Letters to the editor MUST be accompanied by your daytime and evening phone numbers for verification purposes. Letters without phone numbers cannot be considered for publication. Letters must include first and last names. Short letters have a better chance of being selected for publication. We do not publish anonymous letters.
Nobody is above
the law
I retired 15 years ago after teaching at Lincoln High School for 33 years. The current daily disruptions and violent crimes in the schools come as no surprise to me.
As in our society as a whole, there is little accountability and fewer consequences for anti-social behavior or lack of effort on the part of students. It comes down to people’s values.
You could exchange the entire faculty of a suburban school with one from a city public school with no change in performance at either place.
As for the police beating of the captured shooting suspects, I will never forget being asked by a student to settle a dispute over whether "you are allowed to kill a cop if you want to."
When I recovered from shock, I told him that it is not allowable and he replied, "Why not? He is allowed to kill you if he wants to."
Many letters to the editor seem to support that position. Applauding the right of 15 policemen to elect themselves as judge and jury to punch, kick and smash with batons three already subdued criminals seems to support the position of that misguided student.
We must remain a society of laws and offer due process and their day in court to everyone, no matter how understandably emotional the arresting officers felt.
Blaming teachers for poor student performance makes no more sense than blaming police for inner-city crime. Everyone — teachers, students and police — should accept the consequences of their actions.
Melvin Flitter
Fox Chase
Keep my tax dollars away
from the bigoted Boy Scouts
Rarely do I disagree with any editorial in the Northeast Times, but I must cry out loud when I see anyone who stands up for bigotry and inequality, which is exactly what the editorial has done last week (Let’s hear it for the Boys).
I am sure there were similar cries defending bigotry when women wanted to vote and blacks wanted civil rights.
Need I say the Black Panthers or the "KKK." However, since it is homosexuals that are being attacked, the editor feels that the Boy Scouts should be given a pass, which generally tends to be the attitude of many these days. But I think not, as bigotry is bigotry and equal rights should be for everyone.
I would like to see the reaction if the Boy Scouts wanted to exclude blacks, Jews, Irish, Italians, Asians, Catholics or some other group. Clearly and simply, that would never be tolerated. But when our leaders of Philadelphia, the birthplace of freedom, desire to not only extend protections and equal rights to homosexuals, but actually enforce it, the editor and others feel it is OK to accept that bigotry and go against equal rights. What a shame.
What I find completely odd about these attacks are the facts that homosexuals tend to be more educated than the average, earn more than the average, be more involved in the community, and a recent study stated they are more likely to be more involved in their children’s education and more involved in school.
As most are not parents, they subsidize parents who enjoy the benefits of tax dollars going to schools and child tax credits. Of course, these would be the ones that survive society’s attacks, the relentless ridicule and the being set apart as somewhat less human, less deserving of equal rights; these would be the ones that do not end their lives in suicide due to the ever-vigilant bigots and hate mongers in our society; or these would be the ones who do not succumb to depression as a result of hate.
Apparently, however, people like to adhere to the stereotype of a bunch of frolicking, promiscuous and drunken child molesters despite statistics that show homosexuals are less often child molesters than those in the general population such as teachers, coaches, priests and others who work around children and who are actually perpetrating these awful crimes.
If the Boy Scouts want to be a bunch of paranoics and KKK-like thinkers who choose bigotry disguised as child protection as they do, by all means do so. I just do not want my tax dollars going to an organization that espouses hate and bigotry.
I would suggest that the parents who choose to send their children to this bigoted organization find a way to pay for what they are teaching their kids. I would say $200,000 a year would be a fair cost for their bigotry. And by the way, editor, homosexuals are people too, just like you.
Raymond J. Dougherty Jr., Esq.
Pine Valley
There’s too much
sex on TV
I totally agree with Marcello Latessa’s letter to the editor regarding loud commercials, station logos, channels that flash what is coming next, and his views on local channels (Bothered by loud commercials, logos, May 15 edition), but I would add one more, which to me is more important than the others — it is too much sex.
