"The teacher told me not to say it, it's all for my own good" Three common dilemmas of sexual assault on campus

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The Japanese author of "Hidden Campus Sex Crimes" came to Taiwan

School teachers, taking advantage of their personal rights to treat students as their own, should not happen. But in the field of education, there are many such things that happen, so I wrote a book about such things.

On April 13, on the campus of National Taiwan University, Koji Ikeya, a senior reporter at Kyodo News Agency in Japan, shared his reporting work "Hidden Campus Sex Crimes: Teachers Told Me Not to Say It, It's All for My Good" at the "Breaking the Silence and Exposing Concealment - Taiwan-Japan Experience Exchange Seminar on Facing Campus Sex Crimes". The book contains several real incidents of campus sexual assault, and interviews with these victims and the perpetrators of the wolf division. (Extended reading: How to improve sexual harassment in schools: in addition to post-processing, pre-education is also necessary)

Photo provided by the Humanistic Education Foundation

There was a kendo club instructor who asked a middle school girl to strip naked and "connect with the teacher", a teacher took elementary school students to a hotel, claiming that "she doesn't just love a ten-year-old girl, but she is just ten years old", and some teachers asked many female high school students to be primary juniors.

Ikeya has long been interested in social issues, and his books include "The Death Penalty is Fine - Two Murders Caused by Isolation" and "The Chain of Children's Poverty". And what he wants to do this time is not just to try the "wolf teacher", but to ask why campus sexual assault can be "hidden for a long time". Why can these whispered and well-known wolf teachers on campus be able to travel smoothly on Japanese campuses, and even continue to be promoted without any accountability as long as they change schools after the incident?

In this seminar, there are several main and most common dilemmas, which make campus sexual assault hidden layer by layer.

Dilemma 1: "I'm not trying to fall in love with a 10-year-old girl, but the person I fell in love with happens to be 10 years old"

First of all, the biggest dilemma lies in the nature of campus sexual assault, which is a hidden power asymmetry.

Ikeya shared a case in the book. It was Mr. Suzuki and his student Yumi, who was only ten years old. Because she came from a single-parent family, Suzuki, as a mentor, often took care of her, and at that time, Mr. Suzuki and his wife were at a marriage bottleneck, which gave the two the opportunity to gradually get closer.

"I'm not good at dealing with positive types when I'm in a relationship with adults, and I never thought I'd fall in love with elementary school students." Slowly, Suzuki receives letters from Yumi every day from his favorite teacher. She first gave a doll, a help coupon and a back coupon, and finally a kiss coupon.

"I can't stop myself, but the other teachers should feel something is wrong too, after all, Yumi Chang came to me, and I can only rely on other teachers to stop me." Suzuki once said so. In the end, Suzuki took Yumi to the hotel and tried to have sex. Then he was arrested.

Ikeya said that Mr. Suzuki once told him, "I started as a tutor in Yumi's fourth grade. I didn't mean to fall in love with a 10-year-old girl, but the person I fell in love with was exactly 10 years old. The teacher has always felt that the two are in a relationship. They date weekly for two years. Both of them are lonely, the teacher is isolated at home or at school, and the child is a single parent. So there is a feeling of suspicion of love. This teacher also emphasized that he is not a lolicon.

Ikeya pointed out: "He is a good teacher who is serious and ordinary. He was very surprised when the judge said that he had abused his teacher power to persecute students. He never thought he was a powerful person."

The sentence "I'm not trying to fall in love with a 10-year-old girl, but the person I fell in love with is just 10 years old" shows Suzuki's unconsciousness and rationalization of his power. If you understand your own position, you should maintain boundaries with your students, rather than indulging in the illusion of "falling in love" with a girl and finding solace in your personal social dilemma.

The importance of this matter lies in the fact that "in fact, ordinary teachers tend to have a good impression of students. But if you don't control it well, you may have emotional projection, and in the end you will think that you are in love. The biggest problem in it is that especially powerful people, they have no sense of self. So I think it's necessary to re-educate them to let them know that they have power in their hands."

Photo provided by the Humanistic Education Foundation

Akiko Kamei, founder of the National Network on Sexual Harassment on Campus (SSHP), who came to Taiwan with her, added:

Some people are asking whether there is a love between a teacher and a student. In fact, love is a feeling. We cannot ask anyone not to have feelings. There are also students who really like the teacher from the bottom of their hearts. It is not strange that such students exist.

But the focus is on falling in love, how should teachers face their children? The relationship between the two is the position of teaching and being taught, which inevitably involves the issue of scores. The weaker side may not have enough chips to bear the risks of falling in love and breaking up. Another problem is that the experience, maturity, and imagination of two people about love are also completely different.

Kamei said that in Japan, there were teachers and students who broke up in love. What happened later? The teacher gave the student a very low score. In Japan, the evaluation is tenth grade. The students were originally eight points, but after the breakup, she only got five points.

A long time ago, a Japanese reporter made a documentary about the love between teachers and students. I only read half of it, and it was hard to watch. We know that on campus, teachers have a lot of control over students, and in this situation, the students that teachers "like" in the documentary are often families with relatively unstable financial conditions.

In this case, children often have a lot of emotional dependence on the teacher who lends a helping hand, and the family does not suspect that he is there, and leaves the child in the care of the teacher, or even takes it out for the night. Kamei said: "The result of this teacher-student love was that he even got married in the end." But these objects are all children with disadvantaged social conditions. She believes that teachers act as professionals when students find it difficult to say no or are prone to emotional investment. In any case, you should draw boundaries with your students. Teachers should be more sensitive through enhanced education. (Extended reading: My pain cannot be reconciled Interview with Lin Yihan: "What has been inserted will not be pulled out")

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Dilemma 2: Parent cheerleaders say to the victim, "Do you want to repay your kindness?"

