(Credits: Queen Productions)
Sun 2 November 2025 7:00, UK
‘We Are The Champions’ by Queen has become a staple of celebration in everything from sports to charity and even world peace. But a group of children at their school graduation? Absolutely no way.
This might seem a completely bizarre tale of the underdog, but it was one that eventually managed to climb all the way to the top of the tree and catch the attention of the titans themselves, who almost came down from on high to offer up the ultimate reckoning. That’s right – you may have spent decades wondering why the classic Queen hit from 1977 randomly got a re-release in 1992 for the world to relish in once more, but for that, you have a group of eighth-grade kids in New Jersey to thank.
Back in the heady days of 1992, a fresh-faced group of upcoming middle school graduates from the Catholic parochial Sacred Heart School in Clifton, New Jersey, had one simple ambition for their big day: to see out the moment by singing a rousing goddamn rendition of ‘We Are The Champions’ alongside their classmates. Sounds innocent enough, right? Well, not according to their principal, who claimed he was banning the song due to its non-secular origins.
The kids were no fools, and sensed something was afoot due to the song’s obvious road back to Freddie Mercury, who was bisexual and had tragically died only a year earlier from Aids. In this sense, no man knows the wrath like a group of hormonal 14-year-olds on a mission, because nothing is set to stand in their way of making a point. They stopped at nothing – even calling in the big guns in the form of the activism group ACT UP (Aids Coalition To Unleash Power), who caught national attention by staging a protest outside the school, which led to two arrests.Â
Not content with stopping there, though, the eighth-graders decided to take things one step further by spamming their local radio station, Z100, with a constant litany of requests for ‘We Are The Champions’. The increased airplay generated from this eventually caught the attention of Queen and their record label themselves, who responded in kind by producing a special re-release of the 15-year-old single. Victory was almost within grasp.
But the bleak powers that be – otherwise known as the school administrators – were quick to put an end to this ultimate comeback of epic proportions, by cancelling the graduation ceremony so that no celebration was had at all, let alone with the song. It might seem like a damp and depressing end to the whole story, but on the other hand, those kids, wherever they are now some 33 years on, have secured themselves a space in the legendary leagues for standing up for the right thing.
In a lot of ways, that tale is a far greater testament to the power of ‘We Are The Champions’ than simply the melody and lyrics alone. It was patently a song designed to further the cause of the voiceless and silenced, but in no better moment was that fight displayed than through the Sacred Heart School’s class of 1992. From wherever he was in the heavens above, you can be sure Freddie Mercury would have been proud.
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