[babycakes]

Originally Posted by Former OC

I was at Clifton during the late 70s/early 80s and was taught by Chris Jeferries for 5 years. I would entirely agree with the viewpoint that he was an excellent teacher whose character has been largely misrepresented. Some of the gutter press reporting has been laughable. For instance to state he was obsessed by death is a gross overstatement. He sought to teach us the whole gamut of human emotions from grief to joy through literature and the arts - death was merely one instance of this, he was just as interested in more life affirming subjects - I spent far more time laughing at Chaucer, marvelling at Ted Hughes poetry than I ever did watching Night and Fog (this also misses the point that Night and Fog wasn't a sensationalist Channel 5esque Nazi documentary but a major artistic piece of work by a renowned French film maker in collaboration with two surivors of Auschwitz). Todays headline in The Sun argues that this so called obsession scared the children - well I hate to break it to you but the entrance age for public schools is 13 - the so called children were all teenagers perfectly mature enough to deal with such subject matter. In addition there has been much prurient reporting of his lewd statements to pupils - well i was taught by him twice/three times a week for 5 years and I can categorically state that not once did he ever say one improper word to me or anyone else I knew. H emay have been flamboyantly threatrical in his teaching style he was actually very reserved in his attitude to pupils - he did not want to be your confidante.

As others have said there was nothing unusual in going to a masters house - I went to many, again not once did anything improper go on or was even suggested. Oddly this was actually proved by the Sun in their non story that a pupil and his friends (surely a weird predatory paedophile would ask pupils individually) were inivited to his house, strange though the pupil thought this (I would dispute this) he had to admit nothing happened!

Thanks so much for your input; this backs up everything the poster on DS was saying, but I think most of us are bright enough to realise the ridiculous spin and appalling journalism that is most often served up by the sensationalist media (not just the tabloids, sadly).

I just find it frightening that the media can get away with publishing such utter drivel; and for all they knew at the time of writing, they could easily be putting a judicial procedure at risk.