# Covington Catholic High (in case it hasn't been mentioned already)

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090>\
**Category:** The BBQ Pit\
**Created:** [January 20, 2019, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090 "2019-01-20T02:23:43Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 20\
**Page:** 31

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**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/601 "2019-01-24T17:18:40Z")

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How is this a story, when there are so many actual important things happening in the world?

It’s horrifying to see young people wearing MAGA hats, but that’s their right and is not newsworthy. Unless there is another part of the video I’m missing, the Native drummer was getting up in the grill of the high school kid, not vice versa. Since when is refusing to back down and standing your ground a crime?

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**Author:** ![LAZombie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/b38774/32.png) [@LAZombie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LAZombie)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/602 "2019-01-24T18:05:35Z")

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> [@Heffalump\_and\_Roo](#):
>
> Just did a quick search on that opinion piece in the NY Post (as already noted), quite different than the NY Times.
> 
> A [Snopes piece](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nathan-phillips-vietnam-veteran/) says that the question of whether Phillips lied about being a Vietnam vet is “unproven”. His words in the transcript seem to say that he says Vietnam era or Vietnam times vet. CNN and the NY TImes made corrections to their transcript because they claimed he was a Vietnam vet, which is not something he clearly said.
> 
> The [college incident](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6613425/Native-American-man-harassed-Catholic-students-targeted-before.html) was in 2015.
> 
> I find it unsurprising that a person of color has faced two separate incidents involving their race.

Wow, another Liberal who doesn’t even bother to read his own cite. :dubious:

In the Snopes article YOU cited, they link to a Facebook video made by Nathan Phillips where he calls himself a “Vietnam Vet.”

“I’m a **Vietnam ve** t, and I served in Marine Corps 72 to 76. I got discharged May 5th, 1976. I got honorable discharge and one of the boxes in there it shows it was peacetime or, what my box says is that I was ‘in theater.’ I don’t talk much about my Vietnam times. I usually say I don’t recollect, I don’t recall those years”:

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Taber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac91a4/32.png) [@Taber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taber)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/603 "2019-01-24T18:22:58Z")

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> [@SlackerInc](#):
>
> How is this a story, when there are so many actual important things happening in the world?
> 
> It’s horrifying to see young people wearing MAGA hats, but that’s their right and is not newsworthy. Unless there is another part of the video I’m missing, the Native drummer was getting up in the grill of the high school kid, not vice versa. Since when is refusing to back down and standing your ground a crime?

While I agree that the the kid in the thumbnail picture didn’t seem to do anything wrong, a lot of his classmates went straight to racism when confronted.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/604 "2019-01-24T18:24:39Z")

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Just seems like one of those things people got hot and bothered over when Obama was president and news was slow. Right now we have a government shutdown and a president who is a Manchurian Candidate, not to mention a Democratic primary race getting rolling.

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**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/605 "2019-01-24T18:28:02Z")

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“Nathan Phillips, a native elder and Vietnam vet, says the kids approached him and surrounded him! You going to call a native American Vietnam Vet a liar?”

\<video emerges which shows no such thing\>

“Ok, Nathan Phillips now says he misremembered a major part of an event that happened just a day ago, and that he may have approached them.”

\<information surfaces that shows he wasn’t a Vietnam vet\>

“Oh, but he never said he was a Vietnam vet - only a ‘Vietnam ERA’ vet!”

\<video surfaces of Nathan Phillips explicitly saying he’s a Vietnam Veteran\>

“That doesn’t matter! What matters is that the poor old elder went up to the boys only to make peace and defuse the situation, even if the video kinda looks like he was being pretty aggressive and got in a 15 year old’s face. But the important thing is that he was just trying to make peace!”

“How do you know that?”

“Because Nathan Phillips said so!”

“Oh, okay…”

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**Author:** ![Airbeck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/airbeck/32/6574_2.png) [@Airbeck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airbeck)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/606 "2019-01-24T18:28:48Z")

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Ok now do Trump.

I’ll wait…

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/607 "2019-01-24T18:29:05Z")

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> [@Taber](#):
>
> While I agree that the the kid in the thumbnail picture didn’t seem to do anything wrong, a lot of his classmates went straight to racism when confronted.

Did they? How? Can you link to the video evidence of this?

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**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/608 "2019-01-24T18:30:49Z")

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“Hey, guys, we really shouldn’t do this, this guy is a Vietnam war vet…”  
“No, he isn’t, he’s lying about all that!”  
“He is? Well, OK, then, fuck his sorry ass!”

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/609 "2019-01-24T18:32:12Z")

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> [@Airbeck](#):
>
> Ok now do Trump.
> 
> I’ll wait…

Trump lies his face off. I do not like Trump. Trump is a bad person.

