Editor:

Rather than spending the coming weeks fighting with my friends over the content of last week’s joke issue, I’d like to lay my views out here, in the forum TSL invites.

First of all, as a matter of clarification, my position at TSL this semester is "Staff Writer," which means I can submit articles or accept assignments as often as I want to, and the editors can choose to print or not print what I write. I did not provide any content for the joke issue, with one exception: the idea behind the Bobby DeRideo series. I did not write any of the DeRideo articles, but my thought was that, instead of lampooning an actual, existing individual and real acts he or she committed, it would be funny to make someone up. The staff of TSL, I know not who, ran with the idea.

This brings me to my first problem with the issue. The attacks leveled against the fictional DeRideo ran alongside similar attacks on actual people. The former type of attack is an attempt at satire, well-done for the most part here, but one that is totally undermined by the attacks on real people.

As I see it, there are two ways to justify attacking real people. First, it can be justified in the name of satire. The article that appears on the cover about Stanley Gaines is one example. Gaines is constantly in the news and has made himself a public figure, open to such attacks. Also, Gaines is called something that he is blatantly not: white. That’s why it’s funny. The same things are true for the letter about Senate, or the articles about the Bridges concert or professors Flynn and Foster, who are known for being buddies. Funny stuff.

But if the attack is of a personal nature, satire doesn’t really count. In that case, free speech is the only method of defense. I accept free speech as a legitimate but weak defense; some things that qualify as free speech are also in bad taste. Much of page 7, for example, is devoted to attacks on j-board. I can think of no reason that these articles (or ones that imply that people are lazy, incompetent or overweight) were written except for personal purposes. Sure, you can call someone ugly (something that could be hurtful in a way that calling Gaines white could not). . . and say you have the speech rights to do so. I just think it’s in poor taste.

It’s also unclear to me why the issue featured real letters that had already been run. This seems designed to speak directly to the authors of those letters and to devalue the opinions they offered. Throughout the issue, TSL seems intent on picking on several individuals, deepening the rift between them and the paper. Again, one can argue that they have the right to do so, but for me TSL is sinking to the level of their opponents in a name-calling contest. On a much smaller scale, this is not unlike awarding Claremont PD officers Hanna and Jacks: not breaking any rules but simply not a move made with the community – or common sense – in mind.

It’s hard to cultivate good humor writing, especially satire. The funniest articles in this issue were the ones that had nothing to do with the school. Maybe that says something. TSL has strived for and achieved new levels of professionalism and news coverage in the past year.

Perhaps, like other professional papers, it is time for it to eschew the idea of a joke issue, or put its humor in a different form. The more controversy the paper engages, the more it needs its objective reputation, and the more difficult it becomes for the joke issue to avoid the scrutiny and accusations it has endured.

Sincerely,

Adam Graham-Silverman ’00