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Mother says yearbook photo of son offensive, wants recall

By Cynthia Kopkowski

 

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

 

Wednesday, May 18, 2005

 

BOYNTON BEACH ? For a mother who remembered the senior superlatives in her own high school yearbook hewing to "Most Likely to Succeed" and "Best Smile," the picture came as a surprise to Jacqueline Nobles.

 

In Boynton Beach High's 2005 yearbook, her son, Robert Richards, is shown with a leash around his neck.

 

Two of the superlatives categories in the 2005 Boynton Beach High yearbook. Robert Richards, 19, whose mother demanded the recall, is shown at right with girlfriend Melissa Finley. They have since broken up but remain close friends.

 

Students voting on superlatives ? a staple of yearbooks for decades ? elected Richards as "Most Whipped" by his girlfriend, using the slang term for a person who is controlled by another in a relationship. The accompanying photo shows Richards, who is black, on a leash held by Melissa Finley, who is white.

 

Nobles wants the books recalled.

 

"I know it's supposed to be in fun, but there are people still having trouble with African-Americans' past and this will be offensive," said Nobles, who said the picture reminded her of the poster for the 1970s miniseries Roots, which featured a manacled slave. "This picture, to me, is very distasteful."

 

Another photo, of the winners of the "Most Likely To Be On Jerry Springer" category, features a male student pretending to be on the verge of hitting a female with the back of his hand.

 

The pictures are inappropriate, school district spokesman Nat Harrington said. The professional standards committee will investigate the situation, Harrington said, and there could be "serious disciplinary consequences" for yearbook adviser Jordan Barenburg and "anyone else who should have brought it to the forefront for review before it was published."

 

Harrington said the review likely will include Principal William Latson.

 

"We expect the adviser to apply good judgment, good common sense, ethical standards, moral standards and standards that reflect the level of respect and dignity we expect in our schools," Harrington said.

 

About 240 copies of the yearbook made it into students' hands before Nobles called the school Tuesday to complain to Latson. The principal is holding an additional 460.

 

Neither Barenburg nor Latson returned calls for comment.

 

Perhaps least upset by the photo is Richards, 19, who is bound for Florida Atlantic University after graduation next week. In fact, he came up with the idea.

 

Richards said he and Finley thought it would set them apart from the other superlative students striking traditional poses. They have broken up since the photo was taken, he said, but remain close friends and have the same opinion of the photo.

 

"We don't see a problem with it," Richards said before referencing the Roots character that haunted his mother when she saw the photo. "Kunta Kinte ? that was over 300 years ago."

 

He also believes his mother and those who might share her anxiety think differently about racism and slavery because of their age. He and his peers aren't as conscious of race, he said.

 

"If there was a black girl doing this in the picture, it wouldn't be an issue," Richards said.

 

A number of black students were standing around when the photo was taken and nobody protested, he said. "These are people who if they had a problem would have let us know," he said.

 

Yearbooks have evolved from their early days as catalogs of smiling students in tuxedos and gowns and cheerleaders in knee-length skirts shouting into megaphones.

 

In recent years, yearbook editors at some Palm Beach County schools have had to edit slang and obscenities from senior quotes, ban senior superlatives and study photos closely for indications of drug or alcohol use. At least one yearbook company offers principals the option of using stickers to cover offending photos. The page tears when someone tries to remove the sticker.

 

Along with such traditional or uplifting categories as "Best All Around" or "Next Bill Gates," Boynton Beach High's superlatives also featured students under the headings "Biggest Slacker" and "Worst Case of Senioritis."

 

The district will explore the feasibility of recalling the first batch of yearbooks and having them reprinted without the leash photo, as Nobles is requesting, Harrington said.

 

"I don't want this to be the memory any student has of my son," Nobles said. "Just like these books went into circulation, they can come back out."

I will admit that the white girl having the black kid in a leash has some major undertones to it, and that the yearbook advisor should have caught it. At first, when I read this, I feared it was going to be that parents were upset over the sexual connotations, which would have been ridiculous as far as I was concerned. But anyway, should be a fun story to talk about.

I wonder if the right wingers who think kids didn't know about oral until Clinton will make a connection between this and the Abu Ghariab photos.....

We have something of an issue in my country of, "well, it might offend...". Typically, it's things like, "we shouldn't celebrate Christmas in schools, because it might offend non-Christians".

 

Is this image offensive? If you want it to be. Was it intended to be offensive? No. You can take offense at anything you like, or get upset by whatever you want. But is it worth it, really?

 

The guy in the picture isn't offended, as he went along with it. (Excluding, of course, the chance that he went along with his girlfriend despite not being happy with it, which is his own fault, really.) The "number of black students ... standing around when the photo was taken" didn't protest.

 

This woman is doing more harm to race relations and getting on with the future than helping. She's creating a climate of "who will this offend" and oversensitivity with it. Not good.

 

EDIT:

 

Here's the picture:

 

 

and Officials order stickers to cover photos, ask students to return copies

Race aside, it's a stupid thing to put in a high school yearbook. Who the hell edits these things anymore?

I don't have an issue with the superlatives themselves, but the accompanying pictures have a tendency to be idiotic. I remember one in my yearbooks a couple years ago that featured the two class clowns running down the hall with the American Flag on a pole like it was a spear.

Kids will be kids. I take satisfaction that I'll be able to use stupid poses from our yearbook to tease my friends with in the future.