Gay Teachers and Accusations of Pedophilia

What teachers do with children when they intend to care for them as teachers (Noddings, 1984, 1992) may also be read as an act of sexual impro-priety by an observer. Anderson’s (1966) powerful narrative, “Hands,” details the costs of Wing, a man who cares for children in teaching contexts. In writing about Wing’s years as a teacher, Ander-son describes him as “meant by nature to be a teacher of youth. He was one of those rare, little men who rule by a power so gentle that it passes as a lovable weakness” (p. 31). Anderson creates in Wing the power to teach, care, and change lives through touch:

Here and there went his hands, caressing the shoul-ders of the boys, playing about the tousled heads. As he talked his voice became soft and musical. There was a caress in that also. In the way the voice and hands, the soft stroking of the shoulders and the touching of the hair were parts of the schoolmaster’s efforts to carry a dream into the young minds. By the caress that was in his fingers he expressed him-self. He was one of those men in whom the force that creates life is diffused, not centralized. Under the caress of his hands, doubt went out of the minds of the boys and they began also to dream. (pp. 32-33)

But Wing’s touching is understood differently by the townspeople. Through the character of the sa-loon keeper, who beats and kicks him, Wing is warned, “I’ll teach [italics added] you to put your hands on my boy, you beast” (p. 32), and “Keep your hands to yourself” (p. 33). Wing is driven from the town, and endures his shamed hands by keeping them out of sight, and himself away from others. He becomes a recluse.

Anderson presents Wing as the protagonist, and then destroys him to make an important point about the ambiguity surrounding what counts as pedophilic offense. I’m intrigued by the choice of Anderson’s words, “I’ll teach you,” spoken by the attacker. The “teaching” enacted by the saloon keeper is brutal, abusive, and criminal. It was not so long ago that corporal punishment was a common teaching tool. Interestingly, physical abuse of children in school contexts (e.g., paddling) has historically been tolerat-ed to a greater degree than has caring touch.

Anderson also uses the character of Wing to teach readers about the injustices of misinterpreting

King Gay Teachers for Young Children

touch and misunderstanding others’ caring. Wing is victimized by the misrepresentation that was born of bigotry and fear. Yet, when I was rereading the previously quoted paragraph, I also recoiled at the words caress and stroking. These intimate physi-cal acts of caring made me uncomfortable when I read them and now as I write them. I thought about how I use my hands as a teacher. I have told my-self that touch is a productive and ethical teaching move. But I have conditioned my hands to touch my students only on their shoulders, arms, and up-per backs. I have further instructed my hands that touch means quick pats and not massage. At this point in time, I think my rules of touching in class-rooms are productive ones. I do not mean to sug-gest that I, or other teachers, should touch in ways that are different from my rules. But it is impor-tant to interrogate how it is that touching is so suspect a behavior that it requires rules to con-strain it. Johnson (1995, 1997) has carefully ar-gued that our current panic regarding touching children has actually impacted their school experi-ences in negative ways. Criminalizing “teaching touch” is complex and difficult work that requires a “pedophilic monster.” In fact, touch has been taken away from young children in order to pro-tect them.

The Duplicitous Use of Pedophilia to Intensify Gatekeeping

A largely ignored issue in accurately defin-ing pedophilia is that most of the reported pedo-philic offenses occur between heterosexual men and young girls, usually inside family boundaries (Kelly, 1982; Newton, 1992). Instead, there has been a history of disastrous and inaccurate map-pings between homosexuality and sexual relation-ships between adults and young people. Two of the many issues that warrant discussion are the definitions for pedophilia and children’s construc-tion of their own sexuality. Pedophilia can be de-fined as sexual activity between those above the age of consent with those below the age of con-sent. Considering the frequency and variety of sexual experiences that do occur before the age of consent, such a definition does little to explore the dynam-ics that underlie the relationships and the power positionings within them. The onset of puberty has