A maths teacher being removed from a post and not replaced for over two weeks, leaving scheme A children of form 3 and 4 with no maths lessons.

A French teacher who is more often than not absent .. and when she is, she allows herself the discretion of deciding not to teach because there are not enough students … Grrrr … I am going crazy!

No. He just looks like a 2000s version of Norman Hamilton in his Soho days. Hamallagni redux.

Maybe it was Good Friday

Very well said, Matthew S.

What seems really sad to me is that no rights group such as The National Council for Women or any other gender equality group has given a reaction to the comment. I would have expected any self respecting group, aware of the responsibilities especially of those in public office and at the head of a department as important as education, to point out the folly of ridiculing topics highlighting inequality and gender bias.

What is even more sad is the fact that journalists, some of whom are women, did not ask for a reaction from these groups who say they are for women’s rights and equality.

Perhaps everyone was impressed that the Prime Minister, a father of two daughters, laughed!

When you have to give a speech at a conference or meeting, you spend at least an afternoon thinking about it and writing it out. If you’re an important person, you assign someone to review it and contribute a few ideas. If you are a very important person, you have a professional speech writer to write it all out for you. If you don’t have a professional helping you out, you generally discuss it with your spouse or someone close to you.

I don’t know how Evarist Bartolo works but his speech must have at least passed through parts of the above process. It is simply incomprehensible that his poor excuse for a joke went through this process and came out the other end intact. Why didn’t anyone say ‘Hey, that doesn’t sound right.’?

Evarist Bartolo certainly has no excuse. Aside from being a member of parliament for 24 years, he is also a lecturer in communication studies. He should see a communication gaffe coming from miles away. And for God’s sake, he is the father of two daughters. As for the government’s regiment of hacks, communication officers, speech writers, spin doctors and public relations officers, if any of them work in his office and had anything to do with his speech, he should sack them forthwith.

The other fascinating thing about Evarist Bartolo’s ribald comment is the reaction it elicited. It’s hard to say whether anyone’s jaw dropped or whether anyone walked out in disgust (I’m not holding my breath) but what we can definitely say is that no one booed. On the contrary, the laughs were audible, and judging by his upbeat delivery, the audience seemed to be lapping it up and, as a result, cheering him on. No one thought of cutting his microphone off either, signalling him to cut it out or, in an act of desperation, rushing the stage and grabbing the microphone to save him (and his party) from himself.

Still, all the above couldn’t prepare us for the prime minister’s reaction. When given the opportunity to put a distance between the minister of education’s sexist comment and himself by The Malta Independent , the prime minister laughed and said that the comment is acceptable because we are European now.

Oh, so that’s what being European is all about. And there we were thinking that being European is about democracy, human rights, the free market and free movement. If being European is about enlarging your breasts, switching your gender and reconstructing your hymen, why exactly did he wage a ten year war against Malta joining the European Union? Did he want to deny his daughters access to these ‘European’ medical procedures? Or is it maybe Evarist Bartolo’s interest in European brothels which bothered him?

Well, Mr Prime Minster and Mr Minister of Education; a hymenoplasty is no laughing matter. These are two comments taken from beneath a YouTube video about the procedure. Please read them and reconsider your comments.

maya howell
6 months ago

would love to do that. I was virgin before and i was raped.
I want my dignity back. :(
Going counselling is good and everything but still i need that back.

Mrs Dylan
4 months ago

The same thing happened to me and I feel the same way.
It’s not a “piece of skin”.
I want a white wedding…

Now can someone please take Evarist Bartolo aside and tell him that virginity can only be lost once? Despite his fantasies, virginity can never be regained. Hymen reconstruction is just that. It has nothing to do with virginity. In fact, the breaking of the hymen often has nothing to do with virginity either. It can easily break due to strenuous exercise. Can that kind person also please tell him that his obsession with hymens and virginity makes him sound really old?

This is the video where I took my comments from. It contains adult material.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsqSuTYauJM

‘Labour, infottu l-edukazzjoni ghax jaqblilna’ – @Nighthawk – epic! Can we have it as a slogan for the next election?