Slashdot Mirror
In Maryland, a Soviet-Style Punishment For a Novelist
An anonymous reader writes A 23-year-old teacher at a Cambridge, Md. middle school has been placed on leave and—in the words of a local news report — "taken in for an emergency medical evaluation" for publishing, under a pseudonym, a novel about a school shooting. The novelist, Patrick McLaw, an eighth-grade language-arts teacher at the Mace's Lane Middle School, was placed on leave by the Dorchester County Board of Education, and is being investigated by the Dorchester County Sheriff's Office, according to news reports from Maryland's Eastern Shore. The novel, by the way, is set 900 years in the future."
Book burns you.
He should have made the plot around child molesting instead of shooting! Geeze!
Only a verifiable head case would write about a school shooting 900 years in the future. I have it on good authority that the last 'chemical/kinetic homicide' was recorded in the waning days of the Transcend Uprising in 2234. By 2914, the most common spree killings, by method, are 'engineered retroviruses', 'covert antimatter decanting', and nanoassembler override.
Also, ever since Heuristic Neural Patterning became economically viable in the mid 24th century, 'school' exists as little more than a footnote in some of the low level neural patterning modules. I'm not sure why you'd expect to find enough people for a mass casualty incident visiting one.
"Think of the children"
The book is 900 years in the future. I think you mean "Think of the great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandchildren."
Someone should write a dystopian sci-fi novel about this (oh wait/Yo Dawg...).
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
But amid all the despair and hopelessness, people were working indefatigably to stabilise the nation and alleviate the prevalent tumult; and on 28 August 2298, the sedulousness of these committed inidividual was recompensed.
Zow. This guy was supposed to be a "language-arts" teacher. I think we can clear the Sherifs department of any charges of overreacting, Patrick McLaw is obviously a danger to himself and society.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Yet strangely, I don't recall anything about Stephen King being arrested in the middle of the night and involuntarily committed to a mental hospital.
Yeah, just who do you think is going to voluntarily go to Steven King's house in the middle of the night?