Midweek Rant: Save our children – it’s about time cruel teachers were jailed

[webfact]

Midweek Rant

 

Save our children – it’s about time cruel teachers were jailed

 

Picture: Sanook

 

BANGKOK: -- There are certain stock phrases in Thailand that even relative newbies following the Thai news will be aware of. Such phrases as ‘the driver fled the scene’, ‘managed to escape in the confusion’ and ‘transferred to an inactive post’ are all such basic examples.

 

To these and many others of the genre can now be added “the teacher had gone home because she wasn’t feeling well” and “the director of the school was in a meeting and unavailable for comment”.

 

They both follow cases of cruelty and abuse to children at schools and are becoming almost a daily staple in the news pages about Thailand. Especially now that video evidence is becoming to widespread.

 

I am ranting this week about the situation in schools, not in homes. Domestic abuse can wait for another day because I don’t want to confuse the two even though some claim there is a connection.

 

Last week there was the case of the two so-called teachers at a kindergarten who were caught binding the hands and blindfolding two five year olds supposedly under their care. They claimed pathetically that their actions were to teach concentration. Shockingly the director – when he could finally be found – backed them up before he

realized what hot water he was in.

 

The parents settled on compensation of 20,000 baht per child. Almost as ghastly.

 

This week video has emerged of a teacher assaulting a young boy and stomping on him in class. The poor chap didn’t know what was happening to him and didn’t know where to turn. Indeed there was no one to help him. The abuse was repeated again and again. That happened last year and nothing has been done.

 

In 2016 a PE teacher hurled a coffee mug at a student and disfigured her. He was allowed to keep his job while the student herself was obliged to go elsewhere. To feel like she was in the wrong.

 

She didn’t listen to an instruction – kids do that, funnily enough. I saw it once or twice in thirty years as a teacher. Thirty years, I might add, when a raised voice or a steely stare was all I ever needed.

 

There have also been reports of sexual abuse against girls and boys – many of which are shoved under the carpet when the press furor dies down.

 

Many other cases at all age levels have been reported. It is alarming but there is something much more concerning, more insidious than the crimes in some ways.

 

Virtually all the teachers concerned are still in their jobs. Many have not even been transferred to other schools meaning that children who can’t move away have to face them again and again.

 

The worst they can expect is paying a few thousand baht compensation, if they have to pay anything at all. Many just get the most cursory of telling off by the local education authority after the inevitable committee is set up to pretend to investigate.

 

Directors just protect their staff knowing that their own face is at risk from fingers pointed at their schools. They are scared to death of their profits taking a plunge.

 

Many parents accept money rather than insist on prosecution.

 

Police wait until doctors tell them the bleeding obvious that a child has been wounded, then dally and try to fob the case off onto others such as child protection services. This when a criminal assault has often taken place.

 

Everybody is at fault in this national scandal – everybody that is except the children.

 

Though you wouldn’t know it at times.

 

As is always the case when abusers meet victims, it is the children and most vulnerable that seem to frequently get the blame. Some are forced to apologize as children invariably will to help ease matters even when they know they are in the right.

 

What sort of educational example is that?

 

It just makes for a sickening and repeating cycle of abuse where the young people are let down time and again by those very people who should be tasked with protecting them.

 

Of course the government can point to the now long outlawed change in the law supposedly banning corporal punishment in schools.

 

Big deal.

 

It is one thing to promulgate a law but, as we see in Thailand time and time again in other areas, quite another to actually enforce it.

 

There exists a lingering vestige of acceptance that teachers have the right to threaten children with violence and even to use it. Within all corners of society there are those who accept it. And the children even do – they are so used to the propaganda of the rights of adults over children that they feel they have little say in the matter.

 

They need adults to help them – which is so absolutely lacking in so many cases.

 

Sure, there are of course good teachers everywhere who are appalled by the violence and feel sickened themselves that their calling is so besmirched. They are in the majority, only a fool would deny it.

 

But these good apples need to be helped too, by a proper reaction to those that are sullying the name of the teaching profession in Thailand.

 

So what needs to happen?

 

Firstly any teacher under investigation needs to be suspended immediately.

 

Directors of schools need to be compelled to act quickly and decisively. Education authorities of all levels need to ensure that directors are forced to act.

 

Then there need to be guidelines that are followed. Physical abuse needs to be assessed quickly. And police should not wait for complaints before acting in the interest of the young victims.

 

They need to arrest and prosecute perpetrators of violence on children with no leniency shown to teachers – in fact the opposite should be the case. Because of their position of authority the cases should be considered more serious more heinous.

 

No teacher should have any right to hit, browbeat or bully a child in any way.

 

Teachers who assault children physically should be jailed. Courts should be prepared to hand down custodial sentences to teachers, suspend the sentences if they are sufficiently minor – but make it jail.

 

Most fines in Thailand are hopelessly inadequate.

 

And anyone convicted of assault against children should not be allowed to enter a classroom again – ever. If you assault a child one strike and you’re out. No second chances.

 

Directors who have connived to protect teachers under their command should also be jailed. They are as much part of the problem.

 

Civil servants in education authorities who fail to act in the interests of children should be sacked. They can be given jobs sweeping the roads or something if they still need to work for the authority.

 

And please, please, please…no more of this offering and accepting of money as if that is the answer to the problem of abuse and will make it go away.

 

It won’t – it will just help to engrain the idea in all other areas of society as the children grow up that problems can be sorted with money. It is time to start challenging that notion with the young because there is very little hope for the older members of society in that regard.

