ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, October 15, 1996 TAG: 9610150067
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-5 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: Ellen Goodman
SOURCE: ELLEN GOODMAN
FINALLY we're beginning to get some sense out of the story of the 6-year-old kisser.
In September, the news that Johnathan Prevette was suspended from school by a teacher for sexual harassment put his towheaded picture in every newspaper from North Carolina to New Zealand.
The first-grader from Lexington, N.C., became the poster child for the excesses of (1) the school system, (2) the legal system, (3) political correctness and (4) feminism. His plight provoked enough attention, media commentary and public hysteria to win his school the contemporary version of a blue ribbon: a bomb threat.
There hadn't been such an uproar in the county since the local sheriff painted the jail Pepto-Bismol pink.
But after 30 years of reporting, you learn to be just a touch suspicious when something is too good a story to be entirely true. This one seemed a touch ``off'' to me. And so it was.
The little boy who was suspended by a teacher for sexual harassment? It turns out that he wasn't suspended - just sent to another room for misbehavior. Nor was his act defined as sexual harassment. It was unwanted touching that violated the student-behavior code.
It also turns out that school policy does distinguish between big and little kids in assessing motives and actions. And it wasn't the teacher who turned the kid in. It was the little girl who complained to the teacher.
Oh, did I mention the little girl? In this hyped version of the ``Georgie Porgie'' story, she's been invisible. It took a father of two speaking at a Lexington school board meeting last Monday to ask emotionally: ``How old does a girl have to be before no means no?''
This story got out of hand - way out of hand - in part because the boy's mom chose to file her complaint with a talk-show host. Then, too, the school system and the much-respected principal were silenced by privacy regulations. The girl's parents wisely decided to keep their daughter out of the center ring of the media circus.
But it was the kiss heard round the world because it fit so neatly into the preconception - and maybe hope - that claims of sexual harassment have gone too far, and/or are trivial to begin with. Didn't we warn you? A little peck on the cheek and a 6-year-old becomes a sex offender!
Johnathan Prevette's celebrity was followed by a similar story on Page 1 of The New York Times about a second-grader, De'Andre Dearinge. This school had suspended the boy and called it sexual harassment. But it turns out that De'Andre had been pestering a number of girls; a parent had complained; and De'Andre's mom had been called to school twice before.
Let me state the obvious. Johnathan Prevette is no Bob Packwood. Nor is De'Andre Dearinge a sex offender to be registered at your neighborhood police station.
Was there some ``over'' in the schools' ``reaction''? Maybe Johnathan's ``sentence'' was a bit stiff. And yes, someone applied a weirdly adult label to De'Andre's misbehavior. Both schools have made adjustments.
In any period of change, people can get hit by a swinging pendulum. Schools all over have instituted student-conduct policies in a hurried response to legal and funding worries. They don't always negotiate the line between policy and common sense.
But the routine, dog-bites-man, everyday non-news is about the intimidation so many girls experience in the hallway, the classroom, the playground.
De'Andre made Page 1. Did anyone in New Zealand read about the 9-year-old in the Bronx this fall who grabbed a girl and pushed her head to his crotch? I didn't think so.
Did they read about the 11-year-old girl in California who was subject to a daily barrage of threats and insults? The school didn't think it had the responsibility to stop the boy until her family sued and won $500,000.
The law about a school's responsibility for student conduct toward other students is in wild flux, differing from court to court. Last week, the Supreme Court decided not to hear a harassment appeal from Texas, sending a message that it isn't ready to rule in this area.
Meanwhile, back in North Carolina where rumors still abound, some folks are worrying about the 6-year-old girl. Craig Koontz, the chair of the School Board, is appalled at reports that she is blaming herself for the whole furor. ``She is worried, `Did I do something wrong?''' he says.
She thinks it's all her fault for speaking up? Isn't this where we came in? No news here. Just the same old, old story.
- The Boston Globe
LENGTH: Medium: 84 linesby CNB