am quite sure that it's not only a joke as you say for the following reasons:
1. Whenever I made a substantial input either on Chinese, English or ESL teaching, you never could reply in depth to the actual points I made.
2. You have tried very hard several times to get acceptance for degree-less teachers on here, and even the YL ESL lady told you it's not the proper way. I

Horses for courses, Turnoi. Beth was the kiddy for 'in depth' but you seemed to have frightened her off. Now I've seen these arguments, these in-depth arguments. Beth would come up with something which is true ( in a round world) and you'd reply with a load of old polony, and on it would go ad infinitum; well, until you had worn down the poster with stuff and nonsense.

Now, I have perhaps exaggerated things a bit in order to drum home my point of view. We can I am sure call an FT with a degree and a track record in teaching, a teacher. We can also call a degreeless person a teacher, if that's what he's been doing, teaching. But neither of the aforesaid can compare with a teacher, trained to teach in their own country's schools. And we mustn't forget the properly qualified Chinese teachers. The latter must really feel peeved by the activities and the arrogant attitude of wide-boy cosseted foreigners; some of whom never thought of teaching until fairly mature; found themselves womanless, and stuck their profiles on the Internet. "I only want to deal with schools directly. No agents or recruiters. I don't want to do very much. I don't want this and I don't want to do that. I want an apartment fit for a top western teacher" You know the type, the type that does a runner type.