Letter shouldn’t have been edited

In the May 18 Fence Post, a letter was edited by the Daily Herald in its online edition because of a phrase used by the Fence Post contributor that was extremely offensive to a group of people based on their religious and ethnic background. The posts of those who quoted the phrase in their comments were removed as violations of the Daily Herald’s terms of service agreement, despite only being criticisms of use of the phrase by the letter writer, not agreement with.

Despite my personal revulsion in regards to the use of that phrase and knowledge of its historical background, once published, in my view, the letter should not have been edited and the posts should not have been “TOS’ed.” Perhaps the letter writer was angry because his house was in foreclosure or he had lost his job and this letter was totally out of character. We will never know. Everyone who has graduated from high school is familiar with the phrase and the context it has often been used in historically.

If this letter writer chose to put a name to such views, knowing that neighbors, co-workers and the wider community could read them and such views could prove a poor reflection of character, then the Daily Herald should have either published them or not published them, living with whatever decision was made. How does the Daily Herald decide in the future whether to go back and edit a letter, if similar complaints are received from offended readers and/or commenters? The Daily Herald just might have opened a can of worms that was best left closed.

Dan Blackburn

Greenwood, Ind.