Fortunately, he has nothing to do with this situation, except that for some triggered people a kid in a MAGA hat will do fine as a Trump surrogate for spewing hatred.

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**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/610 "2019-01-24T18:34:02Z")

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> [@elucidator](#):
>
> “Hey, guys, we really shouldn’t do this, this guy is a Vietnam war vet…”  
> “No, he isn’t, he’s lying about all that!”  
> “He is? Well, OK, then, fuck his sorry ass!”

No, more like, “This person has proven himself willing to lie to bolster himself and his cause again and again, so why exactly are we taking his word for anything at all?”

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/611 "2019-01-24T18:36:21Z")

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> [@LAZombie](#):
>
> Wow, another Liberal who doesn’t even bother to read his own cite. :dubious:
> 
> In the Snopes article YOU cited, they link to a Facebook video made by Nathan Phillips where he calls himself a “Vietnam Vet.”
> 
> “I’m a **Vietnam ve** t, and I served in Marine Corps 72 to 76. I got discharged May 5th, 1976. I got honorable discharge and one of the boxes in there it shows it was peacetime or, what my box says is that I was ‘in theater.’ I don’t talk much about my Vietnam times. I usually say I don’t recollect, I don’t recall those years”:

You are claiming that a rambling facebook video was his official statement to the press?

> [@Sam\_Stone](#):
>
> “Nathan Phillips, a native elder and Vietnam vet, says the kids approached him and surrounded him! You going to call a native American Vietnam Vet a liar?”
> 
> \<video emerges which shows no such thing\>

I’ve got some blank VHS tapes in my basement that also show no such thing.

> [@](#):
>
> “Ok, Nathan Phillips now says he misremembered a major part of an event that happened just a day ago, and that he may have approached them.”

Cite this, please.

> [@](#):
>
> \<information surfaces that shows he wasn’t a Vietnam vet\>
> 
> “Oh, but he never said he was a Vietnam vet - only a ‘Vietnam ERA’ vet!”

Yep, consistent with all of his interviews with the press.

> [@](#):
>
> \<video surfaces of Nathan Phillips explicitly saying he’s a Vietnam Veteran\>

Old and long rambling facebook video, where it is actually a bit hard to her whether he said “era” in there or not, and in any case, was not an official statement to the press, or to anyone at all.

At best, you have proof that he misspoke once.

> [@](#):
>
> “That doesn’t matter! What matters is that the poor old elder went up to the boys only to make peace and defuse the situation, even if the video kinda looks like he was being pretty aggressive and got in a 15 year old’s face. But the important thing is that he was just trying to make peace!”

15 years old?

> [@](#):
>
> “How do you know that?”
> 
> “Because Nathan Phillips said so!”
> 
> “Oh, okay…”

This was pretty poorly done on your part. Very poorly done. The fire marshal called, and is concerned about all this straw you left lying about here.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/612 "2019-01-24T18:39:15Z")

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Why would any Democrat take a stand here? This is ceding ground to the bad guys, people. Just abandon it and move on to more fertile territory.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/613 "2019-01-24T18:41:02Z")

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> [@Sam\_Stone](#):
>
> Trump lies his face off. I do not like Trump. Trump is a bad person.
> 
> Fortunately, he has nothing to do with this situation, except that for some triggered people a kid in a MAGA hat will do fine as a Trump surrogate for spewing hatred.

Well, except that trump has taken an interest in this conversation, and you are on his side of it. That alone should give you pause.

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**Author:** ![Tee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@Tee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tee)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/614 "2019-01-24T18:46:40Z")

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> [@LAZombie](#):
>
> Wow, another Liberal who doesn’t even bother to read his own cite. :dubious:
> 
> In the Snopes article YOU cited, they link to a Facebook video made by Nathan Phillips where he calls himself a “Vietnam Vet.”
> 
> “I’m a **Vietnam ve** t, and I served in Marine Corps 72 to 76. I got discharged May 5th, 1976. I got honorable discharge and one of the boxes in there it shows it was peacetime or, what my box says is that I was ‘in theater.’ I don’t talk much about my Vietnam times. I usually say I don’t recollect, I don’t recall those years”:

Vietnam Veterans are people who were active duty during the military operations in Vietnam and Southeast Asia. So said the US Vietnam War Commemoration, the VFW, and also my stepdad with two bronze stars and jungle-rot feet who did not see a reason to glorify his situation. Stepdad was admittedly drunk and AWOL between his two tours, but papers show that he served with distinction and was honorably discharged at the ripe old age of 23 or so. Please cease this horseshit.

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**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/615 "2019-01-24T18:50:19Z")

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> [@Sam\_Stone](#):
>
> No, more like, “This person has proven himself willing to lie to bolster himself and his cause again and again, so why exactly are we taking his word for anything at all?”

