Transcript of Armchair Anonymous: Bad Teacher

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Anonymous. I'm Dan Rather, and I'm joined by Miniature Mouse.

Hello.

Today we have one of your favorite things, but not the right version of it. You love teachers.

Oh, I do love teachers.

But these are bad teachers.

Oh, I don't like bad teachers.

You like some bad teachers.

Depends on what we're calling bad.

Okay, well, this is bad teachers.

These guys are baddies.

Yeah, they're baddies. They're no good. We gotta get 'em out of the school. Please enjoy Bad Teachers. Hard times come and go. Good times, take them slow. My life, I had them both. But one thing you gotta know, I'ma keep on shining.

Hi, Charlie.

Oh, what a great trick for me. 'Cause I knew we were gonna talk to Joey, so I was like, oh, it's gonna be a boy who's trying to play up Monica's love for Friends.

Oh, wow.

I quickly whipped up a whole scenario.

It is based off of a different show, though.

It is? This is a test.

I'm about to fail.

Is it from Blossom or the other one connected to Blossom?

No.

Damn it.

Okay.

What about an ocean? Something with the ocean?

You got Joe Versus the Volcano.

No, it's a show.

It's a show.

Mermaids?

Is it about those awesome mermaids? Australian Mermaids.

Oh my goodness. I think you're out of that demo for the Australian Mermaid show.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Is it 3-something tour?

What is— Oh, Gilligan's Island.

Yeah, Gilligan's Island. That's the most I've ever sung on this podcast.

Think of like the teens on Dawson's Creek.

Oh, well, Dawson's Creek.

I didn't, unfortunately.

Fuck.

That's okay.

I thought Monica might get it.

That's one of my blind spots.

It's all right.

On this week's Fact Check, we read an exhaustive list of girl names that were boy names.

That were originally boy names. Yeah, it's a great list. I only got through about a fifth of it.

Okay. Where are you, Joey?

I'm in New Jersey.

The Garden State.

Yes.

Drove here today from Massachusetts just to do this.

What? Wait, what? You don't have internet in Massachusetts?

No, we do. But I needed to get back here in time.

Oh, you were on vacation in Massachusetts? Were you on the Cape? Were you in Martha's Vineyard?

No, but close to the Cape, the South Shore. So an ocean town.

Oh, lovely.

Oceans are a theme.

And you've got a nice savage glow. You've got the sun-kissed glow. Okay, Joey, you have a bad teacher story.

I do. And I preface this to say that most teachers are awesome, because I am one.

Oh!

So let me set the scene. It was early 2000s, and it was my 5th year of teaching. And right at the start of the school year, I was told that I would be orienting a new teacher, and that she would have her own classes, but we would co-teach one section of 8th grade English together.

I would imagine in the teaching game, it doesn't get much harder than 8th grade.

Most people think that, but this is gonna be my 26th year of teaching, and I teach 6th, 7th, and 8th grade. Like, I love middle schoolers. Yes, they're crazy, but they're crazy in a good way, as opposed to— for me, little ones whose, like, noses are running and things like that, that's, like, way more hectic than someone with their hormones all out of whack. But so they were telling me that as someone who was in my 5th year that I was the veteran, which was kind of a crazy concept to me.

Yeah.

But I'm like, okay, I can do this. But shortly after being told this, I didn't feel like I was the veteran because we had these 2 weeks of teacher meetings in August where it was professional development and I met this person that I was going to be co-teaching with and immediately she intimidated including myself. This was at a private school in a very liberal city, and so we spent a lot of time sharing out about our strengths and weaknesses, and our hopes and fears, and all of that. And it seemed like every time she shared something about her background and experience, I just kept getting more and more impressed with each thing. And I'm like, what can I have to offer this person? So, first it was she graduated from a very well-known Division I university and had been in the honors program. Next, it was while she was there, she was the head of the writing center, and ran the whole thing while she was a student. Next, it was she was on the Division I volleyball team. And it just, like, kept going on and on and on.

She was a wunderkind.

She loves Division I.

Yeah, exactly. And I was just kind of like, each time, oh, like, shriveling back more and more. And, you know, she's, like, taller than I am. When the students arrived, they also were very drawn to her because she had just graduated from college. She was young. She had a distinct sense of style. Super energetic. But then, Shortly thereafter, all of a sudden, she started calling in sick. Next thing we know, she's out because a relative died. Then a relative was murdered.

Oh!

Yeah, sounds like addiction, but continue.

So, like, more stories started appearing each week, right? And, you know, there's of course, like, a group of teachers who are like, okay, we should all dress in black one night and go out and, like, stalk her apartment and see what's really going on.

Come on.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, there was, like, a little bit of that background kind of stuff going on. So you're saying dress in black for the murdered relative?

Oh, to show some—

Support.

Yeah, this was early 2000s. Obviously we had the internet, but people just weren't Googling things as much to try to match up the story or anything like that. Needless to say, the co-teaching wasn't going very well because her attendance was so spotty. So like, I never knew if she was gonna be there. And on one particular day, she was late to our co-tak class. And you know, as a teacher, you're not waiting for your co-teacher to start the class. So I kind of just started things off. And we weren't even supposed to be doing a joint thing that day. I was supposed to be leading something and she was just going to be supporting some of the students in the room when all of a sudden the head of school pops in to observe. And he did this unannounced all the time to different rooms, so that wasn't something that was alarming. But I knew I had to start the class even though she's not there and I don't want to draw attention to that. So I just start going over some short lesson on vocabulary that we would encounter in our reading.

