Nudes are bad for your career.

[Dburkhead]

sigh

[McDuffies]

This is utterly ridiculous. If there was any common sence, the board responsible for suspending this teacher would be fired like a fox by higher instances.

Nude drawing is an essential part of learning to draw. Every artist knows that. Should a 9 grader start drawing nude models? Well, the earlier he starts, the earlier he'll learn. Any kid who has a potential for career in art will appreciate that when it grows up.

About maturity, I think that seeing nudes in a non-sexual context would actually help them build a mature relationship toward nudity. Are you supposed not to take kids to museums because horny boys are going to drool over Modigliani's acts?
In any case, it's something that's a normal part of growing up. Over-shelter the kid and you'll in the end have a repressed grown up man. I know that no mother ever regreted that her son is sexually repressed, but it's no reason for government instances to incourage that.

Once again: no kid ever grew up with serious psychological problems just because it saw a nipple or two.

[Mr.Bob]

Is it just me, or has society headed vaguely backwards since the Italian Renaissance?

Testament to the exquisite taste of bolognese.

[Kisai]

Ditto, and ditto. 9th grade is the time of life when you point at the wang on Michelangelo's David and giggle .

Then again, I find America's nudophobia rather hypocritical, especially since kids can be taken to an art museum with nude schulptures everywhere, and have it be called "art" instead on "naughty."

Sadly,there is no shortage of people here who think naked sculptures and paintings in museums are evil and perverse.

Argh. You're right.

Is it just me, or has society headed vaguely backwards since the Italian Renaissance?

I think society has been heading backwards since the end of the 60's, as soon as black people and women were able to vote, the society has been working to undo much social progress.

I mean look at the immigration bill in the states. Slavery 2.0 . They want to keep their illegal immigrants not because they are good employees but so they can keep paying them slave wages.

Someone did hit the nail on the head somewhere, maybe it was a slashdot comment, is that the babyboomers are the ones that are in power right now, the same people who were born in the 50's, who grew up and LIKED being conservative. We need to kick these people out and put younger people in power, ones that are more open minded.

I predict that the next 10 years are going to continue to move backwards and then it will move forwards again. I just hope it doesn't turn into a christian-style taliban-like government in the mean time.

There are too many laws that fly in the face of common sense, they are there only to protect "everyone" from the stupid people who would abuse it, but in turn also get used against people that only one person doesn't like.

[TheSuburbanLetdown]

Once again: no kid ever grew up with serious psychological problems just because it saw a nipple or two.

I dunno, that wardrobe malfunction at the Super Bowl destroyed my ability to function as a normal human being. I lost my innocence ever since I saw that boob.

[Sincerely]

I don't really remember much of high school, I've pretty much blocked it out, but I recall seeing a decent amount of photocopies of nude artwork and going to museums and seeing nudes.

I never worked from a nude model till College and by then I was mature enough to pretend not to be weirded out by it.

I think the proper response to this situation should have been the administration having the teacher apologize to the class, inform them that he had stepped out of bounds by the suggestion, and then move on. Suspending him accomplishes very little except make a lot of people upset.

[Garneta]

Even in my college drawing class they wouldn't allow us to work from a nude model. At least the art teacher apologized to us for that. Even in the buckle of the bible belt, there are some open minded people. Unfortunately, though, many more are of the type that think nudity is among the many many things that are evil and taboo.

[Dutch!]

Never saw or participated in a nude drawing class myself...

Put it this way...I know I wouldn't suggest to the kids to go and have a look at some old feller's old feller, or some woman's funbags. Getting fired is probably taking the extreme a bit too far past the end of the line, but the bloke was a dick (to continue the nude theme) to suggest it in the first place. Tell them such classes are valuable to improve anatomy, yeah, but don't openly tell them they should go and have a gawk at rude bits. He was asking for trouble.

Mind you...last time I took a bunch of kids to the local gallery, they weren't at all interested in the naughty bits on some of the pictures and sculptures. They were all mingling around a little upstairs window looking at the power station outside.

[Ekolter]

I signed up to be a non-nude model at the University. Had to fill out a ton of paperwork - background check, character check, etc. They do this for both types of models.

I find that a lot of schools are walking on their tippy toes on many issues. It's not a easy job being an educator in this days. Everyone so paranoid, they're afraid to sneeze because it might offend someone and get their behinds canned.

[Sippan]

Where I come from, people are born without clothes and therefore the naked human body is considered quite natural. But on the other hand we don't have as many sick and twisted sexual crimes over here, as in the US.

(I just realized I was too subtle. I'm trying to imply that the uptightness is causing the perversion.)

[Grabmygoblin]

I'm staging a protest. *strips and runs around campus nekkid*

[McDuffies]

*strips everything but stockings and rust after Gmg*

I generally thought that 80ies were a kind of golden age of humanity.
Except for haircuts, of course.

[Christwriter]

I am of two minds about this one.

Nude drawing is important to learning how to draw, and I'd kill for the opertunity to get to participate in a nude drawing class.

Nine is too young for nudity. There is no reason for a nine year old to draw nudes. They might be extreamly talented, but they are still far, far too young to do nude. They could get the same artistic training from a woman in a skintight leotard that they could from a nude. Hold off on the nudes until they're at least thirteen.

I think the teacher was probably being a little insensative by not pausing to think of Little Jimmy asking mom if he could enroll in a nude drawing class next week. I do not think he deserved to be fired, or even repremanded. Just to have someone explain to him that in most people's minds, nine is too young and he probably shouldn't make that particular suggestion again.

