Teacher Tells Students His Race Is 'Superior'

A middle school teacher in Texas has been fired after students in his class recorded him telling them his race is the "superior" one. NBC News reports the recordings were made last week at Bohls Middle School in Pflugerville, though it's not clear what type of class was involved. The New York Post has one of the videos showing the interaction between the teacher, who appears to be white, and his students, in which the teacher tells the students that "deep down in my heart, I am ethnocentric." Meaning: "I think my race is the superior one." When the students, a group that seems to be made up of different races, start groaning and laughing in reaction, the teacher notes, "I think everybody thinks that. They're just not honest about it." When one student says, "I like all types of kinds," the teacher responds, "Did I say I don't like people?"

When another student asks the teacher to confirm that "you said you are a racist," the teacher concedes, "I did." At one point he notes, "I think everybody is a racist at that level." Two Black students then tell the teacher they no longer respect him. Per the Austin American-Statesman, a parent posted a different video on Instagram, showing a student trying to get a bathroom pass and appearing to call the teacher racist over a previous incident. "If I was racist, I wouldn't let you go to the restroom, would I?" the teacher retorts. He also appears to say he'd had prejudiced feelings in the past, at which point the students call him out on using the present tense to describe how he feels. Rhema Benjamin, one of the students in the class, spoke to KXAN about the incident, telling the station it was his first time encountering someone who flat out admitted to being racist.

Rehma, an eighth grader who's Black, says it all started when he walked into the teacher's classroom wearing a Black Lives Matter sticker on his shirt, which the teacher made him remove. After the teacher acknowledged his racist leanings, he then told the students they should respect him more for being honest. "I don't see it that way," Rehma tells KXAN. His parents say they're proud of him and the other students for keeping their cool and recording the incident. In a Monday statement, the superintendent for the Pflugerville Independent School District said that the unidentified teacher's remarks were "inappropriate, inaccurate, and unacceptable," and that the teacher "is no longer employed" by the district, per NBC. Meanwhile, a spokeswoman for the district says she can't confirm what the fired teacher's race is. (More Texas stories.)