This is What Happens When You Meet a Stranger in the Alps!
| Published 11/19/04

Graphic by: Ande Hearn

As long as man has put word to paper, parchment or stone, there has been some guy in the background ready to nitpick at the hard work of the writer. There was a time when speaking out against the king was blasphemy, and whoever wrote such scandalous words would find his head fashioned to a pike. Thankfully, here in America we have a little something called the Bill of Rights with the very first article saying, "Congress must not interfere with freedom of religion, speech or press, assembly and petition."

However, there are still institutions in this great land of ours that would sooner clean their rectum with this cherished doctrine than allow it to serve its full function. It wasn't until I became a writer that I realized how important this freedom of speech is to every single American citizen. If censorship is allowed to continue in it's current manner, soon the only works anyone will be allowed to read will be stories about closet homosexual wizards and whatever the almighty Oprah deems worthy of her book club.

About a week ago, I decided to take up the pen in order to express my thoughts on the recent election. While my views in the article were not specifically attacked, the manner in which I chose to express them was. My logic was that the only people who will read this article would be college students who hear these words upwards of eighty times a day. However, a day or two later I received a letter from a staff member of the publisher whom I submitted the article to. Here is what the she had to say:

I know that the editors are not to blame; there is a strict set of rules they must oblige by to keep their glorious unpaid positions. I also realize that naughty words shouldn't be used, because people who have been locked in closets all their life by their Puritan parents would not approve of reading certain four letter words on a college sponsored website. One question that still escapes my grasp is when are we going to stop being P.C. and allow the world to grow up?

Back in the 50s, a television version of "Huckleberry Finn" was made to show Cold-War America, a simpler time in the history of our country. The network executives were leery to have any person of color involved or any adult situation, so the entire show was basically Huck sitting on his raft fishing. Sadly, once the Anti-Fish Defamation League saw how the network was stereotyping fish as stupid beasts willing to be caught by a worm on a hook, the show was scrapped entirely. Now, while I don't know how true any of that is, it does illustrate how the greatest American novel of all time can be easily defecated upon.

Fifty years later, televisions are still playing the monkey on a rope to the organ grinder of society. Recently while viewing one of the greatest motion pictures of our generation, "The Big Lebowski," I was stunned, flabbergasted and other synonyms for those two words. I realized the entire scene with The Jesus had been edited out for a daytime-television audience. Not only that, but one of the greatest lines in the movie had been replaced by "This is what happens when you meet a stranger in the Alps!" Maybe it's just me and never having met a stranger in the Alps, but I'm sure if I did, he wouldn't come to my house and wreck my neighbor¹s car. Oddly enough, the same station that edited the movie is the very same station that has cartoon poop in Christmas specials.

Understandably, parents want to keep their innocent children away from as much nasty material as possible, but I can honestly say I wouldn't be the man I am today had I never stumbled across my father's Playboys when I was four years old. Sooner or later, everyone learns that life isn't what "Sesame Street" makes it out to be; in 20 years, I have never seen a green man living in a garbage can -- and believe me, I've looked. So, I'm saying that before kids start growing up and forming dreams about being successful and idolized, we crush those hopes by showing them vulgar and lewd material. In the end, everyone dies; so we may as well leave some colorful words for our deathbeds.

As long as people control what words we use, they will continue to control the way we think. While not many thoughts include superfluous profanity, it is still a part of who I am and what I stand for. My high school English teacher made a good point one class period when she explained that some characters in literature are defined by the words they use; some words fit certain people better. In the dusty book of human history, I just happen to be one of the characters who would sooner settle for a four-letter word than try to explain myself any further. So go ahead. Say we can't write certain things but to quote someone, who is much more intelligent than I, "You can look up my body, but not my mind."