For calling myself gay. My teacher just assumed I was using it as an insult and referring to myself as being terrible. It took a visit to the principals office with the teacher and going “No. Seriously. I am an out of the closet homosexual. Ask anyone in that class.” They ended up apologizing but I was just kinda pleased they were taking it that seriously in the first place.

When I was in second grade, my teacher saw me bend a paperclip once. For the rest of the year she would scream my name every time she found a bent paperclip and insist I must have bent it. One time she took away a snack I had because there was a twist tie on the bag and she insisted it was one of her paperclips I stole and bent.

Another time she got mad at me and insisted I was chewing gum when I was actually just eating graphite from my mechanical pencil. I don’t think I can really blame her for that one though

Got suspended in 8th grade for “smoking on school grounds” because I stood outside the front door finishing my fruit snacks before I walked into the school (we weren’t supposed to have snacks outside designated food areas). Some rocket scientist of a teacher saw me standing by the door with my hand occasionally going up to my mouth (I think it may have been cold enough outside to make my breath steam) and said, “AHA! This child is smoking!”

She literally grabbed me by my collar and dragged me to the assistant principal’s office. Multiple other kids, and an adult who must have been someone’s mom, told her I wasn’t smoking, but she wasn’t having any of it. And the assistant principal just believed her out of hand. Wouldn’t even let me finish a sentence to say something in my own defense.

They had the security guard escort me off school grounds. And I just stood there for a while looking back at the school, still holding my fruit snacks, trying to figure out wtf just happened.

I pretty much checked out mentally after that. That kind of stuff ended up being pretty much par for the course. I hung out with the metal/punk/skater/stoner/goth crowd, and that was some kind of unforgivable sin at that school. My friends and I were constantly being singled out for minor or imagined infractions and never believed or given the benefit of the doubt. I went from a 3.8 gpa to something like 0.6 that year. I’d have to sit through all these meetings about how I was “so smart,” and how “I could go so far if only I would apply myself.” And I’d straight up tell them what was going on, and they’d be like, “It’s just a mystery why you won’t apply yourself.”

It’s been like 30 years and I’m still mad about that shit.

In 2nd grade the teacher had to step out of the room for several minutes and put me in charge. If anyone misbehaved, I was to write their name on the chalkboard. One group of boys did misbehave, so I wrote down their names.

When the teacher returner, she scolded me for “being a snitch” and sent me to the principal’s office.

Two kids were playing catch with a milk carton to see who it would burst on. One kid missed and it hit me and burst. I was blamed for it and the teacher tried to make me clean it up no matter how much I explained that I didn’t do anything wrong. Fortunately, those two kids owned up to it and they cleaned it up but the teacher was super upset about it and still insisted it was my fault. Idk if she had some sort of vendetta against me or if she just couldn’t accept that she was wrong and doubled down.

5th grade music (singing) class. We’re practicing a song for an upcoming assembly. It’s cheesy. An excerpt:

We can fight all the evil, we can fight all the hate
If we do it together, it won’t be too late
If we do it together, it won’t be too late

During the song, two adjacent kids start laughing every time it says “We can do it together” because “do it” = “have sex” even though most of us don’t know what it entails at this age, myself included. The teacher glares at them but does nothing else. Several other kids including me chuckle at the scene. This goes on for 3 weeks.

Now comes the dress rehearsal. Today is special because two 5th grade classes are having a joint rehearsal. All of us are a little giddy because there are double the kids crammed into the same space.

In anticipation of getting caught up in the infectious laughter, as the words “do it” approach I hide my face behind my sheet music. Suddenly, the backing CD track cuts out. I lowered the paper from my face she was already halfway to the clown kid sitting beside me. Except… she comes to me. In this abrupt silence she explodes at me, point blank, index finger brandished:

“YOU NEED TO GROW UP! IT IS NOT ABOUT HAVING SEX!”

She singled me out. I was embarrassed.

Only after class did I learn from my homeroom teacher that the two instigators had recently been given a very stern talking to, such that the music teacher thought it was resolved until my hiding face gave her the impression it was not. Thankfully my homeroom teacher understood and I received no further consequences other than all of this living in my head for the next 30 years and forever.

Two classmates got into a fight in class and I bailed out of there because I wanted no part of it. The teacher got mad at me for bailing and said I should’ve done something. I was 12, what do you think I could do?

There are a lot of choices, but one I was talking to someone else about today was the time we were doing the pledge of allegiance, and I did it in a language that wasn’t English. I started doing it in an indigenous language, and after two lines the teacher was like “TINA, NO!!!”

Got arrested for self defence against a bully

fuck the school admin

and ACAB

Reading ahead in class. I wasn’t reading ahead, I am just a fast reader. Yes, I really did finish that chapter already. Yes, when you said to read it. No, I’m not showing off.

What kind of teacher complains that a kid is reading too much?

One day at 5th grade recess I was just walking by myself when some kid jumps on my back and starts choking me. I reflexively bent forward causing him to fall. I was suspended for a week. He got nothing

In 3rd grade (maybe age 8), when coming back from the playground, my teacher had a rule:

STRAIGHT LINE, NO TALKING, NO TOUCHING

One day, when coming back from recess, I noticed that the kid in front of me, Joe, was crying. Now, I didn’t like Joe, he was a bully and had made fun of me and my friend group since the 2nd grade. But I still didn’t like just letting someone sit there upset. So I put a hand on his shoulder and said, “hey, are you ok?”

Thus breaking two of the three most important rules you could possibly imagine. The teacher came over and chastised me for “playing around in line”, completely ignoring Joe (who was still crying). I tried to argue, but to no avail.

Later that day, the teacher made a huge speech in front of the class about how sometimes you think you’re doing the right thing, but you still need to follow the rules, and gave me a citation in front of the entire class.

Also, Joe continued to bully me.

Making a fireball with the schools powdered coffee creamer.

Was a boy in kindergarten and my teacher told my parents that I was retarded because I couldn’t read. Had been reading to parents since I was three. Turned out she just hated boys.

Putting my arm around my girlfriend’s shoulder while we were sitting at an assembly. I wasn’t doing anything inappropriate, we were just sitting there. But the principal took me aside at one point and told me to stop.