Utah language school instructor fired for post about homophones

[Newsjock]

Source: Salt Lake Tribune

... When the social-media specialist for a private Provo-based English language learning center wrote a blog explaining homophones, he was let go for creating the perception that the school promoted a gay agenda.

Tim Torkildson says after he wrote the blog on the website of his employer, Nomen Global Language Center, his boss and Nomen owner Clarke Woodger, called him into his office and told him he was fired.

As Torkildson tells it, Woodger said he could not trust him and that the blog about homophones was the last straw.

"Now our school is going to be associated with homosexuality," Woodger complained, according to Torkildson, who posted the exchange on his Facebook page.

Read more: http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/politics/58236366-90/says-english-homophones-language.html.csp

[whatthehey]

1. The link looks like a newspaper but surely this is Onion et al.? nt

[surrealAmerican]

2. So this is why right-wingers mix up "their", "they're", and "there".

It's because homophones are part of the "gay agenda". It all makes sense now.

[Scuba]

15. DUzy!!!

[CBGLuthier]

17. Yeah, only right-wingers make those mistakes. Sure. uh huh.

I see those and all the related errors on DU every single day.

I have decided to never correct any of them and instead to judge them silently as either lazy or uneducated.

[surrealAmerican]

18. It was a joke. You're right, that is an alarmingly common error.

I've even seen it in print in newspapers and magazines that ought to have actual copy editors.

[redqueen]

36. Sadly, no.

I remember a time on DU when lack of proficiency in grammar, spelling, and usage were often cited as reasons to possibly be suspicious of one's political leanings. That hasnt been the case in a long time.

[CrispyQ]

3. Oh, good grief!

hom·o·phone (hm-fn, hm-)
n.
One of two or more words, such as night and knight, that are pronounced the same but differ in meaning, origin, and sometimes spelling.
ho·mopho·nous (h-mf-ns) adj.

Nomen is Utah’s largest private English as a Second Language school and caters mostly to foreign students seeking admission to U.S. colleges and universities. Woodger says his school has taught 6,500 students from 58 countries during the past 15 years. Most of them, he says, are at basic levels of English and are not ready for the more complicated concepts such as homophones.

Complicated concept? What a fuckhead.

[NuclearDem]

4. This has got to be satire.

No way someone is actually this stupid.

[Coventina]

5. This is a joke, right?

It just HAS to be.

[tblue37]

54. Not necessarily. Remember when a D.C. mayor's aide who was forced to

resign over the word "niggardly"?

David Howard, an aide to Washington, D.C., Mayor Anthony A. Williams, used the word "niggardly" in a discussion with two of his city employees. While his real crime was trying to shoehorn a ten-dollar word into a two-dollar conversation, D.C. employees objected to the use of "niggardly" due to its "racial overtones."

Read more: http://www.cracked.com/quick-fixes/3-racist-incidents-that-werent-actually-racist/#ixzz397FAV1s6

[Faux pas]

6. If this is true

all I can say is, are they kidding?!?

[3catwoman3]

7. This is beyond pathetic.

Biology classes will be next - imagine the freak out over the terms Homo sapiens sapiens and the predecessor Homo erectus.

As observed by someone posting in the Salt Lake Tribune original article, what about stores selling homogenized milk?

[Bettie]

8. Fear of Homophones explains so much about right wingers language usage

It really does.

[kentauros]

40. Yes, he's obviously a homophonic.

[RKP5637]

9. My god, does the stupid really run that deep!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! n/t

[cloudbase]

10. It's reminiscent of the flap over the guy

Last edited Thu Jul 31, 2014, 12:02 PM - Edit history (1)

who used the word niggardly.

This one is more gooder, though.

[Lindsay]

19. That was exactly

what I thought of when reading the OP.

The stupid, it hurts.

[8_Point]

37. It's a new world where a word means what you think it means...

.. dictionary be damned because of feels.

[tblue37]

55. See my post #54 above. nt

[DetlefK]

11. homogeneous mixtures, a homolog set of chromosomes, homomorphic algebraic structures...

They are all part of the gay agenda!

And I know what their next step is!!!!!!!!!!! They want to turn our home into homo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Tanuki]

14. Next they will want to ban homogenized milk! n/t

[BlueMTexpat]

21. And homo sapiens. eom

[napkinz]

35. ...