She arrives.

and jumps right in and just starts writing a bunch of stuff on the other side of the whiteboard. We have a bunch of students who have various learning styles. Maybe someone's ADHD, maybe someone else has some auditory processing thing. And if you've got like a ton of things going on in the front of the room—

The ADHD kid's loving it and everyone else is fucking lost.

Yeah.

And they're already in 8th grade, so their executive functioning is like out of control anyways. And so I'm thinking immediately in my head, it's like, You're the veteran teacher. You have to control this. Like, what are you gonna do? Not only is she up there doing this, she's jamming things into the corner. So all of a sudden I say something like, let's pause and get some additional information from Cindy before we go back to the vocabulary. Cindy, what do you have for us? And so she starts going through some sort of a timeline about the Vietnam War, because the book we're reading is set in the Vietnam War. But it's, like, false information.

Oh!

She's pronouncing things incorrectly. And then the cap is, like, a word she writes up there very boldly is is not a real word.

Oh my goodness.

Something's bad.

Something's misfiring.

She does everything with such confidence that I start questioning myself. And just as I'm trying to figure out what to do, she fully turns herself to the board with her back completely to all of us. Because you know how most of the time teachers try to be, like, at an angle so you're never not looking at the kids? And her thong is fully on display for this full group of students and the head of school.

Oh my goodness. Wow. No! Okay.

Wait a minute, hold on.

What?

She's wearing a thong, but her, like, pants are jacked down, you know, like, Like, rolled down.

Out the top.

2001.

Was that the year you—

Oh yeah, so low ride.

Yeah, low ride.

Exactly. Yeah, low ride, and like the shirt has popped up.

That's a pretty big event for an 8th grade boy.

Oh my gosh, right. Exactly, right? And I'm waiting for one of them because I've seen, you know, the kids who are clearly focused on something else or doing something else with their hands and whatever. None of them burst out laughing. No one says a word. And the head of school is sitting there. And so again, I'm like, I gotta do something. I have to do something. So I immediately say, Cindy, thank you so much. Can you sit with Charlie while I share some vocabulary and make sure that he gets it all down?

You're also reminding me of a news anchor where it's like, now we're gonna go to Betty with the weather. No, we're not. We're gonna go to Mike on the street.

Can I go pull the fire alarm at that moment or something? So eventually the class ends and I'm questioning my sanity still. Am I the only one seeing this? Because the head of school just Strolls right out of the room without a word to either of us.

Oh my goodness.

And he's a man, so maybe it was like he didn't know how to address the situation.

Sure.

Talk about his employee's underwear. Yeah, that's a rough zone.

Yeah, that's the minimum part of it, at least like, hey, we're gonna meet to debrief this. But then it got even better where a few days later, she's off coaching a middle school sports team. I think it was basketball. And they're headed to play against a school for the deaf. And they arrive at the game, and it's well known that we're playing this school for the deaf, so it's not like that was a surprise. The ref who's supposed to work the game, who was someone who was certified in American Sign Language, was not in attendance. And the substitute ref asks if anyone knows sign language.

Oh, yes.

Oh!

Yes.

Cindy announces that she knows sign language.

Oh, fluent.

Yeah.

And this is, like, in the moment. So there's no, oh yeah, I know that language that's never gonna come up, or something.

Right, right.

The ref then asks her to communicate something to an opposing player. And she starts making a variety of hand signals that look like a mixture of tai chi moves and someone trying to come up with a secret handshake.

And maybe some light charades.

Yes. So this kid on the opposing team has no idea what's going on, and yet she holds fast to this claim that she's fluent in the language.

Oh my goodness. Oh my God.

And luckily, no one got hurt. The game went on. It was universal enough. So then we get back to school, and we're having this faculty volleyball game where all the kids come to watch and the teachers play each other. And of course, everyone wants her on this team because—

D1?

Remember, she's a Division 1 volleyball player.

I can't wait. I mean, this is like in a movie.

This is NXIVM!

Yeah, this is NXIVM. And then also, like, in the movie where of all the sports they're gonna have the faculty play the students, it's volleyball.

I know.

Exactly. And we did a basketball game once, you know, stuff like that. But people can get injured easily and all of these things. So everyone wants her on their team, but after the game, it becomes apparent that either our expectations of what a Division I volleyball player would look like were either too high, or this was another skill that she didn't possess.

Liar, liar!

So, as she tries to serve the ball, or return balls, or spike the ball, or whatever, none of her movements are any better than what any of us who just took middle school gym classes. But then she starts inventing moves that don't really work well, but blames her teammates for, like, why it didn't work. work the right way. And then gives a variety of names to these moves that don't make any sense.

You're watching someone living in their own reality.

Yeah.

Well, they're expert.

So like, mine's like kind of Munchausen.

You want it— I want it to be. You want it to be CT or Munchausen for everything. Yeah. Oh, CT!

