Career Confidential is on vacation for the summer. This column originally ran in October 2020.
Q: One of the worst parts of being a teacher right now is getting tons of negative feedback from society. I don’t think I’ll ever get over the way the anonymous masses have turned against us on neighborhood listservs and other social media, accusing us of being lazy and unwilling to work. (Hello? Um, virtual work is work.) That’s bad enough, but I’m writing you about something far worse, and very personal. A parent of one of my students is trash-talking me on her Facebook page and calling me out by name. She has never once approached me directly with her complaints, and to my knowledge she hasn’t contacted my principal either, but there she is out there in the internet world, saying I’m checked out and flat and that it doesn’t seem like I want to be there, but also that she suspects I’m not racing to get back to the classroom either since my life is “so cushy.” So, here are my questions: Considering that we’re not Facebook friends (and a mutual friend told me about her posts), what should I do? Is what she’s doing even legal? And can I sue her? If I win, would she have to pay my legal expenses? Otherwise, I can’t afford to take her to court.
A: I hear your frustration and sense of powerlessness. She’s chosen a cowardly and juvenile way to address her dissatisfaction with you (which, for what it’s worth, could have far more to do with her own general unhappiness than your performance). That doesn’t make it OK and may not help you feel better, but know that fear and anxiety can leak out in less-than-constructive behaviors.
I’m not a lawyer, and my response is not a substitute for legal advice, but I did speak to an attorney about your situation. He explained that for a parent’s statement to be defamatory (libelous if written, slanderous if spoken), the statement must be a statement of fact, about you, that is false, and that was made with the required level of fault, and that injured your reputation. The “level of fault” element is a bit complicated. There’s a sliding scale of fault, with a higher standard for public officials and high-profile public figures, and a lower standard for private figures. The law for public servants such as teachers is nuanced, but the statement likely would have to be uttered with negligence, and probably with actual knowledge about its falsity. And to be defamatory, the statement must be one of fact that can be proven true or false, rather than a statement of opinion. In other words, she probably can get away with calling you flat and boring, but she’ll run into trouble if she calls you an alcoholic who doesn’t log into Zoom classes because you’re drunk and passed out.
According to the attorney, there’s little prospect that you would recover legal fees. Threatening or pursuing a libel claim could end up being messy, expensive, and counterproductive. It could even end up drawing more attention to her criticism. (That’s known as the Streisand Effect — after Barbra Streisand — an online phenomenon in which attempting to bury information has the opposite effect.)
So, what can you do? You could reach out to the parent directly, let her know you were made aware of the posts, ask her to remove them, and request that she approach you directly in the future. You could choose to ignore them, recognizing that her approach could backfire and that others might judge her for denigrating her child’s teacher publicly. Whatever you choose to do, you might want to consult with your principal, if only to give them a head’s up. If you do ask the parent to engage with the school directly, they might start with your administrator.
I’m sorry this has happened to you. It’s upsetting and unfair. But try to remember that in the end, her comments say more about her than they do about you.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Phyllis L. Fagell
Phyllis L. Fagell is the school counselor at Landon School in Washington, D.C., a therapist at the Chrysalis Group in Bethesda, Md., and the author of the Career Confidential blog. She is also the author of Middle School Matters and Middle School Superpowers, available at https://amzn.to/3Pw0pcu.
