As a rule, I recommend that every carbon-based life form online avoid the comments section of news sites, from newspapers to television stations to local blogs covering the farmer’s market, because the comments are usually overflowing with fresh awful crazysauce.
In this case, I recommend everyone read the comments because they restore some sanity and hope for what is a truly disgraceful and frankly stupid news segment.
WNEP, a television station from the northeast and central part my home state of Pennsylvania (OH MY GOSH I AM SO PROUD. NOT.) ran this lovely piece of crap story revealing the pen name of a local high school English teacher who writes for Ellora’s Cave as Judy Mays. But wait, there’s more: the news segment then assists these parents in holding her up for public ridicule—and, in the case of one class act of a parent, accusations of pedophilia.
It is no secret that there’s crazysauce in epic levels which amplifies to a full boil when placed in front of a news camera. My question is why this was a story in the first place. What is the big deal if, in her private time, a high school English teacher writes erotic romance under a pen name and keeps that part of her life separate?
The comments to the news article are marvelous and incredibly supportive of Mays, including this one, from Jessica, a former student:
I attended MWSD and had the pleasure of having Mrs. as my English teacher. I LOVED her class! It was my one morning class I looked forward to everyday. She inspired us as student just not to read and write, but to enjoy our high school years before they were over. She gave me the idea to switch my graduation paper from becoming a photographer to a nurse. I am now in my third year of nursing school, and thank Mrs. B everyday for the lessons in English she gave me that allow me to write lengthy papers on nursing topics. She also encouraged me to take honors and AP english in high school. I knew about what she did when I was in her class, but I never gave a though to it. I said great for her to find the time in her day while juggling so many other things to be able to do that. I applaud and support her as a teacher, writer, and mother. techniqually if we look deeper she has many jobs, but these two are the only two we are analyzing.
Hear, hear.
So how to respond? Often, I find websites for news organizations don’t really curate or even respond to comments to articles. They mostly fester alone and neglected.
But beyond the comments to the article itself, which are mostly made of Grade-A awesomesauce in support of Ms. Mays, I’ve found that the WNEP news room has a Facebook page.
Kena Vernon, the reporter who did the story, can be reached at Kena.Vernon@wnep.com.
WNEP is on Twitter, too but all they do is broadcast (quelle surprise).
What makes me absolutely livid is that all WNEP did was expose someone’s private life because it made for salacious content. It’s not as if Ms. Mays had brought any of her writing life into her classroom or had behaved inappropriately – the two parts of her life were apparently separate – until now. And, as Colleen Thompson pointed out on Twitter, if a male teacher were writing serial killer fiction and doing well at it, he’d be lauded—probably with a soft focus profile as a “local author.”
But because a female teacher writes about sex and romance, parents feel the need to call her ethics and her professionalism into question, and expose her to public humiliation.
If you’d like to write an email to the author, the address published on her website is writermays@yahoo.com .
And oh, my gosh, look how many books Ms. Mays has written. You go on with your awesome self, ma’am.
ETA: The Associated Press has a very brief story on the WNEP site that highlights the accusations and the response. Ms. Mays has declined to be interviewed by the AP, but as per Dakota Cassidy’s comment below, Ms. Mays is aware we’re all irate on her behalf. (Hi Judy! Kick ass and take names at work today, ma’am!)
And a wise former broadcast journalist sent me a heads up that the News Director for WNEP and the General Manager for the station may be better places to direct your ire than the reporter, who may have been handed the story with little say about it (conjecture on my part, obviously). The News Director would be more likely to have approved it for airtime. Should you feel inclined, the News Director email is news@wnep.com, and the General Manager is generalmanager@wnep.com.
The Facebook page furthers the social and media fail that is WNEP: if you want to see the comments left by angry viewers and readers, you have to click on “Most Recent.” I’m hoping they come up with a better response instead of hiding them, but I’m not holding my breath.