Ikeya said: There is a situation when students finally muster up the courage to talk about their experiences of being victimized. Unexpectedly, the teacher insisted, "I didn't do such a thing." As a result, students were labeled as "lying liars." Since then, he has not been able to hold his head up among classmates, parents and teachers, and has even been bullied.

Sometimes the victim also has to leave school, which is known as secondary victimization.

There is also a situation where Ikeya is called a parent cheerleader.

Another case in the book is that Sanae, a female student, sued Haraguchi, the instructor of the Kendo Club, asking the female students to express their loyalty, including saying "I am willing to die for the teacher", and asking the students to "take off their clothes and communicate with the teacher". Because Haraguchi was an excellent teacher at school and led the kendo club to achieve excellent results, when Sanae and several other students filed a civil lawsuit, they were obstructed by other parents.

Ikeya analyzed that when teachers who are enough to lead the school to the national competition cause problems, parents often become teachers' cheerleaders and protect teachers. They repeatedly asked Sanae, "Do you want to repay your kindness?" "Do you want to overshadow your dazzling results?" It also invisibly inflicts secondary harm on the victim who stands up, which is the so-called "condemnation of the victim". The situation of blaming the victim is often more likely to cause harm to minors if it occurs in a closed campus.

Photo provided by the Humanistic Education Foundation

Dilemma 3: "Since the teacher knows, why don't you save the other sisters?"

Why can these teachers get away with it? The most serious problems occur in the most everyday banal evils. The third dilemma comes from silent campus colleagues.

When other teachers know and don't report it, the sexual assault case is just a whisper. Why do many teachers remain silent even though they know these things? Chen Zhaoru, author of "Silence: Collective Sexual Assault in a Special Education School in Taiwan" and "Silent Island" (Extended reading: Interview with Chen Zhaoru in "Dark Country": Desire is not dirty, desire is actually very painful), points out several key points:

First, many teachers believe that this kind of thing will not happen to them. "We are a good school, this is impossible." But the teacher who bullies the student has nothing to do with whether he is a high-performing teacher or not. It cannot be said that this kind of teacher is at fault, but it is definitely not vigilant enough.

The second is conservative Zhenguan. For the sake of the child's future, do not report or publicize. "What if the report harms the child and makes him unable to get married or make friends in the future?"

It sounds ridiculous, but it is the concern of many front-line teachers. Chen Zhaoru said: "We can't continue to be bullied because of our personal chastity." There have been cases in the past, in a special education school in the south, many years ago, a student bullied a senior sister, and the principal's reaction after learning about it was that since it was a fact, let the two "get married". Chen Zhaoru said:

I have been slowly ruminating and imagining this matter in the past few years, and I don't only describe the principal purely hateful, because it is possible, it is possible, that principal thinks "really for the good of the children"?

We can easily label this person as a bad guy, but the psychological factors behind him still need to be further clarified to reduce the possibility of teachers having such myths.

The third. The teacher didn't know how to deal with it. First, it is at the legal level. She mentioned that many teachers have not even read the Gender Equality Education Act. Because everyone thinks it won't happen to them. Second, it is the teacher's personal fear. What should I do if I am worried that this teacher will be fine in the end? How to work with him in the future?

"I believe that no one is hard-hearted, and knowing that someone is suffering will not feel at all."

Chen Zhaoru reminded that protecting students is also one of the teachers' jobs. "I believe that all teachers should have love for their students and want to be good teachers before becoming teachers. But over time, the enthusiasm may slowly fade away. I hope these words can rekindle the spark."

Campus sex crimes are not a personal problem, but everyone's responsibility

The problem of structure is most often forgotten by society.

Ikeya said that the recent buzz in Japan is the mother's child abuse case. "As long as a mother abuses her child, Japanese society is very concerned, but when it comes to teachers abusing students at school, everyone is a bystander."

This is because it is much easier to blame the individual than to blame the structure.

Photo provided by the Humanistic Education Foundation

"It's easy for us to care about the individual. But I think that incidents such as campus sex crimes are basically not individual actions, but organizational actions. But it is very difficult to condemn the organization."

This is why, just punishing the wolf master will not help reduce the number of incidents. What we have to do is to remind our children that they are willing to speak out when they encounter such things. Teachers should also be reminded to stand up to protect their children, not deny their experience of being victimized.

The seminar also mentioned several ways to improve sexual assault on campus, which may include:

1. Improve the effectiveness of gender equality mechanisms: When the campus gender equality mechanism is launched, it is necessary to ensure that its investigation is legal and effective. Similarly, investigators need to have more professional training and practical experience.

2. Improve the vigilance of regular teachers: Through teacher training, teachers can have higher sensitivity and handling principles on gender issues, so that they can catch children who are left behind.

3. Improve the self-awareness of wolf teachers: As Kamei mentioned, in workshops in Japan, they will provide real-life exercises, such as how to refuse if a student likes you and wants to sit on your lap. Avoid unknowingly making people become the wolf master they don't want to be, which is also a way for teachers to be self-aware.

Only when everyone is willing to change can school sex crime be structurally reduced. As Ikeya said, "Leaving it alone is a crime in itself."

I hope the world is getting better and better, and we can take better care of our children before they fall behind.