EDITORS NOTE: (8:41pm) Since posting this, two of my three comments have been approved. The Automoblogging comment exists in limbo still.
So, over the months (or years), there have been a lot of my comments that - for one reason or another - just don’t make it into Binks’ blog. Until now, I haven’t said anything because I didn’t want to make a big deal about it. But over the past week or so, I’ve seen about three comments get “lost” in the shuffle, and it is starting to seem like I am just being censored on a regular basis.
I’m going to link to the posts here and include the text from the unapproved comments. You tell me if it seems that bad. Perhaps someone can explain to me why they did not make it through the moderation filter.
Freedom of Speech = Giving Fox News An Interview
Comment #3:
All very true.
But I cannot see how trying to steal the reporter’s microphone will cast them in a favourable light either when they are on the 6:00 news. That clip wont even need to be edited. (I’m talking about the guy at 2:07).
I think the only guy who did something sensible was the guy who said “Stop the torture, stop the war.” I mean, as you said, if you don’t say anything that can be twisted, they’ll edit you out completely. I would rather say something productive and have it edited out then say something offencive and have it looped for the next 48 hours on Fox News recaps of the day’s headlines.
Comment #4: (before Andrew’s final comment)
Yeah. They have been slowly moving it forward so that everyone has to take it.
In Andrew’s year, if you had a certain percentage in your Grade 12 English in high school, you did not have to write the ELPE. But then, there was all this concern about how effectively high schools teach the fundamentals (remember how we had to do all that grammar stuff in Sinko’s Gr. 12 English, and we made a big stink about it - they actually should be teaching more of that, and they’re instead teaching Moss-ian literary analysis).
So, they changed it so that high school credits don’t count.
And, up until last year, if you had a transfer credit from another university that counted as the ELPE equivalent course (one of six ENGL courses at 100 or 200), you didn’t have to write the ELPE either. But even that has changed because they feel they can no longer determine how much other universities are teaching students.
So, now they have migrated to everything being done in house. And now everyone does the ELPE.
They are changing things to suit Andrew’s argument for the importance of the ELPE. However, in the past, they have been unable to do so. So, they are now moving to a more suitable system.
Also, as Andrew said, most Arts students are from Ontario. They have the appropriate background in English. Any students not from Ontario are surely aware of the volume of reading that goes along with Arts courses, and would be prepared for it. Any International students admitted to the Arts Faculty (and I imagine they are few and far between) will have taken their English entrance tests that will have provided the University of Waterloo with a brief overview of the student’s understanding of English. They do not get admitted unless their TOEFL scores show that they understand English at the minimum levels it would take to survive at the university level.
The small percentage (and I mean really small) of Arts students who get into that faculty who do not understand English in the slightest are the most minimal losses that the ELPP allows. The ELPP is by no means perfect, but they have minimized “losses” - so to speak - campus wide when it comes to understanding of the language.
As one final point, a lot of Math/Engineers go on co-op in the Winter of their first year (or used to, Stream 4 is being phased out). So, they need to have their writing skills solid before their first work term (i.e., their first work report) because they wont have time to go to a writing clinic after writing the ELPE in December if they start work in January.
The Beginning of Automoblogging
Comment #4: (before Andrew’s final comment)
Is the objective of those presentations to get kids to say “Police officers are nice people” or to get the kids to say, “Drugs are bad” (I remember a drug presentation at St. Als) and “Drinking and driving is stupid” (this presentation happened at St. Mikes, I believe). But yeah. I have never been under the impression that the message of those presentations was “Police officers are cool and nice.” There has always been another message that is much more important. Just because they treat kids with some measure of civility during these presentations does not mean that that was the point.
I think having police seem entirely friendly might work against them as well. I remember one time I caught a guy shoplifting at Zellers, and a cop came in. And I had to be present in the room as stuff happened. I think shoplifters and other criminals might be more defiant of police officers (once caught) if they remembered that Officer So-and-so gave them high-fives when he came to their school.
And I don’t know that “increasing respect for the law and will to cooperate with the police” will increase their safety. You are not a criminal. You are not likely to commit any crimes. Whether a police officer waves to you or not is not going to change your mentality towards crime. Similarly, people who would be willing to commit crimes are not going to change their mind because a cop waved at them. Drug addicts will still be drug addicts. Pedophiles will still be pedophiles. Murderers will still be murderers. A wave is not going to change their outlook. In fact, I doubt these people would be the type to solicit a greeting from a cop anyway.
Also,
0:46 - Binks: “That’s why people hate police officers.”
If you don’t hate police officers, what are you basing that on? I think police officers are good people and I respect the job that they do. I’m not going to judge them negatively because they don’t wave to me.
I mean, I understand that all three of these comments have some sort of criticism toward the original topic. But you cannot just walk out into the world and say things with no basis, and I found that there were several false generalizations and incorrect assumptions about how things function that needed some sort of clarification, or at least another viewpoint expressed. I do not think that such actions are cruel. I do not think that such actions are malicious in any way.
I’ve been criticized for comments I’ve made before, and I dealt with them accordingly. I did not censor the person with critical comments. I find the treatment that I am receiving to be unfair, and I no longer feel that I should stand for it.