I attended a private all-boys, white-shirt-jacket-and-tie high school. About halfway through the 9th grade our Health Studies teacher, an unquestionably celibate man who had devoted his career to teaching, announced that we had arrived at the sex education part of the curriculum. Two classes would be devoted to it the following week.
No one especially enjoyed Health Studies, preferring to use it to do homework instead. But when the following week rolled around not a single fourteen year-old permitted himself that distraction, nor was there any need to take attendance - no one was about to skip sex education week.
Our teacher did an admirable job in the first class, using a few clinically bland charts that graphically depicted what we either already knew, had accepted on faith, or fervently hoped to be true. He set aside 20 minutes for general questions in the second class. He set it up something like, "You are growing into men, so now is not the time to be shy." It was to be his undoing.
I cannot honestly recall specific questions put to him, but I vividly recall the frenzied excitement as we sought to understand what were, to us, secrets of the universe jealously guarded by adults. I also remember one classmate whose questions were solely meant to demonstrate his reservoir of personal experience as he looked around the classroom grinning. The real capstone to that class was a series of, shall we say, moral questions, all of which fit under one theme: just how far is too far?
I can still vividly see our teacher standing at the front of the class when the bell sounded, exasperated with both hands in the air as if he was signaling a touchdown, his face reddening, almost shouting as he said:
Congressman Anthony Weiner was definitely not in that class, and I'm certain he did not attend my school. When I saw the Twitter photo of the Congressman that circulated last week it was as if the advice had, though some other route, reached the Congressman. Alas, that advice did not serve Mr. Weiner well.
There's a reason the Twitter belongs to platforms called social networks, and not private networks - they're built for easy sharing en masse. With a simple click.
I genuinely feel for the Congressman. His problem began when he clicked the wrong button. But his fate was sealed when the evidence - not of his folly, but of his judgment in choosing to deny it - spread virally on social media as quickly as had the original photograph.
There are two things I'd wager occurred as a result of this:
No one especially enjoyed Health Studies, preferring to use it to do homework instead. But when the following week rolled around not a single fourteen year-old permitted himself that distraction, nor was there any need to take attendance - no one was about to skip sex education week.
Our teacher did an admirable job in the first class, using a few clinically bland charts that graphically depicted what we either already knew, had accepted on faith, or fervently hoped to be true. He set aside 20 minutes for general questions in the second class. He set it up something like, "You are growing into men, so now is not the time to be shy." It was to be his undoing.
I cannot honestly recall specific questions put to him, but I vividly recall the frenzied excitement as we sought to understand what were, to us, secrets of the universe jealously guarded by adults. I also remember one classmate whose questions were solely meant to demonstrate his reservoir of personal experience as he looked around the classroom grinning. The real capstone to that class was a series of, shall we say, moral questions, all of which fit under one theme: just how far is too far?
I can still vividly see our teacher standing at the front of the class when the bell sounded, exasperated with both hands in the air as if he was signaling a touchdown, his face reddening, almost shouting as he said:
Gentlemen, it's very simple: keep your pecker in your pants.
And that, much to our chagrin, was how sex education week ended. As far as advice goes, however, though not everyone liked it you had to appreciate its brevity and clarity. There's a reason the Twitter belongs to platforms called social networks, and not private networks - they're built for easy sharing en masse. With a simple click.
I genuinely feel for the Congressman. His problem began when he clicked the wrong button. But his fate was sealed when the evidence - not of his folly, but of his judgment in choosing to deny it - spread virally on social media as quickly as had the original photograph.
There are two things I'd wager occurred as a result of this:
- A good many casual Twitter users logged onto their accounts and got reacquainted with Twitter Basics (if they'd ever read them to begin with). Some will have exhaled a small sigh of relief.
- More than a few executives - and politicians - will have now really understood what viral means, and will have asked a staffer to explain this stuff again and tell them just what it can do.
Check the settings twice; click the send button once. In that order.
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