to my son’s, and physically harrassed my son until he complained to me and I had to come in to speak to the teacher. This was done by many of my teachers, including several favorites. It’s how I got to teach Pili J. how to read (K1, K2, 1st grade) and how Almudena got to teach me how to jump the horse (8th grade). When done properly, it’s a great tool for both the mentor and the mentee. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/77 "2010-02-15T17:14:47Z")
> [@GreatStuffMan](#): > > That’s one sensitive teacher… Hmmm, I was going to say, stupid. ---
**Author:** ![Hello\_Again](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/85e7bf/32.png) [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/78 "2010-02-15T17:24:40Z")
Another thing to toss out there, harkening back to the Holocaust survivor thing, is that many, if not most of the survivors had incredibly forceful personalities, which were huge factors in their survival. This is where the “overbearing” part comes in. My grandmother used to sneak out of the Lodz ghetto, to “pass” as aryan (like me, she had fair skin and red hair) in order to get food and necessaries for her family. Had she been discovered she would be immediately executed. You think a person who will risk getting shot on sight for the sake of keeping her family together, is scared of you _thinking_ she is mean? Oh, hell no. ---
**Author:** ![Hello\_Again](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/85e7bf/32.png) [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/79 "2010-02-15T17:38:52Z")
Argh sorry wrong thread ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2010, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745/80 "2010-02-15T18:11:20Z")
> [@Hello\_Again](#): > > Another thing to toss out there, harkening back to the Holocaust survivor thing Geez, and people say the TEACHER is overreacting! 😉 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-my-sons-teacher-overreacting-or-am-i-underreacting/528745.md?page=5)