Well, this last week has been a little more exciting than most. My school’s student newspaper, the Rocky Mountain Collegian, published a brief editorial on September 21st that has since become the talk of the town, if not the nation. What has everyone howling is that the editorial board used the word “fuck” in the editorial. They claim that it was to raise awareness of our First Amendment rights. They certainly accomplished that--did a bang-up job of it, I’d say. And it is undeniably a demonstration of free speech. Where they failed, however, is in practicing the concepts of journalistic professionalism and integrity. As professional communicators, they have a responsibility to their readers, and to their profession to articulate a position in a thoughtful and intelligent manner.

The fate of the paper’s editors is still undecided, but I'd like to see them fired, as they won’t do the right thing by resigning. I didn’t really care one way or the other when I first saw the editorial. I actually thought it was funny they’d had the balls to do it. Over the course of the week, though, the ramifications of what they’ve done sank in a little deeper. So many of the letters to the editor in response to the editorial condemn all of CSU for the actions of these few people. I’ve read several in which the authors say they’ll never donate to CSU again. One or two even went so far as to say they wouldn’t ever hire a CSU graduate because of this. The Collegian’s editorial board has hurt the reputation of my school, and thrown all ideas of journalistic ethics in the trash with one thoughtless piece, and for that they should go.