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p 4 weekender february 8 1997 stux lnion v v let those who are trained decide what to ban catcher in the rye huckleber ry finn the diviners lady chatterleys lover these works of great literature may not have a common theme when considered at first glance however there is a thread that weaves them together one of ignorance and misunderstand ing these titles and dozens more have at one time or another been the target of censorship in our schools all of these titles considered to be among the finest literary works in the english language have been subjected to the witchhunts and bookburning ideals put forth by certain parental and religious special interest groups now education minister john snobelen would see these groups take an even greater con trol over what volumes would be placed in the school curriculum this announcement comes viewpoint andrew mair about as one milton group in particular led by the infamous gaybasher rev ken campbell attempts to have joyce carol oates novel foxfire removed from school library shelves and off the class reading list their reasoning certain scatological words pervade the book as do images of violence certainly we would not recom mend the title to our primary grades as a first reader but the class that studies this book is made up of 18 year olds these students are in grade 12 in four months we will expect these same children to be out on their own in the real world these same students will be able to vote in the elections this fall they are certainly long past their formative years this group would protect these students from words they are certainly aware of and more than likely pepper their daily language with as to the violence there is more mayhem in the school parking lot this is just another case of a group attempting to subject its morality on the rest of us the reason we pay taxes is so school boards or whats left of them can hire responsible trained professionals to look after educating our children parents very often take an emo tional tack and feel the teachers are undermining the good upbringing they have bestowed upon their progeny they take great exception to anyone else telling them what is proper for their children to learn however if teachers and prin cipals cannot use their consid erable training to determine what is appropriate we might as well close the doors to the schools and do the jobs our selves- we are beginning to view schools as simple daycare cen tres and the only purpose served by our beleaguered edu cators is that of a glorified babysitter snobelen should let the peo ple who are trained make the decisions and keep parents in a strictly supporting role by allowing them to make decisions on what is appropri ate for study snobelen is com mitting the educational equiva lent of letting the hockey parent behind bench the tribune weekender edition a metroland community newspaper patricia pappas publisher joann stevenson editorinchief andrew mair general managereditor debraweller director of advertising barry goodyear director of distribution vivian oneil business manager pameia nichols operations manager stquffville all enquiries 905 6402100 fax 905 6405477 6244 main st stouffville ont uxbridge all enquiries 905 8529741 fax 905 8524355 88 brock st w uxbridge ont httpwwwyorkregioncom the stouffville and the uxbridge tribune published every wednesday and saturday is one of the metroland printing publishing and distributing group of community newspapers which includes ajax pickering news adver tiser al lis ton herald courier barrie advance brampton guardian burlington post city parent collingwoodavasaga beach connection east york mirror etobicoke guardian georgetown independent acton free press kingston tins week lindsay tins week markham economist and sun midlandpenetanguishene mirror mil ton canadian champion mississauga news newmar ketaurora erabanner northumberland news north york mirror oakville beaver orillia today oshawa-whitby- claringtonport perry this week peterborough this week richmond hillthomhillvaughan liberal scarbor ough mirror todays seniors contents not to be repro duced without written permission from the publisher per mit 1247 the publisher reserves the right to refuse or classify any advertisement credit for advertisement lim ited to space error occupied the weekender is a member of the ontario press council nrall st patrick was not even irish get your facts first then you can distort them as much as you like mark twain no matter how thin you slice it its still baloney alfred smith its a little early in the calen dar year but im ready to nominate 1997 as the year of disillusion i cant believe the number of verifiable certain ties that ive seen shot down in the past few weeks first it was saint patrick everybody knows that st pat was an ancient irishman famous because he single- handedly drove the snakes out of ireland right wrong he wasnt even irish patrick was an englishman who spent a few years as a slave in ireland returned to england and became a priest then set about converting the irish to christianity the snake story is 100-per- editors mail salvation army volunteers praised dear editor we are now well into the new year i am writ ing to thank you and your newspaper as well as canadian tire zehrs the lcbo and their staffs for the assistance they gave to those of us representing the salvation army uxbridge ser vice extension unit this past christmas in providing coverage and information of our kettle program and in providing their premis es for the kettles the above have shown the true spirit of the season the kind residents of uxbridge raised approximately 6500 to help carry on the salvation army work in this area this success would not have been possible without the following volunteers who managed the kettles at each location john taylor fred tassie walter marshall john harvey cliff robb daniel wigdor len and sandra nichols wes westelaken bob and effie woodland cliff hughes cynthis nidd vivian baker darlene currie irene watts andrea redinour lori davies sandra will lundi trucsik bev bax ter ann wanninkhopf mary alexander barb hughes lydia dinatale arlene scudamore sandra darby katie ballinger and pauline collins we extend a special thanks to these volun teers for their assistance in making someone elses christmas more pleasant wishing you and yours all the best in the coming year i would also like to thank those who donated to the kettles without you this past season may not have been as happy for those less for tunate sylvia robb chairperson mary alexander secretarytreasurer uxbridge service extension unit the salvation army cent irish baloney and didnt even appear until patrick had been dead for 300 years then theres sherlock holmes whats the most famous phrase the great detective ever uttered elementary my dear wat son everybody knows that except sherlock never said it holmes says elementary a lot and he addresses his slowwitted partner as my dear watson a good deal but he never once combines the two of them its enough to make you lose your faith in in betty crock er which you might as well do most of us grew up with the friendly matronly mug of betty staring back at us from the back covers of our own mothers cookbooks except there never was a betty crocker she was an invention the figment of some ad agency flacks imagi nation lab technicians at general mills came up with a whole bunch of recipes using gm products that they wanted to flog to the public the company needed a name to put on the cookbook covers the ad flack picked betty because it was a nice inoffensive name and crocker because well the director of general mills was one william g crocker heh heh oh yeah you dont wanna examine those accepted truths too closely remember the christmas song chestnuts roasting on an open fire jack frost nipping at your nose basic black arthur black sounds like it must have been written in montreal or winnipeg in deepest febru ary right or during a winter in upstate new york at least actually mel torme and his lyricist tossed that off in less than an hour during a cali fornia heat wave while con suming cold drinks and putting ice on their foreheads remember the beach boys the group that made surfing a worldwide mania they never surfed their leader brian wilson was afraid of the ocean the only beach boy who ever rode a surfboard was the drummer brians brother dennis he drowned in 1983 christopher columbus he not only didnt discover amer ica the vikings beat him by about five centuries columbus didnt even see america the closest chris got was a small island in the caribbean oh me oh mydo a little digging and you discover that french fries arent french and english muffins arent english that great danes do not hail from denmark and that french poodles orig inated in germany while german shepherds are native to alsace next thing you know some body will try to tell us theres no santa claus