Heh heh. They ARE deleting comments on their Facebook page, but I reckon they can’t delete them fast enough…people are posting their opinions faster then they can get rid of them. They’re wondering what kind of anthill they’ve kicked…..
Don’t Piss Off The Interwebs should be listed on the rule list right under Never Get Involved In a Land War In Asia.
I would like to try to get a blog talk radio show up in a day or so, talking about your situation and censorship in general. Could you drop me an email or on facebook email.
What, you mean teachers have free time? That is news to me. The teachers at my dude’s school work so hard.
And I had some made-of-awesome teachers at high school who fostered curiosity and a love of learning that helped me get through the classes run by asshats who wasted everyone’s time.
Thank you so much for this post. I hadn’t heard of Judy Mays but I’m gonna download a few anyway to show my support. May she become a bestseller!
We’re constantly hearing how hard it is to get qualified teachers—the schools don’t pay enough, and good people go into other fields, yada yada yada. Now, by all accounts, we have a teacher who is EXCELLENT—and who demonstrably knows her field—and they want to get rid of her?
Because of something that doesn’t have any impact on her classroom performance?
Because tenth graders might hear about it and think about sex?
This gets me so mad.
The thing is, how many authors got their start as teachers of some kind? Stephen King is one who comes immediately to mind. If she were writing anything but erotic romance (and not even straight erotica, mind you!) would ANY of these lame parents be objecting?
Answer: No. And neither would the school district.
I’ll bet anything Apple’s kids are flunking English. No doubt that’s why she started on the crusade: babies can’t hack it and she’s willing to do anything to discredit the teacher rather than, you know, helping her kids learn something.
Hey all,
Just heard from Judy, and I passed her email on to the SB’s, but I thought I’d share here, too. It would seem the women who began this witch hunt should look for new work. it was unsuccessful and Judy’s gotten hoards of support from not just the Snyder County community, but the ROMANCE COMMUNITY!
All hail romance readers and writers!
This is my worst nightmare!!! I’m a high school teacher, and I publish mainstream in my own name. But I also write hotter stuff under a pen name I keep a well-guarded secret. My heart goes out to her!!! And I’ll have nightmares tonight!!!
I am so disgusted by this story. I write “racy” romances under my real name. I work for a Christian-owned company in my day job. I thought long and hard (no pun intended) about whether or not I should write under a pen name, because I was worried about my bosses’ reactions if they discovered the types of stories I write. After my book came out and my employers DID find out, one of them said to me, “Unless it has pictures, you don’t have to worry about me reading it.” That was the extent of the conversation. 🙂 And I’m still gainfully employed there. Thank God my employers are open-minded and have a sense of humor about the whole thing.
@elysabeth williams ROTFL …also never go against a Sicilian when death is on the line 🙂
I’m so glad to hear that the local community is rallying around Judy Mays, just as the online romance community is. I hope she ends up even more secure in her job and sells tons of books because of the extra publicity.
Nevertheless, I hope our writing organizations, especially RWA, will come to her aid and make strong public statements against this kind of journalism. If an author’s fitness to teach and/or work with children can be called into question because of her romance writing career, that is a dangerous precedent. I wrote to the RWA president and my regional reps in part saying,
I hope others will write their professional organizations, too.
The part that makes me furious is the one mother who they interviewed basically was calling Judy a pedophile. Saying because she writes erotic novels she is worried about how Judy is looking at her son in class. The amount of ignorance those mothers and the news station are showing is unreal.
Mays/Buranich has a decent defamation suit here. These women who tried to stir up a scandal and this inept news station who colluded with them in their harassment of Ms. Buranich should be sued, IMO.
I don’t usually read erotica, but I bought one of her books today in solidarity.
That this “news story” is based on two women slamming a teacher who has done nothing illegal or inappropriate just goes to show that for all their smug, self-righteous sneering at the content of Mays’ books, not one person involved, including everyone at WNEP, is even remotely familiar with journalistic ethics.
