It must be nice to be so much higher than everybody else.

Patrick Graham, the publisher of The Paris News thinks on a higher plain than the rest of us poor mortals. In an editorial recently, he talked about a double standard pertaining to the case of a local female high school teacher accused of having sex with several of her male students.

Graham says that society will hold her to a lesser standard than a male teacher in similar circumstances would be held. While that may be true, he then deigns to speak for the rest of us (himself excluded, of course). In a hypothetical, he offers the same circumstances as in the case at hand except he switches the genders of perpetrator and victims. "You can't tell me your initial reaction to the first scenario wasn't a lot different than your initial reaction to the second. Well you can, but I won't believe you." I got news for you, Mr. Graham, my reaction is the same. A sexual predator is a sexual predator, no matter what gender.

Then he says, "Personally, I don't make a distinction." Well, Mr. Graham, as a man who's a legend in his own mind once said, "Well you can [tell me that], but I won't believe you."

"Teacher case will be a study in a societal double standard." The Paris News; July 4, 2010; p. 4A.