Angry Viral Videos Are Not The Way

So today somebody on Facebook posted a link to a video that is (or hopes to soon be) viral, at least locally. The video was the parent of an autistic child who was claiming that his son was verbally bullied by the teacher and staff of the special needs classroom in the school that he attends. To back this up, the man sent his son into school with a hidden recording device. This entire story kind of freaked me out on multiple levels, not the least of which was the fact that I used to work at that school and with that same student. Now this is my personal opinion on what a situation like this says in general, so I'm not going to be giving any names or places. If you're familiar with any of them, please don't mention it anywhere, as the last thing I want is for any of this to come back and bite me in the ass. Bullshit like this is the reason I quit that line of work in the first place.

However, as it turns out, the father was right. Some of the audio that was caught on tape ranged from inappropriate (such as the teacher talking about getting drunk the previous night) to verbally abusive. According to the dad's self-edited video transcript, at one point the aide says "you're such a bastard" to the child. Behavior like this is of course inexcusable and should not be tolerated. Any school employee who engages in institutional abuse like name calling is beyond wrong and should not be allowed around students. When I was there, I worked under a very good teacher, and for the most part, a very good group of classroom aides. There was one who would say inappropriate things in front of students sometimes, and I believe she got transferred out of that room after I left.

In any case, I am of course a strong opponent of any type of bullying; institutional, peer to peer, or otherwise. I, like probably a majority of people, have been through it in some ways myself, and it sucks. I really approve of the action that has been taken in the past several years to try to recognize and address this problem.

But with that said, I want to look at the dangerous precedent that occurs when any parent that feels like it has the ability to open up Windows Movie Maker and spread viral videos around the Internet. Now, as I said, in this case the father was right that his son was being mistreated by the staff. In the video it mentions that the aide responsible for these comments was in fact fired, and the teacher and other aides were all reassigned to different schools. It would appear to me that even though the pain of the experience cannot be undone, a measure of justice was served. However, in the video, the father rails against the teacher union rules that allow the names of those involved to be kept secret, and demands a public apology from everyone involved. He mentions he's not going to sue (which is pretty admirable considering that many parents of special needs students love nothing more than big cash settlements from underfunded public schools when they're already rich), but its clear that the woman losing her situation and the rest of the staff being reprimanded over this matter is not sufficient. There has to be a viral video that incites rage, and a big production needs to be made. Its not enough that the school district took action, but everyone in the world needs to know about it as well, and every member of the classroom, guilty or innocent, and the school system as well, needs to have its reputation tarnished.

The biggest reason that crusader parents making viral videos is dangerous is because for one, they're completely one sided. There's no editor, there's no fact checker, there's no due process. The video is just the parent saying his side of the story as angrily as possible with well-placed editing to make it appear exactly the way he wants it. I know for a fact that he, like most parents of disabled kids (or maybe just parents in general), completely downplays the extent of his child's disabilities. He mentions that his son flipping out and having breakdowns in class was a new phenomenon related to the bullying, and that normally he never acted out anymore than "quietly mumbling to himself" and so forth. I had personally seen this kid launch into unprovoked tantrums years ago when I worked there. No, they were not common, but they did happen, and on one or two occasions, they could be somewhat violent. Even though this fact does not have too much bearing on the events that occurred, it is nonetheless a deliberate misrepresentation of the facts on the part of the father in order to further his case. Most people watching the video would probably not even think to question such a minor statement of the video, but because I was familiar with the student, I caught it instantly.


Another reason these videos are dangerous is because sometimes they achieve their goal: to incite rage. One of the comments I saw after this video was posted read, and I'm paraphrasing here, something about "taking those cunts and slamming their heads into a wall." Right, because the best way to deal with verbal abuse is more verbal abuse, and to crush women's heads. Some people really don't think about what the fuck they're saying, because this is the Internet and let's all kill everybody for everything! Now while I'm sure the father of the student wouldn't condone the brutal murder of a room full of teachers, that doesn't mean that by releasing an inflammatory video of a matter that should (and for the most part has been) handled through the proper channels, he hasn't started down a path that could lead to threats of violence or worse. He does not reveal the last names of the staff in question (seeming to indicate that if they don't come forward for an apology, he will), but that doesn't matter. He's already revealed their first names, where they work, and what position they hold. Since the names and salaries of all public employees in New Jersey are a matter of public record, and there's also this thing called the Internet, it shouldn't be too hard for anyone who wants to email someone a death threat to track them down. At the very least, you run the risk of turning entire public sentiment against a school full of mostly good and honest, non-abusive teachers and staff who are working their asses off every day to try and teach your god damn kids how to read and write.

And one more thing. In this case, the evidence was clear and the sentiment was as least justified. But what if the next angry parent with a bone to pick on YouTube is not? When I worked at that school I was kicked, punched, stabbed with pencils, and hit with thrown chairs on a daily basis by a different student with whom I worked. Some days I seriously considered bashing my head on a piece of furniture so that I could go to the hospital instead of to work. For my trouble, when we had to use state approved restraint techniques to keep the student from hurting others in one of his tantrums, his parents called for investigations of abuse from both the state and from Dyphus. Thanks to the due process of both of these entities, they found that the accusations were baseless, and nothing came of it. But maybe if the parents had thought that a viral video would have been a more effective means to deal with the imagined situation and had decided to fire up the webcam and publicly call me a child-beating monster until there was such a media firestorm that there was no choice for the school but to fire me, my good name would be fucked forever. Or hell, maybe they could have just sent the kid to class with a wire on every day until they had enough audio they could take out of context to doctor up and be able to "prove" whatever they wanted. By the time anyone figured it out, the damage would have been done and no one would have cared anymore, because that's how viral videos work.

Like I said, the woman who was responsible for saying these things was wrong, and deserved to lose her job several times over. The motive behind making this video is just, even though I strongly disagree with the method. We, as an information age society, need to be very cautious as to what we give credence. Many of the parents in that school district already have a staggering success rate at suing the district for, quite frankly, bullshit reasons. Some people are just out to rightfully protect their kids. Other people are looking for any excuse to lawyer up and prey on an already overburdened public school special education system and the underpaid employees who can't afford legal counsel. While advanced education programs and regular classroom aides are being cut due to the budget, special education classes are fully stocked with a personal aide for each child, and there's still not enough resources to train everyone sufficiently. If making viral videos becomes an effective way for vindictive parents to get people fired, there won't be one god damn teacher left in that school.

So, if you want to make an online video instead of going through the proper legal channels, you'd better have a good fucking reason, because you only have to destroy a person's career once. As for me, I left all that behind. Now, I no longer worry about being sued, investigated, or apparently wiretapped. Some people might say that its a shame, because I was good at that job, but in the end I just couldn't deal with the parents' bullshit.

Oh well, their loss.