But it's so good because I sort of believed but didn't believe, but I questioned myself. I don't really remember exactly how it fully came to a head, if there was, like, a couple of other things before this. But one day the dean of faculty, who was the person that I looked up to on the staff, comes to and he just sits down, and he's like one of those people that, like, only says a few words at a time. First, he apologized for hiring this person to me and putting me in the situation, acknowledged that it turned out some things hadn't been true that we thought were true, and then said, but hey, you know, it's gonna all make a good story one day. Then, before the school year ends, she sends out this mass message saying that she's going to need to leave to go take care of a sick relative and won't be in the area anymore.

Take care of her father who was already died, she forgot to say.

3 times before, yeah. So a few weeks after that, a group of us teachers were all, like, at a local road race. And one of the guys who was faster is standing there waiting at the finish line for me, and he's like, you gotta go over to the energy drink tent. And so I go over to where they're giving out all the free stuff, and who's the person promoting and giving out coupons for this energy drink but this teacher?

Oh my!

And so again, another lie. Like, not that we thought she really was off to take care of a relative, but she We ended it with that story.

Oh!

In the age of now, the internet, have you figured out if she even was a graduate of college?

So I looked her up 2 days ago because of this, and she is on the internet. It lists it as her background, but I don't know how you verify that. Could I list that I have been to the moon?

Sure. I've been telling people I went to UCLA for, like, 30 years, and everyone believes it. Right.

And then it's probably on like a Wikipedia page.

That's right.

That's right. And then it becomes real.

I never went. I never even went to college.

I know.

Yeah.

No, it's crazy. It's crazy what you can get away with.

You have a look on your face like you're really questioning whether I did go to UCLA. But yeah, you can claim anything.

As teachers and anyone who works with a kid, you have to get those background checks to make sure that like you haven't been in trouble with the law. Or there's this thing called pass the trash. A school isn't supposed to be allowed to like pass a bad teacher to another school. And so it's— they ...this check-in thing that you have to do at, like, your last place.

I mean, she could have stolen someone's identity. That's kind of what it sounds like.

There's a lot going on. She's a pathological liar, which is fascinating. I would like to know more about that condition, people who are pathological liars.

Yeah, me too.

Right. Why do they do it?

I have a pretty good friend who, while trying to get sober, they were a bit of a pathological— like, they would tell people they had children and stuff when they were talking to someone else who had kids.

Like— What?

Yeah.

And I've asked this person, like, what was going on? They're like, I don't know, other than in that moment, the most important thing is that they like me and want to bond with me, and they've said they have kids. So it's like this kind of insecurity, and you think this will be the thing that makes this other person like you.

But that's so deep to do a full-blown lie like that. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

This one—

that one hit— I'm like, wow, man, that's a biggie.

Do you think if there was a medical emergency and they were like, is there anyone trained in this medical technique?

Yes, 'cause she did the sign language. I mean, that's bonkers. What a gift she gave you.

Yeah, it is a good story. He was right.

It is. But most of us teachers are not like that.

Well, clearly not. You're a blast. I wish I had you as an 8th grade teacher.

Yeah, you'd be fun.

Thanks.

Well, it's lovely meeting you, and thank you for racing back.

Thank you. And I just want to say, I first started listening to you guys 2 years ago because 2 years ago my mom got diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I would go on lots of walks and listen to you guys through that. And actually, 2 weeks ago tomorrow, she passed away. And I got your message, though, a couple days later that I was on. So it was sort of my first smile that I had. So I wanted to thank you for that. Just a shout-out to Hannah, who's a former student who knows this bad teacher. Good teachers that I work with now who listen to you guys, Heather and Dan and Maryanne.

Oh, we love that.

Heather, Dan, Maryanne. I love it. Okay. Thank you so much, Joey.

Bye!

Take care.

Chris?

Hello.

You have a gallery wall.

I do have a gallery wall, yes.

Really nice.

So you have some neon lighting and it's in a squiggly pattern, and at first I was like, That looks like it could be a racetrack, but I don't think it is.

No, I was just kind of randomly putting up holes in the wall and it created this.

Okay, wonderful art. And Chris, where are you?

I am in Denver, Colorado, but my story takes place in Austin.

Oh, nice.

Okay, I was in Denver last weekend for the Savannah Bananas.

Oh yes, with Kristen.

That's right. And are you from Austin?

I'm actually from Knoxville, Tennessee, but I spent about 10 years in Austin. So basically from Austin.

How does one leave Austin?

I think this story will kind of tell you.

Oh, okay.

Oh my God, I want to hear it.

Okay, great.

This story actually takes place my junior year of high school. So this was back in 2019. I lived in the suburbs of Austin. I was in this organization called DECA, which is like a business competition club. And so there's 3 levels. To get to internationals, you have to make it through the district and then the state competition. In Texas, obviously, there's a ton of kids that participate in DECA. So in our specific category, there was over 250 competitors or teams at the state level. So somehow, miraculously, me and my partners pulled it off. We placed first in the state of Texas.

Oh, my Lord. How many folks are on your team?

There was 3 of us.

I love winners.

Exactly.

Yes.

