In the midst of the VCE exams unfolding in Victoria, a private college has come under fire after a student posted a classist, racist and misogynist rant about public school attendees on Facebook.
The post, which was made earlier this week on a Facebook VCE forum, was posted online by an 18-year-old private school boy from $25,000-a-year Xavier College in Melbourne, and made a point of calling public school attendees “retards” and “povos”.
“The amount of retarded people on this page makes me so happy that my parents bothered to send me to a good, private school instead of a poverty stricken s—hole in Pakenham,” read the offensive post.
“People often say that paying to send your kids to a private school is not worth it, but when I read what you povo f—ks post on this page, I’m eternally grateful to my parents,” it goes on.
“I hope you all f–k up really bad so I can see your posts tomorrow. Have fun and remember to say hi to me when I’m your boss one day,” it concluded.
The post was relatively well-received by other like-minded private school students who garnered more than 400 likes in 11 minutes.
The comments section of the post was equally as offensive, urging women to “let the men handle business”.
“Could all woman [sic] please refrain from expressing there [sic] opinions thank you,” wrote another student.
After being left up for hours, the post was later removed after several forum users reported it.
Following its posting, several news outlets and Facebook forums commented on the display, highlighting its classist, racist and misogynist nature.
Xavier College issued a statement the next day, promising that the offending student would be punished.
“Xavier College is taking disciplinary action against those concerned. This inexcusable behaviour deeply hurts our whole school community,” said Principal Dr Chris Hayes.
“The derogatory language and sentiments within the post are highly offensive and go against all that we stand for at our school.”
The student also took to the forum to issue his own apology, which read, ‘It was inappropriate and out of character. I apologise totally for my disgusting comments.’
As expected, the apology was not well received in the forum.
But anyone who’s ever attended a public school knows that the attendees are not likely to go down without a fight.
The “povo” students responded in kind, with one going on to post an impressive defence of their education.
via The Age.
Taking a red pen to the post, the student highlighted the spelling errors, punctuation mistakes and use of language.
Replacing ‘retarded’ with ‘disabled’ and chastising them for their use of a ‘colloquial’ term like ‘povo’, the student gave the post a dismal D+, writing, “Please take time to proof read next time… Have some decency, too, please. See me after class.”
The VCE English exams are still ongoing.
