Ruby Granger #35 Hello, it's Flu-bee!

[DanBanks]

Spoiler: OT

I have always felt it a bit unfair that an adult man is just Mr irrespective of his married status, whereas as women it’s still typical that our titles are defined by our relationship to a man.

Spoiler: OT

Right, this is exactly why the title "Ms." was created some 50 years ago. It had nothing to do with a woman's age, it was entirely about removing that instant (and wholly unnecessary) indication of whether she was married. I suppose the use of Ms. might be more common in some parts of the U.S. than others. I live in New York and the titles of Miss and Mrs. have all but disappeared, especially in the professional world. It would be unheard of to refer to a colleague as "Miss" anything unless you were being jokey or you deliberately wanted to patronize her. Most mainstream media outlets that still use titles (like The New York Times) default to "Ms." for all women, unless they know their subject prefers "Mrs." or a completely non-gendered title like "Mx." I think at the elementary school level, little kids may still say "Miss" or "Mrs." when directly addressing their teacher, but it wouldn't be formally written out like that in the staff guide the way it is at Piper's Corner. (Just out of curiosity, I checked the staff list for my old high school and the only title they now use is "Dr." where applicable -- no Miss, Ms. Mrs. or even Mr. And this is a Roman Catholic school.)

 

[threeSMEGfridges]

Spoiler: OT (Miss/Mrs)

I know it's still quite common in the UK, but personally I don't like distinguishing between a married an an unmarried woman. It is outdated, in my opinion. If all the men can be Mr irrespective of their marital status, so should it be for the women. Some European languages (such as German) don't use this distinction anymore because it's seen as insensitive.

i retained my pre-marriage surname for work and stay Ms. I use Mrs (family surname) for personal things.

 

[StatusWoe]

Sometimes temporary or assistant teachers are added to those staff lists, so it doesn't necessarily mean Ruby's been given a full-time teaching position. I'm interested to know if she's teaching secondary age or juniors. The cringey YouTube videos won't be such an issue for the youngest kids, but for Year 7+ I can imagine it being a problem. Actually, sharing any personal info on social media while in a teaching job is something trainee teachers are warned about. There's no way teenagers would take Ruby seriously if they find those clips of her reciting The Raven or pretending to be Hermione Granger.

 

[Mclindy]

From Australia, and I get that different cultural norms have an influence but the Miss/Mrs thing made me balk.

I use Ms/Dr because the titles are neutral. Would never dream of alluding to my marital situation in a professional context and would select Ms, if pressed. Seems super conservative to me (the sort of thing I encountered in private/Christian education growing up).

 

[Whisper2Me]

The idea of Ruby working as a teacher for High School age is pretty cringe. Not only is she ill equipped, doesn't have the credits/degree for it, has no prior experience of any kind of work and I've never even heard her talk about actually babysitting anyone, she also still has a major chip on her shoulder for being bullied at this school (isn't it the same one?), will probably have Mommy or Daddy bring her back and forth, like a student, wants to be a student in HS again and bring back her childhood, and she always wants to be friends with the teachers. So, is she going to cozy up to teachers, students, and basically act like everyone's best friend? That isn't teaching. Is she playing another role? Yes. Does she plan to go into teaching? Highly doubtful. But I would not be surprised if she bows out early, making some lame excuse to escape this charade.

 

[StatusWoe]

From Australia, and I get that different cultural norms have an influence but the Miss/Mrs thing made me balk.

I use Ms/Dr because the titles are neutral. Would never dream of alluding to my marital situation in a professional context and would select Ms, if pressed. Seems super conservative to me (the sort of thing I encountered in private/Christian education growing up).

Understand what you mean. I also go by 'Ms' whenever it's an option. That said, choosing Miss/Mrs isn't seen as conservative in the UK. It's still a fairly common way to address people.

Another thing is that private Christian schools are nothing like their U.S. counterparts. (I don't know what these schools are like in Aus.) Most schools in England have a religious affiliation, but it's not taken very seriously by staff/students and doesn't play a major part in school life. There's no right-wing evangelical curriculum or anything like that. There might be traditional stuff, e.g. a morning assembly with hymns and a carol service at Christmas, but aside from that it's not a big deal.

