On April 1, 2012 the Maneater, Mizzou’s primary newspaper, published their annual April Fools Edition. This year’s title: the Carpeteater.
'The Carpeteater' April Fool's Edition
After years of doing an April Fools edition, their reign has come to an end with their latest edition of the Carpeteater. Not only did they throw in slurs toward women but managed to insult the LGBTQ community as well. But the managing editor, who has asked not to be named, has stuck by her word in saying she was unaware of any negativity toward the LGBTQ community.
“I truly did not know that “carpet eater” is a derogatory term used for a lesbian,” the unnamed source said.
She later told Campus Basement she believed that carpet eater was actually a term referring to the carpet beetle, which – you guessed it – eats carpet. She later mentioned that this may have been offensive to the biologist/entomologist community and apologized for that statement as well.
The most surprising factor for this recent issue is that it somehow got past the entire editorial board, designers and editor in chief without any resistance. The words slut, whore and cunt were also used in this issue, which were “supposed” to be used in a satirical manner. According to the unnamed source, as long as they are used in satirical language they aren’t offensive; well, we learned that the hard way, too.
As always, the Maneater has done an incredible job at not only embarrassing themselves but really showing us the issues. Thank you Carpeteater, for not only providing us with instant entertainment, but another reason to hate you. I believe Steve on the Maneater website said it best, “I’m just amazed that this could’ve all been avoided by a simple Google search.”
