Have you ever wanted to write? I know I have.  I still occasionally think I ought to try my hand at it, but then I remind myself that I don’t know the first thing about writing.  Many people do write.  Successfully even. Some people write about science fiction.  Some people write about school shootings.  One man wrote a science fiction story about a school shooting set in the year 2902.  He was placed on a leave of absence due to “significant matters of concern brought forth by law enforcement.”

A Dorchester County, Maryland, teacher was taken in for an “emergency medical evaluation,” suspended from his job, and barred from setting foot on another public school. Authorities searched his school, Mace’s Lane Middle School in Cambridge, for weapons. As classes resumed, parents worried that their children were in danger, so police decided to remain on the premises to watch over them.

What happened? The teacher, Patrick McLaw, published a fiction novel. Under a pen name. About a made-up school shooting. Set in the year 2902.

 

If authorities are going to start rounding up people for the “crime” of writing science fiction stories that mirror real world events, they have a LOT of writers to go after.  Of course they started with a black man…