
Welcome to TikTok Watch. You know, 2019βs version of Vine.
This new series unearths the latest TikTok trends, so you donβt have to. Letβs face it, if you signed up, itβd just make you feel really old.
When I was in school, a long time ago, teachers were called βsirβ or βmiss.β Never, under any circumstances, were we permitted to address them by their first names. It was a cardinal transgression, guaranteed to earn the offender a stern bollocking and almost certainly an after-school detention.
Fast forward to 2019, and what was once an unpardonable sin is now the latest TikTok trend. Across the US, high-school students are walking up to their teachers, addressing them as though they were equals, and filming the results for posterity (and, letβs face it, likes and follows). Iβve compiled a three-minute supercut of the best examples, which you can watch below.
The response from the teachers is somewhat mixed. Itβs like thereβs a spectrum of emotions. At one end, thereβs pure confusion. At the other, thereβs ferocious rage, which is compounded by the fact that the experience is being recorded.
And, of course, there are outliers. Some teachers, it seems, weirdly dig being called by their first names. One must assume theyβre lumbered with a truly unfortunate family name, like βShufflebottomβ or βGlasscock,β and enjoy the relief of being addressed by something that canβt be twisted into a cruel sexual jibe.
These videos are obviously entertaining, but they also are a great example of why I think TikTok is such an amazing app. It allows people to experience different cultures and lifestyles through the lens of comedy. This is true whether youβre an enlisted soldier in Afghanistan, or a student goofing off during class.
When I showed the above video to TNWβs EU and India team, it sparked a discussion of how the US education system differs from what they grew up with. Depending on where you grew up, US schools seem way more informal. Students werenβt wearing uniforms, and teachers werenβt dressed in suits and ties, but rather jeans and t-shirts.
Our EU and India managing editor, Abhimanyu Ghoshal, attended a top-tier private school in one of Indiaβs major cities, where discipline was everything.
βMost of my teachers at school were not remotely happy to be working with children,β he told me.
If Ghoshal called his teachers by their given names, it would have almost certainly resulted in a beating.
βMy 5th grade teacher made friends with the groundskeeper so he could get a fresh supply of bamboo sticks every few days to whack us with,β he said. βIf you didnβt do your homework, youβd have to line up with your fellow degenerates and walk up to him in front of the whole class, so he could yank the hair from just above your ears and drop them into your diary (which your parents had to review and sign daily).β
Indian schools are really intense. Who knew?
Sadly, itβs unlikely this trend will catch on in India, even though itβs one of the appβs biggest markets. The country is clamping down on the app over content concerns, and has forced Google and Apple to remove it from their respective Indian app stores.
Given the long and prolific history of corporal punishment in Indiaβs schools, thatβs probably for the best.
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