[Sca-cooks] OT SCAdian High school yearbook photo banned

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

On Dec 13, 2006, at 12:27 AM, Wanda Pease wrote:

> Oh my ears and whiskers!  You couldn't have him in the typical  
> knighthood
> pose!  That would insinuate that there might be a higher power.   
> Worse yet,
> something with a Cross in it.  If he had been in a tee shirt and  
> jeans and a
> completely harmless baseball bat over his shoulder no one would  
> have thought
> twice, well except for people who have been injured by someone  
> using a baton
> or baseball bat on them as a weapon.
>
> Regina

All true. On the other hand, speaking purely as a devil's advocate,  
we have to decide to what extent we, as a culture, are prepared to  
cater to people's sensitivities. For example, while I don't  
necessarily view a baseball bat as a necessary social icon, I also  
don't automatically associate it with violence, which I can't say  
about a sword. However, if I had reason to believe it bothered a lot  
of people, I'd seriously consider finding another prop.

While (I think) Phlip mentioned that there's nothing wrong with the  
student expressing his love for medieval history, there's no reason  
he couldn't do so with a drop-spindle or a potter's wheel, and if the  
default setting is that he's expressing his love for the middle ages,  
we could as easily argue that at least some of the other kids are  
expressing their love for things modern, and if they were doing it  
with AK-47's, I expect we'd have heard about it.

Sometimes it seems as if SCAdians can enter into a kind of labor- 
union-rep mentality that assumes that every time one of us doesn't  
have things our way, it's the result of some kind of oppression or  
abuse that needs to be fought, until equilibrium is no longer the  
goal, only uncontrolled pressure.

In the end, this kid is probably not getting what he wants because,  
unfortunately, a lot of people consider it weird. It's sad that they  
do, but this is the community he wants to be remembered as a valued  
member of, and a community is largely defined by its standards. He  
can allow himself to be hurt and find another photo, or be remembered  
by many of his alleged friends and peers as the kid that screwed up  
the yearbook.

Adamantius




"S'ils n'ont pas de pain, vous fait-on dire, qu'ils  mangent de la  
brioche!" / "If there's no bread to be had, one has to say, let them  
eat cake!"
     -- attributed to an unnamed noblewoman by Jean-Jacques Rousseau,  
"Confessions", 1782

"Why don't they get new jobs if they're unhappy -- or go on Prozac?"
     -- Susan Sheybani, assistant to Bush campaign spokesman Terry  
Holt, 07/29/04