We placed first in the state of Texas, which was awesome, which meant we were headed to Internationals in Disney World. So it was a big deal. We had spent the whole school year preparing for this competition. We were very excited. It was one of the proudest moments of my high school career. because we put in so much time and effort. So a week later, there was about 20 kids from my school going to Internationals. Within the organization, there was probably 350 of us. There was only 9 boys, so there was an odd number of boys traveling. And so the advisors, which were our teachers, asked us if any of the guys would be willing to room with guys from another school in the district. And so I volunteered because I actually had some friends through band who were at another high school in the district, and they were also going to Internationals. So I was like, okay, I'll take one for the team. Volunteer for everyone to room with kids from another school. So the advisors agreed, everyone approved. I didn't think twice about it. And then about a week before the competition, my advisors emailed me asking if I could come to their office to talk to them.

And so I didn't think anything of it. I was like, sure. So I walked in expecting to talk about some sort of travel details or the competition schedule or something about our paper. And instead, the very first words out of her mouth when I walked in were, are you gay?

What an appropriate question to ask a high school student.

What the fuck is wrong with people?

And how big is your penis?

Oh my God. So I'm like 16 years old, I'm still closeted. My friends knew, but none of the teachers knew. My parents didn't know. I was very caught off guard. The first thing out of my mouth was, what? Why does this— what does this matter? And she told me that if I was gay, I wouldn't be allowed to room with my friends from the other school because they could also be gay. and we could all potentially have sex together.

Oh, they were envisioning a deca orgy.

What? But also, even what about the kids in your own school?

They're trying to not facilitate the students having sex with each other.

No, but he—

I think it's completely inappropriate that they're asking you, but also they're not putting boys and girls together.

No, but you would be with the boys in your class.

And that's what I said. So I was like, what's the difference? Because no one else was gay except me.

Oh boy.

In the situation. And so I'm like, why are we signaling out me as being a gay kid? I thought thought she was joking at first, so I was like, okay, so because I might be gay, you automatically assume that I'm gonna hook up with my friends? And she goes, that's exactly right.

Oh, oh, she didn't hide from it. You're in Texas.

I said, well, can I room with my 2 friends who are girls? Obviously I knew the answer was going to be no, but I wanted her to say that. So immediately she said no. I asked why, and she says, because we can't prove you're gay.

And I was like, okay, you're on trial for both not being gay and being gay.

This is insane.

I said, let me get this straight, so I can't room with my friends that are boys from the other school in the district because I could potentially be gay and I could potentially hook up with them, but I can't room with my 2 friends who are girls from this school because you can't prove I'm gay and I could potentially hook up with them.

This is a real catch-22.

She looked me dead in the eyes and she goes, that is exactly right. And I was speechless.

Oh my God.

So the plan that all 4 of the advisors had come up together, they were apparently talking about me because I guess someone spilled that I was gay. They said that I had to go room with 2 random boys from another in the district. They weren't gonna tell me who they were until we got there. So I left her office and I was kind of like, okay, well, I don't really have anyone to talk to about this because I wasn't out to my parents. If I was out to my parents, my mom would've gone absolutely ballistic on the school. I had a couple friends, obviously my partners who were in DECA with me, they knew I was gay. So I talked to them about it and we kind of fought back with the teacher and she still was firm with her decision of, we are not letting you room with anyone that you know.

This is strange logic.

You could also hook up with people you don't know.

No, I don't understand any of this.

The other thing that I kept saying was, I was like, I could go hook up with this guy in his room if I really wanted.

And the straight people are definitely hooking up, by the way.

Yeah, I quietly accepted the new room assignments. She ended up telling basically everyone that was going to internationals with us. So now 15 of these people now know that I'm gay, which then spread throughout the organization. So then people in the organization knew, now people at the other school know. And I was just kind of like, okay, you've kind of I've just spilled my secret to everyone for what? Like, what was the point of this?

They Scarlet Lettered you.

Yeah. And so the funniest part of all of this is we get to Disney World, we're there for the competition. I meet my 2 new roommates the very first day. Next morning, we wake up at 6:00 AM on the dot. One of my roommates' alarms go off. It's Delicate by Taylor Swift. I hope you hooked up just to spite everyone.

I was gonna say, I hope there's a meet cute.

Oh my God.

I asked the kid right then and there, I was like, oh, so are you gay too? And he was like, no, I'm not. Well, 3 years later, he came out on Instagram, and now he is an openly happy gay person. Oh, thank God.

It's so tough at this age.

This is wild.

But it was just funny because it was like her foolproof plan to not get me with anyone that I potentially could know. It's a funny story now. I wrote my college essay about it. That's actually like how I came out to my mom and dad. And I was like, hey, here's this crazy story that happened to me last year. Sorry I couldn't talk about it at all while it was going on.

Oh, wow.

Oh, boy. Oh, well, I'm really sorry that happened.

Yeah.

But you are very smiley.

I think you're indomitable.

Thank you. I appreciate that. I do have a couple shoutouts, though. Yes, do it.

Take your time.

Her name is Susan. She's my best friend's mom. She actually got me on to Armchair Anonymous. She's been listening since day one. She was actually one of the only parents who I had come out to before my parents. And so she knew during this whole entire time, this whole entire story going on, and she was very much ready to go to war with this teacher as well.

