Sports Illus. Swimsuit

[Northeast Community School District <Gooselak@INS.INFONET.NET>]

        The following is a letter to the editor of the Des Moines, Iowa
newspaper that I wrote several years ago concerning the swimsuit issue of
"Sports Illusrated" magazine.

        I'm writing in regard to the article in the Feb. 14, 1989 issue of
the Des Moines Register about the annual swimsuit issue of the "Sports
Illustrated" magazine and the apparent wide spread censorship of this
particular issue by school officials.
        We see almost every type of censorship possible in regard to the
swimsuit issue.  When the pictures are removed that is abridgement, when
only the articles are photocopied it is restriction, and when the whole
issue is withheld it is censorship.  I would like people to stop and think
about what they are doing concerning the "Sports Illustrated" swimsuit
issue and the messages they are sending to the students by their behavior.
The first message is that adults are unaware of the equally suggestive
pictures in other magazines.  (Teenagers thought adults were out of it, now
they know for sure.)  The second message is that suggestive pictures are
dirty or that sex is dirty.  (Let's make sure the next generation is a
neurotic as we are philosophy.)  The third message is "you are too young to
see this".  (What better incentive to whet the curiosity of young people.)
        My point is this the swimsuit issue of the "Sports Illustrated"
magazine is part of our mass media culture.  Students have the money and
transportation necessary to buy a copy at any local newsstand.  Students
are reading it and seeing it.

Kathy Geronzin,
Jr.-Sr. High School Librarian,
Northeast Communit School District
Goose Lake, IA 52750

Hate is not a family value.