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Teacher, parents weigh in on nude-artwork incident
Lincoln Elementary School art teacher Mateo Rueda had no idea what was in store for his career when he wrapped up a lesson Dec. 4 by telling students to look through some art postcards in the classroom library for examples of color usage in notable paintings. The cards, which were part of an educational package called "The Art Box" produced by Phaidon publishing, were placed in the library before Rueda began working at the Hyrum school. He knew the set portrayed a wide variety of classic artworks, but he has since said he was not aware that three or four of the 100 pieces featured in the box showed nudity.
Before the week was out, Rueda would find himself at the center of a controversy at the school, would be contacted by police after someone filed a classroom pornography complaint against him, and would eventually be out of a job.
The situation came to light Wednesday when The Herald Journal published a letter from the mother of one of Rueda's students complaining about the art teacher's dismissal and praising his work with students. She also let her feelings be known on Facebook, where her posts gained wide circulation among local school parents and educators.
Cache County School District officials have declined comment on the matter, noting that this is "an ongoing personnel issue." However, one district official who asked not to be identified said that Rueda's termination had more to do with the teacher's interaction with students after the students noticed the nudes than it did with the actual pictures themselves.
Parent Venessa Rose Pixton said this was the nature of a complaint she lodged with the school after learning about events of that day from her 11-year-old son, who was in Rueda's class. "It wasn't the pictures so much that really bothered me; it was the method in which he went about it afterward," Pixton told The Herald Journal, though contending in the same interview that she thinks the teacher shirked his responsibility by not reviewing the pictures thoroughly before allowing children to access them. "My son felt that Mr. Mateo belittled them," Pixton said. "He said Mr. Mateo even told the class 'There's nothing wrong with female nipples. You guys need to grow up and be mature about this.'" Rueda flatly denies he said this or took such a tone. "No, that did not happen," he said this week. "I did say that when you grow up, you're going to find yourselves going to museums or to places where unavoidably there's going to be nudity."
This is The Art Box, containing 100 postcards. Also at Fox 13 Salt Lake City and Snopes.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by termigator on Monday January 01 2018, @10:31PM
I have not heard of that. There is a locker room scene in the police station showing cops getting dresses/undressed, and at least one topless female is shown. Nothing sexual about it, just cops, men and women, getting ready for work.
What was edited was the extra violence. The orginal cut was deemed so violent, it got rated X (not sure if NC-17 was defined at the time) for the violence. For example, the scene where ED-209 shoots the exec at the beginning of the movie lasts longer than the release edit: a conderable amount of time is given showing ED pumping rounds into the exec. The unedited cut was made available via DVD release.
Being a fan of the original Robocop, the edits in some of the violent scenes actually make the movie better. I an definitely not squeamish, and there is still some pretty graphic violence, but the with the extra footage, some of the violence was bordering on comical, lessening the impact of the affected scenes and distracting from the story. I.e. The extra violence distracted the viewer from appreciating the other themes various scenes conveyed.