I sincerely hope the only thing these bored mothers and this “news” site have succeeded in doing is driving up Judy’s book sales 🙂
Why are you surprised? Teachers are not allowed to have any sort of life of their own. We are not allowed to be creative. We are not allowed to spark creativity. We are not allowed to delve into uncomfortable topics. We are not allowed to explore things that may upset “leftist lunatics” OR “right wing nutjobs”.
We are to teach the test. We are to make SURE the scores are high on any and all standardized testing. Forget free thinking. Forget teaching students to THINK.
The news is the news – they are bred to be pathetic. What is insane is the families and parents ready to get the tar and feathers or light the stake. They are the ones who will lose out on their child, on their STUDENT, growing into a thinking person. Rather than an automaton who merely poops out the right answers and makes everyone happy with their high scores.
This is the third idiotic media tale I’ve come across today. Soooo glad I got the hell out of that field—it’s full of sensationalistic asshats. I just might have to hit the bookstore this week myself….
The best revenge is success is I sincerely hope that Ms. Mays enjoys the best revenge ever with skyrocketing book sales. I’ve already made a purchase and I hope that many more do the same.
Good luck, Ms. Mays! We’ve all got your back. 🙂
Thanks for the positive post about this ridiculous non-news item. A teacher has every right to do anything in her/his private life as long as it doesn’t hurt the students. She evidently tried to keep her writing separate from her teaching because of a pen name. What right did the reporter/news department have in making it public?
I’ve included my pen name. And I will add this: I’m the VP of Nursing for PennMed Consultants, Inc and I’ve had an erotic romance (with a happy ending) published. Go ahead; make something of it!
small minds ban books. Ordinarily I might sign this as ‘proud to be a Pennsylvanian’ but not tioay.
captcha: saw99 = I saw at least 99 positive comments about this today!
A commenter named thexjib posted this link and claims it comes from Wendy Apple’s MySpace page: http://a3.l3-images.myspacecdn.com/images02/140/01ebf7a5eaee4451b4dad03d9cda7fde/l.jpg
I have no idea if it does or not, but if it does, the hypocrisy is beyond appalling.
I’ve read a lot of this NON-story over the last hour. There is a reason why the reporter is at a small, local, low-powered television station out in the middle of podunk nowhere.
As someone else said, I hope that the positive result out of all of this is that Judy May’s book sales go sky high.
The other positive result would be for the reporter and editorial staff to fall on their collective swords and resign en-mass.
They’ve shown their lack of honor and integrity so I doubt that will happen.
The support is wonderful and more than deserved. I bought a book today and hope she sells a bazillion more!
Unfortunately, no amount of positive support in the world will give Judy back what she deserves: the right to keep her teaching life and her writing life separate. Something which she appears to have wanted and to have successfully done for ten years until these meddlesome bitches outted her in this so-called ‘report’.
This makes me so angry. A definite witch hunt. What is worse is that they imply that it is about morals/right & wrong/what is ‘bad’/etc…..
The first time I ever read anything I would think of as erotic romance was in Song of Solomon. That’s right…the Bible. Kinda makes them have to re-think the book burning and witch hunting huh? While I am one to let each believe as they would….I would hate to think that they actually believe that they are in the right with their filthy suggestions as to why a high school teacher can’t write erotic romance. Why it isn’t ‘appropriate’. What is filthy and inappropriate are those parents, news reporters (if we can really call them that) and others that believe persecuting a writer who has dedicated 25 years to her students (who didn’t have a clue about this till now) is right and good.
So… I was at work this afternoon when I caught wind of this. I’m so glad SBTB has taken it up, and I’m so proud to be part of a community that stands up for its own. The comments on FB and elsewhere are so right on.
