Land of the selective free

I take exception to the statements made by Brook Dailey on what I hope was the Editorial page of the September 14, 2010 Mesa Press.

There are several factual problems with her piece, and I won’t cover them all here. Most importantly, she states that the recent controversy surrounding the construction of a mosque at Ground Zero exhibits “an all too familiar hypocrisy of our constitution.” What? The Constitution of the United States is a document and cannot be “hypocritical” – the word isn’t even being used correctly.

The fact that some people in the United States have narrow minds does not make the Constitution hypocritical.

Ms. Dailey makes other inflammatory statements that are simply not backed by facts. I am not aware of “laws supporting religious intolerance” (that would be other countries’ laws); I am aware of individuals, frankly in the minority, who are intolerant of others’ religions.

This piece was ignorant. A well thought out, fact-checked piece asking for specific changes in policy or opinion would have been welcome.

Ms. Dailey assaults “the American population” in addition to the Constitution. The majority of Americans are good people, tolerant of others, and made up of every color, religion, and ethnicity. The Constitution is the reason Ms. Dailey can voice her dubious opinions in a newspaper.

If one is going to attack the enemy, it is best to name the actual enemy — and get your facts straight.

Beth McKinley, 46
French

9/11 not recieving respect it deserves

I would like to voice a concern regarding the September 2010 issue. The topic was this year’s 9/11 anniversary and the title stated September 11 not receiving the respect it deserved.

In general, I agree with this article and its author. A well-known newspaper publishing a spread over the anniversary of 9/11 after the actual day it occurred seems like an inappropriate mistake for journalism veterans. Maybe they should’ve had the memorial as main article and posted the end of the Islamic Ramadan as a smaller article seeing as they fell on the same day this year. That way both topics would be respected.

However, it seemed to me that the article posted by the Mesa student was attacking the Islam religion, calling it radical and atrocious. Sure the events of that day were atrocious, but I don’t believe that anyone should generalize an opinion over an entire group of people solely based on the actions of a small group that associates themselves with those people.

Why should any Muslim in our school have to read such an article and feel blamed for acts of terrorism that were not directly related to them?

I could go on and on defending the Islam religion and why discrimination against them is atrocious in itself, but the foundations of America and her ideals say enough themselves.

Also, it seems that there is an article being published over the rising discrimination of the Muslim Americans in Issue 9. I’d like to know how an article that outlined the decreasing respect for 9/11 that should’ve used more delicate wording was allowed to be published without the correction of phrases that could lead to misunderstandings by people such as myself, yet the discrimination and out casting of Muslims is attacked in the next issue?

I understand how a few misplaced words can warp a message. I’m simply trying to bring this inconsistency to light and hope that later articles and issues concerning touchy subjects such as religion are handled with more delicacy.

Emily Nguyen, 18
Culinary Arts