Oh, we love Susan.

And then Jesse, my manager, because she let me take about an hour and a half off of work today to come film this.

An hour and a half.

And then Emily, Hannah, Selena, and Natasha, because those were the 4 people who were in Deco with me who went to Internationals. They're actually in those pictures. I don't know if you guys got them.

Oh, let me see. Also, how'd you guys do in Orlando?

Okay, so we placed in the top 25, which was pretty crazy.

Okay, that's amazing.

Oh, so cute. Oh, you're even cuter.

Oh my God.

And who's this?

You and your lover?

Oh, that's me and my boyfriend now.

Yay.

Chris, what a delight to meet you, my friend.

It was great meeting you guys. Yeah, thank you so much. I really appreciate it.

Special thanks to your manager.

Take a little extra, like, 20 minutes.

Say there was an internet connection issue.

Have a great day.

All right, take care.

Thank you. I appreciate it. You guys have a good one.

Bye. My gloom is over.

Yay!

Gloom is lifted. Gloom, gloom, go away. Let my smiles shine today.

Hi!

Hi, can you hear me?

Look at that shirt!

Oh, what a cute shirt. Okay, why did we pick Abby for a fake name?

Okay, wait, do you want me to start recording now?

Yeah. ABR girl, you don't know the rules?

I'm sorry!

You got the shirt, you should know the rules.

Okay, it's recording. Abby is my mom's name, and she is the biggest Armcherry. She's watching on FaceTime in the corner.

Stop it!

That's so cute.

Hi, Abby.

Literally, she's been watching Armchair since it came out in 2018, which is coincidental incidentally, when this takes place, my story, and when I started middle school. So I grew up with you guys, and I can't believe I'm on here right now.

We're excited to have you.

The best day.

So I know from that that you're not the teacher in this story.

I am not the teacher. I am the student in this story.

Okay, let us have it. Well, what part of the country does this take place in?

In the Midwest. I'm in my university's podcast recording studio.

They have such a—

I was gonna say, I can see the sound-deafening background.

And Dax, you're gonna like this. I go to school in the Appalachian Oh, you do?

Is it so beautiful right now?

It is so pretty. It's all green. We're starting to get a little bit of change, which is kind of weird, but it's gorgeous up here right now.

You probably went there saying Appalachian, but now you know to say Appalachian.

My mom grew up here in the Appalachian Mountains, so it was kind of ingrained in my head since I was a kid.

Was she in the Kentucky, the Virginia, or the North Carolina?

North Carolina.

Okay, great.

All right, so hit us with Okay, so my story takes place starting in middle school and goes all the way through high school. So I was in middle school starting in 2018, and my 7th grade year of middle school is when COVID hit.

Hmm.

So that following day, after we all left at spring break and the world shut down, school looked very different. We had different days where half the school would go to class and the other half would go on a separate day. It was called A-Day and B-Day. You were with the same 5 or 6 people for every single class, and it was called like a cohort. And it was just a weird period in general because middle school's such a developmental period in your life. And then to have it in COVID when you can't talk to people or see people just made it even worse. Kids were assholes. Everyone hated everyone. It sucked. But what came from that is connections got really strong because we were in those classes all the time. and we were with certain teachers more on certain days, you just naturally kind of latched on to those teachers. So that teacher, for pretty much every student in my middle school, was a teacher that we'll call Mr. L. Mr. L was an ELA teacher, but he was also the head of the student council.

Is ELA emotional?

English.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

English language arts.

I thought it was English as a Second Language.

Yeah, ESL.

But what's the A?

English Language Arts.

Oh, nice. Okay, good job. You're great. I'm glad you're in college.

You belong there.

Yeah. Okay. So with Mr. L, it wasn't, you know, we just had him in class. We were with him before school for student council meetings. During school, we'd eat lunch with this teacher. After school, we'd have our events. We'd get pulled out early or go on field trips and stuff like that. So this was just one of those teachers that really shaped who we were as people. And especially the student council kids, because we were all the goody-two-shoes and we're all super involved. This was the teacher that we liked, and he was our favorite teacher going forever and ever and ever up through high school. And so even after middle school, when we would come back or do events, that was the teacher that we always wanted to talk to. I have TikToks with this teacher. We would post on social media. We followed him after we graduated. So that's the first half of the story. A few years later, my junior year of high school, towards the end, would've been in 2024. And there was rumors going around that Mr. L had passed away. Oh.

Oh, no.

I was texting my friends. We were just hearing this through the rumor mill, and we were in, like, a grieving era because he was that teacher that we all just loved so much. My brother at the time was in middle school with him, so So my mom got the email with the big statement saying, we're so sad to hear the passing of Mr. L. He was such an integral part of our community.

Can I ask what age he was when you were his student?

He was a young teacher, so he was probably in his early 30s.

Okay. Yeah, this is not a 70-year-old man.

This huge statement came out, and after the statement came out, we had to do a mandated program called SOS, which stands for Signs of Suicide. So Mr. L had killed himself.

Uh-huh.

And that just makes it worse.

You know, they're sad and suffering.

