Hey kids of Timberland High School, you remember this: You mess with the bull, you get the horns.

The staff of the school newspaper and free speech honks that live for things like this filed in to a Wentzville School Board meeting Thursday night to hear a discussion of whether the level of censorship being displayed by the Timberland High School principal was within “acceptable” levels.  Apparently the kids have been feeling a bit censored for some time now. Things like…

At issue, everything from a tattoo article pulled from the paper to yearbook photos deemed too risqué. Legally, it is the principal’s prerogative to make these calls.

No one is arguing that the principal has the last call in his school, and we aren’t going to get in to that here. This is really about letting the kids put their argument out there, be heard, and have a rational discussion about it. Hell, they even cared enough to start a blog about the subject, and just wanted to be heard by the school board.

…of course by the time all the people on the other side of the coin got done blathering about how censorship is good, time was up and the meeting was over. Go home. F*ck you kids.

Seriously. That’s what happened.

Inside the board meeting, public comment began. The first speakers supported the idea of extra review for budding journalists. And then, because of a time limit, public comment was over before the free speech group got its turn.

The group filed out of the meeting disappointed, angry and frustrated.

Nothing quiets a group of angry kids down like promising them to let them be heard and then say “Nevermind, all the adults talked up your whole turn.” I’m sure a fair and balanced argument like that will definitely make the school newspaper think twice about running stories about tattoos or bubblegum or penny whistles…whatever it is kids want to write about these days.

Now to be fair to the school board, they did decide to allow one member from the group to defend their side of the argument before the meeting was adjourned.  Well gee, don’t go out of your way or anything you assholes. How the hell is hours of people talking about one side of the argument and then at the last second, saying “Oh yeah, you wanted to say something for your side…hurry up though.” is a fair shake?Why bother even having the meeting?! Why not just tell the kids “Hey, guess what? We don’t give a crap about what you think.” That’s clearly the truth isn’t it? Did the board not know about the time limit? Could they not just say “This is your last speaker, we have to let the other side have their time.” Nope. They might as well just done that thing when you blow in to your thumb to “inflate” your middle finger at the kids while they let a bunch of people talk that came because they are pro-censorship.

Its also worth nothing that a KSDK film crew was there, and just before they left is when the board had a change of heart to let one…one…high school representative say their piece.  Ya think the kids would have even got that if the KSDK crew wasn’t there? Pfft. Please.

Here’s a tip kids. Screw that school paper. Give us a ring, and we’ll happily set you up with timberland.punchingkitty.com. Write about tattoos all you want. Seriously: 314-266-8477

via: KSDK

Update: The Stop THS Censorship blog now has a post up about their school board meeting experience.

Remember the second string Rams QB that came in for Marc Bulger this year and did about as good?  No?  Well do you remember that hot moron that mistook the Miss America pageant as Larry King Live and decided to tell the world that one dude and another dude shouldn’t get married because apparently that actually effect her in some way.

Also, she’s hot, so because of that she has some valid points.

Scandal-laden beauty queen Carrie Prejean has gotten engaged to NFL stud Kyle Boller, E! News has learned exclusively. A source says that the two decided to make their whirlwind romance official Saturday in Prejean’s hometown of San Diego—where the Rams QB also has a house and spends time during the off-season.

The ex-Miss California, 22, began dating the 28-year-old U.C. Berkeley alum last July in the midst of her controversial rise to fame, which included anti-same-sex marriage lobbying, alleged sex tapes and a much-talked-about showdown with Larry King.

Jesus’ little messenger and the quarterback talent forgot are getting married!  How delightful and legal for them.  Can you imagine if two guys got married?  It would totally invalidate this marriage that won’t last more than 2 years.

Also, I hope she knows that you can’t get a single decent wedding arrangement made anywhere without having to schedule a meeting with a very very gay man at some point.  Good luck with that Carrie.

via E! Online

According to the Globe-Democrat, managed to kill 24 less people in 2009 than in 2008.

The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department reported there were 143 homicides recorded in the city for 2009. That’s 24 fewer than the 167 homicides reported in the city during 2008. Police departments record crimes such as homicides that become part of the FBI’s Uniform Crime statistics

24 of you got away…and St. Louis pissed.

You think you’re going to get away with this?  Pffft.  Maybe in Salt Lake City, but not here.  Not in one of America’s most dangerous cities.   24 people cheated death in St. Louis last year and St. Louis hates cheaters!

Ha ha ha…another funny article from Punching Kitty!  Well laugh it up buddy.  You just wait until 2010 ends with exactly 24 more deaths than in 2009.

Come Thursday it will all be official, the Wellston school district will be no more come June 30th, 2010.  The students will be folded in to the Normandy school district, and the staff’s contracts will be terminated.

Wellston’s facilities are inadequate, its students have not made enough academic progress, its superintendent is retiring, its finances are stable but weak, there is little hope of more help from the state and this is the right time to try something new.

“One guiding principle has to be what is the best course of action so that Wellston kids have the best possible opportunity for education achievement, now and in the future,” [Chris L.] Nicastro [Missouri's commissioner of elementary and secondary education] said in one form or another several times [at the town hall meeting announcing the changes].

Translation?  ”What the hell does it matter?  The only thing we know for sure is that we can’t do anything to make Wellston any worse.”

