Publix Edits the Dirty Word out of 'Summa Cum Laude' on a Graduation Cake
Source – Saturday was Jacob Koscinski’s big day. His whole family, many from out of town, saw the Charleston, S.C., student graduate from his Christian-based home-school program with a 4.89 grade-point average and the coveted honor of summa cum laude.
His mother, Cara Koscinski … ordered a cake online from her nearest grocery store, Publix, which lets customers build their own cakes complete with a customized inscription, which they enter into a message box marked “cake message option.”
Carefully, she typed in the words she wanted on the cake: “Congrats Jacob! Summa Cum Laude class of 2018.”
Publix’s online system was unhappy with the word “cum.” …
When they opened the box, there it was: “Congrats Jacob! Summa — Laude Class of 2018.”
Jacob was “absolutely humiliated,” Koscinski said to The Post. “It was unbelievable. I ordered the special graduation edition cake. I can’t believe I’m the first one to ever write “Summa Cum Laude” on a cake.”
Nice try, Cara Koscinski. But no, you are not the first person to ever order a cake with “Summa Cum” on it. In my own experience, the first I ever saw was ordered by my cousin Phil when his wife graduated. And it said “Summa Cum Louder,” decorated with a cartoon of him with a big plastic wang shooting white frosting out of the tip. True story. My aunt and uncle were thrilled.
Anyway, it was dirty when my cousin did it and it’s dirty now. This mom might think she was putting one over on Publix, but you can’t outsmart their anti-pornography cake software. And don’t try to hide behind “cum” supposedly meaning “with” because they’re onto her little ruse. If the ancient Latins didn’t intend for a conjunction to have a dirty meaning, they wouldn’t have given it the 20th century English word for semen. It’s bad enough that society is forcing bakeries to do same sex wedding cakes. Don’t make massive chain stores have to cater to the filthy minds of academic achievers in Christian-based home school programs, too.
Finally, there might not be a better argument against home-schooling your kid than the fact an 18-year-old would feel “absolutely humiliated” over the word “cum” being edited off his cake instead of thinking it was the funniest goddamned thing that happened his senior year. Best of luck fitting in with all the other freshmen at college, Jacob.