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Ignorance on parade in the Herald

By jikamens on Tue, 06/01/2010 - 8:06am

I wish I could figure out why the Boston Herald prints letters to the editor which are so mind-numbingly stupid that they leave the reader agape, his jaw dropped so far that it spills his morning coffee.

This morning's chestnut was Harry Shuris of Winchester, who derided the U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission for, um, doing its job by recalling a novelty chair decorated with lead paint. He offered the following "proof" of why this shouldn't matter:

Pencils contain "excessive amounts of lead." I would venture to say that at any given time there are more kids chewing on pencils than on basketball-shaped chairs.

Except, of course, that "lead pencils" don't actually contain any lead.

I sent the Herald a response, although God only knows if they'll print it. It may be that they don't want to soil their precious letters page by printing letters that contain nothing stupid or false.

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Comments

By datadyne007 on Tue, 06/01/2010 - 12:44pm.

The Metro does the same thing, but I have no problem with it. While I many not agree with some letters, it is their duty to print the people's ideas in the opinion section be it whether they are intelligent or completely idiotic. I don't read the opinion section for facts or news. I read the opinion section to challenge my ideals and ultimately they are either strengthened (by the opposition's idiotic responses) or shifted (by the opposition's enlightening responses).

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By jikamens on Tue, 06/01/2010 - 12:50pm.

...that it is a newspaper's duty to print letters that contain factual errors. Crazy opinions are one thing; things that are objectively, unequivocally false are another thing altogether. They should no more print a letter containing falsehoods then they should print an article or op/ed column containing falsehoods.

Furthermore, they frequently print letters that are so outrageous that a response is really required, and then fail to print any such response. And I don't for certain that it's not just that no one bothers to respond, because there have been occasions when I have been the one sending in the response to the outrageous letter so I know for a fact that they received one and yet didn't print any.

Printing a letter containing a statement that is not true, and then refusing to print a response correcting the falsehood, is just as bad as printing a news story containing an error and then failing to print a correction when it is brought to their attention.

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By Katia on Tue, 06/01/2010 - 1:00pm.

Speaking of out there letters, did anyone catch the foot fetish dude in the Metro this morning, encouraging "ladies" to not forget about taking care of their feet?

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By laurence_glavin on Tue, 06/01/2010 - 1:49pm.

Pencils may be more dangerous than you think. Is it possible that #2 pencils could spread e coli bacteria?

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By jikamens on Tue, 06/01/2010 - 1:59pm.

...if you stick them up your ass far enough.

<rimshot>

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By markk on Tue, 06/01/2010 - 2:47pm.

...if they are manufactured in China, per this article from 2007. Of course, it's not in the core but in the outer paint.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/05/business/05count...

Late last week, Canada announced it was recalling thousands of pencils made in China because of fears they were coated with too much lead.

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