77 replies to this topic

[Mishelle]

Obscene materials are defined as those that the average person, applying contemporary community standards, find, taken as a whole, appeal to the prurient interest; that depict or describe, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable state law; and that, taken as a whole, lack serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.

Compiling a list of the best reasons to rape a preteen falls under that.

[Nunc]

It's got literary and artistic value - comedy is an art.

[Seaner]

But you don't really care about obscenity and the fact that minors have access to it, you're just looking for a reason to have the paper shut down.

Edited by Seaner, 27 March 2011 - 12:33 PM.

[Nunc]

But you don't really care about obscenity and the fact that minors have access to it, you're just looking for a reason to have the paper shut down.

QFT, +rep

Edited by Nunc, 27 March 2011 - 12:36 PM.

[Mishelle]

But you don't really care about obscenity and the fact that minors have access to it, you're just looking for a reason to have the paper shut down.

Lol forever at you telling me what I really care about.

For your information at our first Board of Directors meeting I informed them that the Koalas at ucsd and at sdsu have 18+ notifications on the paper and that they need to do the same thing, they didn't. So I brought it to their attention and they ignored me. So don't try to tell me what I care about.

Edited by Mishelle, 27 March 2011 - 02:47 PM.

[Seaner]

Lol forever at you telling me what I really care about.

For your information at our first Board of Directors meeting I informed them that the Koalas at ucsd and at sdsu have 18+ notifications on the paper and that they need to do the same thing, they didn't. So I brought it to their attention and they ignored me. So don't try to tell me what I care about.

You just wanted something that might add some legitimacy to your cause and you happened to find it.

So they add the 18+ notification to shut people up and then what?

Spoiler

You're back to square one.

[Mishelle]

And then I'll still be on their asses for harassing people to accept their paper and for putting hate speech in their paper. Tbh I told them already I'd be totally fine with them keeping the paper if they took the hate speech out. It's entirely possible to be funny without advocating to treat your fellow students as less than because they're not apart of your social group. It's entirely possible to be funny without propetuating stereotypes. It's entirely possible to be funny without calling out specific students just because they're different. We asked them to stop printing that kind of material in their paper, they refused to take it out so that's why students are calling their advertisers and boycotting their paper. I'm not the only one doing this, it's hundreds of other students Black, White, gay, straight, etc. It's not fair that some minority students already have to deal with prejudice and stereotypes out in their everyday life but when it comes to the place where they're paying to attend and get an education, they're having this material shoved in their face and having expletives shouted at them if they don't take the paper. It's not cool. It's immature, and I'm going to advocate against it. If you wouldn't, congrats but I'm not going to stop.

Edited by Mishelle, 27 March 2011 - 03:39 PM.

[Royce]

And then I'll still be on their asses for harassing people to accept their paper and for putting hate speech in their paper. Tbh I told them already I'd be totally fine with them keeping the paper if they took the hate speech out. It's entirely possible to be funny without advocating to treat your fellow students as less than because they're not apart of your social group. It's entirely possible to be funny without propetuating stereotypes. It's entirely possible to be funny without calling out specific students just because they're different. We asked them to stop printing that kind of material in their paper, they refused to take it out so that's why students are calling their advertisers and boycotting their paper. I'm not the only one doing this, it's hundreds of other students Black, White, gay, straight, etc. It's not fair that some minority students already have to deal with prejudice and stereotypes out in their everyday life but when it comes to the place where they're paying to attend and get an education, they're having this material shoved in their face and having expletives shouted at them if they don't take the paper. It's not cool. It's immature, and I'm going to advocate against it. If you wouldn't, congrats but I'm not going to stop.

Why are you advocating here?

[Mishelle]

Not really advocating here. I haven't done anything here except bitch tbh, that's why I put it in the spoiler tags.

[WharfRat]

You know the absolute best way to get this paper shut down, nearly instantaneously? Get a petition/facebook page/whatever together listing people that will sign on to your pledge... Make a pledge to never visit/shop/purchase anything at any of the sponsors of their paper. Send the copy of the pledge/facebook page whatever directly to all of the sponsors of the paper and let them know that for supporting a paper with such hateful and discriminatory views, you and all of the people listed will never go to their establishment again. Tell them that you are going to launch an ad campaign on the internet through facebook, etc. telling all of your friends to not go to their business because of their support for it.

Get people to call the establishment and let them know how they feel and tell them that if they do not remove funding to this paper, you all will never support their business.

Bottom Line: If a business realizes that their advertising dollars are actually LOSING business for them, they will quickly pull the plug on that shit. Welcome to a capitalist country... You want change, effect the bottom line and watch how quickly change happens.

[Sage]

Something to consider, since the Westboro Baptist Church was mentioned: In order to keep WBC from protesting at the funeral for the little girl killed in the Arizona shooting, the state passed emergency legislation requiring all protests be at least a certain distance away from the funeral.

