Some opinions offer interesting positions for people to think about. Some opinions offer insight into a side of an issue you hadn't considered. Some opinions offer thanks to someone for a good deed. Some opinions offer congratulations. Some opinions inform readers of upcoming events.
Some opinions just don't follow the rules.
Some opinions generate divisiveness and some generate hate.
Sometimes people use extremely poor judgment when offering an opinion. That's not a good way to get others to view your opinion with an open mind. There are other ways to express your opinion and not have others suffer for your poor, or ignorant, choice of words.
You can state your fact and cite your source. That will help others. They can verify your statements and draw their own conclusions. If you have no source, it's just your opinion.
Name-calling never works. It can immediately remove the credibility of your opinion and others will just think you're a "kook" and ridicule you.
You send a letter with a "Who do you think you are?" hubris and demand that the newspaper fall at your feet and bless your every word as if your opinion is the only one that matters. Won't happen – we serve more than just you.
You sit and count the weeks until you can submit another letter and the cycle starts all over again. Get a social media account and you won't have to wait four weeks to vent again.
Some people don't even know when they are doing more harm than good and that's frightening. It's their opinion but there is a certain level of respect and/or civility that must be used when expressing it. You don't have to like a person or their opinion, but show them the courtesy that you would want from them. If you can't do that, then what kind of a human being are you? If you want to have a back-and-forth with them, go to social media – not here.
Times are rough and tempers are short. We've been through this before and came through it. In 71 years, I have never witnessed the level of disrespect, divisiveness, lack of courtesy, and outright hatred in our local communities.
We have many more readers than just those who submit letters, and yes, we receive complaints from them about some of the Letters to the Editor we publish. I can just imagine the complaints we would receive if we didn't edit those letters for libelous statements.
Threats made to the property of the Town and Country newspaper and/or its staff will be documented and reported to law enforcement authorities. If you think your letter shouldn't have been edited or omitted, please feel free (in fact I encourage you) to send it to another newspaper publication. See if they'll print it.
Take note that not one name, particular letter, threat, or expression of hate toward any individual was mentioned in this rant. Hopefully, you get the point. Maybe you can do the same in the future.
To borrow the words from Joni Mitchell's Big Yellow Taxi: "Don't it always seems to go that you don't know what you got till it's gone. They paved paradise and put up a parking lot."