College Journalists Apologize For Expressing Free Speech, Saying Catholic Church Wants To Prevent AIDS

The student journalists at The Hawk are in trouble! In last week’s issue, the paper published its annual joke issue, The Squawk, which got them in a bit of hot water. And now, forced with an army of angry Jesuits, the paper has apologized for the joke issue. And university spokeswoman Harriet Goodheart told the Inquirer she couldnt’ say whether the students would be punished. (Sigh.)

Among the content people were offended: the president of St. Joe’s, the Rev. Timothy Lannon, endorsing condom use; an article saying the only St. Joe’s women’s basketball fan had been murdered; an article describing Cardinal Rigali as gay; and, of course, the comparison of Jesuits to Nazis.

That last one, obviously, is ridiculous. Everyone knows Jesuits are way more totalitarian than Nazis. But the paper’s Editor-in-Chief posted an apology to the St. Joe’s community, which prompted a commenter to respond with this: “This isn’t MadTV, folks. I hope everyone associated with this debacle learned something.” That’s right; Even if it was offensive, The Squawk might have actually made people laugh.

But the letters to the editor in this week’s Hawk shed some more light on the situation. Four seniors wrote an up-in-arms letter saying, “Plainly, it is inappropriate to attach the President’s name and photo to a condom ad.” Hey, that works for the president of St. Joe’s or of the United States!

The letter also revealed a few days ago someone (presumably from St. Joe’s) dumped a case of beer on Cardinal Rigali’s lawn. No word if the archbishop is a Natty Ice fan.

But the best letter comes from — who else — Tom Brennan, a Jesuit priest and English teacher, who proves that, well, maybe Jesuits aren’t much like Nazis after all:

Thank you for publishing last week’s Squawk. I laughed my head off at it. Of course, I imagine that some did not, but perhaps Geoffrey Chaucer’s lines from the “Prologue to The Miller’s Tale” are worth repeating: “And eek men shall nat make ernest of game” (l.78). (We teach Chaucer, by the way, in Texts and Contexts - one of our very canonical selections for that course.)

Preach on, father. And eek men shall not make ernest of game indeed.

College journalists apologize for satire [Inquirer]
St. Joe’s Apologizes for April Fool’s Parody [KYW 1060]
The Hawk apologizes for squawk content [The Hawk]
Letter: Squawk succeeds in amusing [The Hawk]
Letter: Parody paper not amusing [The Hawk]