Every college newspaper uses the occasion of "April Fool's Day" to blow off some steam in the form of a Joke Issue, in which each article parodies well-known campus trends. But for straight news reporters-in-training, one annual burst of "satire" can be a challenging task, as they sometimes go overboard. Or they don't. But at least one writer will be called racist by the end of the day.
Yesterday's Joke Issue of the esteemed Georgetown Hoya newspaper featured a satirical opinion piece that bravely, or stupidly, played off of the paper's perceived reputation of being racially insensitive. The op-ed was titled, "We Need More Interracial Loving at Georgetown." This is not an easy satirical concept to pull off, but let's see how the deft hand of "Ryan Westen" managed:
These days, things are much more peaceful her on the Hilltop. Only One thing's missing: We don't have enough good old vanilla-chocolate swirl interracial f******.
This is not a good path -- ABANDON THE CHOCOLATE-VANILLA IMAGERY, RYAN!
Nothing is more beautiful than adding a few drops of Georgetown's milk into some dark chocolate Cocoa Puffs. Think about it: Halle Berry, Naomi Campbell, Alicia Keys, Mariah Carey -- all the results of some good old-fashioned biracial f****** and sexy pieces of a** to boot.
Aaaaaand here's the fresh new Facebook protest group. It is called "The Hoya: Discrimination is Not A Laughing Matter."
But maybe Ryan Westen was just "in character," portraying a very, very stupid ignorant idiot. The "Cocoa Puffs" line is too hilariously bad to be offensive. A racially-charged CEREAL metaphor is so terribly unfunny and amateurish that it kind of works. But surely other opinions abound.
Jim Newell writes about comical college newspaper controversies for Wonkette and IvyGate.