As an award-winning investigative reporter and the editor-in-chief of a newspaper, I am of the professional opinion that the reporting in the WNEP news segment sucks badger ass. A few prissy, disgruntled parents does not a new story make, especially when the issue that’s gotten them all riled up happens to be none of their damned business.
What this teacher does in her spare time is not their affair unless what she’s doing is their children. And because that’s not the case, they’re not really acting as concerned parents, but more as self-righteous busy-bodies out to inflict their point of view on this author. They need hobbies, more constructive ways to use that energy.
I suggest masturbation.
So are her photoshop skills. 😉
Ack…I can’t get my comment to stick on the WNEP website, so I’m posting it here because I just have to say this!
This is the most insipid, ridiculous article I’ve read in a long time. Shame on you, Kena Vernon, for writing this. And shame on WNEP for relying on sensationalism to attract readers. Reporting the facts is one thing. Inciting outrage by lending the article a flavor of scandal is quite another. Unless her actions are breaking the law (and I assure you, THEY ARE NOT) it is of no import how she chooses to spend her free time. I mean really, you are faulting an English teacher for pursuing a creative outlet? Yeah, how dare she be an independent thinker with an entrepreneurial bent who pursues her own passion for writing outside of her work environment, under an assumed name, no less. What if all teachers did this? What if they were, GASP, like real people who have varied interests that might not align with the rest of the population? They might all teach our children horrible things like perserverance, creativity, critical thinking, the power of believing in and pursuing ones dreams. Yeah, those are terrible, terrible lessons to learn…
I went ahead and emailed the “reporter”—- newness is not an excuse—especially for “reporting” half-assedly on a topic that could potentially ruin a teacher’s job——see below:
Wow—I’m surprised at how a “journalist” like yourself fresh on the job didn’t even put forth a little bit of effort to present the story in an unbiased manner. I’m sure your professors at Hofstra University discussed that you can’t just interview one side’s opinions and not find other people to demonstrate the other side of the issue. Indicating you tried contacting them and they refused comment is not enough—- did you even try to find other parents or students who either supported her or at the very least were benign on the issue?
You may be “the newest reporter assigned to the central Pennsylvania newsroom” but with the internet you can’t afford to half ass any story; people care and they care about fairness.
What crappy journalism, and how sad that ABC News picked the story up and described her writing as “salacious.” Another reason why I only watch TV news if there’s storm coming. Utter tripe.
If I found out one of my kids’ teachers wrote for EC, I’d buy her book and get her autograph.
There is nothing more important than finding out what our “female” teachers do in their spare time. Really. I mean drop out rates, low reading-math-science scores, bullying, etc is nothing compared to one female writing about S.E.X! Mr. David down the hall writes ‘Dexter-esque’ novels set in our hometown…but Ms. Mays writes about S.E.X!
Frankly, some of these people could use an industrial size of lube and one of Ms. Mays books. Prudish-ness doesn’t keep you warm at night 🙂
And….I wrote a comment on their FB page, but some pesky intern keeps deleting it. I think the Bitchery needs to drop a Google bomb on this mess.
I taught in the public schools for 36 years. I applaud Ms Mays for finding a way to suppliment her teacher’s pay so she can continue to do what she loves. I loved teaching, but I was always scrimping to get by on what I earned doing it. I agree with those who say what a teacher does on their own time is their own business.
Back in the 70’s, I was waiting with friends outside a theater to see the racy movie ‘Last Tango in Paris”. I was thinking I was pretty safe in the area where we were because it was far from home. Who could we possibly run into?
Well! Who walks out of the previous showing of the movie but a second grade teacher (probably in her 50’s) from my school! What could we say to eachother but “Hello!”
OH MY GOD THIS IS NOT NEWS. News is a story about parents slandering and witch-hunting a teacher. News is a story about a reporter who took part in the slander and witch hunt. I really truly hope another reporter sees the ACTUAL NEWS here and runs with it.
I hope she sues so other parents and reporters think twice before trying to destroy someones life.