Yeah, exactly. And I mean, everyone was posting about Mr. L. Everyone was talking about it. It just really shook our community. And I sent you guys a picture of a Facebook post that was created in his honor. And, you know, it just talked about all the incredible things he did for our schools.

Yeah, he looks cute in that picture.

So about About a week after the announcement of his passing, these accounts on Instagram started getting really popular called Pedophile Patrol.

Oh boy.

So what these accounts were, were teenagers who basically were doing like the Chris Hansen To Catch a Pedophile in our hometown. So they would create Tinder profiles, Hinge profiles, Instagram, Snapchat, all under the guise of luring men and sometimes older women to meet them. catch them trying to have sex with minors.

This was in that manosphere doc. Do you remember that? That was like the side hustle of that weird dude from England living down there. And then they beat that guy up in the car. It's like, A, I want justice for the kids. B, vigilantism always goes sideways. That's just a fact. Yeah, yeah.

Okay.

All right. So that was happening in your town?

Yes.

And the people doing this, they were were just, like, delinquent teenagers. They weren't kids, you know, trying to, like, make a difference and save kids' lives. They just wanted to fucking brawl.

And get likes and views.

Exactly. So after these accounts started getting popular, a video popped up, and lo and behold, it was Mr. L on the Pedophile Patrol Instagram account.

Oh, yeah.

And this video is brutal. It's in our hometown grocery store parking lot. lot. They've got the camera against his car window, they're yelling, screaming, trying to open the door, trying to break the window. Get out here, we're gonna beat your ass! You wanted to meet up with little kids! He was in his car looking at the profile and incriminated himself on camera.

Oh!

They tried to hit his car. There's a moment about halfway in the video where you can just see his And he realizes that his entire life is just completely ruined.

It just ended. Yeah.

And this video is passed around. It's got thousands of views. Everybody's talking about it. And people were like, when was this taken? And they responded that it was taken a day before the announcement came out of his passing.

Oh, so he killed himself in response to that.

He killed himself because he got caught being a pedophile.

Oh my God. I don't know if you heard the episode we had on that.

Yeah, we had experts on about pedophilia.

Oh, yeah!

The woman who's the head of the Johns Hopkins—

Basically prevention. It's so upsetting.

All of it's— It's all so fucking upsetting. Obviously, I hate pedophilia.

Yeah.

And obviously, no one's picking to be a pedophile, and this is the end result. It's all terrible.

It's horrible. It's horrible.

All of it. Whoa!

Oh, no.

Was there a funeral for him?

There was, but it was planned before the video came out. And once it came out, everything was just wiped off the internet. There was never a follow-up, 'cause I mean, it's not like the school district's gonna say anything.

Yeah.

Yeah. And, you know, it was all left alleged, but that video is so incriminating. The worst part about this story is when we started talking about it, you know, me and my friends, we thought back like, could this really be? Could he really have done that? And there was a rumor that went around in middle school that he would make out with kids in his closet, and we all just brushed it off, laugh, hahaha! But now thinking back, it's just like, oh shit!

Oh my God!

Even worse!

Also, gratitude if you're not afflicted with this.

I mean, it's even worse to think my little brother was in his class at the time, and that's like, the group that he was looking at. It's just so icky, I hate it!

It is!

Yes.

So none of you or your friends experienced, obviously, anything?

Well, it sounds like he liked boys.

Sounds like he liked boys, yeah.

It's rare you can say you're saved by being female.

It is very rare.

Very rare, but in this case—

That sucks!

Well, I hate to say this, but you know, the expert was saying like, so many of these cases are people that are— look, he could have been a pedophile day one and got this job specifically to groom people, and he's a predator. That's one version. But we learned there's also another version where it's like, otherwise, people who don't have that are in a situation that can be situational. It's like someone who has a stepchild.

It sounds like this feels a little more intentionally.

Yeah. Yeah.

He's making out with kids in the closet.

Yeah.

But she was saying there can be teachers who are like getting all this attention from somebody and they're feeling a certain way. And that gets confusing how much education needs to be around. Like, hey, even if you haven't had a history of pedophilia, I'm trying to tell you, people are susceptible to this. That's what I'm trying to point out.

But this doesn't feel like it.

It doesn't.

But that is true. That is a thing.

Yep.

Oh, boy.

Oh, man.

Well, look, every school— you know what's funny is talking to my children and, uh, it said— no, I was talking to you, wasn't my children— that I had— Aaron and I wiped our butt on our gym teacher's bifocal glasses. We hated them and we did that. And Monica was really, really mad. And then I said, but you should know this man was fired when we were in 11th grade for this, for pedophilia, molesting kids. And then she's Then I said, let's go to church. Then she's happy that we wiped our butt on his glasses.

Yeah, good thing you did.

Look, you got to find a little bit of humor in this darkness.

Well, because then he had pink eye and he probably couldn't go out.

No, no, no, no. Well, I hope he got pink eye, but I don't think we ever successfully gave him pink eye.

He definitely got pink eye from urine in our eyes.

We just lived to watch him put his glasses on, and then he'd always wear a white t-shirt, and then he would wipe his glasses off on the white t-shirt, and Aaron and I would be sitting cross-legged waiting for the instruction. And just the delight we would have of him then Rooney's shirt.