Something like that would be much simpler to push through than getting it shut down at the outset (that can be tried later). "You can print your paper, but you can't distribute it on school grounds."

Aside from that, you're already getting their sponsors to pull out, which is the most effective way to stop the paper entirely. Getting it away from the school and getting the paper shut down are two different goals, so you need to decide which one you're really after, knowing that getting it shut down is going to be virtually impossible if you can't get your own monetary backing; "hit 'em in the pocketbook" is a pretty valid statement.

I will say I don't place a whole lot of faith in facebook-based petitions, but that's because everybody that SUPPORTS that paper will find a facebook page about it in two minutes and you'll get a whole lot of fight posts and threat posts, instead of really helpful (for your side) testimonials about how this paper is detrimental to the businesses that support it, and the quality of your campus life.

Edited by cuddlydemon, 27 March 2011 - 07:34 PM.

[WharfRat]

I will say I don't place a whole lot of faith in facebook-based petitions, but that's because everybody that SUPPORTS that paper will find a facebook page about it in two minutes and you'll get a whole lot of fight posts and threat posts, instead of really helpful (for your side) testimonials about how this paper is detrimental to the businesses that support it, and the quality of your campus life.

I agree with you here, I only make mention of facebook because it will be extremely easy to get a shit ton of people from your university to jump on board rather quickly... Especially if you have all of the people call the businesses one at a time telling them that they demand the sponsorship be pulled...

The only downside to the whole 'hit 'em in the pocketbook' approach, is that if the businesses in your town or the general population genuinely support the things that are being said in the paper... then it's rather self defeating as the business may see it as "any publicity is good publicity". So before attempting this approach, you should really look at the material in question. If you truly believe that it is awful things that the average person would hate to see, follow the approach. If you think that most people agree with the paper... then you're likely fucked.

[Seaner]

have all of the people call the businesses one at a time telling them that they demand the sponsorship be pulled...

Ooooh I could see that one going down-hill pretty quick.

[Ladida]

A pedophile released a book about being a pedophile and giving advice to to other pedophiles. He sold it on Amazon. He was soon arrested. Honestly, compiling a list of the best reasons to rape a preteen doesn't seem very much different. If he was arrested, the authors of filth like that should also be.

Boycotting and threatening the advertising companies is the way to go, that's exactly what happened with Amazon. However, in a case like this, I fail to see a large support group arising in support for the trashy paper, because anyone who signs up for that group is broadcasting to his/her entire friends list what a fucked up, prejudiced bigot he/she is, unless that entire friends circle is like that. I also think you should definitely draw media attention to the situation. The University definitely won't want bad press, and you'll get viewers pretty riled up about it as well, and maybe some other support groups might take this on as well. Starting blogs, linking on other forums to your blogs, pretty much raising awareness. The internet is pretty powerful, especially when you hit the right chord with the people behind the computers. Parents won't want to send their kids to a University where students are harassed. Yep, go public, go big. It should work.

I lol'd at Nunc and Seaner, who are obviously trolling. Don't get sucked in Mishelle You're doing something admirable, and society would be much better as a whole if people took action rather than sat around coming up with excuses to do nothing about it. It'll probably be a long process, but I hope you and the other students who're standing up for what's right succeed in this.

[Seaner]

I lol'd at Nunc and Seaner, who are obviously trolling. Don't get sucked in Mishelle You're doing something admirable, and society would be much better as a whole if people took action rather than sat around coming up with excuses to do nothing about it. It'll probably be a long process, but I hope you and the other students who're standing up for what's right succeed in this.

How dare you! I wasn't trolling, but I can't speak for Nunc. Good for Mishelle for taking action, I just disagree with the whole, 'why the paper should be silenced!'

[Ladida]

How dare you! I wasn't trolling, but I can't speak for Nunc. Good for Mishelle for taking action, I just disagree with the whole, 'why the paper should be silenced!'

Grats on your 500th post!

[Mishelle]

I told them already and I have the minutes from the BOD meeting to prove it. If they just took all of the racism, homophobia and sexism out of their paper I'd be totally okay with it. Most of the rest of the content is basically about drinking and partying and college life. I just don't think it's fair for students to be targeted when we all pay the same tuition. Like there's a specific part of the paper for people to write in anonymously and talk shit about other students. It's really sad to see people in that paper specifically targeted and trashed. Thus far all of the advertisers (or so they claim) have had no idea what kind of paper they were in. They were just approached to buy adspace and they took it. I have yet to have an advertiser endorse the content. So far it is working and hopefully they'll make a change soon. I think it'll be easier because our campus is smaller and the group who writes this paper is relatively small, I just feel bad about the people at UCSD and SDSU because those papers have way more backing behind it and there's way more backlash against people who don't want that kind of shit shoved in their face. Then again I have no idea how they distribute the paper. All I know is here they harass the hell out of anyone who doesn't want the paper.