By the way. I would be so freaking thrilled if my daughters had a teacher that not only taught them to write, but also taught them that good writing is important in everything. I wish she would come teach in our school district. We need educators like her.
Wendy Apple…The Forbitten Fruit? Really!? Sheesh
Also a teacher and writer, I am outraged. This is ridiculous. Do we have to be super-chaste, super-pure and super-boring, just to be teachers? Mind you, we have private lives.
Though I have sent comments in support of Ms. Mays, I decided the very best thing I could do was buy a book even though I don’t usually buy from Ellora’s Cave. I would like to see Ms. Mays successfully pursue a libel case. SB Sarah, thank you a thousand times for sharing this.
This is absolutely appalling, and I am in no way trying to diminish that. However, to all the people who think this is about women’s sexuality and sexism in general, it is not. A man was fired for doing the exact same thing. Well, in his case, it was erotic poetry. What happened here was awful, and I pray Ms. Mays is able to get back on her feet, but the issue here is not one of sexism.
Kena Vernon……….shame on you
‘The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues. Conscientious journalists from all media and specialties strive to serve the public with thoroughness and honesty. Professional integrity is the cornerstone of a journalist’s credibility’.
The blame for this monumental debacle falls squarely of the shoulders of gobshite Kena Vernon, she has brought her profession into disrupt and should be forced to resign immediately.
It would be instructive for that so-called journalist if she would now turn to trying to expose everyone who READS “racy” and “salicious” books and magazines, starting with her colleagues and bosses and the nasty women who brought her this “story,” moving next to the town and county administration. She could clearly make a career of it, since—guess what!—she will find a hell of a lot of people reading romance, erotica, and even (*shudder*) pornography. She might even get run out of town on a rail, or at least told to shut up and learn the difference between news and slanderous gossip.
average76: The average person has read 76 books with sex scenes. You’ve got your work cut out for you, Kena1
This really is beyond ridiculous. They act like she’s a terrorist or something. It’s soooooooooo silly. So silly. I can’t say I’m shocked because people who are bored/unhappy with their own lives tend to try and muck up others. I am quite pleased, however, at the overwhelming response of the literary world. Don’t mess with us book readers/writers! And you know some of those mothers have Judy Mays books holed up in their basement. For shame!
Sadly, ignorance, stupidity, malice and hypocrisy are part of the human condition. But as many people have pointed out, journalism is a serious profession, and it has definite standards. Those standards have clearly been violated in this case, so while one just has to roll one’s eyes about the original complaint, which was mere ignorant and spiteful gossip, the decision to turn it into a ‘news’ story seems to me to require some sort of legal slap on the wrist to both the woman who wrote it and her employers.
On a more general note, from outside the USA, it does seem extraordinary to us, the extent to which American parents are apparently able to browbeat their educational establishments, insisting on the teaching of this, or forbidding the teaching of that. As somebody said above, very eloquently, education should teach children and young people to think and reason for themselves, to become rational human beings, not simply to parrot the views of their elders. All parents have ample opportunity to influence their own children, and to bring them up according to their own standards and beliefs; in many cases, the influence of teachers and students from different kinds of home backgrounds is essential to give children a wider and more balanced view of the world. Some parents will bring their children up to be intellectually inquisitive, tolerant and generous people: others will try to make them into petty-minded, joyless bigots in their own image, but school should be a place where they should learn that we are not all the same, that there are different ways of looking at life, and that people who are ‘not like us’ may still be good and worthy human beings.
Here’s a new article on a different site that at least mentions the Facebook page:
http://dailyitem.com/0100_news/x1250116361/Teacher-s-novels-upset-parents
Here, Apple is quoted as saying that the erotica is “is unethical, totally unacceptable. Period. It just sort of sickens and saddens me to know everybody’s sort of looking at this like, hey, this is OK.”
Also, she complains that she’s being attacked on Facebook for speaking out. Poor wittle baby.