The Student Room Group

Vicar fired for kissing a girls CHEEK

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=KQTPHFOKPMSLXQFIQMFCFFWAVCBQYIV0?xml=/news/2006/07/14/nvicar14.xml

How can it have got to this point? An innocent congratulatory kiss on the cheek for a struggling pupil, and he gets sacked from his position as Chairman of the Governors board. The rhetoric in this article is unbelievable. Saying that in today's modern climate we have to be careful, have to watch our every step. Not once is this assertion questioned. Its automatically accepted as right that people have to watch every word they say and everything they do, so as not to be persecuted by some poncy social services type.

This is why, a few months back I walked straight past a lost child in Kings Cross. She was sat on the floor bawling her eyes out, obviously lost and in distress. I and hundreds of others walked straight by, in the knowledge we would not be thanked by the parents, more likely taken to court. We all walked past in the knowledge that girl could have gotten seriously hurt or taken, because its simply not worth helping others these days.

We live in a society in which if you defend yourself or your home, you are likely to be prosecuted. We live in a society that spits on helping others. If I saw a bunch of chavs kicking ****e out of someone in the street tomorrow, would I help in the knowledge it would be me, not the chavs to get in trouble. A judge recently charged a man who helped someone getting assaulted telling him 'next time, walk past'. I'll try and find the source for that today.

Thoughts?

Scroll to see replies

o tempora, o mores?

Western urban society is uncaring, by and large. It's partly down to capitalism, partly down to human nature, but mainly down to the interaction of the two, which frequently turns people into grasping little rats. I think the law should require all City bankers to go to a barn dance at least twice in a financial year.
Reply 2
Both capitalism and human nature have existed and interacted for hundreds of years. Basically all the public amenities in my home town, and almost all the major parts of my university, were not funded by the state but by private contributers who were wealthy.

It's a social thing. If anything, the mass media is to blame. Not to mention that society is so safe and protected that people go to extreme lengths to remove the possibility of anything bad happening to them.

It's obviously not as bad outside London. Thankfully.
LibertineNorth
Both capitalism and human nature have existed and interacted for hundreds of years. Basically all the public amenities in my home town, and almost all the major parts of my university, were not funded by the state but by private contributers who were wealthy.

It's a social thing. If anything, the mass media is to blame. Not to mention that society is so safe and protected that people go to extreme lengths to remove the possibility of anything bad happening to them.

It's obviously not as bad outside London. Thankfully.
Mass media? The problem started before they arose. Perhaps they've accelerated the process, by giving airtime to cases such as this and coming down on the side of nanny-state views, but they aren't the sole, or even the main, culprits.
Reply 4
This isn't the fault of government or media in my view. Its the fault of a vocal minority who have pushed others into an idealogy of total individualism, whilst at the same time claiming it is not they, but us who are selfish.

I can see the entirety of society slowing being engineered to fit the world views of a few. This is also a case of paranoia. Personally I always thought paranoia was a good thing anyways! :p:
Reply 5
The firmly entrenched rules are that, when dealing with children in any capacity, one does not touch the child either in an affectionate or comforting gesture.

The vicar, as Chair of Governors would know that, so his action was extremely ill-considered.

It is as much to protect the adult as to protect the child.

Very sad indictment on our modern society.
Reply 6
Well, if children never get touched, I'm sure it'll do them nothing but good mentally and socially :p:
thats crazy.

the girl did well he congratulated her
and he gets fired

this country is getting beyond a joke
Reply 8
But if she hadn't done well, she most likely would have 'achieved' 'deferred success'...:p:

Your right, as much as I hate to say it, this country is becoming a joke.
Reply 9
tehjonny
Well, if children never get touched, I'm sure it'll do them nothing but good mentally and socially :p:


I would expect their parents and other loved ones to give them plenty of 'touchy feely' hugs.

For other work related adults - a definite no,no because of accusations of all kinds of abuse.
Reply 10
Cadre_Of_Storms
thats crazy.

the girl did well he congratulated her
and he gets fired

this country is getting beyond a joke


He also kissed her (on the forehead according to The Times.) What was wrong with just telling her that she had done well to persevere and understand long multiplication?

He didn't 'get the sack' - he was a Chair of School Governors which is entirely voluntary. He was removed from the Governing Body. Not the same thing.

The people who make up our society have caused what this country has become. It is not different to any other western society.

As I said, the natural reaction to comfort or congratulate a child by hugging them or giving them any physical contact has had to be controlled and replaced with distance when comforting or congratulating.

I remember reading an archived case a while ago where a school caretaker who was a grandad and just loved kids, was asked by a 7 year old girl at the school to give her a kiss goodbye at the end of the day. The kids always hung around him because he was so good with them and they were all very fond of him, treating him like their own grandad. He bent down, gave her a quick peck on the cheek and said 'goodbye dear.'