[Ladida]

I always thought California was a pretty flamboyant state.

[ToxicS]

Trolls in real life? Awesome.

I would just take the newspaper from then and just throw it away later. Let the trolls have their fun, they want negative reactions from people so you're just feeding them.

[Ladida]

Not all trolls are evil.. You know you want to touch it's hair!

[Seaner]

Go to the website and read an issue. It might seem like less of a big deal when you see how 0/10 troll it is.

[Mishelle]

At this point I'm really at a catch 22 because I want to incite change but at the same time people do shit here that's just so brain numbingly stupid that I just want to go back to LA where I've never had to deal with this bullshit.

I went to the museum with my boyfriend today. I'm Black, my boyfriend is White. We were just walking around, looking at the exhibits, holding hands, kissing occasionally (closed mouth kisses, nothing offensive) and this Black security guard comes up to us and asks us to separate. I tell him that I've been to the museum before and I've never seen a rule that said that couples couldn't hold hands and kiss in the museum. I asked him why he had a problem with what we were doing, he said it made him uncomfortable. I told him his job is to be a security guard, not to be comfortable. I guess since we were both carrying backpacks (and I'll admit I have some fucking juvenile buttons on my backpack) he thought we were high schoolers who ditched school and basically said if I didn't stop causing commotion in the museum he'd have to call the truancy police. My boyfriend told him that we were both in college so he can take his threats and shove them up his ass. We went and got his manager and filed a complaint, but I'm still super irritated over the whole situation.Fuck that prejudiced asshole, seriously.

Edited by Mishelle, 31 March 2011 - 08:40 PM.

[ilovepolkadots]

At this point I'm really at a catch 22 because I want to incite change but at the same time people do shit here that's just so brain numbingly stupid that I just want to go back to LA where I've never had to deal with this bullshit.

I went to the museum with my boyfriend today. I'm Black, my boyfriend is White. We were just walking around, looking at the exhibits, holding hands, kissing occasionally (closed mouth kisses, nothing offensive) and this Black security guard comes up to us and asks us to separate. I tell him that I've been to the museum before and I've never seen a rule that said that couples couldn't hold hands and kiss in the museum. I asked him why he had a problem with what we were doing, he said it made him uncomfortable. I told him his job is to be a security guard, not to be comfortable. I guess since we were both carrying backpacks (and I'll admit I have some fucking juvenile buttons on my backpack) he thought we were high schoolers who ditched school and basically said if I didn't stop causing commotion in the museum he'd have to call the truancy police. My boyfriend told him that we were both in college so he can take his threats and shove them up his ass. We went and got his manager and filed a complaint, but I'm still super irritated over the whole situation.Fuck that prejudiced asshole, seriously.

...
this doesn't sound like he was being prejudice
you and your boyfriend conducting public displays of affection seem to be what was bothering him
also your boyfriend telling him to "shove them up his ass" only speaks to his immaturity
the fact of the matter is that racism only exists because people allow it to
in this case it only exists because you choose to take it that way and make it an issue, when in reality the security guard was probably just doing his job and following policy

Edited by ilovepolkadots, 01 April 2011 - 12:32 PM.

[Mishelle]

We were holding hands. I closed mouth kissed him a couple times during the whole thing. I don't like PDA so I have a really sharp line with it and wanted to look at the exhibits, it's not like we're walking through the place making out. There's no rule inside the museum saying people can't hold hands or kiss. He was completely out of line because I've seen people hold hands and kiss their spouses in that museum before and I've NEVER seen a security guard ask two people to separate. Their jobs is to make sure no one touches the paintings and no one takes pictures when pictures are not allowed. He wouldn't even give us a reason of quote a rule to prove that what we were doing was wrong or inappropriate. I got mad when he threatened me just because he didn't like me questioning him about his actions. I talked to his manager and his manager told me there was no such policy that people can't hold hands or kiss in the rooms. If the manager was ready and willing to take down my complaint and even chastised the guard in front of me I'm pretty sure he agreed that that man was in the wrong.

Edited by Mishelle, 01 April 2011 - 06:17 PM.

[Ali]

In relation to the hate speech debate bit earlier, for anyone with access to BBC iPlayer, Louis Theroux had a documentary on BBC2 tonight where he made a return visit to Westboro Baptist Church. Haven't had a chance to watch it yet but the original one was pretty good. Surprised they're allowing him back really but I suppose they're just desperate for constant publicity. Did read somewhere last week that he spoke to some ex-members who were prompted to leave after comments he made to them during his initial visit. May be interesting stuff. ('Louis Theroux - America's Most Hated Family in Crisis' for those of you looking elsewhere for it. )