You’re either missing the point, or evading it. The young MAGA louts didn’t know anything _at all_ about him at the time. If the question is about their behavior, his honesty regarding his life experience is not relevant.

For me, the bigger question is about the presumed “adults” who set this minor tragedy in motion.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/616 "2019-01-24T20:19:18Z")

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> [@elucidator](#):
>
> You’re either missing the point, or evading it. The young MAGA louts didn’t know anything _at all_ about him at the time. If the question is about their behavior, his honesty regarding his life experience is not relevant.
> 
> For me, the bigger question is about the presumed “adults” who set this minor tragedy in motion.

His honesty certainly matters if you are citing him as a factual source. For example, his claim that he approached them as an act of peace and to protect them from the Hebrew Israelites is contradicted by his behaviour and that of his supporters in the video. So why on Earth would you believe him? He’s already been shown to be a serial liar.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/617 "2019-01-24T20:24:35Z")

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> [@Tee](#):
>
> Vietnam Veterans are people who were active duty during the military operations in Vietnam and Southeast Asia. So said the US Vietnam War Commemoration, the VFW, and also my stepdad with two bronze stars and jungle-rot feet who did not see a reason to glorify his situation. Stepdad was admittedly drunk and AWOL between his two tours, but papers show that he served with distinction and was honorably discharged at the ripe old age of 23 or so. Please cease this horseshit.

I see. So Phillips, who joined the Marine Corps Reserves a year after the last Marine left Vietnam, and who was a refrigeration tech stateside in the reserves for a while until numerous AWOLs and other displinary problems got him a general or disciplinary discharge, is completely in the right to call himself a ‘Vietnam vet’. That’s what you are going to stick to?

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**Author:** ![Taber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac91a4/32.png) [@Taber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taber)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/618 "2019-01-24T20:32:34Z")

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> [@Sam\_Stone](#):
>
> Did they? How? Can you link to the video evidence of this?

Did you not see any videos of the event at all? Tomahawk chopping and mocking his chant is pretty prevalent. It’s an inflammatory title, but [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8Esf5WO5fQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8Esf5WO5fQ)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/619 "2019-01-24T21:26:39Z")

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> [@elucidator](#):
>
> You’re either missing the point, or evading it. The young MAGA louts didn’t know anything _at all_ about him at the time. If the question is about their behavior, his honesty regarding his life experience is not relevant.
> 
> For me, the bigger question is about the presumed “adults” who set this minor tragedy in motion.

I do wonder if the “adults” were actually looking towards a physical confrontation between their students and the Black Israelites. Letting them get themselves worked up, singing school fight songs and chants, and not defusing the situation. That was what they were there for.

They didn’t get on any of the students about harassing a woman they chose to target, and they did nothing o head off this probable physical violent confrontation.

the BI’s were definitely shouting some pretty inflammatory stuff, and it would be “reasonable” for some of the kids to react with violence towards it. The BI’s wanted a physical confrontation as well.

So, two groups, one looking for a fight, and the other not avoiding it. There were no adults to remove tensions. They say they asked if they could sing school songs and cheers, which are things that you sing at sports games to rile up your team and the crowd for a physical confrontation, they are not what you use to lower tension. The kids may not have understood that, but the chaperones most certainly should have.

If they had been looking to lower tensions, they should have suggested “This little light of mine”, not the school fight song.

So, yeah, it seems like the only adult who was looking to prevent violence was Philips. His act of getting in between the groups and distracting them probably headed off a physical confrontation between them.

I get that the students misunderstood this. They just saw some weird guy chanting some weird (but not foreign) language at them. It was something different, so it was something to be challenged and mocked, because they are a bunch of teenage boys, and that’s what teenage boys do when they confront something they don’t understand.

I mostly believe the student when he says that he didn’t understand what Philips was doing, and that is why he thought that Philips was trying to cause an altercation, rather than to prevent one. In his usual environment at a far right religious indoctrination center, adults escalate things, rather than mollify. That explains why the student was so confrontational “back” at him, he was reacting to Philips the way he would if it were a teacher or other adult peer in his community. He is not used to adults trying to calm things down. He was sent on a trip, by adults, half across the country for the specific purpose of riling things up, why would he think that an adult is looking to calm a situation? It’s just not something that really conforms to his life experiences.

In the end, Philips most likely prevented a brawl between the groups, while the chaperones not only allowed it, but took steps to increase its likelihood.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\
**Post date:** [January 24, 2019, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covington-catholic-high-in-case-it-hasnt-been-mentioned-already/828090/620 "2019-01-24T21:27:19Z")

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…is it just me or has this story gotten massively stupider since the discussion started?

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