Dear Vocal Reviewers

Dear Vocal Reviewer's

Let me start by giving you a ton of credit for the job that you are doing. I can only imagine how much awful, terrible, craptacular writing you must encounter on a daily basis (e.g. see this very sentence) and I give you mad props for maintaining your sanity and faith in the general goodness of humanity in spite of it all. I have not doubt that when you graduated from college with a degree in English/creative writing/history/philosophy/fine arts you never thought you would have been given the opportunity you now have in front of you so early in your career. For most people, the chance to be a professional censor does not happen until much later in their lives when they become old fuddy-duddies, but you are tasting the intoxicating power that comes with holding the power of digital life and death in your very hands right out of school. You have proven all the naysayers, including your very 0wn friends and family wrong, and gotten a real job with a degree from an actual 4 year college and not obtained online. And, you did not study data science or machine learning or artificial intelligence like your grammie and granpa insisted you needed to do if you wanted to "go anywhere in life." Who's going somewhere now grammie? Who? You, that's who.

Now that you are living a life of ease and luxury on the fat paycheck and top of the line benefits an organization like Vocal.media no doubt pays you can say without question that the $120,000 you spent on college was well worth it and those loans should repay themselves within 20-30 years max.

With those pleasantries out of the say it's time to get to the heart of the issue and the reason for which I am writing you this letter. However, now that I find myself having made it this far I am struggling with exactly how to put this. Hmm. Let's see. Have you ever read George Orwell's 1984? No. Too on the nose I guess. Ok. How about, Jude the Obscure, or Lady Chatterly's Lover, or the Satanic Verses, or perhaps The Great Gatsby or The Catcher in the Rye? All of these classic books were banned or censored in one form or another for controversial content. Some had graphic content, others religious content, but all had some content that some or many people at the time the books were written felt was objectionable. They all in fact had content that would be banned here on Vocal.media the organization for which you currently work. And guess who would be the person deciding to ban these classics of literature? That would be you. So I ask you Mr. or Mrs. moderator. Do you want to be responsible for preventing the publication of the next The Grapes of Wrath or To Kill a Mockingbird? Do you? Because you could be. If you continue in your current role as a professional censor for Vocal.media you might be the person everyone in the future points at as the one asshole that thought The Color Purple did not meet the community standards of Vocal.media and therefore could not be published here. Put that on the old resume and see how many job offers you get. But, more importantly, could you live with yourself? Seriously, think about it, could you? I will end this letter here and let you cogitate on that last point for a while. It is not a pleasant thought.

Sincerely,

Everyday Junglist

07/12/21