[BlueMTexpat]

39. LOL - thanks!

[kentauros]

41. To be perfectly honest,

perhaps that's the primary reason why they fear science

[MineralMan]

12. Not a satire. Tim Torkildson is a frequent contributor to

The St. Paul Pioneer Press's Bulletin Board feature, which prints stories from readers. He's an interesting guy, who was once a clown for Barnum & Bailey and who also writes very interestingly about his own life.

I had to read it two times because it was almost too ridiculous to be believed.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

29. OMG.

Did someone get around to explaining their stupidity to those involved and getting him his job back?

[3catwoman3]

32. I don't think I would want...

...to go back to work for someone so ignorant.

[Aristus]

13. One would need a bathyscaphe to plumb the depths of such stupidity.

[alp227]

16. If he wrote about HOMOPHOBES I could get it

But seriously??

[Aerows]

20. Wow.

There is uninformed, and then there is just plain stupid.

[dickthegrouch]

22. Apple had the largest ever contingent at SF Pride this year

There were reportedly over 4000 employees and friends marching in the Apple Computer contingent at this years San Francisco Pride Parade. It was by far the largest group I've ever seen.

Now I know why I like my ihomoPhone so much

[hifiguy]

23. The stoopid is like an advancing glacier.

It gets thicker and more destructive by the hour.

This may represent something of a high-water mark in Idiot America, though. Don't these cretins have a goddamn dictionary?

[kentauros]

42. Only if it's written by the Ministry of Information,

aka, Conservapedia, where rewriting reality is a requirement. (That's the Wikipedia page about Conservapedia; I will not link directly to them.)

[niyad]

24. I was hoping to see that this was from the Onion, but, sadly, it is not. how in the HELL can this

stupidity operate in something that is supposed to be a LANGUAGE center????

[kentauros]

43. My first thought about this story, and owner,

is that it's a "hobby business." I got the impression that he doesn't take his business all that seriously. Because if he did, he'd be fully educated in the English language, as well as whatever other languages necessary to teach non-speakers.

[niyad]

25. I think all the students should demand their money back.

Nomen is Utah’s largest private English as a Second Language school and caters mostly to foreign students seeking admission to U.S. colleges and universities. Woodger says his school has taught 6,500 students from 58 countries during the past 15 years. Most of them, he says, are at basic levels of English and are not ready for the more complicated concepts such as homophones.

[X_Digger]

26. *headdesk* n/t

[Turbineguy]

27. He may have been

a pedagogue as well....

[msanthrope]

44. I hear his sister was a thespian who matriculated at Vassar. nt

[Turbineguy]

46. Yet another

firing offense if there ever was one.

[msanthrope]

47. Damn thespians infect everyone with their verve and spunk. nt

[immoderate]

28. Imagine if he had used the word "niggardly?"

--imm

[redqueen]

34. Since that word is archaic, he'd get a well-deserved stinky side-eye. nt

[immoderate]

38. Archaic? Why did nobody tell the Dictionary people?

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/niggardly

--imm

[knitter4democracy]

30. So, he followed the standards and got fired anyway.

Homophones are a part of the ESL standards. For crying out loud.

[LuvNewcastle]

31. Fools. Nothing but fools.

The people who did this should have their teacher's licenses taken away. Too bad their colleges can't take away their degrees. They aren't fit to ride on a garbage truck.

[redqueen]

33. ...

[JHB]

45. I take it they only allow boys in school plays...

...lest the girls be encouraged to become thespians?

[hifiguy]

49. Oh, THAT was gooood.

[betsuni]

48. Homophonehome

[Brigid]

50. It's just another word for "homonym."

Or don't they like that word either?

[OilemFirchen]

51. Well, it's a synonym.

Do we really want these students practicing syn?

[Manifestor_of_Light]

52. Don't forget those studying pedagogy.

They're dangerous.
A woman executive at Pizza Hut got fired for using "pedagogy" in a memo because the bosses thought she was referring to child molesters.

[JEB]

53. I'm sure in Utah it is not PC to study Polygonomy in Econ class.

[TheKentuckian]

56. Somewhere, in some dimension there has to be a race of dangerously intelligent beings

in desperate need of stupidity to save their species from destruction that we can work an exchange with.

[ladyVet]

57. I'm pretty sure it's stuff like the article that keeps other intelliget life from coming here.

Hard to justify the economics of intergalactic travel just to visit Stupid World.

And, goodness, doesn't that homo agenda get around? We need to root it out everywhere it pops up. Root it out! Send them all to jail! Deport them with all those dark-skinned people! Gotta save Murica for the Christian White Folk (TM), don't ya know.