D&D has threatened my job!

[Dannyalcatraz]

I said it before, I'll say it again- this thread needs to be stickied or archived.

Anyone have any special pull with the mods?

 

[mythusmage]

1. The kids stay.

2. Get the parents involved. Invite them to a game. Hold games at their houses. Introduce them to the other adult players. Stay in touch and widen your circle of friends.

People, we're not talking about infants here, we're talking about adolescents. Teens are supposed to be widening their world. No, they're not competent adults. But neither are they helpless babes. They make mistakes and, one hopes, learn from those mistakes.

In case you hadn't noticed, teens are not rational creatures. An adolescent gets kicked out of a group it's angst city time. A kid with a complex is not a pretty thing.

Another thing, would you please stop infantalizing adolescents? While not the most responsible critters in the world, they aint hopeless. Lay down some rules and insist junior abides by them. Expect responsibility of your teen, and your teen will do his best to live up to your expectation. Won't always succeed, but at least he'll try.

BTW, has anybody ever wondered how old those teens are?

One more thing, what say we stop letting the bigots and bozos have the initiative? By booting the adolescents from a group you are saying the anti D&D crowd's accusations have a foundation in fact. You are saying, for all intents and purposes, that D&D is bad for kids, and kids shouldn't play it.

Folks, what say we stop acting like twitter pated fuss budgets and start acting like adults?

(One last thing. I am very disappointed to see so many people who hate teenagers.)

 

[LiKral]

When I was in Secondary School (which I think is equivalent to High School) one of the teachers ran a D&D club in lunchtimes. I regret not joining it now, as I always wanted to, but I was too shy at that age. Anyway, that teacher disappeared one day, and there were rumours that he had been fired for something. I never found out the details. I was upset because he was a great teacher. It was probably nothing to do with D&D but still... You can never be too careful when your livelihood is involved.

In your case it is made worse because you are having kids to your (mother's) home. That would look really suspicious to anyone, even if it was a completely different hobby, like karate or comic collecting.

 

[Old Fezziwig]

One more thing, what say we stop letting the bigots and bozos have the initiative? By booting the adolescents from a group you are saying the anti D&D crowd's accusations have a foundation in fact. You are saying, for all intents and purposes, that D&D is bad for kids, and kids shouldn't play it.

Folks, what say we stop acting like twitter pated fuss budgets and start acting like adults?

(One last thing. I am very disappointed to see so many people who hate teenagers.)

I don't know, mythusmage. He's made it pretty clear that his job's on the line -- I'd say it's a little late to worry about him letting the bigots and bozos have the initiative, as it seems they have already got it. I think what people are saying is not that D&D is bad for kids, but that it's probably not worth him losing his job over (which I would agree with). As for the kids, they have the bad luck to be caught in the middle, I'll agree -- I'm not sure that I think they should have been in the group in the first place, but that's a moot point.

Point is, this just isn't worth him losing his job over. He can get the kids involved in RPGA games in public places, which they'll do if they want to keep gaming. This isn't about hating teenagers; this is about him keeping his job.

Nick

 

[Jonny Nexus]

One more thing, what say we stop letting the bigots and bozos have the initiative? By booting the adolescents from a group you are saying the anti D&D crowd's accusations have a foundation in fact. You are saying, for all intents and purposes, that D&D is bad for kids, and kids shouldn't play it.

But this has nothing to do with D&D. People would have been giving him the exact same advice if he'd been hosting Opera appreciation evenings, in his mum's garage, with teenagers attending, and someone had complained.

It's a fact of life that teachers can't really be seen to socialise with the children they teach. Boundaries have to be kept. Teachers should be fair and impartial adult figures of authority, and not friends. I think it's unfortunate that in the modern world, these basic principles have been taken up to somewhat hysterical extremes, but there are still some basic principles there.

Now admittedly this isn't the case here, because he teaches a completely different (younger) age group. So in principle, he should be able to carry on having teenagers in his game without weakening his "status" as a teacher with *his* pupils. But unfortunately many people will fail to see that distinction (that he teaches a different age group).

