Letters to the Editor
David Schlaefer
Published Letters: 36 Editor's Choice: 3
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Media Proliferation
[Read the article: Unstable starlets and little-girl voices]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Exaggerated weakness may indeed appeal to men just as saucer-eyed small children provoke our maternal and paternal instinct; but there's something else going on with the proliferation of and focus on starlet dramas in American society. In today's wired culture, there's an ever-expanding number of media outlets desparate for 24/7 content, and that demand is largely being filled with the absurd, shallow, and voyeuristic antics of Paris Hilton and company. I'm not sure that starlet obsession says as much about the deep-rooted psyche of American men or women as it does about the intersection of pop culture and modern communications.
There are so many magazines, TV and radio networks, and websites today that whatever demand exists for images and stories about vapid, slutty blondes is magnified by a factor many times greater than itself. I don't think so many people really want to read or hear about starlets and their discontents so much, but you can't avoid being bombarded with it and can't tune it out. SALON is a perfect example; hungry for new, daily content like thousands of other media outlets, SALON is publishing about starlets, and here I am posting about them. Perhaps it's not as simple as supply creating its own demand, but there's definitely an element of that involved.
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The Slate Article is Rather Absurd
[Read the article: The word "rape" banned from courtroom]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Really, both SLATE and SALON should have lawyers comment on legal proceedings--or at least their journalists should speak to someone with a legal background--before opining on such cases.
The SLATE article says that it is "not unheard of" for a judge to bar the use of inflammatory conclusory language like "rape" from testimony; that's a tremendous understatement, it's common practice. If a prosecutor began a line of questioning with the phrase, "So, when you raped Ms. Smith...," any defense attorney worth his or her salt would object, and absent prior admission or introduction by the defense, the judge would uphold. If the prosecuting attorney persists, the judge will take action similar to that in the trial in question. In a case where the issue is not IF sex occurred--consensual or not--between the accuser and defendant, but WHETHER admitted sex was consensual or not, this is to be expected.
It doesn't stop the alleged victim in any way from describing her (or his) experience in graphic terms-- "What did the defendant do to you?" "He slapped my face, tore off my clothes, called me a bitch, shoved his penis inside me while holding my throat, etc."
Not so hard, huh?
The case in question sounds incredibly difficult to adjudicate. But-- I don't know if the Duke case is becoming a strawman or not, but this "example" of patriarchal injustice definitely is.
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Euthanasia Has Two Sides
[Read the article: Death-wish granny]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Stories like this are really terrible, and it does indeed seem like there are more and more of them. My stepfather is in the US at this moment dying from pancreatic cancer, bowel cancer, stomach cancer, and a host of cardiac ailments, and yet rather than discuss palliative care options with him, etc., his doctors treat him as a human pin cushion with more chemo, more radiation, more everything to keep him alive a few more months, weeks, days; with absolutely no quality of life. He and his wife are humble people and just accept this as inevitable. It's very sad.
But posters like Adar make some good points. Euthanasia isn't just about mentally competent people choosing to end treatment or get help to commit suicide; it's also about society choosing where that line is between who should live and who should die. Euthanasia-friendly public policy inevitably broaches issues about WHO among the elderly should live and at WHAT cost-- irrespective of individual wishes. Some physicians who today push patients to fight to the end would just as surely push patients toward giving up; and how can any of us know how dreadful or precious those last months or years will be to us until we reach that point?
In countries with socialized medicine and legal or de facto pro-euthanasia policies (full disclosure, I have lived for several years now in such places), this is exactly how the issue has evolved-- the problem becomes not one of dying with dignity, but one of the elderly-ill sometimes being written off even if they wish to fight because of rationed resources and social pressure.
I'm not arguing against common sense death with dignity policies. It seems like we have more mercy for animals than for humans sometimes. But the euthanasia issue isn't as simple as might seem on the surface, and government reluctance to embrace it isn't as bizarre or unthinking as it appears.
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Have More Kids
[Read the article: In the midst of joy, I have dark thoughts]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]You're too obsessed with your only-chld son. Not good for you and potentially very bad for the poor kid in the long run. You need to have another child; at least one more. It may not quell all your fears, but it definitely gives you a different perspective and will help you lighten up a bit.