Shows like Grey’s Anatomy have a very interesting story, but it spoils it for me when they just have to show two people in bed talking about their sex life.
There are still some of us who believe sex should come after marriage and should be a private affair. Even the commercials have to have some half-naked babe pushing their product.
Let’s have some good, clean television.
Claire Orr
Pennypack
Thanks, Julie
I just want to send a special thanks to Julie from Rothman Institute for helping and consoling me while I was having an MRI done.
Julie went above and beyond to make sure I was comfortable. Nice people like her are hard to find. Thanks again.
Gerry Etling
Our Lady of Ransom
students speak out
As another school year winds down, students in Lorraine Cole’s sixth-grade class at Our Lady of Ransom School in Oxford Circle are speaking out on abortion, cell phones, child abuse, gun control and other hot topics.
Here’s what’s on their minds:
Give us a break!
Knowing that people are talking about school all year round makes me sick. We kids have a right to have a vacation and live a good childhood.
Why start school all year round now? It doesn’t make any sense. How would you like to be in school every day for seven hours without any vacation?
It’s frustrating to all kids. We are always worried about having to complete projects, do homework and study. Would you like to go back to school and be there all year round until college?
There shouldn’t be school all year round because kids need their brains to be fresh, which means we need to keep having fun, socializing and schoolwork at a balanced rate.
So think about it. Would you like to be in our position?
Christopher Sanchez
Abortion is a crime
Abortion is a crime and should be made illegal. Killing innocent children is wrong and should be punished.
People criticize and punish murderers when they shoot and kill people, but people are killing others by abortion every day.
Statistics show that about 1.6 million children are aborted per year. Think about what a child might become — a future president, a world leader or an important scientist. This child will never experience his or her birthday or the first day of school.
There are so many couples that want a child but can’t have one. If you know that you can’t take care of your child, give it to someone who can, or take it to an orphanage. Wouldn’t it be nice to let these children live and also make someone else happy!
Jennifer Danella
• • •
Abortion should be considered a serious crime. Do you know how many children could have had a birthday but didn’t?
Instead of having abortions, young people who get pregnant should seriously consider having the baby and then giving the baby up for adoption to people who would care for him or her. If it was me, I would sleep better at night knowing that my baby was safe with another family, instead of always having the bad feeling that I killed my unborn child.
I bet that people don’t stop and think that their child might be the one to create a cure for measles or AIDS, or maybe make the world a better place by becoming a firefighter or police officer to stop crime in our cities every day.
Abortion takes place every day. In fact, about 1,000 babies die every day because their parents couldn’t or wouldn’t raise them. Would you like to be the baby who gets killed and never gets the chance to have friends or a family? I know I wouldn’t, and I don’t think many other people would want that fate either. One of the biggest results of abortion is that the mothers are living a life that they will regret forever.
C. Stengel
• • •
Unborn children should be born. Even if the mother is thinking of putting the baby up for adoption, the baby could be the person who found the cure for cancer or even stop the war in Iraq, you never know.
If I hear a person is getting an abortion, I have no sympathy for them. What did the baby do to deserve this? I know they are frustrated with everybody telling them what to do, because most of the time the mothers are 16 and in high school, but sometimes you have to think about why you are going through with it and that you are killing a baby.
If I killed a baby through abortion you might as well just put me in jail.
When the baby’s birthday comes, the mother would go crazy because now she knows what she did. And those abortion doctors should serve time in jail because I can’t even think of a person who would do that.
Sometimes it’s not even the girls thinking of having an abortion, it’s the parents. Maybe the girls are thinking of having the baby put up for adoption, and the parents are making the girls suffer and making the baby die of an abortion.
Megan F.
Driving and chatting
don’t mix
I think that Pennsylvania should adopt a law that would not allow people to drive while talking on a cell phone. Although many countries and other cities already have this law, Pennsylvania does not.