But my point is this: this isn't about D&D.

 

[d20fool]

I'm honestly relieved. I just caught up with the thread and on page 5, all I could say was, "The guy asked for legal advice, THREE attorneys answered and he has ignored us all." Thus, I was relieved to see the post quoted above.

Naturally, publicly played and advertized RPGA games are an appropriate place to play with folks of all ages. Plus you might get a few new folks to play in your RPGA games that might come over to your regular game - especially in a college town.

Final piece of advice - thank your principal and explain to her/him that you will not play games with students in the future at your place. Tell her you realize that appearances are very important and you will be more conscious of this in the future. Yes, it's a$$-kissing, but it's also good politics at this point

Take care and good luck.

Thank you for your advice. I don't think I would have considered it soon at all without it. Yes, it punishes a couple of players, one regular player and an infrequent player (whose parents I did talk to and played D&D at one time themselves). The mom of the regular player said "They hardly have to be lured" and was quite supportive. Her son is best friends with the kid whose mom is the problem. If I know my locals, mom number one has given mom number two an earful.

I'm hoping the RPGA/Living Greyhawk thing will work out. Any Dyver's region folks in and around Warrensburg care to comment?

I've already thanked my principal, I almost did the second sentence you spoke of but stopped short. I will do so verbally at next opportunity.

I still haven't had a chance to give my union rep a written notice, but I shall do so.

Thank you for all your input pogre.

 

[d20fool]

1. The kids stay.

2. Get the parents involved. Invite them to a game. Hold games at their houses. Introduce them to the other adult players. Stay in touch and widen your circle of friends.

People, we're not talking about infants here, we're talking about adolescents. Teens are supposed to be widening their world. No, they're not competent adults. But neither are they helpless babes. They make mistakes and, one hopes, learn from those mistakes.

In case you hadn't noticed, teens are not rational creatures. An adolescent gets kicked out of a group it's angst city time. A kid with a complex is not a pretty thing.

Another thing, would you please stop infantalizing adolescents? While not the most responsible critters in the world, they aint hopeless. Lay down some rules and insist junior abides by them. Expect responsibility of your teen, and your teen will do his best to live up to your expectation. Won't always succeed, but at least he'll try.

BTW, has anybody ever wondered how old those teens are?

One more thing, what say we stop letting the bigots and bozos have the initiative? By booting the adolescents from a group you are saying the anti D&D crowd's accusations have a foundation in fact. You are saying, for all intents and purposes, that D&D is bad for kids, and kids shouldn't play it.

Folks, what say we stop acting like twitter pated fuss budgets and start acting like adults?

(One last thing. I am very disappointed to see so many people who hate teenagers.)

1. This was my initial reaction too. However, considering professional ethics, I feel I had a lapse of wisdom in having them there in the first place.

Let's say one of these kids commit suicide (which is a very rare event here, BTW.) People look for a reason, and oh, six months ago he played D&D twice with that teacher. That's all it takes for me to lose my job. Further, chances are I can't get hired anywhere else.

I knew a teacher once who taught English in a high school. One of his students accused him of saying her hair was "sexy." She even claimed he did it in front of the class. Some students seemed to back up her story. He was immediately put on adminstrative leave, this means he loses his job and cannot come back to that school ever. The union descended like locusts on that school and found out the truth. The girl had entered the room tardy with a new hair-do. Several boys in class showed their appreciation with wolf-whistles and other remarks. The teacher, angered at the disruption, told her to sit down. She said, "But my hair's sexy, Mr. U" and he said, "Yeah, yeah, whatever."

Although completely innocent, he was not re-hired by the district. When he found a job in a neighboring district, they refused tenure when they got wind of the incident. His guilt or innocence was irrelevant, it was his reputation that was the problem. That sir, is what I am dealing with.