I'm sure Ruby's school is conservative in other ways, though. It is a private school after all.

 

[slamvs27]

She had pictures of children, literal children, on some "inspo" wall of hers. If I was a parent at the school she's "teaching," I would be highly uncomfortable with her supervising my child.

The fact she's playing at teaching is a slap to the face to actual teachers as well. One thing I've learned over my teacher training course is that you have to do it for the kids. Not because you want to go back to your safe place that is high school, not because you want to seek validation, not because you want to seem like the smartest person in the room (looking at you, Rubes). Everyone's reason for wanting to be a teacher is different ofc, but if it comes from a selfish place you won't last.

And, at least here in Canada, private schools (as in paid, students in uniform, don't have to follow provincial curriculum) are actually worse because they're allowed to hire unqualified teachers despite being sold as better than public schools. In fact, for the few years I did go to a private school, my "teachers" were fired from public schools for whatever reason or were never hired and needed another job.

Just my two cents. I'm seething.

Oh and you can just imagine her strutting into her old school like some celeb who has come back to bless her home town. The fact that her students know their "teacher" is a Youtuber is going to be...problematic on so many levels. If she really wanted to take teaching seriously, she would enrol in a course, delete her channel, and focus on maturing herself before leading kids and preparing them for the real world (that's what teachers should do, ideally). But ofc she won't. It's just another pet project for her to play at, like BeInG an AuThA

 

[andthatstheteasis]

It's because the Brontes are not 'victorian' enough AKA they're too regency/early Victorian to be ""relatable"" (its why I feel like she didn't like Bridgerton either + the sex scenes) I can tell she does not really like the Regency era at all and wants to live more of an Edwardian / late-Victorian lifestyle. I honestly expect her to want to be the Dowager Countess from Downton Abbey when she turns 40 ngl.

the funny thing about getting the honour of having the cranky old granny title with good one liners, stories and going to bed at 8:30 pm… you have to live a wild life first . The Dowager countess had some spicy lovers in her time! Ruby could never, but for her own and our sake I hope her rebel teen phase finally kicks in at 40

 

[berkeleymoon87]

For those of you on TikTok, I'm sure you've seen videos of teachers crying because of kids bullying them for the way they dress, their looks, etc. Bad behavior is definitely playing a huge role in the teacher shortages we've seen (at least here in the US). There's also a teacher on TikTok who eats school lunch and answers questions and she constantly gets made fun of by current students. They've even posted videos of her in the classroom without her permission. I honestly would not be able to handle all that. I'm not sure how Ruby is going to make it through this job in one piece.

Also I'm not sure what Ruby's position will be, but I often see students on TT complain about teacher's assistants not being helpful at all. They always prefer more experienced teachers to help them and say they put their hands down when they see the TAs approaching. Lol. Imagine her giving students feedback on their papers and receiving a bad grade because she made them switch perfectly sensical words to malapropisms she's guilty of like lucrative, astronomical, and quantum.

 

[gisellejoly]

Sometimes temporary or assistant teachers are added to those staff lists, so it doesn't necessarily mean Ruby's been given a full-time teaching position. I'm interested to know if she's teaching secondary age or juniors. The cringey YouTube videos won't be such an issue for the youngest kids, but for Year 7+ I can imagine it being a problem. Actually, sharing any personal info on social media while in a teaching job is something trainee teachers are warned about. There's no way teenagers would take Ruby seriously if they find those clips of her reciting The Raven or pretending to be Hermione Granger.

I’ve just seen on the school website that year 5 and 6 are taught in sets for English, maybe she’s going to be teaching one of those classes? It would be way less pressure and risk than teaching older kids.. Primary school age kids would probably think it’s cool that their teacher is a YouTuber I guess we’ll see. Hopefully she mentions what she’s doing in the school because I’m curious!!

 

[Lovely_rita]

The school kids will have a field day seeing Roobee dropped off at school by her mummy every day.

 

[Griftwood]

I just remembered that Holocaust Memorial Day is in just over two weeks and she'll be "working" in a school when it happens...

