Teen's claim of teacher making rape jokes in class goes viral

PETALING JAYA: A student's tweet about her teacher who had joked and trivialised rape has gone viral and gained attention from a women's group and a former minister.

Condemning the teacher's actions as "rape-supportive" and "completely unacceptable", the All Women’s Action Society (Awam) said youths must speak up against such behaviour.

"The youth need to speak up about this and we love that (she) is doing exactly that.

"Call rape-apologists out, guys," said Awam in a tweet.

Awam has also asked the student to get in touch as they want to use her story to spread further awareness about the culture of sexual harassment in schools.

The student's encounter also caught the attention of former education minister Dr Maszlee Malik who called on the school's principal to investigate the matter.

"Rape is not a joke. (The) teacher should be emphasising safety, not otherwise," he said.

The 17-year-old student had on Friday (April 23) alleged that a male teacher made jokes about rape during a physical and health education class at her school in Selangor.

She said the inappropriate remarks were made while students were discussing sexual harassment during the lesson.

"It was going good you know, we were talking about sexual harassment, how to take care of yourself and your body rights.

"He was making a couple of jokes and it seemed normal at first, but slowly the jokes were getting weird and more lucah (lewd).

"Then we were talking about how there are laws protecting minors from sexual abuse and harassment and then he said 'if you want to rape someone, don't rape those under 18, rape those above 18'," she said.

She said the girls in her class were shocked to hear the joke while the boys laughed.

She also claimed that the teacher said that boys who were raped did not report it because it felt good.

After the classroom incident, the student had allegedly lodged a complaint to the school's counsellor.

She shared screenshots of their WhatsApp conversation, which showed the counsellor apologising for the teacher’s actions.

However, the counsellor also said it was “normal” for teenage boys to utter crude remarks in jest and she should not take it to heart.

“Instead, teenage girls are a bit sensitive and emotional. That’s natural," the counsellor teacher had said.

When contacted, the student's father told a portal that he was going to lodge a police report on Saturday night (April 24).

Expressing his disappointment over the teachers' insensitivity, he also said he would go to school to meet with the school authorities.