Posted on 11/26/2004 3:50:11 PM PST by Nachum
MONTREAL -- Montreal's exclusive Lower Canada College is again in an embarrassing spot after two graduating students placed coded messages calling for death to all Jews in the school's yearbook as a joke.
The statements, in a jumble of acronym-like e-mail shorthand, were spotted hours before the 2003-2004 yearbook was to be widely distributed this month.
All 1,000 copies were destroyed.
"It was a hidden message that was intended to be a secret between two students," headmaster Paul Bennett said in an interview yesterday.
"These students don't represent anyone but themselves but they've caused a tremendous amount of harm and that's what's so upsetting about it."
Jewish community groups said they felt the incident wasn't serious. However, it came after LCC garnered unwanted headlines last month when a handful of students were caught trying to circulate crude counterfeit money to cover gambling debts.
Yesterday, Mr. Bennett said the two hidden messages were spotted thanks to a tip from fellow students.
"We have concluded that the two offensive comments were intended as a 'secret' that the two 16-year-olds thought no one would notice," he wrote in a letter sent yesterday to the parents of all LCC students. "The incident stemmed from a personal disagreement between two boys and was isolated in nature."
Mr. Bennett said that it does not reflect the views of the school's 745 students, and that the authors have Jewish friends and are not anti-Semitic.
The culprits got letters of reprimand in their files but cannot be disciplined because they have graduated.
"I immediately contacted the two Grade 11 graduates and their parents to express our extreme displeasure," Mr. Bennett said in his letter to parents.
Jewish leaders expressed satisfaction with the school's handling of the controversy.
"Apparently it was a prank, done without malice, more of a stupid joke," said Allan Adel, national chair of the League for Human Rights of B'nai Brith Canada.
"It was more indicative of immaturity and ignorance than hatred, so we're not as concerned or disturbed as in other situations."
"The school acted very responsibly in this action," said an official from the Canadian Jewish Congress.
Last month, four students were expelled from the school and another five got suspensions ranging from one week to one day for trading bogus $10 bills.
The counterfeiting was triggered by students trying to repay Internet gambling debts, prompting the school to institute counselling and education programs.
Tuition at the co-educational private school ranges from $8,810 for kindergarten to $12,850 for the pre-university year.
After the fact, maybe. But that same school failed to adequately educate those "kids" about where this leads.
How are those two kids going to be able to afford to pay for all those yearbooks?...
Instead of being ripped from the headlines this incident is ripped from an episode of "Law and Order" that was on a few years ago.
This so called joke is not funny.
Yes, well, I agree with you. Now what happens, nobody gets a yearbook? So all the other students can say "I went to an incredibly expensive HS and all I got was no lousy yearbook, because of two idiots, and the idiot faculty supervisors who failed to detect it?
That would make a really bad t-shirt!
I am trying to figure out the problem here.
The left is tremendously antisemetic. When I dine with them the "code words" buzz thick and fast. Bush is hated partly because he is committed to Israel.
So these kids are just doing what their leftist teachers and parents taught them.
More from the “enlightened” ones. Isn’t Montreal in a blue state?
I think the problem is this school probably DID educate these kids. I'll bet that one (or more) of their teachers told them that the Zionist entity needed to be eliminated for oppressing the poor Palestians. In fact, I'm surprised more kids from "posh" (code word for liberal) schools don't exhibit this behavior. Anti-semitism has become an essential characteristic of modern liberalism.
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