When I was in high school, there was this asshole. He was a major league asshole too. He’d pick fights with the retarded kids from special education, after making fun of them. He wanted his car painted so he intentionally rammed a grocery store shopping cart into his car figuring the grocery store would be liable for damages and pay for it (he was wrong, witnesses saw him do it). He’d intimidate kids and try to take their stuff. The list goes on. He also wasn’t particularly bright.

Then one day, he died. He died a particularly horrendous death. After drinking a bit too much, he ran off the road into a ditch that was slightly wider than his car. His car caught fire and he couldn’t open the doors because the walls of the ditch prevented him from doing so. Truly a horrible way to die and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

As you may have guessed, this asshole became the saint of the school. The school gave everyone a day off to go to the services (I didn’t go). Memorials left and right, mention in the school newspaper, special graduation memorial, the high school founded a chapter of SADD in his name, etc., etc.

All this for an asshole. What changed? Now, he was a dead asshole.

I guess when people pass on, we become forgiving. Or forgetful.

I bring this up because I was going to do a post on a professor I once had. This professor was an ideologue. For example, he had the class watch a movie on abortion that was blatantly biased toward the pro-choice side. People left in the middle of it (it was particularly offensive to any pro-lifers who may have been there) and reported him to the department head.

He also told us that when we turned in a paper, we couldn’t use the words he or she. We had to use the non-sexist word ne. I forgot the rule for his and her. Obviously, ne wasn’t an English teacher. I had written a paper and turned it in and I, while referring to a specific person who was matter-of-factly female, used the word she and her quite often. Ne tried to ding me some points for doing so but I sought out the department head and created a stink about how teachers shouldn’t allow their preferences to affect proper English.

Now, ne wasn’t an asshole. He add various little socio-political idiosyncrasies that were annoying. Ne was ideologically obtuse. Ne allowed his ideology to consume his professional life and ne wanted to exert his influence on his students and mandate they be exposed to his worldview and that they comply.

To his benefit, ne encouraged me to think by pissing me off.

I Googled up his name today to see what happened to him. Ne died of a massive heart attack at the age of 44 two years ago. Bummer.

Posted in uncategorized on July 20th, 2004 by SayUncle | RSS 2.0 |