The biggest reason we need this law is that a driver cannot possibly give his total attention to the road, traffic signals, speed limits and other drivers while chatting on the phone.
Many studies have shown that talking on the phone while driving has been the cause of many car accidents and deaths. According to a study conducted by Harvard University, drivers talking on their phones account for 6 percent of automobile accidents each year, killing an estimated 2,600 people and injuring 330,000 others.
I think that when you get into your car, you must be responsible. If it’s really necessary to make a call in the car, pull over to make that call. A driver needs to protect himself, his passengers and others on the road by being in total control at all times.
I think banning call phones while driving could definitely save lives.
Kristen
Get tough on guns
Pennsylvania needs and must pass stricter gun laws. Guns are too easy to buy in our state and many times end up in the wrong hands — the hands of people who want to cause harm and have no respect for human life. These guns are being used for violence in the streets against police and in shootings of innocent people.
With nearly 400 murders in our city last year, including the deaths of police officer Chuck Cassidy and Sgt. Stephen Liczbinski this year, I hope that our lawmakers will see the importance and need for some tougher laws. Although laws can’t end violence completely, they would certainly help.
When Pennsylvania enforces stricter gun laws, fewer police officers will be shot, there won’t be as much violence in our streets, and there will be a lower death rate. People in our city will feel safe in their neighborhoods.
If we had stricter gun laws, cities in Pennsylvania, especially Philadelphia, would be a happier and more peaceful place to live.
Breanna G.
End child abuse
If you were a child, would you want to be beaten to death?
When an adult seriously harms a child, they should face major charges. Children are helpless and cannot defend themselves against an adult. If the criminal gets away with it the first time, they will every time. They will hurt the child until it’s too late.
I get very mad when this murderer goes to jail for a minor amount of time. They took the life of a child, so they should spend the rest of their life in prison.
A child takes its last breath and most parents don’t care because they are the ones mainly beating their children. In 2007 alone nearly 3,000 children were abused and killed by parents and relatives. Laws toward first-time child abusers should be stricter. Now think, are you going to let another child be beaten to death?
Christina G.
• • •
I am sick and tired of seeing children dying because of child abuse. Every time I watch the news there is always one story of a child dying.
Statistics show that about 3 million reports show signs of child abuse. Four children die a day from child abuse, and usually these children are under age 4.
From what I have heard, when there is a report of child abuse, the authorities just warn the parent the first time. When they come back the second time, the child is already dead. Just think of what the child is going through, not just physically, but emotionally.
This is why I think that first time child abusers should be arrested immediately. Next time just think how you would feel if your parent did not love you and hit you almost every day.
Brandon Carrido
End animal abuse
Would you want to be abused? I don’t think so.
No one should abuse poor animals like they are nothing. They should be treated the same as you would want to be treated. I know that if you were in the animal’s place, you wouldn’t want to be abused. If you were an animal being abused what would you do? Would you cry? Would you fight back? Would you keep letting them do it?
I heard that there were 800 dogs in a house without food. Now come on, who would do that? I also heard there were birds fighting and whoever won would go up against a hawk. I went to the SPCA the other day and they had the dogs and the birds. The dogs’ ribs were showing.
Would you want to be starved to death or get really sick? I want you to think about that.
Amanda Carlson
Don’t kid around
with toy safety
Many toys manufactured in China are being recalled for lead paint contamination and safety issues. Recalls are not enough for our government to do with this situation.
Innocent children can be seriously injured by defective and contaminated toys. Toys children unknowingly play with that are below standard must be removed from stores immediately so that our children will be in a safe environment.
What is the point of the government spending millions of dollars to kill people in a war that should not even be happening? The government should spend the money on a program to test children’s toys. Think of it, a world where an innocent child is not threatened with illness or injury because he or she has placed some sort of toy in his or her mouth. Also think about how a child feels to have his or her favorite toy taken away and does not know why the toy is being taken away.