She went home and mentioned in passing to her parents that mr. - had given her a kiss.

The poor man lost his job over something that was totally innocent and yet portrayed as something perverted.

A natural reaction of concerned parents in this day and age, particularly with the high profile of paedophiles.
This is ridiculous. When I was at school our teachers would regularly kiss the girls vaginas when they did well, let alone their cheeks. They loved it.
Reply 12
DanGrover
This is ridiculous. When I was at school our teachers would regularly kiss the girls vaginas when they did well, let alone their cheeks. They loved it.


What an ill-thought out post. :confused:
DanGrover
This is ridiculous. When I was at school our teachers would regularly kiss the girls vaginas when they did well, let alone their cheeks. They loved it.


i bet they did.
Reply 14
Obviously neither Dan nor smokeyjoe know much about the female anatomy. :rolleyes:

Just leave it you two with the misogyny and your own puerile little fantasies.
Boo hoo.
They did an experiment on some show where they left a child (an actor obv) lost on a street somewhere and not one man even looked at the child, let alone saw what was the matter, such is the stigma created by the media frenzies and hypocritical police/courts.
Also another story where a police officer, who was off duty and out of uniform was mugged in the street, harking on about not one member of the public helping her. Well b****, if you wern't so busy arresting people for playing good samaritan but accidently hurting the bad guy maybe you would have got help.
tehjonny
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=KQTPHFOKPMSLXQFIQMFCFFWAVCBQYIV0?xml=/news/2006/07/14/nvicar14.xml

How can it have got to this point? An innocent congratulatory kiss on the cheek for a struggling pupil, and he gets sacked from his position as Chairman of the Governors board. The rhetoric in this article is unbelievable. Saying that in today's modern climate we have to be careful, have to watch our every step. Not once is this assertion questioned. Its automatically accepted as right that people have to watch every word they say and everything they do, so as not to be persecuted by some poncy social services type.

This is why, a few months back I walked straight past a lost child in Kings Cross. She was sat on the floor bawling her eyes out, obviously lost and in distress. I and hundreds of others walked straight by, in the knowledge we would not be thanked by the parents, more likely taken to court. We all walked past in the knowledge that girl could have gotten seriously hurt or taken, because its simply not worth helping others these days.

We live in a society in which if you defend yourself or your home, you are likely to be prosecuted. We live in a society that spits on helping others. If I saw a bunch of chavs kicking ****e out of someone in the street tomorrow, would I help in the knowledge it would be me, not the chavs to get in trouble. A judge recently charged a man who helped someone getting assaulted telling him 'next time, walk past'. I'll try and find the source for that today.

Thoughts?




GOOD!

Thats my thoughts. The group of people I'd least like to touch any of my children are a bunch of mentalists who repress their sexuality due to the ramblings of their cult.

Reply 18
1) Technically, he didn't get fired.

"The girl's mother complained but investigations by the police, social services and the Church all cleared Mr Barrett of doing anything wrong.

However, he said the subsequent furore left him with little choice but to resign as chairman of the governors on the advice of the Archdeacon of Lichfield. He had been due to step down later this year."

2) I feel sorry for the girl. Not for being kissed - I see nothing wrong with that, but because she has the ill-fortune of having such an idiotic mother.

"Last night the girl's mother said that more action should have been taken against Mr Barrett.

"I am so disappointed with the way it has been handled and I would like him to be removed from his position," she said.

She has complained to the school's board of governors, Staffordshire education authority, the police and Brian Jenkins, the Labour MP for Tamworth. No one at the William McGregor school wished to comment."
Reply 19
yawn
He also kissed her (on the forehead according to The Times.) What was wrong with just telling her that she had done well to persevere and understand long multiplication?

He didn't 'get the sack' - he was a Chair of School Governors which is entirely voluntary. He was removed from the Governing Body. Not the same thing.

The people who make up our society have caused what this country has become. It is not different to any other western society.

As I said, the natural reaction to comfort or congratulate a child by hugging them or giving them any physical contact has had to be controlled and replaced with distance when comforting or congratulating.

I remember reading an archived case a while ago where a school caretaker who was a grandad and just loved kids, was asked by a 7 year old girl at the school to give her a kiss goodbye at the end of the day. The kids always hung around him because he was so good with them and they were all very fond of him, treating him like their own grandad. He bent down, gave her a quick peck on the cheek and said 'goodbye dear.'

She went home and mentioned in passing to her parents that mr. - had given her a kiss.

The poor man lost his job over something that was totally innocent and yet portrayed as something perverted.

A natural reaction of concerned parents in this day and age, particularly with the high profile of paedophiles.


So you say in one post that this is a sad indictment of our culture, and at the same time seem to agree with it? Why should we accept this? Why not introduce a new 'whiny parents' law? :p: