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LGMS Students Shineat District and Region Competitions

Volume 2, Issue 4

March 2016

publication of Locust Grove Middle School

WILDCAT WIT WISDOM

Gianna Curra, 2nd place writing winner

at Griffin RESA Literacy Days

LGMS Spelling Bee winner

DesireéGordon.

LGMS Reading Bowl team placed fourth in recent

county competition.

LGMS 7th grade drama team won for their grade level at Henry County Literacy

Days competition. Karizma Munoz, Catherine Brockman, Ryleigh Mann, Cierra

Chatman, Courtney Tabacci, Courtney White, Ahava Murray, Emma Gowen)

LGMS Science Fair participants William Ward,

Tyler Maddox, and Colby Dempsey are going to

the state science fair April 1st. They also won

the Broadcom Masters Award and will have the

opportunity to compete nationally in 2017.

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Page 2

Permission to Speak Freely?

Students on Team 802 recently competed for a pizza party and the chance to represent

LGMS in a national writing competition sponsored by Fox News and John Stossel on the

topic of threats to American first amendment rights. Below is one of the team winning

essays.

By Matthew Manley

The U.S Constitution states that there can be no law that prohibits free speech. But there are

people who are trying to do that very thing. If we didn’t have free speech, we wouldn’t be able to for-

mulate our own opinions and share them with other people. Free speech is also important so that if

we need to, we can tell the truth, and it will prevail.

Religion is a very controversial topic. But one religion in particular does what others won’t:

killing people for "disrespecting" their god. I’m talking about the Islamic religion. Now, not all people

who are in the religion or support it are violent, but many are. One example of a violent act in this

religion is the Charlie Hebdo shooting. There had been a drawing contest about the Prophet Mu-

hammad. Two gunmen raided the office building and killed 12 people, and injured 11. Think about

this for a second. Twelve people died over a simple drawing contest. That shows me that some

people will do anything to prevent free speech.

Students created a bulletin board in the commons with excerpts from several essays and

quotes about freedom of speech by celebrities and other famous individuals.

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Another time free speech is limited is when peo-

ple criticize the LGBT community. If you just so happen

to not like or support the LGBT community, you could be

put down as a homophobe. I have seen plenty of people

try to state their opinion about the issue, only to get

called out. Sometimes, gays or their supporters will call these opinions “hate speech”. In 2004, a

disabled veteran came home to find a U.S flag with the LGBT colors on it. He claimed that it was

disrespectful and went to twitter about it. After about an hour, his tweet was taken down. Now isn’t

that crazy?

One other example of people who try to limit free speech are feminists. Now I’m not talking

about women who simply want equality. I’m talking about the ones that think women are superior to

men. I once saw a feminist claim on Twitter that all men are rapists and pigs. A respectful person

counterclaimed her argument. After a while, she reported him and blocked him for being misogynic.

And then there are many more like her, being mean and trying to stop us from saying what we want

about women, even in a respectful way. But as I said, not all feminists are like this. Just the ones

whose lights aren’t all on upstairs.

Now here’s something you’ve probably heard of: censorship at schools. It’s nothing new.

But some schools censor too much. Some colleges around the world condone people being able to

talk about how they feel about other controversial topics, such as homosexuality. A student at one

college was protesting why abortion is not acceptable. Then a female professor and two other stu-

dents took her sign! The professor then laughed and taunted in the student’s face. I bet you’reguessing that the professor got in trouble. Well you’d be wrong because the professor got no pun-

ishment whatsoever! To me that is just unfair to the student. She was trying to use her freedom of

speech and it got taken down! People like that professor make me sick to my stomach. It should

make you angry, too! I hope this never happens on a

college campus ever again!

Everyday our free speech gets dwindled down. But we can stop this by speaking up against

people who are trying to stop it! People like ISIS, feminists who don’t understand the concept of

feminism, college liberals, and rude people in the LBGT community. If we all stand together, I know

we can protect one of our most basic and important rights!

