#bad teacher

[stacys-mom-has-got-it-goin-on]

Cameron Diaz promoting "Bad Teacher"

[flanaganfilm]

Dear Mike,

I'm writing my first novel, a horror story about giant cicadas that hypnotise people into moulting. It's a metaphor for drug addiction. In my opinion, horror is its best when it's also a commentary, or a reflection, on something real that afflicts society, like capitalism, xenophobia, or intergenerational trauma. I'm nearly 6 months clean, and though it wasn't my intention, this book is helping me come to terms with how bad things were, and how hard I had to work to get out of that life.

You tackle a lot of the toughest parts of the human experience in your work: loss and grief, mental illness, addiction, trauma, recovery... How do you write about those things without falling too deep into memories of what they felt like? My creative writing professor says there's no place for grief in horror, but I know she's dead wrong. My novice guess is that drawing from experience to make a character's trials feel more "real" makes their stories more immersive and empathetic. What do you think? Do you have any advice for how to emotionally detach for your characters, or how to balance grief and terror in a story?

Thank you, Fíona

Hi Fiona, First, a huge congratulations on 6 months. That's an amazing feat. Second, your creative writing professor is embarrassingly wrong when she says there is no place for grief in horror. That's so wrong, in fact, it should disqualify her from teaching creative writing. (Or, perhaps this is a rare creative writing teacher who simply hasn't been exposed to Charles Dickens, Henry James, Shirley Jackson, Edgar Allan Poe, or Stephen King. Ask her to go read Don't Look Now by Daphne du Maurier, and then explain that there's no place for grief in horror. What an embarrassing thing to say.)

I don't emotionally detach from my characters at all, far from it. When it comes to truly facing my own traumas, darkness, grief, shortcomings, fears, and insecurities, I have far more courage when I'm writing than I do in day-to-day life.

It can be tough to fall too deeply into the dark places, or the memories - there's at least some measure of safety to such expeditions when I'm writing. It can be similar to the kind of safety I find in therapy. Sometimes, a character scares me because I can't relate to them at all (Beverly Keane). Other times, characters are so close to my self that it's impossible to separate them in my mind (Riley Flynn). Drawing from experience is a brave and beautiful act, and infuses your fiction with authenticity, nuance, and humanity. Best of luck with your writing. And whatever you do, don't listen to that teacher. Apologies, but she's full of shit.

[space-homosexual-the-third]

rant post but here goes

teachers of neurodivergent students, what the fuck? Ok im going to be up front: NOT ALL OF YOU DO A BAD JOB! Some are amazing (posted about this in the past but tyyyy profe libby). It’s just some of you, weirdly in my experience usually health teachers, who REALLY seem to need more training.

Recently I had a panic attack, my first in a while. Wha happened was a children’s game that we were playing in class (which had caused many openly neurodivergent students to cry before) was played and made one of my friends have a meltdown. The teaches dealt with this in a harsh manner by grabbing their arm and pulling them outside. I have trauma around my meltdowns and had a flashback/panic attack. The teacher left us in the hallway with only the care of a third friend, who is not trained. We are all under 18. This has happened to me before, with different teachers.

teachers NEED more training on how to help neurodivergent students in a truly helpful manner. So often it’s just insults or rude comments.

[stone2stars]

What’s the most irrational thing you’ve ever done?

Most irrational? Probably lying about my allergies yesterday.

I tried to prove my homeroom teacher’s teaching style was “statistically suppressing intellectual growth,” so I ran an unauthorized experiment where I split the class into two groups: One following his exact restrictive format, the other “accidentally” exposed to open-ended problem-solving I fed them after school. Collected grade trends, participation rates, even stress indicators.

Then I compiled a full presentation with graphs and projected outcomes… and tried to present it to the faculty board.

I was fourteen.

In hindsight? Slight overreaction.

Did it work? Hell no.

But my defense, his worksheets were criminally, mind-numbingly boring.

[stacys-mom-has-got-it-goin-on]

Cameron Diaz promoting "Bad Teacher"

[aworldofconvolutedthought]

guys how much aura did my health teacher lose when he said "Mental illnesses aren't real if you're not diagnosed, just assume it's a bad day"

[celebrityroom]

[syistoppedgivingafuck]

i wanna rant for a sec.

cw for violent threats under the cut because thats just what i be saying tbh. don't actually hurt anyone, i don't condone violence.

ive personally never been to art school, but my brother is in graphics and design so i kinda had to deal with his art assignments (on top of my own, not that i ever did those lmfao) and he also tends to look at my art from time to time bc i show him stuff.

why are art teachers so fucking mean in college?? like i understand if the art teacher is frustrated, but genuinely they be a bitch sometimes.

my brother took a look at my sketch (really bad sketch mind you, because the characters were not the point, i was just testing my ASL depictions) and he said his teacher would've told me to redraw it again because it looked wrong. didn't even say WHAT was wrong, just "its wrong."

IF I WAS IN ART SCHOOL, AND ALL MY TEACHERS DID WAS SAY "THATS WRONG" I WOULD NOT BE IN ART SCHOOL. I WOULD JUST POST MY ART ON THE INTERNET AND THE INTERNET WOULD HAPPILY RIP MY ART TO SHREDS AND SOME MIGHT EVEN OFFER ACTUAL CRITICISM FOR FREE.

YOU ARE BEING PAID TO TEACH. WHY ARE YOU NOT TEACHING? AND NO THESE PEOPLE CAN'T PULL THE "OH THEY AREN'T PAID WELL" BECAUSE THEY FUCKING ARE IN THIS INSTITUTION. THEY'RE MAKING BANK AND I KNOW THIS BECAUSE MY UNCLE IS A TEACHER AT THE SAME FUCKING SCHOOL.

mind you, these are the SAME EXACT teachers who will shove AI into your face and tell you its the future. I WILL SHOVE MY FIST DOWN YOUR THROAT AND PULL OUT YOUR FUCKING APPENDIX I SWEAR TO GOD.

my brother has lost motivation for art, my brother's friends in the same course have lost motivation for art. i understand that art is a difficult subject to pursue because it has a lot of weird rules, but WHY are teachers making it more difficult?? would it be that hard to be like "oh you did ___, ___, and ___ right, but you could improve on ___."??? ANGEL GANEV'S FIXING YOUR ART TIKTOKS DO IT BETTER FOR FUCKS SAKE.

but you know what, maybe they have a reason for their behavior. maybe the students are just not following instructions and—

WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU GAVE ALMOST EVERY SINGLE STUDENT A GRADE UNDER 50 ON AN ASSIGNMENT THATS WORTH 100 POINTS BECAUSE IT DIDNT LOOK LIKE YOUR ART???