But you didn't know he was a pedophile.

We had bad vibes about him. I mean, we weren't just randomly doing that. No, there was cause.

Oh boy.

Wow.

Okay, I guess I'm as bad as those boys in the parking lot.

Oh yeah, we have to deal with a lot today.

Yeah, we do.

We have to process a lot of this one. Abby, you're such a well-spoken, great storyteller. I don't know what your majoring is. You have some oral dexterity. I hope you double down on it.

I totally do. I just talk my professor's ears off all day.

Good, good, good.

I have to shout out my professor because he's letting me skip class to do this because he's an armchair as well. So shout out to Dr. Chomper.

Wait, wait, Dr. Chomper?

Chomper.

Oh, Chomper. Oh, I want him to be a dental instructor. Dr. Chomper.

Of course you do.

Okay, Dr. Chomper.

Do you mind if I let my mom say hi?

Yes, of course. Let her say hi.

Hi, Abby.

Hey, guys.

Oh, she's so cute. She has a matching shirt on. Oh, you guys.

Yes, she does.

Oh, I love it.

You guys are so sweet.

We love you guys.

All right, we love you back.

Yeah, both of you.

All right, take care.

All right, bye. Bye.

Hello. What does your shirt say?

It's Queens of the Stone Age.

Rob, are you hard as a rock back there?

Love Queens of the Stone Age.

He loves it. Alexis, where are you?

I am gonna be vague 'cause he will get me.

Really quick, based so far on this, this story better involve Ooh, I can't wait.

It doesn't, unfortunately.

So vague. What part of the country, a zone?

Northeast.

And are you currently residing where you were born, or have you relocated?

I'm still in the Northeast, and I go to school in the Northeast.

Okay, and you were born in the Northeast?

Yes.

Okay, wonderful. So you have a bad teacher story?

I do. This was about 4 years ago. I had transferred out of my regular public high school in the second semester of my sophomore year into this charter school. So it was a little weird. It was dedicated for the arts, which was super fun, super cool. And a lot of students had similar experiences to me where they transferred out because their other school just wasn't working for them. A very, very, very large population of the students were queer. And experienced a lot of bullying at their old school, and at this new school, it was great. Obviously, they had regular classes that I had to take. I was placed into a biology class, and my teacher, who I'm just gonna call Mr. Teacher because he will get me and sue me, was kind of a selling point for the school because he went to this pretty prestigious undergrad and he was a doctor. However, he was a doctor in naturopathic medicine, which is very important.

And also, I think we're playing a little fast and loose.

Can you get a doctor? Can you get an MD?

Not from a university.

I think it's called like an ND or something, but they were very insistent that he was a doctor.

Okay.

Okay.

Just hadn't taken the MCAT or done a residency or—

okay.

Even, even probably even got a PhD. So not even a doctorate.

It was the kind of thing where he'd be on the first page of the website. He was a selling point for the school because it's like, wow, look at this doctor we have working here. Originally, I thought he seemed kind of cool because he was this middle-aged guy and he was super accepting and very open and created this wonderful environment for all these queer kids. And he provided a lot of hygiene products and little snacks and food you could just take, no questions asked. And I thought that was pretty neat. However, as I was in his class more and more, I kind of started to see through this front he had.

Can I ask quickly what the hygiene products were?

Like pads, tampons, birth control options, deodorant.

He's a mini CVS.

Pretty much. He had like rice packets you could microwave.

Oh, wow.

Wow, wow, wow.

Okay.

Yeah, it really was like a little store. So a lot of students had issues at home, and there was kind of this following around this teacher where they all referred to him as a father figure.

Oh, no.

It was just weird. It was almost culty. And he knew that referring to him as a father was happening, and he just kind of let it happen. He obviously had his own views on— I'm just gonna call it like evidence-based medicine.

I'm just gonna call it legitimate medicine.

He hated peer-reviewed science.

And it would come through a lot with personal conversations with students and his actual class. He would tell students individually to talk to their doctor and be like, you need to tell your doctor to stop prescribing you medication. There was this one specific conversation I overheard where he was like, you need to stop taking your Lexapro.

Oh my God.

Tell your doctor. Because so many of these students were on antidepressants and he would say, don't take them. And at the beginning of every class, 60 minutes, it was a short class, he would take attendance and attendance was an event. It was 20 minutes minimum. minimum because he would ask people individually how they were. He would be like, Monica, how are you today?

Ew.

This would kind of open the floor for students to essentially trauma dump. It turned into this therapy session where he would suggest things, and it just was a very long event every single day. And he then, after 10 students would often propose a hypothetical situation or a hypothetical question, and he loved his hypotheticals. And often these hypotheticals had sexual themes.

Oh.

There was one time he used a student's name. He loves using students as examples. And he said, if student's name was a stripper and only stripped while they were ovulating, oh, they would make more Because of the hormones. There was a question one day he asked a room of 20 or 30 15-year-olds. If you had a kid and comes out to you as a furry or a zoophile, which would you prefer? He wrote it on the board, which is one of the pictures that I sent in.

Oh my goodness. Okay, I want to— I want to look at this.

