Teacher Resigns in Wake of Anti-Gay/-Black Slur Disagreement
[There was a video here]
On May 12, a senior at Pflugerville High School in Texas named Isaiah Thomas used what’s being reported as “a derogatory term directed towards gay people” in science class. Let’s assume the reason it’s not being said on the local news stations that are covering this story is because it’s a very bad word—probably “faggot.” In response, his teacher, Gretchen Summers told him (in his words), “How’d you like it if somebody called you a nigger?”
If you want to look at her response optimistically, Summers attempted to shock Thomas into acknowledging his misdeed. If you want to interpret it pessimistically, she’s a racist who spends her days waiting to say the word “nigger,” even in hypothetical, words-as-words instances.
Thomas reported what Summers had said to his principal, Summers was put on leave, and then she resigned two days later. In KXAN’s report, above, Thomas explains, “She could have at least said the ‘N-word,’ or could have said, ‘how would you like someone calling you N-Word?’” That is true. She most likely would have avoided all of this if she had.
Thomas was also interviewed by KEYE, and said that he was offended by Summers’s language. Thomas’s mother, Charlott Swist, said, “I raised my kids not to even use that word against each other.” Swist added, “We send our kids to school to learn. Not that kind of learning, either...She owes the school and all those children a public apology.”
[There was a video here]
If Swist mentioned whether or not she raised her kids to use the word “faggot,” KEYE did not report it. In fact, there is no mention of Thomas being punished or for feeling any remorse for using a slur himself. And so, it would seem that the lesson to extract here is that one derogatory term actually does carry more weight than another. Summers’s lesson went unlearned.
