It’s the 21st century and somehow parents are still managing to be scared of Iron Maiden. This time, satanic panic nostalgia has reared its head in St. Catharines, Ontario, where a high school principal was faced with petitions for her firing because she posted a photo of herself next to a truck covered in Maiden decorations and another picture of an Eddie toy sitting on a dashboard above a piece of paper that says “EDDIE” and has a nice 666 with a heart drawn around it.
The National Post reports that the principal, Sharon Burns of Eden High School, inspired a Change.org petition over the since-deleted photos that called for her to be fired.
Though it’s been dropped now, the petition read: “As concerned parents with impressionable children at Eden High School, we are deeply disturbed that the principal assigned to the school blatantly showed Satanic symbols and her allegiance to Satanic practices on her public social media platforms where all the students can see them.”
Soon after, another petition was launched in her defense that called the effort “ridiculous.” It also pointed out that Eden “is a public school[,] not a Christian school,” and stated that Principal Burns “spreads nothing but love and kindness, and is probably one of the best and most enthusiastic principals the school has ever had.” At the time of writing, it has 23,638 signatures.
The now-removed original petition had 553.
The district school board “spoke with Burns and the parents who published [the petition]” and decided “no disciplinary action or policy changes were needed.” A St. Catharines city councillor called the whole thing “funny, silly, and frustrating all at the same time.”
Fortunately, everything seems to have turned out all right in this case and the board has sent Burns’ critics running to the hills.This victory for rock and roll leaves the schools of St. Catharines safe to celebrate heavy music and produce future Neil Pearts and Alexisonfires.
[via Consequence]
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