Girlfriend dog, it says.

Yeah.

Oh my other kin.

Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. Because he follows it up with, what if it was your girlfriend or boyfriend who said they were a zoophile or a furry? It was just unbelievably strange.

Yeah.

Yeah, this is not school.

No, this is his own narcissistic masturbatory—

This is like the ending of my sophomore year, and I'm like, this guy is a really fucking weirdo. Weird. So I decided to Google him because I'm a stalker at heart, and if something's on the internet, I'm gonna find it. There are countless articles about him debunking his claims and tearing him apart because he calls himself a doctor and makes medical claims which are false. His main claim was that an elderflower pill can replace the flu vaccine, which is also the other pictures that I sent in. One is just a screenshot of Google of all of the articles, and the other is his claim.

Can I ask, how long had this charter school been in operation when you joined? How long was he holding court like this, and how on earth were no students flagging this to anyone?

As of right now, it's been open like 10 years, and he had worked there for maybe 2 years at the time.

I imagine his confidence was just growing. He didn't start out this hardcore, like, hey, what do you want your boyfriend to be? Or if you're a stripper on your period— I mean, it feels like you'd have to ramp up to that. And like, you kept not getting busted for being inappropriate.

And then—

Well, if he's a father figure and people are looking up to him, he's scary.

Ugh, disgusting.

Yeah, the principal loved him because he was a doctor and he was a wonderful asset to the school. And had gotten rid of the principal's It was impossible to get fired from that school too. There's some like crazy stuff that had gone on there. So in the beginning of my junior year, now that I had taken a class with him, he obviously knew me very personally and could now diagnose me. So I ended up having a seizure within the first like month of my junior year because of a side effect of Wellbutrin.

Oh no.

And it's like one of the most common side effects. It was a one-time event, never happened again. So I'm telling my friend about this. I'm like, girl, you're never gonna guess why I wasn't here the other day. And he overhears this conversation and he comes up to me and he's like, you need to stop taking all of your meds. And this was exciting for me. I'm like, oh my gosh, this is my first— I'm finally getting medical advice from this crazy man. Obviously, I continue taking my medication. And a couple weeks later, I am complaining to the same friend about period cramps. And he looks at me and says, those aren't period cramps you're having. And instead, it's a bug in my stomach that has been passed down through generations of my family, and that I need to go get tested. He says it like it's like a freaking STD. I'm just kind of okaying my way through the situation because that's what I've learned best with him, is if you just like go okay, you know, he's always right no matter what. And he stops talking and he looks at me and he goes, Alexis, I don't think you're taking me seriously.

Ew.

And is like super like stern and mean about it. He kind of just shrugs it off and He suggests I take a garlic pill. He ended up getting fired finally because he was using students as examples in class. There was this like classic high school couple who ended up breaking up and he was using this as this example. And that was the final straw.

Wow.

It's kind of shocking that that was versus all the other stuff. Yeah.

It's kind of like when you talk about bottoms and it's like there's so many bottoms, but the actual bottom is never really the worst one.

Oh, right, right.

Is that because someone told their parents and a parent probably complained?

I'm not entirely sure because he had talked to parents and offered medical advice to parents about their kids. Like, one of my best friends, during parent-teacher conferences, he suggested to her mom that she get taken off of Lexapro.

I'm mildly delighted he got fired for that. I thought for sure this is going to end up with him in an inappropriate relationship with the student, because he's like, I'm a father, I'm a trust— he's clearly— yeah, he's an egomaniac and a narcissist.

He was on his way to cult leader, which always involves sex.

Yes.

He does work with children now still. I would like to add just some other additional fun facts about him. He had a human skull in his room. He did not know who it belonged to. He just kind of had it, which I don't think is ethical. He told us in depth about his suicide attempt and experiences with acid. And then one day, my friend was experiencing a UTI, and he found out and told her unprompted that she needs to start having more phone sex with her girlfriend.

Okay.

Because she's having sex on the weekend. but not enough sex during the weekdays, so she needs to have phone sex.

Oh, this is— this is insane. It sounds like a horror movie, kind of, right?

It does.

When I told my friends I was going on this podcast, they were all like, holy shit, because everyone's a victim of Mr.

Teacher. Yuck.

No, thank you.

You would kill him.

Although I might have him take a look at my psoriatic arthritis, see if he's got another perspective on how I can approach it. Yeah, no, no. If my daughters came home and gave me this report, It would be very hard for me not to drive up to the school and, uh, yeah, get physical.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Oh wow, that's a story.

Well, Alexis, it's so nice meeting you. I'm glad you made it through, and I'm glad he got canned, right?

I would love to shout out my mom. She is a reading teacher, and a very good one at that. We listen to this all of the time.

Shout out, Mom. All right, well, have a great rest of your day and have fun in college.

You too.

Thank you so much.

All right, take care.

That was a good prop.

It really was. All right. Love you.

Love you.

Do you want to sing a tune or something?

We don't have a theme song. Oh, okay, great. We don't have a theme song for this new show, so here I go, go, go. We're gonna ask some random questions, and with the help of Armcherrys, we'll get some suggestions. On the Fly Rhyme Dish. On the Fly Rhyme Dish.

Enjoy!