by Gavin S Innes, TCW
THERE is something shifting in Britain’s schools, and parents can sense it even if it is rarely admitted. It’s not written into policy documents or announced at parents’ evenings. It’s quieter than that. It’s the growing reality that a lot of teachers no longer feel free to teach openly or fairly on issues which schools, government and left-wing social media describe as ‘sensitive’.
A Policy Exchange report, ‘Blasphemy’ in Schools, highlights the issues parents and teachers are gas-lit into avoiding. Based on polling of more than 1,000 teachers, it found that 16 per cent openly admit to self-censorship, while a further 24 per cent preferred not to say. In other words, at least two in five teachers may be holding back in the classroom. About 60 per cent said they had not self-censored at all but, knowing the punishment for honesty, we can assume those teachers valued their finances and social standing more than the need to put themselves under an interrogation lamp. That alone should give pause to any parent who assumes lessons are being delivered with neutrality.
The reasons aren’t difficult to understand. The same report found that half of teachers believe there is a real risk to their physical safety if protests arise, and three-quarters say such protests would be damaging to them professionally. One in five even believe the risk to their safety isn’t worth it. This is not a normal working environment. It is one shaped by caution, calculation and increasingly by fear.
Under those conditions, how can we assume teachers always act as neutral arbiters of complex and controversial topics? It doesn’t appear to be because they’re unwilling but because the system in which they operate punishes it. When a poorly phrased lesson or a misjudged example can lead to complaints, reputational damage, or worse, the safest option is obvious. Avoid the difficult ground altogether or stick rigidly to approved narratives that frame atheist boys as bad and expendable and everyone else as potential victims.