The Peak needs an enema
Some years, The Peak rocks. Other years, The Peak sucks. At the moment, it sucks.
Why? First of all, the editors are getting careless. Case in point: check out last week’s front-page headline. Yes, that’s “plagerism,” not “plagiarism.” It’s our most embarrassing cover in ages.
Second, The Peak is currently dominated by a clique dedicated to shoving their pro-Palestinian, leftist agenda down readers’ throats. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. However, this crowd tends to clamp down pretty hard on things they find offensive, and it’s poisoning the paper.
Case in point: Last fall, the editors claimed, in print, that one of my columns was “offensively racist.” (As opposed to, I am forced to assume, “inoffensively racist.” We’re not dealing with a lot of bright lights here.)
As it turned out, the column in question [Scenes from a bus, Oct 29 2001] was so virulently racist that most other members of the Peak Collective thought it wasn’t racist at all, and not one reader wrote in to complain. I was hung high in the Peak offices and had my character publicly attacked, yet not a single reader voiced agreement with the unanimous editorial clique that was so quick to damn me. Not one.
Could there be more compelling evidence that the Peak editors are out of touch with the sensibilities of their readers?
Of course, regular readers know that half the Peak editors can’t even write. Check out “Editor’s Voice,” which is frequently the biggest embarrassment in the paper.
But I digress. Inspired by my “racist” column that offended no one but Peak editors, I wrote a lovely little science-fiction piece about genocide and jelly cups a couple of weeks back. It wasn’t racist, either. Not surprisingly, it was also censored. Oh well.
What’s the difference between a good and bad Peak editor? A good editor can say, “I do not like this item. It offends me” and then run the damn thing.
Many editors past and present have strived to ensure that The Peak contains nothing that offends them. And since their sensibilities are so, so delicate, and their fear of phantom reprisals so intense, this pretty much guarantees that little of genuine interest or originality will make it into the paper.
Our editors complain about the major dailies stifling the free flow of ideas, then they do it themselves. They can’t see their hypocrisy because, with the blinkers of the self-righteous, they know with certitude that their instincts are right. After all, how could I be wrong for silencing people with the wrong ideas?
I submit one final measure of The Peak’s decline. Some weeks, we don’t get a single letter from a reader. Not one. When this happens, I think the entire editorial staff should be lined up against a wall and shot.
This is an independent paper, folks. We answer to no one but ourselves. We could do pretty much anything we want with this rag. And look what we do with it. More often than not, The Peak is a monument to squandered potential.
Listen to me now. The Peak needs an enema. There are several folks here who’ll be out on their asses next semester if some half-decent new blood comes in the door. Trust me.
When you read a shitty article, come in and write a better one. When you read an embarrassing Editor’s Voice, come in and take that person’s job.
Don’t act like it’s above you. It isn’t. Peak editors are students just like you-and clear thinking, an open mind, and good writing skills are not required to get in the door here. Hell, you can even rise to the top.
People, there is hope for The Peak. That hope is you.
Glen is a disgruntled Peak columnist. He has held the positions of Copy, Features and Humour editor, as well as Volunteer Coordinator. •
Originally published in The Peak, January 21 2002.
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