School fires blogger over post about homophones, citing 'gay agenda'

[james1981]

I don't know whether to laugh or weep over this article. At the very least, it makes for good comedic fodder... and I'm glad that the teacher involved seems to have taken this in stride. It's worth reading some of the comments. I've posted some comments I thought were particularly outstanding below.

School fires blogger over post about homophones, citing 'gay agenda'

Source article

By Lauren O'Neil | CBC News | Aug 1 2014

If you know the difference between the words "homophobe" and "homophone," you're well ahead of one American English language school administrator who fired an employee last week for allegedly promoting "some kind of gay agenda" through a blog post about grammar.

Timothy Torkildson was recently let go from his position as a social media specialist at the Nomen Global Language Center in Provo, Utah after writing an educational blog post called "Help with Homophones."

"In English a homophone is a word that has several different meanings and spellings, but always sounds the same. The best way to learn these tricky words is to memorize them little by little," he wrote in the July post on the school's blog, providing the example, "Ad is an advertisement. Add is a mathematical function."

According to The Salt Lake Tribune, Nomen Global Language Center owner Clarke Woodger called Torkildson into his office shortly after to tell him that he was fired.

"I’m letting you go because I can’t trust you” said Woodger according to Torkildson, who posted an account of the exchange on his personal blog. "This blog about homophones was the last straw. Now our school is going to be associated with homosexuality."

"I had to look up the word because I didn’t know what the hell you were talking about," Woodger allegedly continued. "We don’t teach this kind of advanced stuff to our students, and it’s extremely inappropriate. Can you have your desk cleaned out by eleven this morning? I’ll have your cheque ready.”

Stunned, Torkildson left the private ESL school, from which, according to the Tribune, more than 6,500 students hailing from 58 different countries have graduated over the past 15 years.

Nomen has since removed his blog post about homophones from its website, but the Daily Dot was able to screengrab a portion of it using Google cache.

When speaking with the Tribune, Torkildson said that he had been especially careful and straighforward while writing his educational post because he understood that the "homo" part of the word could be politically charged.

Despite this, he felt that clarifying homophones through his post was important for the students at Nomen.

"I taught English in Thailand for nearly five years, and it's awful confusing for them. Words like "see" — I see something, I swim in the sea, I take vitamin C..." he told CBC's As It Happens during a phone interview Thursday. "Also, taking the TOEFL test... part of that is a conversation and essay section, and if [ESL students] don't know about homophones, they can really, really trip up."

Woodger told the Tribune that his reaction to Torkildson’s blog had nothing to do with homosexuality. Instead, he said that he had been concerned about Torkildson's tendency to offend and confuse readers by "going off on tangents" in his blogs.

"I'm not bitter about it, I'm not ashamed about it, I'm still puzzled about it..." said Torkildson about his dismissal to As It Happens. "I never heard back negatively from anyone except for him."

Online, reaction to the story is running the gamut from outraged to amused. Many have made jokes about the situation, while others are slamming the school for its actions (and for not knowing what a homophone is.)

Some great quotes generated by this article:

"If a language school owner fires a blogger because people might think a homophone post = 'gay sex' imagine what he'd do re: split infinitive"

"Doubtlessly the school would claim that the firing was propholactic in nature."

"The whole episode is . . . wait for it . . . niggardly."

"Oh yeah -- and when I read this I got a piloerection."

"When Eye red this article it maid me think: is this what wee half come two? R people sew ignorant?"

"one of the more devious plots in the "gay agenda" increasing literacy rates."

"Coming soon the story of what happened after said administrator discovers homogenized milk in the cafeteria." "That's nothing, just wait until he finds out their teaching the penal code in their LSAT courses."

"I wonder what would have happened if he had posted about rising diphthongs..."

"Calling the homophone will cost you $2.99 per minute (plus long distance charges)!"

"maybe the problem was his post on dangling participals"

"What would the man do with homosapiens, homogenize, homogeneous, etc???"

 

[W!nston]

"Calling the homophone will cost you $2.99 per minute (plus long distance charges)!"

This one really cracked me up :rofl:

 

[ihno]

This is indeed a disgrace for the school in question.

"We don’t teach this kind of advanced stuff to our students, and it’s extremely inappropriate." Yes, american students don't need to know the difference between "then" and "than".

 

[gorgik9]

Homophony is unnatural. It sez so in the Good Book, Paul's letter to the Romans 1:26-27.

Homophones exist because immoral people make bad choices, founded in Godless lifestyles. Homophones aren't born that way, no sir, you can make homophony go away with intense praying!!!

The levels of nutcrackery is continuously rising in the US of A.

And it isn't funny. It's just sad.

 

[Shelter]

The knight made love to the sweet maid in their suite during the night! - I think that shows that homophony is the work of the devil and really unnatural! So I think it is correct that this man has been fired. It's simply immoral!!! What if a student of this center in Provo, Utha will read this. Oh my god! -

 

[gb2000ie]

On the one hand it's funny, and the victim of this ignorant 'educator' is not upset at his wrongful termination, so no one has been badly hurt.

On the other hand, I hope this spectacular display of ignorance is enough to close this school for ever. An institution that claims to teach language but doesn't know what a homphone is, or why that might be really important for kids to learn about is clearly not fit for purpose.

In this case, the victim hasn't lost his house or been bankrupted by the ignorance and homophobia, but he so very easily could have been.

Also - it's shit like this that explains why many foreigners think Americans are idiots.

It'd be bad enough if a politician had gotten in trouble for it (as famously happend with the innocent word niggardly), but for a SCHOOL, and a school of ENGLISH at that, to be so ignorant is actually tragic.

Reminds me of the Bush classic - "seldom do we hear it asked - is our children learning"

 

[dargelos]

It's like the case of the vigliante group attacking the home of a British childrens doctor.
They were too stupid to understand that being a pediatrician has nothing whatsoever to do with being a paedophile. So America doesn't have a monopoly on ignorance.

 

[bigsal]

It's like the case of the vigliante group attacking the home of a British childrens doctor.
They were too stupid to understand that being a pediatrician has nothing whatsoever to do with being a paedophile. So America doesn't have a monopoly on ignorance.

The mother of the imbeciles is always pregnant.

 

[fkboy1]

Another ignoramus!! :rolling eyes::rolling eyes::rolling eyes:
And his name is Clarke Woodger <= the name somehow makes me wanna giggle!

 

[james1981]

I think what annoys me most about this article is how the administrator when faced with the irrefutable error in his logic - homophone is not a gay agenda, but a grammatical term (and btw, you administer a grammar school) - he still refuses to get it. Certainly, there must have been an agenda to get this instructor fired and this was likely just used as an excuse to hand down the dismissal. But what a terribly poor point to fire what seems to be a perfectly competent instructor on.

I bet the dismissal letter read something like the following:

Hay their! This instant too Sean do not like you no more. May bee don't bi anymore. Wii can knot support your happy agenda. Are stew dents argh import tent.

Stew pit Lee yours,
Woodger

 

[dargelos]

On rereading this story my interpretation has changed.
It's an ESL, which teaches English language to adults usualy so that they can improve their job prospects. An ESL teaches to a basic level, it has low academic standards. The manager of such a place is not a headmaster, his job is more like running a shoe store, he needs few qualifications. So his poor vocabulary is not as suprising as I first thought.
His real problem is a problem shared by bad managers the world over, the delusion that admiting you made a mistake is a sign of weakness. Covering up your mistakes with bullshit excuses is the sign of weakness, as is making the innocent take the blame.
He should open up his dictionary for the second time this year and look up magnanimity.