People being general idiots all around, and overreacters when their children are involved, he got axed when he shouldn't have. Bad situation all around.

CW

[Prettysenshi]

I don't think this is a big deal. Honestly, I saw nudity in all art books in my high school. It was art, not porn. So, I don't see the difference with nude models in an art class. Maybe it should be restricted to colleges and such since I personally feel that some kids shouldn't see nudity up until 16. So to keep it fair, unless the school is exclusively an art school, nude models shouldn't be introduced to them until maybe senior high school, which is like grades 11 and 12.

But back to the religious argument, I think that the people making these kind of things news are the overreligious people. Make it a big deal, bring political attention to it. By then, it's blown out of proportion, and it has to be turned into law so that Congress can shut the bastards up.

Everyone overreacting to things like this and using religion or morals or who cares what make me worry where my "land of the free" is going. Makes me want to move to England, I'm so serious.

[TheSuburbanLetdown]

I am of two minds about this one.

Nude drawing is important to learning how to draw, and I'd kill for the opertunity to get to participate in a nude drawing class.

Nine is too young for nudity. There is no reason for a nine year old to draw nudes. They might be extreamly talented, but they are still far, far too young to do nude. They could get the same artistic training from a woman in a skintight leotard that they could from a nude. Hold off on the nudes until they're at least thirteen.

I think the teacher was probably being a little insensative by not pausing to think of Little Jimmy asking mom if he could enroll in a nude drawing class next week. I do not think he deserved to be fired, or even repremanded. Just to have someone explain to him that in most people's minds, nine is too young and he probably shouldn't make that particular suggestion again.

People being general idiots all around, and overreacters when their children are involved, he got axed when he shouldn't have. Bad situation all around.

CW

They weren't 9-year olds. They were 9th graders, so that'd be about 13-14 years old.

[Christwriter]

Ninth graders?

And they're pitching that much fuss about it?

Twelve and thirteen is still young-ish, but odds are...thirteen? They've probably seen nudes.

Then it's defenately more overblown than I thought it was.

CW

[TheSuburbanLetdown]

Truly. And if I gather correctly from the website Remus linked, it was just one kid's dad that had objections to the suggestion.

[CJBurgandy]

This reminds me of two things.

First: my Senior year of High School, for my art studio final, my class had to make poster sized art peices with mixed medias. I chose to do a picture of fairies dancing on flowers. While I recived an A on the project, it almost cost me my diploma. I only needed one class to graduate and my grade was low enough in it, were my final could make or break it because I really messed up on a project in that class earlier. Knowing that I would do fine on the final though, I wasn't really worried about failing the class.
The Principle though, while on a visit to the art room saw the poster on the wall in there and had a cow. The faires in the picture were sugested to be nude. I say suggested because flowers covered anything that would be concidered to be inoproriate. The Principle wanted me to be suspended for the rest of the school year, which would have caused me to miss my finals and getting an F on the one final I needed to graduate. Thankfully I had a great teacher who won on the argument on not suspending me for an A project.

The other thing this reminds me of was my 2nd year of college. the life drawing class had gotten to the point where they were doing charcoal nudes. Like any class, the best of the portriats were hung in the hall way to show case the class. The art building, of course, is the same building the university's theater is in. When a group of Jr. High students came to see a production of Faust, a teacher saw the nudes (Which were in a hall way on the oppisite side of the building from the theater) and was worried a kid would wander out of the play and find themselves on the other side of the building and be forever tramatized by the site of abtract charcoal nudes. He found it to be in the children's best interests to cover the art work with sheets from a near by class room. (sadly enough, the sheets they use to create backgrounds for the life drawing class.) After the production, they remembered to go back and uncover the charcoal drawings, and Lo and behold, they were all smudged to the point of being ruined. (thankfully, I wasn't in this class) The teacher, was really upset that his students' art work had been destroyed and sent a bill to the Anchorage School District for damages. I'm not sure what the bill was, but it was rumored to be a pretty high bill. Of Course the school district refused to pay for the damaged art works, but instead decided that only 11th and 12th grade students can now have field trips to the university. Some of the students who had damaged artwork, protested by making really sexual peices, that the teacher proudly displayed in the main lobby's showcase. Being behind the glass, meant that no one could touch them without a key and being in the lobby meant everyone got to see them. The only one that wasn't in the case was a sculpture of a 6 foot penis, complete with veins and balls. (it was too big to go in the display case) The Penis suffered damage one day though, when the father of a high school student, who was taking night classes at the university saw it, and kicked the balls in and then pushed it onto it's side and dragged it to the men's bathroom and covered it with a sheet from a nearby class room (not sure if it was the same sheet that smudged the charcoals.) The man was charged with vanadlism. oddly enough, the man seemed to not remember that people in the lobby watching him, might make witnesses to his crime. The Penis came to rest in the 3d design class (which when I signed up for the class, thought it was a 3d computer drawing class and not some sculpture class...)

[TheSuburbanLetdown]

The kid that made the dick & balls should go to that guy's house and break his stuff. Then kick him in the balls.

Well, not really, but I like imagining it.

[RemusShepherd]

Twelve and thirteen is still young-ish, but odds are...thirteen? They've probably seen nudes.

Definitely, considering that the course work was full of nude images in the textbooks. The uproar is because the teacher suggested they could learn more from live models.

I have the feeling there is just one asshat parent who is causing a stink about this. Once they mollify that idiot, they'll probably reinstate the teacher. I hope.