My gut said, after looking at my triple digit bank balance right after pay day, "if they want my job they can have it." I'm a smart guy. I would make a decent lawyer or management somewhere. But that might consist of moving, which would mean my wife would have to stop her program. She has engineered and run a drop-out retention program for the last two years. She came up with it, she runs it, she writes here own grant, she is practically her own counselor, she fends off problems with some of her adminstration who take out their frustrations with her students on her, and she is very successful. Last year she graduated 19 kids, just her and an aide. She actually makes money for the district with retentions and students sent from other school districts. My mother and stepfather moved here to be near us. Our entire lives and any good we've done over the last five years would be derailed. I'm just not willing to do that so that some high school kids can come to my game. I'm sorry, but I have to acknowledge the facts.

2. Further, I have plans to provide venue for these kids. I don't want to go trapsing around to different homes. Some of these kids don't have great homes to begin with. Not everybody has a dining room set you know. I've got a great space and I'm keeping it.

The students in question are all 16 and older. Part of the reason I thought it was OK was that they were so much older. But they are still someone's child and someone could still get upset.

One of the players I've had in the past, for example, died of a strange blod clot while jogging (I had a memorial on my site for some time.) I know it sounds strange, but what if someone says the devil took her becuase she played D&D at my table once. I live in the sort of town where some would be OK with that. Incredible but true. We've had sniping in my grade level about Harry Potter (someone actually posted the joke story from The Onion about it as if it were fact, they bought into it completely. If someone could post it please, it's hysterical) and we had a battle royale with one church about using "A Wrinkle in Time" in the classroom (it mentions a "mystic adventure" on the jacket blurb, mystic means satan, doncha' know.) I had one colleague want to take the Giver off our shelf just because it's controversial (I won that fight.) That stuff does happen here.

I have to concede the point to the "bigots and bozos" (nice phraseology, BTW) but by expanding my activities (something I will now be very motivated to do) I get to win. I get to bring more players into the game than ever before. I get to "legitimize" D&D to some small degree. A pyrric victory, a victory not yet realized, but a victory. That's the way to fight the bigots and the bozos, you give in (nothing to argue about now) and then come back with something they can't argue with (or would look like fools for doing so.) My wife and I have done that fight before, and we are pretty good at it now.

Finally, I do NOT hate teenagers. I told the kid whose mom is exploding on him (and me) that he should not feel responsible. He is in no way expected to control the actions of his mother. I would prefer people to call me with concerns, but many here would rather call my principal or a school board member rather than me. It's not very adult in my opinion, but it is predictable and I should have seen it coming.

Hmm, way too many paranthesis in that post, couple of spelling errors, I give myself a C-.

 

[pogre]

Thank you for all your input pogre.

You're welcome.

 

[D+1]

EDIT- My response pretty much just repeats what others have said (I jumped in before I looked at the post date and saw that the responses already ran to 7 pages).

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

Say, I'm sure that a lot of people on here are parents with kids in school. And we know that school boards tend to be populated (for some crazy reason) with the most spineless and lunatic people available, who tend to listen to the paranoid caterwaulings of blue-hairs and busybodies. So let's do something about it.

In most places, school boards are voted on. Why not find out who's going to be running for administrator positions in your area, and have a chat with them. Even if you can't change the outcome by voting, you can at least give your administrators an idea of how you feel about things. If anything like d20fool's situation has come up in the past, tell them how you feel about the way they dealt with it. If they were reasonable, let them know you are pleased with their decision. If they were unreasonable, tell them you think so. You're the public they must please.

Secondly, don't let the "bigots and bozos" be the ones to go to the board or the principal with complaints. Certainly it's reasonable for parents to be concerned about their kids hanging out with adults. But do we trust the character judgement of those bigots and bozos? Why not get someone whose judgement you trust to check out the activities and the adults involved. Like, for example, yourself. If you hear of something like this, be the one to talk to the students and the adults involved to see what's up. You're less likely to be unreasonable than a bozo picked at random, and the bozos are more likely to listen to another parent than they are to listen to the adults in question.

So rather than let fear and loathing win the day every time, why not be part of a constructive and proactive approach in your own locality? It's your right to be involved, after all.