Wednesday, December 7, 2011

The New Massachusetts Witch Hunt

by Pa Rock
Citizen Journalist


I guess if you were of a mind to conduct a witch hunt, the state of Massachusetts would be a good setting.  It is, after all, where sanctimonious Christians went on a rampage four centuries ago and burned a couple of dozen housewives at the stake as the result of some malicious ramblings by a few adolescent girls.

Over the past few days there has been another witch hunt occurring in the Bay State, this one involving an annoying television reporter who is hellbent on getting a high school teacher fired over his past involvement in a few porn movies.   Reporter Mike Beaudet of Fox Boston received a tip that the Chairman of the English Department and crew coach at Mystic Valley Regional Charter School in Malden, Massachusetts, had once acted in some gay porn movies.   The teacher, Kevin Hogan, is by all reports well respected by his students who regard him as a good teacher.

Beaudet, in a typical Fox ambush move, had some still shots made from one of the movies and then tried to confront Hogan on camera.  He then began interviewing members of the community to find out what they thought of this teacher's past vocation.

But that wasn't enough for the dogged reporter, he also went on Twitter and contacted a female student of Hogan's.  "Would love to know what you and other students think of him."   The student responded, "I think you blew this story way out of proportion and single handedly destroyed a man's life."  Another student of Hogan's chimed in:  "Hogan is the best thing that has happened to my crew team.  Students now have more respect for him due to what you did  #thanks"  And this from another student:  "My English teacher is a gay pornstar  #nbd"  (no big deal).

And my personal favorite student response to Beaudet:  "Reporters are so fucking annoying."  Are you listening, Mike?  That student was speaking directly to you.  Surely in a city the size of Boston you could find some real news to report.

There is now a page on Facebook dedicated to keeping Kevin Hogan employed and firing Mike Beaudet.   It has only been up a few days and has already been accessed over 25,000 times.  The site is:  http://www.facebook.com/firemikebeaudet.

Sadly, even though the kids are supporting their teacher, many parents are not.  Forgiveness is a hard concept for Christians.  It is much easier to pass the matches and chant "Burn witch, burn."

1 comment:

Don said...

One of my favorite stories from the Bible has Abraham makes his servant swear that he won't let Isaac marry a Canaanite. (Genesis 24:3)

Sounds like this reporter read this passage, took it to heart and decided to make intolerance his life's work.