6.03.2011

#347 Fight Important Battles

Senior banned from prom over conspicuous prom asking technique

Basically the student, James Tate, wanted to ask a girl to the prom and, since he's a little shy, he wanted to do it in an unconventional way.

So he taped letters to the entrance to the school asking her out. He taped the letters, he caused no damage, harmed nothing in the action and the girl said yes, she'd go to the prom with him.

The only problem is that some administrator with his tighty whitey's on too tight decided that Tate violated safety protocols and trespassing laws by taping the letters to the building at night and on a ladder. So he has been barred from attending the prom.

So far more than 30,000 people have joined a support page on Facebook as, like I do, the punishment wasn't even close to fitting the supposed crime.

Here's the thing, the kid was doing something atypical but not dangerous, he wasn't huffing paint, he wasn't trying to damage the school, he wasn't trying to cause any trouble, he was trying to get a date for the prom. And the school officials over-reacted and banned him. Stupid. What a stupid, stupid battle to fight.

Unless, of course, there are no other problems at the school. No drugs, no gangs, no teen pregnancy, no alcohol abuse, no racism, no haters. In which case, kudos the school for cracking down on yet another creative uprising from their sheep, I mean, students.

Update: Because of the widespread furor over the douchey rules enforcement by the school admins, the kid has been given permission to attend the prom with his date. But, because school admins can often not help themselves from being dicks about something, the kid's two accomplices have been barred (presumably because the admins didn't think they'd be able to get the publicity to fight their bullshit penalty). I just remembered one of the main reasons why I fucking hate school systems, they are only as good as the people running them and if the people running the school are small-minded power-hungry douchebags then the entire system will suffer badly as a result.

I would hope that James Tate would have the intestinal fortitude to stand up for his friends' rights too and say if he is allowed to go to the prom then they should too.

Rule #347 is Fight Important Battles

No comments: