”Trash” is the lesson’s keyword.

In Japanese high schools, there’s a unique sort of hurried romantic passion that many guys feel at this time of year. With the Japanese school year ending in the spring, graduation is now just a few months away, and many guys with a crush on a certain special girl feel that it’s now or never to tell her how they feel. Unless they’re planning to enroll in the same college, soon they’ll no longer have any pretext on which to see each other every day, and if they don’t cement the relationship as something more than platonic, they worry their connection will gradually fade away.

So soon enough, those guys are going to take their shot at romance by laying out their feelings for the schoolgirl they’ve got a crush on. And while that can be the beginning of a sweet and wonderful young romance, it can also be incredibly creepy if the guy asking the girl out is her adult teacher.

Japanese Twitter user and middle school teacher @barbeejill3 says that with graduation coming up, he’s been getting a lot of similar questions sent to him. They’re from high school girls, and they ask him “What should I do if my a teacher says he has romantic feelings for me?”

Sadly, @barbeejill3 (fresh off a frustrated rant about his school’s incredibly dumb dress code) says he’s known at least one teacher who did this. Although he doesn’t specify if it was someone at his current school or a previous place of employment, he minces no words regarding how he feels about such educators:

“Teachers like that are habitual offenders. They’re trash, always targeting a girl each and every year.

They’re abusing their position of authority. They know that once the girl has graduated, people at school won’t be talking about her, and he won’t become the topic of rumors.

I’m so sick of seeing pieces of trash like those teachers.”

This being Japan, where idealized depictions of student/teacher romances aren’t uncommon in fictitious media, one commenter felt @barbeejill3 was being too harsh. The vast majority of reactions, though, were from people who shared his distaste for teachers treating their roll sheets like a dating pool.

“It shows that the whole time she’s been in the teacher’s class, he’s been looking at her like that. It’s disgusting.”

“Basically, it’s just that he’s a pathetic man who can’t attract an adult woman.”

“One of my friends at cram school had a crush on a teacher who was married and had a kid. I broke down crying trying to stop her from going out with him, but she wouldn’t listen. A year later, when I saw her again, she said, ‘He wasn’t the kind of person he said he was. Even after I dumped him, he still says he wants to see me again. He’s become a stalker, and I’m scared.'”

“You should never think a teacher who asks you out has only asked you out. There are teachers out there who are dating multiple students at the same time.”

Oddly enough, while @barbeejill3’s words make it pretty clear that he doesn’t think any schoolgirls should be responsive to a teacher’s romantic overtures, he doesn’t offer any concrete advice beyond that. Reporting the teacher to the school’s administrative staff, or at least her parents, seems like it’d be a good place to start.

Source: Twitter/@barbeejill3 via Hachima Kiko
Top image: Pakutaso
Insert image: Pakutaso