Will Rubert try to convince the school to let her build a Holocaust Memorial there so she can finally claim she fulfilled her pledge?

Will the memorial look suspiciously like a statue of herself reading a book?

Will she try to "addjookate" the students on the subject by performing a brow-waggling, head-shaking unhinged dramatic reading of one of her own poems about bullies?

Will she cause yet another PR "depacle" by trying to turn the Holocaust into yet another money-making ad scam of some kind?

Taking all bets.

She doesn’t need to set up a new Holocaust Memorial at Pipers Corner, she already did it.

 

[pinkmug]

Imagine being a uni graduate and writing an essay on your resume for your experiences as head girl. She really needs to get over it.

 

[gossip_guy]

She doesn’t need to set up a new Holocaust Memorial at Pipers Corner, she already did it.
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Surely they'll have trashed whatever macaroni art picture she pinned to the bulletin board outside the headmaster's office by now?

Also what the hell is a "school-wide postal service"? Just one kid passing everyone else's notes around the school?

 

[lmwfh17]

Idk about the US but to be honest, I genuinely think most people in the UK have never even thought about the whole Miss/Mrs thing lol. Some people prefer Ms and so use that instead, but most couldn’t give a rit and it’s defo not considered right wing or evangelical to call yourself Miss/Mrs .

this is why I asked! i’m also from the UK and nobody when i was in high school or even in my life now thought that hard about it. obviously i know what the distinctions mean and that there’s probably something misogynistic in it but it really is just standard practice here. it likely won’t change as it has in other countries because no one’s bothered

 

[StatusWoe]

She doesn’t need to set up a new Holocaust Memorial at Pipers Corner, she already did it.
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While it makes sense to include 'Head Girl' on your uni application, it's embarrassing to keep it on your linkedin profile as a graduate. It suggests you've done nothing notable since your school days, which is clearly not the impression you want to give employers!

 

[Deeznutslol]

this is why I asked! i’m also from the UK and nobody when i was in high school or even in my life now thought that hard about it. obviously i know what the distinctions mean and that there’s probably something misogynistic in it but it really is just standard practice here. it likely won’t change as it has in other countries because no one’s bothered

I feel like it’s generally a complete non-issue in the UK to be honest. I appreciate that it’s misogynistic to have a distinction between married / unmarried women but like hello, the world is generally a very sexist place lmao. I mean, I think it’s also a pretty outdated and misogynistic practice for a woman to take her husbands surname, it doesn’t happen in most countries. but again I don’t think it’s that deep as it’s just a cultural thing.
Either way, it certainly doesn’t imply anything about the school in terms of conservatism/christianity, I went to a non religious state school and I checked the list of teachers just now and it’s a mixture of Miss, Mrs and Ms.
Tldr; it’s not that deep

 

[StatusWoe]

Also what the hell is a "school-wide postal service"? Just one kid passing everyone else's notes around the school?

Maybe they send them by carrier pigeon. Maybe the postal service is managed by owls. Maybe all letters are written from Ruby to Ruby and delivered by Ruby in her ringmaster's jacket blowing into a trumpet to announce their delivery. Just musing.

 

[irunforfun]

I went to the local grammar school to Ruby and we had quite a few Pipers join in the 6th form. They definitely weren’t quiet and unquestioning individuals (my friend in particular!). I wonder if Ruboid knows that you can’t edit and retake sentences multiple times? How will she string out a whole lesson? She has two options: speak continuously so she can’t be questioned, or try some kind of interactive lesson but flounder when children ask actual questions and don’t see her as amazing. I’d be daunted by going into a classroom and I’m double her age, in a senior position in my profession, work with distressed people, and I have a lot of life experience!

OT I am uk based and maybe it’s because people tend to gravitate to those who share similar values and beliefs, but we’ve often had conversations about miss/ms/mrs and how misogynistic and outdated it is. And very often the choices are mr, miss, ms and miss - which really annoys a few of my friends who are doctors and against the identification of being married/unmarried. I think (hope) that this will change soon as people are more aware of such issues.

 

[StatusWoe]

I can believe it. It has a weird blue mark.