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Journalism dean 'appalled' by piece on Asians

CU newspaper posts apology for student's column

By James B. Meadow, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published February 22, 2008 at 12:30 a.m.

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Karson, 22, says he wanted to bring attention to issue.

Karson, 22, says he wanted to bring attention to issue.

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With his latest foray to the edges of free speech, University of Colorado student Max Karson may have gone from gadfly to gad-pterodactyl.

On Monday, the 22-year-old psychology major wrote an opinion piece on CU's Campus Press Web site that, although intended to be a satire about whites' attitudes toward Asians, instead caused indignation from the school's journalism department and administration, as well as numerous members of the campus's different ethnic communities.

"I was appalled" said Paul Voakes, dean of the CU Journalism School, which oversees the Campus Press as an advanced class.

Referring to the "incredibly incendiary subject matter" of Karson's column, Voakes said, "I wish these student editors had recognized that this is bad commentary, bad opinion journalism, and it did not deserve publication, especially in our student paper."

Agreeing with Voakes was Shail Mehta, president of CU's South Asian Student Association, who said, "I get that it was meant to be a joke, a satire, but I'm offended. I don't think that kind of stuff is appropriate in a university newspaper, especially things that filter hatred. Words are very powerful."

Campus Press editors posted an online statement, which said in part, "We owe it to those who were offended by the article to maintain the highest level of journalistic integrity, and sincerely apologize to anyone who was hurt by this article."

Although Karson did not respond to the Rocky Mountain News' requests for an interview, he did explain his motivation for writing the article to other media outlets.

"Just from the interaction with the Asian students, I felt like they were grouping together because they felt ostracized from the rest of the CU community," he told 9News.

"I just wanted to bring attention to that and bring it up for discussion because I think it's important."

Karson's actions have proved vexing to CU in the past.

Last April 17, in the wake of the shooting spree at Virginia Tech University that left 32 students dead, Karson made comments in a CU journalism class to the effect that he "would be capable of killing 32 people."

He also reportedly said, "If anyone in here says they've never been so angry that you wanted to kill 32 people, you're lying."

Students in the class felt sufficiently threatened by Karson's tone to notify school officials.

He was handcuffed, taken to Boulder County Jail and charged with one count of interference with staff, faculty or students of an educational institution, a misdemeanor.

The charge was dropped by August.

In October 2006, the university had threatened to look into whether Karson's self-published satirical newsletter, The Yeti, violated the school's code of conduct by printing an article of his that purported to give men advice on how to deny women pleasure during sex.

Swiftly, the American Civil Liberties Union became involved.

By November, CU dropped the matter.

Most of the Campus Press staff already have started trying to build bridges with the greater university community.

Student editors spent Thursday afternoon meeting with different ethnic organizations, trying to "clear the air, apologize and listen," CU spokesman Bronson Hilliard said.

meadowj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2606

Comments

  • February 22, 2008

    1:35 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    montanarose writes:

    This eejit has had his fifteen minutes of fame, and then some. Can't we just move on and stop giving him what he wants (namely, attention)?

  • February 23, 2008

    12:06 a.m.

    Suggest removal

    rensational writes:

    I say the attention is pretty good. He keeps exposing himself as a psycho. If there is any justice, this dude will have a hard time finding a job after graduation, especially in journalism. Then again, he IS a white male...

  • February 29, 2008

    10:04 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    ExploitAsian writes:

    A creative writing teach once taught me that if you have to explain what you wrote, you probably didn't go a good job of writing it in the first place.

    Max Karson recently published an article in the Daily Camera attempting to provide his point of view. That very at is admission that his opinion piece was a piece you know what.

    He went on to say that, "Sometimes it is necessary to offend,"...in order to bring these issues to light. Really? It was NECESSARY? There really was absolutely no other way of writing that story? You really couldn't come up with a better way? The worst way was your only choice? Really?

    You couldn't have interviewed actual Asians about actual racial tension issues. It was necessary to make it up?

    This is a testament to how poor of a writer Karson is, not how creative he is. I believe that Karson is afraid that people will discover him for what he is: a bad writer.

    Regardless of the racial tones, his article was poorly written. How could any editor in any press of any kind ever consider that good writing? It's high school diary at best. I find the back of cereal boxes more interesting. I've read fortune cookies with more relevancy.

    He is a bad writer. He is so afraid of being discovered, he resorted to the only thing he knows: publicity generating antics.

    He's a great marketer. But he is no journalist.