Challenge Accepted: Why Giant Prosthetic Breasts with Protruding Nipples Are Not Appropriate Workwear

Peter Boghossian tweeted this today:

Not much is known about this teacher, but according to the Toronto Sun, the unnamed teacher works for one of the Halton District Schools, on the fringes of the Greater Toronto Area.

The linked article shows several photos of the teacher, who apparently teaches shop class. The article states:

“Pre-transitioning the teacher was known to students and faculty as a male and went by a man’s name. But the teacher now identifies as a woman and is referenced with a female name.

“The school board says it sees her simply as a good teacher.

“ ‘This teacher (who teaches shop) is an extremely effective teacher,’ said [Halton District School Board Chair Margo] Shuttleworth. ‘All the kids really love being in the class.’

“But videos posted to social media showing the Oakville industrial arts teacher, who began identifying as female last year, appearing in class with large prosthetic breasts while operating a circular saw has created much commentary.”

The school board, for its part “is ‘standing behind’ an ‘accepted’ transgender teacher.… Protecting any person’s ‘gender rights’ is ‘the stance the school board is taking and they are standing behind the teacher,’ said Shuttleworth.”

A more recent Sun article from September 19 shared some students’ and parents’ reactions to the teacher’s manner of dress:

“ ‘It’s definitely causing a big debate,’ [said] Owen Laplante, who’s in Grade 12. ‘Some people are uncomfortable with it. And other people think she should be able to express herself how she wants to.’

“Laplante said the school sent an email stating it is standing by the teacher. ‘I’m OK with it. it doesn’t bother me.’

“Another student said most do not care.

“ ‘I’ve never had the teacher. I feel like people kind of using it to be derogatory — and what-not — shouldn’t because it’s none of our business,’ she said. ‘I feel like what people decide to do with their own body, it’s their own choice.’…

“One parent said she received a Halton District School Board (HDSB) email last week supporting the teacher.

“ ‘It’s understandable – the school taking that official stance on this issue. I totally understand,’ she said, adding some parents have been discussing it on social media. ‘It’s the teacher’s choice to identify her or himself as whatever they want to be. However, I still feel a bit uncomfortable. I think he went a little bit too far. Identifying himself is OK, but wearing that in the classroom – I still have a little bit of a concern for that,’ she said.

“Alison Hodd — who’s running to be school board trustee — said it is a complex issue.

“ ‘Some of them are only 13 years old,’ Hodd said of some students. ‘And to me, to have a teacher wearing things like that could be looked at as kinky.’ ”

When it comes to appropriate workwear for teachers, we have to separate the gender issue and the professionalism issue.

The Gender Issue

Most people would agree that gendered dress codes are out of date. When my mother went to school, the girls had to wear dresses even in the dead of winter. Those dress codes are long gone, and no one mourns their passing.

In some school districts today, there are still separate dress codes for boys and girls — for example, hair cut above the ears for boys, and shorts no more than X inches above the knee for girls — but those are becoming less and less common.

Most people probably agree that there shouldn’t be different dress codes by sex at schools. That also means, if you no longer want weirdo teachers whipping out a ruler and pressing it to your daughter’s bare thigh (“just to be sure”), you agree that boys can wear hair long and wear skirts or dresses or other things traditionally coded as being “for girls.”

And if dress codes for the kids change so that boys and girls can wear clothes or hairstyles traditionally associated with the opposite sex, it should be true of the dress codes for the adults at the school, too. If a male-bodied teacher wants to wear a wig or grow his hair long, or wear a dress or a “women’s” sweater or acrylic nails to school, that should be perfectly acceptable.

The Professionalism Issue

But then there’s the professionalism issue. No one, boys or girls, men or women, shows up to school barefoot and in a swimsuit. We as a society agree on what’s socially appropriate to wear at school. Swimsuits ain’t it. Your pointe shoes and tutu ain’t it. Assless chaps ain’t it. Giant prosthetic breasts with protruding nipples ain’t it.

This is not a gender expression issue.

This is not an issue of whether this male-bodied teacher is allowed to express “as a woman” or whether s/he has “rights” to wear giant prosthetic breasts. No one has a right to wear giant prosthetic breasts at work. Everyone is treated the same — it’s a level playing field.

No one thinks it is appropriate for anyone to wear giant prosthetic breasts with protruding nipples in the workplace. Ever.

Your swimsuit is appropriate at the pool and the beach.

Your pointe shoes and tutu are appropriate at a dance recital.

Your assless chaps and giant prothetic breasts are appropriate (if that’s your thing) in your intimate relations with other consenting adults.

That this needs to be explained at all simply boggles my mind.

The Peter Boghossian Challenge: Should this individual be allowed to teach children in a public school?

According to the school board, this teacher “has not had any previous issues that have come to the attention of the board.”

The worst thing that this teacher has done so far is display very poor judgment in what to wear to work. Very, very poor judgment.

If a “cis” gay male teacher showed up to work in his assless chaps, or a “cis” straight female teacher showed up to work dressed in a micro-mini and bustier, what would happen?

You might expect, if the teachers had “not had any previous issues” that the school administration would have a talk with them about appropriate workwear.

You also might expect, if the judgment was especially egregious (as assless chaps, bustiers, or giant prosthetic breasts arguably are), the school might keep an eye on the teachers to make sure other lapses in judgment were not happening. What are their academic expectations? Are their students learning? Are the students treated with respect? And so on.

If the offending “cis” teachers were to change workwear to be more in line with what every other teacher is expected to wear, if they continued to do their jobs effectively, and if there were no other problems, then yes, it would be fine for the teachers to continue to teach in the public schools.

TL;DR

If someone made me benevolent dictator of the school district, I’d tell the teacher that no one is allowed to wear giant prosthetic breasts to work, regardless of their gender or the way they prefer to express themselves away from the workplace. Then I’d keep an eye on the teacher, to make sure the teacher’s judgment in other areas was not equally shaky.

Pretty simple, really. But the notion that the school district is supporting the teacher in wearing the giant prosthetic breasts to work, presumably in the name of being woke, is just bizarre.

Please come back to reality, Halton District Schools.

What do you think?