Head in the sand

The other week, I posted a piece called 'Excuses'. Ironic tone but very much genuine.

One of the points was: “She’s got the establishment behind her, and you can’t take on the establishment - right?” Sadly, we live in a system where the establishment is extremely difficult to take on. 

Should we try if we are in the right? Hell yes.

Is success possible? That is a different matter. 

However, we owe it to ourselves and to our colleagues to call out injustice. If we don’t, then we might as well just cave, and accept bullying, persecution, injustice in all its forms. 

If we are not united, then what is the point?

Join a union. Support your union. Stand up for victimised members. Collectively stick your heads over the parapet.

My union stood up for me locally, my co-reps stood up for me at school. A lot of people who I trusted at school were quietly supportive. 

Others, who should have been, were not. Some of these included friends. To use the words of Desmond Tutu, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”

Since I left the school, as I’ve written about at length in previous posts, I have been exploring a number of different avenues to alert ‘the establishment’ about the consistent victimisation, bullying and union-bashing that took place (is taking place?) at my previous school. 

So far, there has been no closure. I will have made waves but nothing official. 

There has been collusion between the head, the council (especially HR), the head of the board of governors and by proxy the governing body.

I have reached out to the DfE, the ICO, an education ombudsman organisation. I have had some advice, but ultimately nothing that could bring forth punitive measures, or even an apology from the guilty parties. 

Sometimes, it is depressing. This whole process has been dragging on for nearly 2 years now. Family and friends have told me that I will need to stop, that I cannot go on forever, that I have to think of my family and my well-being.

I completely appreciate this advice and soon I will stop, but I will keep going on for a while chasing that closure.

Did I hear someone say stubborn bastard?

A rejoinder: to people who say “a lot of water has gone under the bridge” when it comes to traumatic experiences, I say this may be true, but the bridge remains.