Millions of children are at risk of medical problems caused by lead paint poisoning and millions more face injury due to substandard testing and manufacturing. The fact is that toys were recalled because of lead paint or hazardous parts only after someone was hurt.
Does that sound like a safe way to know if your child should have a toy?
Bria Gillard
Give us more
good news
Why do news stations spend the most air time talking about bad news instead of good news?
I don’t think they should do that because there are plenty of good things going on in the world.
How would you feel if you did something good or were at an event that is big to you and the news only showed a tiny bit of it? I hate it!
Last year at my old school when my class and I went to Al Taubenberger’s speech while he was running for mayor, there were video cameras everywhere. However, they only showed about two minutes of it.
Why does everybody focus on the bad side of things now? We’re all good people!
Joseph Galati
• • •
News stations should spend more time on good news like Our Lady of Ransom winning at the science fair and less time on violence and bad news.
I know these stations should stop airing bad news because they are just harming innocent minds. Most children imitate actions on broadcasts because they think they will get noticed. News stations should stop giving off these bad influences.
Even if they do put good news in, if you blink your eye, you miss it. The first thing we must do is ask ourselves if we really want these horrible stations poisoning innocent minds.
Nicholas Haldis
Arm the pilots
Should airline pilots be allowed to carry a weapon? I think they should.
If there is a rowdy passenger, they would be discouraged if they knew the pilot had a gun. It would also be there to protect the cockpit from being hijacked and to protect the passengers from hijackers.
If the pilots on board the flights that hit the towers on 9/11 had guns, the whole thing might have been stopped. Thousands of people could have been saved.
Phil Jamora
Stop the murders
I think we should stop the murders in Philadelphia. Our police should be more strict and protective of the people. Maybe the police are trying to do their job, but there are still people getting killed. I see it on the news all the time.
Someone is getting stabbed or shot and killed every day. The people who commit the crime sometimes get away with it. In 2007 alone, 392 people were killed in murders. This is devastating.
Put yourself in the victim’s shoes. How would you feel if you were killed unexpectedly and your family is suffering from your death?
Jeremy A. Cruz
Concern about
horses of course
Owners of the horses in Fairmount Park should have received notice before having their horses’ stables torn down.
I think it was wrong of them to tear down the stables to build a new housing facility.
Also, the horses were living in an unstable living environment. The SPCA found horse remains on the property. The smell of horse waste was in the air. The stables were an accident waiting to happen; they were extremely unstable.
I hope these horses go to a good living facility. I also hope the neighborhood kids will be able to cope with the loss.
Matteo B.
Kids gone wild
I was watching SpongeBob on television when a commercial came on about girls gone wild. It was around 10:45 at night.
I know you will say that little ones are tucked in at that time, but on the weekends kids will stay up late and watch television at that time and see that commercial.
It is wrong that kids might see that and get the wrong idea about sex and think about doing what they see on TV.
Also, the Viagra and condoms ads in kids’ science fiction magazines are very bad and should be taken out.
How would you feel if your little 6- or 7-year-old was watching TV at night or reading a science fiction magazine and saw ads or commercials on porn or condoms?
Kevin W. Oslen
Stop picking
on people
I’m tired of hearing about gun shootings in schools. It seems like once a month there’s a gun shooting, and it’s the same old reason — they got picked on.
If you think the person has a problem, you should send them to get help, because it’s not fair that some people that didn’t do anything end up getting shot and killed. And after they kill at least five or more people, they end up shooting themselves. And I don’t think it’s the person’s fault, it’s the fault of the people who pick on the person. They really must have been picked on a lot if they would just go out and shoot somebody and then kill themselves.
The schools should upgrade their security systems to maybe stop at least one or two gun shootings. If they had some video cameras, they could have stopped the bullying before it got worse. If they stopped the bullying they could have saved a lot of innocent people. And if they had better security systems, they could have found the gun and stopped the shooting before it happened.
Theresa Magauran
Share your opinion by e-mail
Click here to return to this week’s editorial . . .