“Plus with if we  keep grouping the hopeless kids in to a single concentrated camp…us, it will allow us to keep better tabs on them.”

Also new starting next year every Normandy school kid that no one thinks has a prayer will have to wear bright gold stars on their chest to…um…alert everyone to the fact they are super special…yeah, that’s the ticket…yeah…

Once the crowd started to accept the pre-defined fate of their Wellston school district plans were made to “carry on the legacy of Wellston.”  In this regard a bum has been hired to sleep on the front stoop of the Normandy elementary school and pee on at least one set of swings each day while trying to sell the kids drugs during recess.

via St. Louis Beacon

So most people have no idea what we are famous for, what we eat or where the hell we are.

…those that do though, think we are dying.

Sweet.

[Editor's Note: Loving the Popeye logo though!]

Which street that you regularly cross do you find most difficult?

• Forest Park Parkway
• Tucker
• Washington
• Grand
• Euclid
• Kingshighway
• Oakland
• Chesnut
• 11th
• Market
• Southwest
• Macausland
• Arsenal
• Manchester

No, thats the not list of every major street in the city of St. Louis, thats the list we pulled from the complaints.

So…

Your best bet in St. Louis is either to never leave your house, or get your poor ass a car.

Such a lovely city.

The Sociological Images blog recently put together some data on gay marriage support grouped by age bracket and ordered by a state’s overall support.  The overall takeaways of the graph are pretty clear, the younger generation is considerably more supportive of gay marriage, even in states that are generally considered toxic to gay rights like Utah or Alabama.

Of course the other thing you can take away from this data is how each state feels about the gay marriage movement.

Massachusetts, the jockstrap state of gay marriage, came in as the #1 supportive state with an overall percentage of ~56%.

Missouri ranked at #35.

Not much of a surprise to many I would imagine.  The interesting though is the breakdown between the age brackets (see the key on the above graph):

The younger age bracket of 18-29 is ~35% more supportive of gay marriage and if the vote was restricted to that younger demographic it appears gay marriage would pass.  Even more amazing is the difference between the younger demo and the one right above them in our fair state, nearly 15% higher support rate!

So, real-world, what does this mean?  To us the application of this data is simple.  The teenager that’s being a dick and you really want to piss off, will more than likely shrug off your gay jokes, but conversely they will rile up that old asshole in front of you in Walmart without fail.

I’m not here to be that guy that tells everyone that racism doesn’t exist any more.  It totally does and seen plenty of it with my own eyes.  This however, isn’t it:

When Sonja McClendon searched for senior housing for her 87-year-old black father in St. Louis County, she spotted advertisements for housing centers that didn’t feature any black people.

“That’s offensive,” she said. “It says that’s who lives here and maybe that’s the way we want to keep it.” She kept looking until she found ads, and a skilled-care housing option, that included black people.

Maybe these people are racists, maybe they really do hate black people and they went through the trouble to actually pick out white old people for their ads, but if thats the case, bring it forward!

In case your were wondering, the actual racist lady looked through ads until she found one with a black lady in it and put her father in there.  I hope she remembered to check if there were any old people with stupid, fame-whoring daughters in the ads, because if not, you have another chance for your name in paper one more time!

via Columbia Missourian

According to a national study that was just released, the number of people older than 12 that use meth in this area fell 60% between 2006 and 2008.  Not only that, but the number of people trying meth also dropped 60% as well.

Alright!  High-five cops!

But law enforcement officials took little solace in the numbers.

Awww.  Um…great.  Way to kill the mood.

Now we are happy folk that see the good in these number, but maybe the cops just think that maybe meth heads were too busy to do the survey those years, or the meth death rates jumped up 60% those 2 years.

Eh, wait.  There’s also this:

The number of meth labs and dump sites found in Missouri jumped from 2007 to 2008 after two years of flat numbers. The first six months of 2009 indicate things are getting worse, though still a long way from the dark days in the early 2000s.

“We’re still seeing that there’s a significant problem of methampthetamine use just by the number of meth labs that we’re seizing,” said Cpl. Gerald Williams of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department. “If they’re still making it, there’s still demand.”

Yes.  There clearly is still a demand, and the recent concert featuring the worst band ever Nickelback, sold out.  Are the two related?

Yes.

Who doesn’t love YouTube?  I kind of always relate it to New Orleans in that you go in there for what you say is a second and then in an instant you are hypnotized by the sheer number of crazy things to look at, 90% of which is stupid and or gross, and in the end you stumble out with nothing but feelings of guilt a few stories.

On our more recent trip to YouTube, we found this gem below from a guy that appears to be traveling the country and doing little videos for each stop.

This is his St. Louis video, in which he tells the story of how we used to be awesome, and now aren’t.

Apparently this guy has been getting killed over this video from our fellow citizens on the always pleasant comment section.  None of the comments seemed cool enough to repost here, but it got to the guy enough that he prepended the description of the video with this:

I changed the title to something obscure so fewer people would find it and complain. I’m not a fan of removing videos altogether. I think there’s an implicit reasonable expectation that what we see will remain available.

When I first read that, I really thought he let St. Louis have it but, after watching it, I couldn’t figure out what the problem was.  Sure he could have said more about St. Louis but the video is only a few minutes, and everything in there read right out of Wikipedia.

Nothing like good ole’ St. Louis folk getting after someone with their book learnin’.