Making the point during a protest rally

that it often feels like our rights to free

speech are being thrown away.

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Page 4

Should Violent Video Games Be Banned?

An editorial by Jawon Dozier

Many people say violent video games are to blame for today's youth being more aggressiveand violent. I think that's only partially true because people have an option to do the right thing orthe wrong thing. But studies show that 90 percent of young people play video games and out of that90 percent 66 percent play violent video games. When someone constantly plays violent games theythink about the things that happen in those games. So for many people violent video games cloudtheir minds because that's all they play.

I think if people didn't play the games so often the violence wouldn't crowd their minds.Maybe they could have some type of schedule or something to limit them from playing all day everyday. Lots of people that play violent video games even myself limit ourselves from playing all thetime. If people limited how often their children or themselves played it wouldn't be a concern. Be-

cause then their minds wouldn't be crowded with these graphic images and things. But since every-one won't do those things I think the companies that make thee games should make it possible forthe player to only play a certain amount of time per week. The limit could be set by parents orguardians based on how old the child is.

However sometimes limiting the amount of time someone plays doesn't help. For example, in Sep-tember 2007 a 17 year old boy named Daniel Petric killed his mother and wounded his father be-cause they took Halo 3 from him. It all started when his dad took the copy of Halo 3 and locked itaway in a lock-box located in his closet (which incidentally was the same place he kept a 9mmhandgun tucked away). A month later, Daniel broke into the lock-box and retrieved both the Halo 3game and the 9mm handgun. Once both items were in hand, Daniel went downstairs and ap-proached his parents as they lounged on the couch. He asked them to close their eyes, claiming thehe had a "surprise." Mark Petric, 45, testified that he was actually expecting a pleasant surprise. Un-fortunately, that pleasant surprise turned out to be a shot in the head, killing the mother and"gravely" wounding the father. Daniel immediately place the gun in his father's hand, saying "HeyDad, here's your gun. Take it."

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Mark, still alive, blood pouring from his bullet wound, his head numb, realized that his wife wasdead. He believes that he is still alive because of his older daughter and son-in-law arriving at thehouse to watch an Indians game. "You guys shouldn't come in," he heard Daniel tell the couple out-side. "Mom and Dad had a big argument."

Like some cue from a horror movie, Heidi and Andrew both said that they heard moans com-ing from inside the house, perhaps even calling out their names. After bursting into the house andinvestigating, they found the wounded father and dead mother. In response, Daniel picked up thegun, poised to kill, however Andrew managed to seize the weapon from the boy before any addition-al slayings occurred. Daniel fled in the family van, but was captured by police shortly thereafter, Ha-lo 3 sitting in the front seat like some possessed Book of the Dead.

Many events such as this have taken place because people tried to limit their children. Thatshows that it depends on the person when it comes how you can limit them. For some people youhave to take it step-by-step and for others its a more forward process. So you have to know the per-son enough to choose the right method. Maybe for some people after a certain amount of time youcan start to give back the privilege of gaming. This should be an option only if you notice the person becoming more responsible.

“Daniel fled in the family van, butwas captured by

police shortlythereafter, Halo 3sitting in the frontseat like some pos-sessed Book of the

Dead.”

www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/family/11/03/healthmag.violent.kids/index.html?eref=rss_tech

www.videogames.procon.org

www.lifetickler.com/do-violent-games-make-people-violent/http://www.tomsguide.com/us/Halo 3 Shot Parents news 3153.html

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WILDCAT WIT

& WISDOM:

A PUBLICATION OF

LGMS TEAM 802

Sponsor: Ms. Gardner

Locust GroveMiddle School

3315 South Ola Rd.Locust Grove, GA

Team 801 Visit to the Civil Rights Museum

and World of Coke

Team 801 exploring the World of Coke

A beautiful day outside the Atlanta

Civil Rights Museum of living and

interactive history.

March 2016 NL

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