School officials at a suburban Dallas high school are apologizing after a Christian motivational speaker offended some students and parents with pro-character-building, anti-dating violence message that offered some very broad generalizations about males and females.
The speaker, Justin Lookadoo, spoke at Richardson High School on Wednesday, reports The Dallas Morning News.
The tall, blond guru gave his energetic, hour-long spiel during two packed assemblies. A lot of it was boilerplate fare. Be true to yourself, he said. Most high school relationships fail, he observed.
Lookadoo spoke about relationships and aimed much of his talk at the female portion of his audience. He asserted that girls are meaner than boys and often masters of self-sabotage. “The reason it’s so hard for you to succeed these days is not because of guys,” he said, according to the Morning News. “You’re doing it to yourselves.”
Lookadoo also addressed males in the audience, stressing achievements and manliness. “Somewhere between the modern church and the feminist movement, guys turned into pansies,” he said. “Stand up and be a man! Do something with your life!”
Many students greeted Lookadoo’s comments with hearty applause. Other students heckled him, though, either right then and there or on Twitter.
The group of unhappy students knew what to expect because they had looked up Lookadoo before the assembly.
His writings in a book and on a website, rudateable.com angered those students and, in some cases, their parents.
The Morning News unearthed some of the highlights. Central to Lookadoo’s work is a set of Christian-influenced “dateable rules.” He tells girls to “accept your girly-ness” and to allow guys to lead because “God made guys as leaders.” Also, “dateable girls know how to shut up.”
The dating guru also has advice for guys. “Dateable guys know they aren’t as sensitive as girls,” he advises. “Men of God are wild, not domesticated.” At the same time, Lookadoo declares that “dateable guys know that porn is bad for the spirit” so “they keep women covered up.”
Lookadoo speaks at schools around the country. He had previously spoken at Richardson High in 2009.
According to NBC DFW, Lookadoo stressed that the “dateable rules” from his book and website had no part in the speech he gave at Richardson High. He said he followed the orders of school officials not to mention Christianity or his dating wisdom.
After the second assembly, several students approached the stage. Some wanted to shake hands. Others complained about what they perceived as gender stereotyping. They also asked how gay and lesbian kids fit into Lookadoo’s worldview.
“I love this, because you guys are thinking,” he answered.
Lookadoo told the Morning News that he had never faced such an unreceptive audience. He also noted his belief that males and females need different advice because they view relationships differently.
“Guys do not listen to stuff about relationships,” he explained.
Still, some parents were upset.
“I felt that such a person with those publicly expressed views about gender roles would not have access to my child,” Jaime Clark-Soles told the Morning News. Clark-Soles, a theology professor at Southern Methodist University, has a daughter at the school.
School officials noted that the assembly was optional for students, reports San Antonio CBS affiliate KENS.
On Thursday, Richardson High principal Charles Bruner sent a letter to students and parents announcing that Lookadoo would not be welcome back.
“I have learned enough to conclude that the assembly did not meet the expectations I have for communications to our students,” Brunner wrote. “For this reason, we will not invite this speaker back to RHS.”
This incident certainly isn’t the first time in the social media era that a motivational speaker trying to act super-cool with high school kids has ended up facing a ton of negative publicity.
In April, for example, an abstinence-only motivational assembly at George Washington High School in Charleston, W.Va. so angered a student that she promised to file a grievance with the American Civil Liberties Union. (RELATED: High schoolers complain, tweet about slut-shaming during abstinence-only assembly)
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