Love/Hate Mail
Where’s Tom?
Just wanted to know where “This Modern World” was this week. That’s the first thing I look for when I open your “silly publication.” Call me unpatriotic or anti-Fartwell (thank you Larry Flint) or what have you, but I thought last week’s cartoon was right on. As an avid reader of the Scene, I am hoping this week’s disappearance was just temporary and that the cartoon will reappear in next week’s edition. I know that emotions are running high and that certain people want to “smoke them out of their holes,” but the last thing we need is to punish a simple cartoon for expressing what I think is a rational and levelheaded opinion. I want my Tom Tomorrow!
Chris Foreman
ccforeman@home.com (Nashville)
The refrain
After picking up the newest copy of the Scene, I searched cover to cover for the new “This Modern World” strip. Has this strip been removed because of its views on recent events? If so, your magazine is no better than The Tennessean, and you have made a Rage reader out of me. I have been reading your paper for two years now, but what good is an “alternative” weekly if it censors any unpopular minority?
Matt Phelps
kickinslacks@home.com (Nashville)
A dissenting opinion
Thank you for not including the usual “comic” on your letters page in the latest issue. By the way, there’s a great article on the Internet by a writer named Tamim Ansary about the situation in Afghanistan. Did you see it? “Tom Tomorrow” obviously did.
Jeff Lyon
jrlyon311@msn.com (Nashville)
Editor’s note: “This Modern World” can be found on p. 16 in this week’s print issue.
Graceless commentary
Of all the issues that could be a priority on every American’s agenda since the tragic events of Sept. 11, I find it difficult to take seriously Grace Renshaw’s woes report (“Office Politics,” Sept. 27) of Al Gore swooping down upon tenants at the Vanderbilt Plaza Office Complex with the announcement of occupying a suite there again. Gore used space at Vanderbilt Plaza when he was running for president last November. According to Ms. Renshaw, “Those of us who work there already had experienced life with Al, more up close and personal than most desired.”
For all her investigative reporter savvy, her rage seems rather namby-pamby. There’s bound to be a clause in the tenants’ contracts for this kind of thing. Why don’t she and her cohorts take up the issue with the building’s management? Ms. Renshaw’s voice is strong; however, her written word carries no weight or merit here.
Emma J. Wisdom
EWisdom@aol.com (Nashville)
Brave words
I would like to commend Bruce Barry for being bold enough to voice a dissenting opinion on such a sensitive issue as the terrorist attacks (“Advise and Consent,” Sept. 27). While our nation obviously does need better protection against terrorism, proposed federal legislation would allow for increased covert surveillance of citizens and government access to records of our phone and Internet use, presumably for monitoring terrorism. ABC has already violated Politically Incorrect host Bill Maher’s freedom of speech. He was scheduled to speak at Vanderbilt, but the network used its contract authority to prevent him from doing so. Though his remarks on the event were offensive and unwise, he has a fundamental right to voice his opinion.
Barry is also correct that the government had a role in provoking the attack. With questionable motives, U.S. foreign policy makers and their allies have been responsible for state terror, violence, and deprivation against civilians in the Middle East and other areas. These acts of war give despicable opportunists such as bin Laden plenty of fuel for their propaganda that attempts to justify murder.
ndrew.w.moore@vanderbilt.edu (Nashville)
Anti-war metaphor
Now, stop that! Didn’t your mother ever tell you not to hit back? No, it doesn’t matter if he hit you first. You’re bigger, and someone has to be the adult here. Oh, you say he started it? Is that really true? No, I didn’t think so. It was because you are so unwilling to share, even though you have all the marbles. Didn’t your mother ever teach you how important it was to share? Oh sure, there are others who share, but they don’t have that much to share. You’re the one with all the marbles. Now, I think you should give him some. After all, it’s only fair. When will you ever grow up, for heaven’s sake? You’re more than 200 years old!
Why is it that we teach our youngest children the importance of sharing and the importance of not hitting back, and before they’re out of high school we’re teaching them it’s OK not to share and that hitting back is their patriotic duty?
Howard Switzer
2411 Elliott Ave., Nashville
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