On the carpet

What a weekend. Weekends sometimes go like this past one when readers disagree with a published opinion that is inflammatory. And goodness, was this one inflammatory.

The opinion pages, specifically Voices, ran a letter to the editor Friday that had many people up in arms. Figuratively speaking, it should be said. Some folks adamantly disagreed with the idea the letter writer had: of sending B-52s to Gaza to carpet-bomb.

We join them in their disagreement and look forward to running their letters with opposing views. As long as it’s their own opposing view. (Some of the emails we got were clearly “astroturf”—newspaperspeak for the same exact letter being sent out with only the writers’ names changed at the bottom.)

How could we? they asked. How could the newspaper run such a letter?

The best answer we can give:

There are all kinds of people in Arkansas, and not just in Arkansas, who swear up and down that the only statewide newspaper holds back on conservative letters, or maybe more-conservative-than-normal letters. That right-wing letters quietly find themselves in the garbage can because . . . . How can it be otherwise?

This is clearly a red state. But the letters to the editor tend to skew liberal. There must be some sort of conspiracy to keep pro-nationalist, anti-immigration, pro-Trump, anti-Biden, pro-gun, anti-leftist letters and columns from getting a fair hearing, right?

Wrong. It’s a simple fact: More liberal-leaning, progressive-sounding letters come in. For some reason, fewer letter-writers from the starboard side of politics give it a go. And there’s not a lot we can do about that from these offices.

(This reminds of another story about A. Lincoln, former president of the United States: Sitting in a room full of congressmen, he heard about all their complaints about one of the Civil War generals under his charge. Who would you have me replace him with? the president asked the congressmen. “Anybody!” somebody shouted from the back. “Well, anybody is good enough for you,” Mr. Lincoln replied. “But I have to have somebody.”)

When a clearly illiberal letter comes in, we’re going to run it. Even if it offends.

We are reminded of something the old folks in the newsroom used to say with regularity: Sunshine is a great disinfectant. We have no idea if they would have run the aforementioned letter—surely they would have edited it better—but we do know that they used to tell us that this kind of stuff needs to be out in the open. If allowed to fester in the dark, it can metastasize.

Let them write letters. Let them rally. Let them say the things that are on their minds. It’s a public service to let people speak. And get it out of their systems and into the record.

Because to do otherwise would be like shaking a Coke bottle and setting it down for the next unsuspecting customer to pick up—and have it explode.

NB: We disgreed with the letter, too. But that’s no reason for keeping it from being published. What a boring opinion section this would be if we only printed the stuff that we agreed with. Would you want to read such a section? We wouldn’t.

We do note that we are taking a closer look at our policies, and ask letter writers to avoid calls for violence, as well as expressions of bigotry, racism, discrimination or hate.

There’ll be those who disagree with this editorial. And will want to say so in a letter. We encourage them to submit their own thoughts.

Let’s everybody debate. It’s the American way.