This is a followup to my post "Speak Out" from several week ago. I found this at Daily Freeman Opinion. Whenever we see cartoons, articles and news like this, we need to speak out. Your voice counts. I applaud Victoria Read for speaking out. Let's call thing to be what they are - Hate is not funny.
LETTER: Editorial cartoon was hateful, insulting to transgender persons
Dear Editor,The cartoon published at the top of the April 25, 2016, Opinion page was both offensive and insensitive. You owe an apology to all of your readers, particularly members of the transgender community.
The transgender community is targeted by bigots, threatened with physical abuse (often carried out), as well as frequent verbal and emotional abuse. Transgender citizens often live in fear due to these ongoing threats to their safety. This sort of cartoon only serves to perpetuate the worst sort of stereotypes and is simply hateful.
I am quite disappointed, as I would expect better from this newspaper than this kind of insulting cartoon.
Victoria Read
West Shokan, N.Y
Good find. I agree with the comments of Ms. Read. I have been to West Shokan and have fished the Ashokan Reservoir. It is in Ulster County, NY. A large part of the culture of this rural upstate county is dominated by the University at New Paltz, one of the most liberal of liberal arts colleges you will ever encounter. Based on the lead of the college the rest of the county does tend to be overly politically correct so the cartoon would seem to be an out of character and I surmise that Ms. Read is not the only reader to call them on it.
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