Texas high school principal censors paper over anti-gun editorial
A principal from a Texas high school didn't care for the student paper criticizing him for a gun-slinging pep rally that some students opposed. So he censored the paper. According to a story in the Daily Sentinel, some students objected to a pep rally where students pretended to shoot their rivals in the back of the head execution-style. When the student newspaper editors criticized the rally in an editorial, Principal Nathan Chaddick deleted the paragraphs. He also forced the students to move a story about the pep rally from the front page to the third page. Chaddick justified his censorship by saying, "In a public school setting, you can't just publish anything you want to. There is going to be some censorship and some editing if there's something that's inappropriate."
This is where high school censorship has gone wild, where we teach students that questioning authority is "inappropriate." We are teaching a whole generation of Americans that it is wrong to criticize the government. That is wrong.
Here's what journalists can do about it: Write about it.
Following the Daily Sentinel's story, public outrage regarding the skit and the censorship resulted in an apology from the school district, including this sentence: "The editing of the student editorial was ill advised. This has been a learning experience for everyone and we have all learned from the students."
When principals censor student papers, they censor the future of America. Tell Americans that. Let citizens set the government straight.