32 Sexist Teachers Who Mistreated Female Students

27.

“I was one of only three AFAB (I have since realized that I am nonbinary/agender, but since I still have a female-appearing physicality, most people assume female) people in my computer science classes at university back in 1997. There were around 150 guys in those classes. The professor who taught two programming languages I was learning made no secret that he felt women didn’t belong in computing and had no natural aptitude for programming. During classes, he made sexist ‘jokes’ and used very graphic sexual references to illustrate points that he was trying to make about whatever he was trying to teach.”

“One girl had recently been sexually assaulted by her boyfriend, and when the professor made a gross joke about women being raped, this girl got up and began walking out. When the professor noticed, he began nastily making fun of her with comments like, ‘Look at this delicate little flower, getting her panties all in a twist!’ and ‘It’s gotten to a point where men can’t even say anything without some stupid chick getting pissy about it.’ The other girl and I shot each other a look, closed our notebooks, stood, and walked out, too, to a sneering chorus of crass, disgusting comments from the guys in the class, led loudly by the professor. All three of us went to the head of the university and made complaints about that professor. Nothing happened, other than that gross creep beginning to mark the two women and me much more harshly than our male classmates. 

I worked hard for high grades (as did the other two), and I had high grades in every course but the ones he taught. His actions and comments never changed; he was never taken to task over his inappropriate conduct, and he went from making comments about women in general to making lewd, rude comments about the three of us in particular. I was having a tough time emotionally, and his daily harassment and bullying caused my mental health to crash hard. At the time, I didn’t yet know that I had been diagnosed as autistic at the age of 3 (my parents didn’t tell me until after I got diagnosed again at the age of 24), so I had no idea why I was struggling so much with the social aspects of university. 

I ended up having a major depressive episode, quitting uni, and coming back home. I soured on the idea of a career in information systems, thinking I would always face guys like him. It was only a chance job listing that led me back into it. I worked in IT for about 10 years before I burnt out and left to work in a different field. I don’t miss IT. For whatever reason, it seems to attract sexist edge-lords like that professor, and it just wasn’t worth it after a few years of dealing with guys like him all the time — guys who always got away with being disgusting.”

—Anonymous