HSMSE is notorious for its STEM nerds, but The Echo hosts numerous stubborn grammarians who quarrel over the most miniscule details of language. Copy editors viciously purge double spaces, rage over ”straight” quotation marks, and tirelessly correct Title Formatting — don’t even get them started on dashes. When they’re not typing essay-length Google Doc comments for careless writers, they often fight amongst each other over the intricacies of grammar. This article has been written atop the ruins of the newsroom after syntactical conflicts tore C5 apart.
Before the copy editing style guide existed, editors would constantly bicker over insignificant details. When Astrid, for example, added spaces around their em dashes as per usual, Eli protested, calling it “unrefined” and “pedestrian.” Astrid replied that Eli herself always said em dash spacing was a personal choice—as long as the writer remained consistent. Eli was frustrated at the discrepancy and described how she once “tried making a style guide, but it never got approved by the board!”
Oliver stepped in to create a comprehensive guide after receiving the go-ahead from Ms. Hesseltine, who claimed “The Echo’s editors know more than me about super specific linguistic mechanics!” Unfortunately, Oliver’s loving efforts have not improved the pandemonium, but rather exacerbated it—other editors have accused him of subverting the democratic process with his stubbornness and selective research.
As an APA Style enthusiast, he once brought up the little-known rule that a compound adjective is only hyphenated when it precedes the noun it describes. “Blasphemy!” Ocean shouted in response, “You corrupt the style guide with your APA bias.” Oliver responded, “I’m not, like, a tyrant about it! I let other people contribute. And besides, someone has to make it!”
“Guys!” Eli interjected. “We have limited time here. Let’s get back to our conversation about punctuation. Did you know: The Echo capitalizes full clauses after colons! What other rules do writers often mess up?”
Ocean brought up a common nitpick of his: “When you write dates like February 14, 2025, the ordinal number 14 has no ‘th.’” As he wrote out the example on the blackboard, Arianna finally snapped: “That’s a stupid rule. You obviously pronounce the ‘th,’ why wouldn’t you write it?!” “Just because it’s stupid doesn’t mean it’s not true!” Phoebe defended.
Ocean’s fury erupted, and he suddenly sent his chalk sailing through the air, clocking Arianna right in the face. She exclaimed, “Cheese and crackers, you’re all so dramatic about this! There’s no need to throw things at me over a ‘th.’” Arianna stood up out of her seat and stormed out of the boardroom.
Phoebe interjected, “Look at you fools. The editing department is gonna fall apart because you’re too emotionally invested in grammar.” Oliver argued, “You wouldn’t be saying that if this argument were about en dashes.” Phoebe grew defensive: “Hey! It’s an important rule. Writers are always using hyphens to indicate ranges!” Astrid, who had previously been guilty of several en dash crimes, felt compelled to defend themself: “It’s not that ridiculous of a mistake to make.” Oliver retaliated, “It’s egregious!”
In a fit of rage, Oliver lobbed the nearest chair at Astrid. Astrid managed to duck away in time thanks to their fierce jiu-jitsu skills, but the metal came down with a crash and knocked over an unsuspecting writer’s desk. “Oh my God!” they exclaimed in shock. “You’re going to bring the whole building down if all of this infighting continues!”
Ms. Hesseltine frantically hurried over to calm the situation. “Buddies, relax!” She screamed. “I’m going to get fired if you burn down the dungeon. Remember the journalistic ethics pledge we all signed? What would Zoe and Orlena [The Echo’s founders] say?” Unfortunately, the chaos had grown so much that no one registered her pleas for diplomacy. Ocean hurled his favorite red pen across the room and it hit an oblivious designer who cried out in agony.
The echoing of the bystander’s shrill screams burst the dungeon’s pipes, and a flood of murky sludge engulfed C5: Laptops combusted, stickers peeled off the walls, and Ms. Hesseltine’s beautiful, purple door ripped off its hinges. Baskerville Hall shook with the force of the rupture; the quad was the only place still intact.
As the dust settled, the editors took in all of the damage their fighting had caused. In hindsight, perhaps smart quotes and pluralizations weren’t worth destroying our school over. Ocean almost launched into another rant towards Arianna, but he restrained himself: “Fine, you can keep your ellipses unspaced… don’t let me stifle your self-expression.”