Defining Rape

Today, being the first day back from Thanksgiving break, was a day that I expected the students to be a bit lethargic--both physically and mentally (even more so than normal). As such, my lesson plans were catered to the intellectual stupor that I expected. In fact, the first eight minutes of my plans were devoted to the following activity: "Let students find seats." Yes, my classroom is in the same place it always was and no major renovations has, as of yet, affected my end of our construction-ridden school. However, I knew that I would be adding to the impending confusion of the day by doing the unthinkable: I rearranged the desks. Rather than six rows of five desks, students are now expected to maneuver a room with desks set up in concentric semi-circles; ideally this will facilitate discussion, ideally...but I digress.
The class of most interest today, and I have a feeling that this will often be the case, was my basic level juniors. Despite the fact that there are only ten students in that class, more than one had trouble finding a place to sit. In fact, one student entered the class, looked around in bewilderment, sighed, and exited the classroom clearly befuddled. (He did arrive five minutes tardy with no explanation, but he didn't miss anything since the other nine were still playing musical chairs). After that part of the lesson--they got "C"s at best--it was on to part two: a discussion of how I did not grade their papers over the weekend because I was simply too busy playing the new Nintendo Wii. This is the only thing they have understood all semester. Then it was back to utter confusion as we jumped into Beowulf--yes the version that reads like "See Spot Run" and contains fabulous pictures of the epic Anglo-Saxon hero...err...I mean the "tough dude from back then."
Since I finished reading aloud to them and telling them what answers to write down early, I decided they could just "chill" for the rest of class as long as they stayed seated and relatively quiet. So as they all noisily walked around the room, I overheard snippets of conversation that boiled down to the fact that a few guys were making fun of one of the young ladies for hanging out with a twenty-four year old guy. She was getting aggravated, so I told the two males to shut up and be nice. At that point, one of them raised his hand, although he was standing right in front of me, announced, "I have a question." His eyes widened and I could tell that the rusty gears in his head were turning. Slowly and deliberately, he asked a question that was clearly of grave importance to him: "Mr. F., isn't it rape when a twenty four year old talks to a seventeen year old?"

*Sigh