Censored Out
You may be wondering why exactly the Eagle Spirit no longer exists.
It is a sad, tragic tale.
We were once perfect little straightlaced A+ students. We always
did what we were told because hey! it got us good marks and it was pretty
much hassle-free. One day, unknowingly, one of us wrote an article
which wasn't quite what our principal wanted to see. There was lengthy
discussion about the article which was eventually changed to meet the desired
standards. Case closed. It was a shame as many of the best
lines were censored out, but it was nothing we couldn't live with.
We weren't going to start a war over it.
The tragedy struck again. While trying to
meet a printing deadline a short incredibly factual article concerning
the school hockey team's record was drafted by the editor and printed without
being perused by the superior beings. The article was very unoffensive
and the editor really didn't think anything of it. As far as she
was concerned it was the only natural thing to do and it was necessary
to fill the paper. Of course, she couldn't have been more wrong.
It raised hell! Not with anyone who actually read it and took offence,
but with the superior beings who were angered that they had not read it
first. The confused and surprised editor was given a severe upbraiding
during which she tried to explain that she had carefully kept all opinion
out of the article in order to appease the superior beings (and prevent
them becoming involved in anything controversial) and that she had had
no choice if she were to meet the printing deadline. She also refused
to apologize for her actions.
This incident suggests that the motive for censoring articles is not
only to maintain a bland and uninteresting school paper, but that it is
also another mechanism of control. It seemed that any independent
thought no matter how trivial was unacceptable. This we were prepared
to go to war over.
We stopped censoring our articles. What was
the worst that could happen? The superior beings would not allow
us to print them, but at least they were written. At least they were
thought of. Apparently even this submissive stance could not be tolerated.
Very shortly the superiors started to treat us like dirt. Whole articles
were censored with no explanations. We became regulars in the principal's
office. The superior beings were no longer warm fuzzy people congratulating
us on a "good" semester spent regurgitating the ideas of others.
Now we were treated coldly and avoided wherever possible. Apparently,
this was because we were somewhat feared. We didn't know it at the
time, but the school staff did not know what we might do next. This
is kind of shocking since we virtually broadcast everything we do.
They went to extreme measures to limit what we could do, even leaving instructions
with the office not to give the editor anything she asked for and not letting
the editor so much as handle the articles when out of sight of a superior
being. The editor was not even given notice when the apaper was being
printed. Also all opinion articles were conveniently rejected.
Several people in our school have expressed the fact that they will not
read the paper if it contains only purely factual articles.
Apparently even these extreme maesures to protect
peple from our seditiously original thoughts were not enough. We
recently learned that the paper will be no more next year and the blame
was laid on us. So we stepped up the battle a little. These
are our rights that they are screwing with and if we're not going to stand
up for them who is? They made a web page, we made a web page.
So now, while the little hamlet of North Lambton is safe from our vile,
twisted minds they have now been unleashed upon the entire world (evil
chuckle).