Hate and hypocrisy

November 29, 2016
Sandra Duerr

Sandra Duerr

OPINION by KEITH GURNEE

San Luis Obispo Tribune Editor Sandra Duerr’s admonition against hate speech was both timely and appropriate, but it was also hypocritical.

Duerr’s article focused upon two forms of hate– racism and religious bigotry– and used examples of letters received by the paper that expressed those forms of hate. Those snippets were deeply disturbing and her calls for more tolerance and understanding in our society were spot on.

Yet, there are other forms of hatred such as political hatred and personal hatred that the Tribune seems to tolerate. That happens every other weekend when the Tribune publishes the column written by Tom Fulks.

Fulks is the merchant of hate and his biweekly fulminations such as the piece he wrote on November 20, 2016 are veritably dripping with hate.

Hate in any form begets hate. You can’t spread it in one form and decry it in another. If Duerr believes in what she says, “Don’t let hate and fear win,” she should start with her own paper.


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People have disagreed and disliked each other since the beginning of time.

What I wonder now: does our ‘civilized’ life breed more resentment, despair, anger against one another?


There’s so much happening in modern life, I think this may be true.


Absolutely correct!


There’s a local newspaper?


I for one appreciate the Tribune! The exercise I get every morning as I crawl under my truck to retrieve it is wonderful. You have to admire the ability of the delivery person to get it dead center every time!


The issue of what people say / write keeps coming up. Whether cloaked as standing against hate / hate speech or other hand wringing over what people think, something basic is missing. Stifling ideas / speech causes what is stifled to blast out in ways commonly thought inappropriate. (Perhaps labeled as hate.) The imbalance of what is acceptable or not acceptable taints free expression.


Considerable pressure has been placed on all of us to say things in a politically correct manner. That has morphed into pressure to only say “acceptable” things. When people are banned from saying certain things, those feelings / ideas don’t go away just because it is frowned upon. Our nation’s founders knew that people need / crave / have the inalienable right to speak whatever they feel, think, believe. Thus the First Amendment became a lynch pin of our Constitution. The full privileges of applying the First Amendment are and have been eroding under the pressure of politically correct speech. With the ever narrowing scope of what is acceptable to be said, people haven’t stopped thinking, feeling, believing certain things, they have simply pushed their thoughts down.


Unsaid, those thoughts take on more power and covertly or overtly find a way to be expressed in a way that may emerge as “hate”.


Our vision and ability to be accepting of other peoples thoughts becomes more and more limited the more that speech of any kind is curtailed. The simmering antipathy will force itself out. We are seeing that in the greater degrees of overt hate.


Over the years of liberals espousing / demanding that only their idea of correct speech could be uttered, those who think differently suffered. When the suppressed folks voted for a brash, outspoken candidate during this past election, that went against the assumed / preferred out come of the liberals. Those petulant liberals who want to only think and hear their own beliefs parroted back to them acted out with protests, riots and worse. Yet somehow, Ms Duerr laments “hate” from those who believe differently than she does.


A dilemma faces those who are not hateful when they are assumed to be hateful, racist, bigoted for having the nerve to express, even in the most tactful manner, ideas different than the accepted ideas. How does one find an acceptable (to those who negatively judge anyone with different ideas) means to express themselves?


I disagree with almost every word from Tom Fulks. I defend his right to his opinions. The fact that the Tribune gives him free rein to spout his vitriol, yet censors commentary from those with equally strong opinion on the other side is the travesty.


I don’t read the Tribune. Since it rarely has anything that I’m concerned with. But you hit the nail on the head. Watch out, you’re gonna get labeled “alt-right” by people.


They will never control my language, try as they might.


Reality Check, I totally agree with you statement with a side note. As long as an article in the press is “labeled” correctly I have no problem. Example: Fulk’s articles are “Opinions” and should always be labled as such. When a newspaper lists there “Recommendations” for candidates I believe they should be honest and state “as a Democrat Liberal Newspaper we are making the following Recommendations”, and an example of their bias in their recommendation is clearly stated when the recommended Adam Hill but had to make a reference to his behavior and some of his actions and then continue to support him as a candidate.


But overall, you are right. we have been silenced for the past eight years and I believe we have been woken and heard, thank gawd!


I have to admit I do hate the Trib.


Keith,


one little problem in your article–I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.


You assume I read The Tribune’s Editor Sandra Duerr’s admonition. You assume I read this every other weekend column written by Tom Fulks in the Tribune. You’re basically assuming I’ve read all this stuff from another paper and I haven’t.


It makes your article impossible to comprehend. Why would your write an article that people only understand if they read your competition’s paper regularly?


Hear! Hear!


As soon as my subscription comes up for renewal, I will be dropping my service. NOT one, not even half of one, Republican was supported by the Tribune I don’t need their advice, as I can think and figure out who I am voting for but the bias of the Tribune has gotten out of hand and I can no longer pay or support for this type of one sided journalism if that is what you want to call it. The Tribune wants to support the viewpoints of one half of the population, let them pay for this trashy fish wrap! Me, I have given them my last dime…


Make sure you call them, send it certified mail, and if you have it set up as direct debit from your bank account, call the bank and have them block ALL transactions from them.


My wife and I signed up for one of their specials one time $4.99 a month for life or something like that and then got a notice of a “fee increase” for online access. The paper usually arrived sometime after 11 AM, unbagged when raining, bagged when sunny, and called and cancelled it with them 4 times, before finally calling the bank to have their attempts to get paid blocked. Then the driver sent us a Christmas card, with a self addressed stamped envelope to send her a “tip” for doing such a great job delivering the paper.


I learned along time ago to not have direct payments made from my bank account. It takes me 10 minutes once a month to pay bills online, which gives me a change to review high bills or rate increases. No one has access to my account!


We canceled our subscription for these exact reasons after the 2014 election. Obviously nothing has changed.


Switched to the Santa Maria Times with no regrets.