Letters to the Editor
-
Deteriorating as a person
O'Reilly and others like him claim that they are trying to restore traditional culture and values. They're not. What they are doing is helping to turn otherwise normal and nice people into shrill and angry people, artifically inflated with a sense of their own rightness.
Many of us have had the "who are these people?" experience. I've read the stories here, and they are heartbreaking. In my case it was an aunt and uncle in rural Oregon. They were ordinary, nice people, orchard owners, quick to talk about the harvest, what the other relatives were doing, the latest happenings at Sunday school. Then a few months later it was Rush this, Rush that, and the conversation turned strange and boring.
But I don't entirely blame Rush, Bill, and all the others. An adult has to decide what kind of person he or she wants to be. If someone wants to be perpetually pissed-off, perpetually outraged and filled with umbrage, that's a choice that an adult can make.
And here the movie _American History X_ can give us some understanding of how to respond to adults who have made that choice. In the movie a high school principal confronts a nazi skinhead with a simple question: has anything you've done made your life better? This is the question I would ask the right-wing devotee: after the countless hours of Rush, Bill, et al, after the continual anger and outrage, after the hatred of "liberals," and all the many others you don't like, in what way has all of that made your life any better?
-
War on Christmas
I'm a liberal who listens to 'liberal' talk radio, read 'liberal' Web sites and publications and know many 'liberals.' No where do I see any call among all of us to end Christmas or make anyone stop saying 'Merry Christmas.'The only place I see the 'war on Christmas' being flogged is on Fox.
What a coincidence that Fox has so much to say on the so-called liberal war on Christmas just as one of its anchors, John Gibson, is selling his new book, 'The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought.' Mere coincidence? I think not.
-
They are NOT conservatives
I'd like to take one exception to what everyone has written here. The people who are slavishly programmed by right-wing media are NOT conservatives.
Since when does Fox News and Rush Limbaugh get to decide what conservative means and doesn't? Environmentalism, fiscal responsibility, upholding the law and constitution, and isloationist foreign policy all USED to be conservative traits. All of that and more has been tossed aside for the goal of making money for a privileged few and keeping the likes of Bush in power. That is NOT being a conservative.
If anyone manages to take down Bush and put the right-wing pundits like O'Reilly in their place, it will be with the help if not outright action of true conservatives. I just hope they wake up someday.
-
Not necessarily about the politics
An acquaintance of mine believes with absolute conviction in things like atheism and low-carb diets, and he is prone to fly into a rage when expounding these beliefs. As other letter writers have pointed out, people can become "addicted" to anger and to certainty of belief, and it doesn't really matter what the beliefs are.
-
Brainwashed?
To attribute someone's, albeit fanatical, opinions to some subtle brainwashing by Bill O'Reilly and his ilk is no way to bring about peace. You owe it, especially to people you love, to understand why they feel the way they do, whether you think it is justified or not. Dividing the world into "good" and "evil" is how we got into the political mess we are in now, and it is time we all start listening to each other.
-
It happened to us too
My husband and I are in our early 50s. We've had a nearly identical experience with his parents, who were moderate country-club Ohio Republicans until they retired and began watching the Fox channel all day. As a result of several heated political changes over the years, we barely talk to them now. We are not radical leftists, and my husband is the embodiment of his dad's Calvinist cultural values -- but as a member of the reality-based community, he rejects O'Reilly's hate speech.
The kicker for us was when my husband received a group e-mail from his dad with some political rant ... and it was cc'd to Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly.
-
Best Article EVER
This article should be on the FRONT PAGE of EVERY AMERICAN NEWSPAPER on Xmas Day !!!
-
True Conservatives
To Alan, from a few letters down:
Don't worry, Dude, we liberals know that today's "Conservatives" are nothing but. They are rightwing radicals and extremists and anarchists, but they ain't conservative.
-
The War On Christmas
I love Wil's writing. Have read his books and look forward to his blogs. And while I happen to disagree with his opinion here, I'd agree that he has every right to have it and write about it. I'm afraid I do believe in this case that the Williams had not really reformed and that, in general, we take much too long to carry out the death penalty.
To me the real war on Christmas comes from those who have chosen to require all of us to be PC. I'd prefer to all Christians to have Christ in their Christmas and Jews to have whatever they want and that goes for any other religion or belief. This is a country founded by people seeking religious freedom. Let's not forget that. Fine to disagree but don't waste time forcing me to agree with you because I've always followed the words "Unto thine own self be true" and I'm gonna stick with that.
Keep writing Wil and I'll keep reading and loving every word.
-
It's subtler than brainwashing
To those writers who have ridiculed Wil Wheaton for saying right-wing media "brainwashed" his dad:
He didn't say that, and of course, it's not that simple. Take a look at all the letters from people who say it happened to their parents too. Here's how I see it: there is a tendency among some people as they age to become negative. That's why, probably since the cave days, there's a segment of the elderly who complain that things have gone to hell in a handbasket, the young people today are rotten because ... (fill in the blank) and civilization as we know it is about to end. (Fortunately, there are many people who age gracefully and continue to learn, instead of shutting down. I hope to be among them.) The endless stream of invective from right-wing TV and radio feeds that tendency and worsens it. There is no equivalent today for liberals; if liberal TV and radio ever achieved the prominence (and crabbiness) of right-wing media, maybe we would be talking about caustic left-wing parents, but I just don't see it.