 

All adults need to stop paying lip service to the notion that the Thai nation is somehow a paragon of virtue when it comes to the care of their children. They need to stop the denial and start to act.

 

They need to demand action from their leaders.

 

All right minded people must demand it.

 

Because the children – in their innocent hearts - rightfully, demand it.

 

-- © Copyright Thai Visa News 2017-03-01

[Thaiwrath]

3 words..............This Is Thailand !

[wakeupplease]

3 more words

jail Those b>>>>>>>

[doremifasol]

 

Physical abuse needs to be assessed quickly........ 

 

........as well as the emotional and the verbal.

 

.

 

 

[helloagain]

Why dont they go to jail with loss of pension and never teach again or work with children. I am a great believer an eye for an eye. Beat the teacher up

[TheFishman1]

The teachers here the cops here are Fake TIT

[Get Real]

Let the techers sit on the floor, and let a class of children kick on them for a lessons amount of time. What´s left of them after can go to jail for around 10 years.
No pension, Each one a Facebookpage with pictures and information about what they have done. And still it ain´t enough!

[kannot]

id start with the parenting skills which seem to lack not  only in Thailand but many places worldwide now, whenever I was a  kid I had to permanently  hold a parents hand when I was out ( it  was ok after 25yrs  old) went into any shop told "not to touch anything".........see kids now do exactly what they want

[elgordo38]

Money is the thing that makes many problems go away especially among the poor. 

[greenchair]

That's the longest rant I've ever seen ?????

[khunken]

2 hours ago, kannot said:

id start with the parenting skills which seem to lack not  only in Thailand but many places worldwide now, whenever I was a  kid I had to permanently  hold a parents hand when I was out ( it  was ok after 25yrs  old) went into any shop told "not to touch anything".........see kids now do exactly what they want

This is the second time you have posted this blame the victims crap. This Op is little to do with parenting & everything to do with violence against children by teachers. The only fault with parents (in the Op) is accepting payment as compensation for the assault & I fully agree with the writer.

Are you a teacher?

[Beats56]

I know children can be disobedient some times. They are young and learning. That gives no teacher the right to abuse them. If my 5 year old son was abused by a teacher I would be all over them like a chicken on a bug.

 

[toofarnorth]

If I was visiting that school and saw those 2 little girls in the OP pic. I would immediately free them then wait for a teacher to explain the reason .....none good enough for me I'm afraid.

[DrTuner]

Teachers, BiB, Monks, taxi drivers .. pretty much everybody. The whole country is already an open jail.

[darksidedog]

Very good article. It's sad that it needs to be written, but such is Thailand.

Beating kids at school is an absolute disgrace that has been brushed under the carpet for too long.

If I hit anyone in town, I know I am going to be arrested and that is quite fair.

If I hit a random kid in town, I would expect to be in far more trouble, because there would be no justification whatsoever for an adult with more strength to even consider it.

But in the schools it seems to be accepted as perfectly reasonable. <deleted>?

I hope your article is noted by the authorities and acted on.

This is an abuse that should not be tolerated in this day and age.

[Jonmarleesco]

1 hour ago, khunken said:

This is the second time you have posted this blame the victims crap. This Op is little to do with parenting & everything to do with violence against children by teachers. The only fault with parents (in the Op) is accepting payment as compensation for the assault & I fully agree with the writer.

Are you a teacher?

Actually, the parents are part of the problem. They should be part of the solution.  

 

They're part of the problem because they're part of a society that is still feudalistic in its approach to money and its leverage, that still worships patronage, that still thinks someone in a shirt and tie, or a blouse and skirt is superior, regardless of who is actually paying the piper. And yes, because they think it's alright to be bought.

 

Until that underlying inferiority complex, and its attendant boot-licking, is eradicated, nothing will change.

 

[sandemara]

When you consider Thai society in general and how it operates - a small exclusive elite exploiting and oppressing (with impunity) the vast bulk of a submissive, cowed mass of general population unaware that most of the rest of the world moved past a medieval approach to community life centuries ago - you may begin to understand why abuse of young students is rife in the Thai education system. Also why it remains unchallenged.

Education systems are meant to prepare the young so they will "fit in" with their society as they become adults - contribute and don't "rock the boat".

These abusive teachers most likely understand quite well that their "methods" are just what the authorities (and their education system) want.  The kids are being taught the basic truth of Thai society - the authorities (and the elite) have a right to assert their powers and privilege, and the serfs have the right to suck it up and learn to eat the shit sandwich life (and the lottery of birth) has handed them.

Examples of this reality abound in the media, especially in tales regarding justice and the way it is dispensed to the privileged and the downtrodden. How quickly we forget.

It's inevitable servants of the elite doing what they're expected to do to ensure the well-being and continued enrichment of the privileged and powerful will have to do things that make them unpopular with the masses.  Hence the need for things like "inactive posts" where a good and faithful servant can be removed from the resentful public eye for so-called "misdeeds" for a while when necessary. An oppressed public has pitiful short-term memory capacity. No harm done to a promising career in the meantime.  The indignant among the masses will be distracted soon enough by some meaningless froth pulled out of a hat and forget whatever it was that had made them disquieted and insecure. Life moves on. You can drown any unidentifiable sense of growing despair with a range of techniques, from drugs and alcohol through to unbridled violence and rages against oneself or nameless others.  Ah, LOS.